Slowly walking away

Approaching from multiple angle, as a fan and a creative writer to name two, as I watch more and more of season 7, I find more and more reasons to be disgusted with what MLP: FiM is slowly becoming. I started noticing these issues in season 5, when a couple of the lessons learned where repeats from earlier episodes. As season 6 came and went, I noticed that this was becoming more and more of a problem, which made it seem that the creators might be running out of ideas. And then I began to notice other things in season 6 and on into season 7.

I noticed, though it wasn't so bad, there was lack of proper character development, with some characters taking a step forward, but two steps backward. A problem carried on into season 7 (cough Spike). And it branched out into the treatment of characters, where, among other problems, it seems like the main six are slowly being shoved to the side or just made to look ridiculous, an issue becoming more prevalent in season 7. One way this can be seen is the introduction of a new character, Starlight Glimmer.

Introduced as a villain, she was eventually reformed and taken on as Twilight's pupil. At first, the concept was interesting, but then it became annoying, as the show seemed to shift to making Starlight the star and those other six being featured. And don't get me wrong. I don't hate Starlight. I just think she has become a guest who has overstayed their welcome and is a character who needs to move on, but has become stuck in a development rut.

Truthfully, I cannot understand why people comment that season 7 is the best season. Of the twenty or so episodes I've seen, only three are truly memorable and feel like they live up to what made MLP: FiM great to begin with. This season has a number of flaws, besides poor treatment of character, lack of proper character development. Along with those, I also see it more and more where the story is questionable, with the majority of season 7 more like one of those filler seasons in anime where the people in charge either ran out of ideas, they are waiting for the creators of the manga to catch up or any number of things.

This wouldn't be so bad, if a lot of what is shown in the individual episodes didn't make me sit back and think What the hell did I just watch?! These episodes seem to forget a couple formulas laid out since season one (one being a problem arises, the answer often comes somewhere at the beginning of the episode, but everyone is too busy to notice, so they go running about trying everything else to solve the issue before trying what was suggested at the start, or near the start, of the episode). And if there is a problem, it is often Starlight who solves it, whilst the main six are captured under questionable circumstances or shoved to the side, or there really is no resolve and they all just have a laugh or something else happens that cues the end credits. Then there is, so far, at least one episode that seem to be nothing more then a way to flip-off the fan base, almost as if Hasbro and DHX (or whomever) is saying, "We know it was you that helped make the show popular. Now go away and let us target the proper key demography. And from there, the problems seem to keep mounting, with no real end in sight.

In the long run, for me, MLP: FiM is becoming just another cartoon: five minutes of story, 18 to twenty minutes of filler garbage. I'll give the movie a fair shot, as work on it was started back in 2014 or so and what I've seen in one trailer, one music video, read online and in a comic book looks actually interesting. And I give season 8 a fair chance. But if neither lives up to what I grew to love about this animation (I'm looking at season 8 primarily), I am moving on. I'll try to finish the stories I have posted, but cannot promise anything.