Episode Re-Review: Pinkie Pride · 6:46pm Apr 3rd, 2021
By now Season 4 was starting to show signs of running out of steam. "Pinkie Apple Pie" was good but a noticeably low key episode, "Rainbow Falls" was a disaster riddled with plot holes and decisions lacking explanation and "Three's A Crowd" seemed to cram three different episodes into one overcrowded mess. Even "Rarity Takes Manehattan" and "Bats!" were only being talked about for one thing, and how much you loved or hated the episodes seemed to depend on that (Coco Pommel for the former and Flutterbat for the latter). So Season 4 really needed something to get everything back on track, and that something was the first heavily touted guest star: Weird Al Yankovic the famous parody musician. Considering that most recent celebrity exposures in Western media were only ever for marketing purposes, an episode with a well known celebrity carried with it a lot of stakes. Fortunately, this episode was the long awaited return of Amy Keating Rogers, though supervising director Jayson Thiesen is credited with writing the story. Given that Cheese Sandwich proved popular enough to come back and it would seem open the doors for Weird Al to become a more prolific voice actor, this episode should be good right? Well, let's find out.
The episode begins in Appleloosa at sundown (there's a lot of old timey Western tropes associated with this episode) as we see ponies and even the buffalo tribe all celebrating at I guess some kind of hoedown (coincidentally, this episode aired close to Chinese New Year). A lone stallion with a hat and a poncho is observing the whole thing and then departs, identifying himself as Cheese Sandwich. Then his whole body starts shaking (his cutie mark even moves like an accordion), causing him to conclude that he should go to Ponyville. Then we cut to Ponyville as we see that this episode is going to be a musical, though unlike "Magical Mystery Cure" it wisely doesn't open up directly on one. The first song of the bunch is "Pinkie Pie the Party Planner", which much like "Morning in Ponyville" seems to be channeling "Belle" from Disney's Beauty and the Beast.
It's a good song, but in terms of story the only thing we really learn is that Pinkie Pie's planning a party and that everypony in town regards her parties with high praise. Among the things she's planned in the past included Mr. and Mrs. Cake's foal shower, and Diamond Tiara's cutecenera (she says that her dad made her and that she demanded the best). This song is also used for Pinkie to gather up supplies, including a banner and paints and a paintbrush. Then everypony gathers in front of Sugarcube Corner to see Pinkie putting up a banner she painted herself. It turns out to be for Rainbow Dash's birthday, and Pinkie takes her job as party planner very seriously.
Suddenly, from a nearby alley a mysterious stranger appears with a party blower in his mouth. He quickly reveals himself to be Cheese Sandwich and mentions his "Cheesie Sense" which told him about the party. He also reveals that he apparently sensed Pinkie's "Pinkie Sense" but Pinkie Pie never detected his "Cheesie Sense", kind of like how Venom is able to avoid being detected by Spider Man's "Spidey Sense".
Cheese identifies himself as a party pony too and Pinkie Pie is excited at the prospect of a team-up. All Rainbow Dash cares about though is making the party epic, because she reveals that her birthday also happens to be the anniversary of when she moved to Ponyville, making it a "Birthaversary" according to Rarity. When presented with the task of meeting Rainbow's high expectations, Pinkie seems confident she can manage and Cheese declares that he can too. He then throws off his cowboy attire as we get "The Super Duper Party Pony" which includes a few nods to Weird Al's works all the while Cheese Sandwich basically declares that he can bring things to the table that Pinkie Pie can't.
This apparently wins everypony over to Cheese as they all up and abandon Pinkie during the song. This includes not just her friends but even the Cakes, the ones who know Pinkie the most and are like a second family to her. Their defections should carry more weight, especially since the song ends with Pinkie calling out to the crowd and asking if they've already forgotten about her. Afterwards, Rainbow Dash is thrilled to have Cheese take over as party planner and hoster and even Applejack and Twilight mention how they're glad to have him in Ponyville. I know they're probably just trying to be hospitable but the fact that even they don't think about Pinkie Pie is kind of cold. Rainbow is the only one to acknowledge this, basically adopting a mentality along the lines of "go big or go home" though not without telling Pinkie "no offense" and Pinkie replying with "none taken" even while she licks her tears away. She then goes back to Sugarcube Corner alone while everypony else observes what Cheese can do at the park. Twilight is the only one to go back to see Pinkie and ask her if she wants to help Cheese with planning. But Pinkie fakes a smile while pretending to water the flowers and does her best to not look jealous.
After Twilight leaves Pinkie Pie goes off to sulk, wondering to herself if maybe she isn't meant to be a party pony after all. This leads into the song "Pinkie's Lament" which is, in my opinion, the best song of the whole bunch. Pinkie sings her heart out about how all her life she's wanted to bring her friends joy, but now she's thinking that maybe she was wrong despite having gotten her cutie mark after throwing a party.
Then we see Pinkie Pie trying to do various things like nurse, mail pony and even construction worker. And the lyrics accompanying this make it sound like Pinkie's forcing herself to try and work through the pain, she isn't giving herself time to grieve. But eventually she's forced to go home, putting away her party cannon and deflating her balloons. It isn't until she by chance sees a photo of her first ever party that she starts to turn it all around. Looking at the various photos (including Twilight's "Welcome to Ponyville" party, Gummy's birthday party and the wedding reception for Shining Armor and Cadence), Pinkie becomes inspired to get back out there and give it one last try. This song really sums up Pinkie the best, she desires to bring joy and happiness to others. Not out of a selfish desire but purely because she wants them to be happy (you could argue it's also so they won't feel sad and lonely like she does). It all ends with her donning a new party outfit and heading out to reclaim her title.
What Pinkie has in mind is a challenge, a goof off. Cheese Sandwich accepts as Pinkie decides to raise the stakes a little. The winner gets to throw Rainbow Dash's birthaversary party while the loser doesn't (and I assume skips town). Pinkie gets in a good taunt about Cheese being "Boneless" in reference to his rubber chicken friend (and Cheese gets a good joke in reply about being called "Boneless" before talking to Boneless) before proposing to have the goof off take place at high noon.
However, Twilight points out that it's long after that, so Pinkie settles for "3:10 to goof off" and the two party ponies meet in the center of town for the show down.
Unlike the magic duel from last season though, the goof off actually has its own rules (including a rule book). Though the condition is that the contestants have to impress a judge, and the judge decides who will win. Rainbow Dash is made the judge since the winner gets to throw her birthaversary, and surprisingly she's not okay with such a competition even though she's the most competitive of all her friends.
The goof off in and of itself is a song, and it's one where Andrea Libman is singing as Pinkie Pie instead of Shannon Chan-Kent. Considering how many songs are in this episode I think it's easy to see why, Shannon must've been exhausted with how much she had to do. And of course, Weird Al once again shows off his talents here, even doing one of his famous polka parodies to the tune of "The Smile Song" before Pinkie Pie points out how that's her song. There's also a bit of live action stuff with Boneless and Gummy (don't ask me where they got that stock footage of a baby alligator). And both Pinkie Pie and Cheese Sandwich repeatedly try to outdo each other.
At the very end of the song Pinkie actually sings in Spanish, and the lyrics are roughly about not losing faith. But the song ends once Rainbow Dash gets trapped under a giant float and has to pull herself out. This triggers a rainbow realization in Pinkie (the streamers that fall are each in the color of one of her friends) as she calls off the goof off and forefits, making Cheese Sandwich the winner. Pinkie Pie then prepares to leave town, either of her own accord or because that was an unwritten rule of the goof off. It's now that her friends apologize for "getting swept away", though Pinkie Pie apologizes for not being the bigger pony and letting Cheese Sandwich plan the party. Rainbow then points out that Cheese isn't replacing Pinkie, he's just a "guest" party pony. Cheese Sandwich then shows up to apologize as well, indicating that he didn't want to replace Pinkie in Ponyville he just wanted to impress her. Why did he want to impress her so badly, you ask? Well, during the song "Cheese Confesses" we find out why. Cheese actually lied about his cutie mark story earlier, in truth he was a shy little colt from Manehattan (and he wore glasses like Weird Al used to wear before he had laser surgery) who nopony knew. In fact, he left Manehattan and then one afternoon he happened to arrive in Ponyville in the middle of a party. Oddly enough, we see Cheerilee as a blank flank filly alongside Lyra and Bon Bon (who has Twist's glasses but recolored) as well as Minuette (who has braces) but Berry Punch seems to be an adult. But it was this party that inspired Cheese to change his life and become a party pony, traveling all over Equestria.
So how does Pinkie Pie factor into all of this? Well, it turns out that she was the one who threw that fateful party in the first place. And she also unknowingly gave Boneless to Cheese (due to tossing one while she was juggling rubber chickens on a ball). It's easy to see how this could turn into a "Love at first sight" kind of story, especially considering Pinkie and Cheese would ultimately end up together.
Of course, Rainbow Dash has to be a buzz kill and break up the mood. But Pinkie and Cheese are now happy to work together during a reprise of "Pinkie Pie the Party Planner". Then, as night falls and the birthaversary party gets under way, we have one last song in the form of "Make a Wish" which may be most noticeable for Shannon Chan-Kent being autotuned (likely because she needed to rest her vocal chords) and for Rarity appearing as an alicorn due to an animation error (though it is kind of hard to see if you don't zoom in on the image). Rainbow takes a break from the various party games to congratulate Cheese on his work with Pinkie, then Cheese opts to give Pinkie something to remember his visit. Interestingly, although we see Pinkie Pie writing in the friendship journal we never learn what it is that she wrote which I believe is one of only two times all season this will happen. As for the gift, it's Boneless which actually gives off the rainbow glow when presented to Pinkie Pie even though other key objects gave off the glow when no one was looking. Cheese mentions that he has other rubber chickens, which are just ones with painted numbers. But Boneless was technically Pinkie's to begin with and Cheese just "borrowed" it. He then trots off into the sunset as we get an attempted joke about the trope of the unnamed man with a troubled past who rides into a town to save the day. Except the joke doesn't quite work given that Pinkie has spent the whole episode interacting with the "mystery" pony, unless she's intending it as a remark about how different he acts in his cowpony attire.
And that's the story, so what do I think of the episode? Well, even though this episode is also a noticeable first draft in a lot of places, it does so much right that I just can't help but love it! Weird Al Yankovic as Cheese Sandwich absolutely rocked it, he didn't just play the character he became the character! It's a role that couldn't have worked if not for Weird Al. It's the perfect kind of celebrity role, there are nods to Weird Al and his works but it's never so obvious or distracting that it kills the immersion. And neither is he front and center the whole time. Pinkie Pie is great too. She's written so well that even when she's in the wrong you're rooting for her, and not because the one in the right is written badly. It really speaks volumes about her character, her strengths, her desires and even her own insecurities. The songs are top notch with "Pinkie's Lament" remaining my all time favorite song of the entire show for all that it did. Supposedly, Daniel Ingram was a former bandmate of Weird Al's, which might explain why he was able to crank out so many wonderful songs and incorporate Weird Al's signature musical style. Of the musical episodes of the show, this one is probably the best paced and I would say is rivaled only by "Magical Mystery Cure" for overall quality of songs (only "Behold, Princess Twilight" was a true dud). Of course, the episode is not entirely without fault. Everypony singing Pinkie's praises one minute and then abandoning her for a newcomer who claims he can do better is rather abrupt. I feel like they could've done more to signify Pinkie being in the wrong, play up her jealousy and her fear of being replaced which leads to her acting a bit more hostile and insecure at the idea of working with anyone else. The title does have "Pride" in it after all, and it feels like Pinkie only truly gets into the "Pride" aspect after she's upstaged, knocked down and left to question her entire life's purpose. Still, although it is a rather noticeable flaw that could've been corrected, it's not enough to hinder this episode. It easily earns an A+.
So with Season 4 now back on track, the first half was ready to come to a close with "Simple Ways" in which it was said they broke Tabitha St. Germain (or came close anyway). And given what's been made known about Tabitha's performance as Rarity, that seems hard to do.
This is definitely the best episode of the first four seasons, and still one of the best overall (though it's not in my outright top ten anymore).
An episode I find slightly overrated, but I still love a lot.
5489569 Overrated?
5489582
Well you did mention some of the flaws it had. Plus, I think, similarly to John De Lancie being Discord, Weird Al's appearance makes a lot of people unabashedly praise this episode. Weird Al is great, but he doesn't make the episode instantly one of the best.
5489583 True that. Weird Al is not the only thing that was great about this episode, his presence was just a nice bonus.
Has to say, this one of the best Pinkie Pie Episode and one of the best episodes in the first four seasons. And I love Cheese, don't know why but I love him
This is easily Pinkie's best outing of the season, if not one of her best in the entire series. Unfortunately, this would end up biting Amy Keating Rogers in the flank given how she writes Pinkie in her very next episode.
5489583
If it makes you feel any better, Finn the Pony mentioned in his review of The Last Laugh that he personally thinks this episode is overrated as well.
5489679
Yeah I watched that review. I don't think it's as overrated as he thinks it is, but it's still nice to have a (somewhat) kindred spirit.