Normally, I'm super sensitive to bullying, but I don't see the Wonderbolts as bullying Dash in this episode due to the fact that they all got insulting nicknames. It was more of a way to keep the team humble. If ONLY Dash got a name like that, it'd be bullying, but they all did so to me it's more a mark of acceptance.

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I'm of two minds about this whole thing with Newbie Dash. On the one hand, I feel it was an absurdly ambitious notion - too ambitious for the show itself - to try and comment on something that could be read as hazing or military culture. On the other hand, I also feel that the backlash to the episode was WAY overblown, because the Wonderbolts had literally NO idea that Dash had prior bad experience with insulting nicknames and the moniker "Crash". So, yeah. That's where I am at any rate.

7324628
True, but they still were kinda jackasses about it in my opinion. Especially since they didn't immediately explain that all of them had embarrassing nicknames, making Dashie feel miserable and out of place for like, a week.

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They might've assumed she already knew.

7324628 Hazing is pretty shit and toxic in general, which is what this is often compared to. Demeaning nicknames is pretty effin' tame as far as it goes though so frankly I don't really give a shit, but hey, it's true that hazing is shit and that, whilst tame, this was hazing, so I'm open to the criticism.

In this instance though we should note that this was only a problem because by sheer ungodly coincidence it was the exact same nickname that actual bullies gave Dash when she was younger. Not to mention knowing Dash was bullied (which goes all the way back to S1 Sonic Rainboom btw) re-contextualises a lot of her braggart behaviour in general.

I think the Wonderbolts are a bit toxic, but hey, we knew that already and frankly I think that's something interesting about them. Dark side of Rainbow's whole idealistic fangirl imagined version of them and all; her learning to deal with that (and improve the Wonderbolts as a result) is a really cool concept. What I don't blame them for is not knowing the connotation for that specific nickname and how it affected Dash more than any other nickname would have.

Everything else? Fair game, really.

I just think that this episode could’ve had a way more interesting conflict and just name-calling.

There is a myriad of other things that Rainbow could have taken on, like learning how to fly as part of the unit, or learning about having to balance her time between family, friends, and her job.

I’m just throwing things at the wall here, I’m sure there’s a lot of other interesting ideas out there. That being said, I’m glad this episode even happened. It’s awesome to know that Rainbow was able to achieve her dream by overcoming all those obstacles, and growing as a person along the way.

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High school soccer team. I had a habit of booting the ball vaguely down field instead of passing to teammates (which, time and place. Sometimes it's needed, other times just a pass works fine). So they called be Bootsmith. I got better, but the name stuck. So I just owned that shit. It's on the back of one of my team shirts. It's the name of my pegasus OC.

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I wonder if Rainbow Dash being tempted by the "Shadowbolts" in the original two-parter that started off the show was at all foreshadowing that there might be a shadier side to the Wonderbolts?

--Sweetie Belle

7325091 Ooooh, now that is interesting.

one one hand, i feel the episode sort of mistakenling implies hazzing is okay. Another hand is that she never tell them why Crash bugs her so much.
"We all got embarrassing code names"
that doesn't help anything.

ON another note , it was accurate of Dash to try and stand out and be awesome instead of just being part of the team at first. it what all newbies want to do really. or at least, that' what I've been told. Rainobw impersiantions were still cringe