With Season 3 winding down, word began to spill out about what was coming: Namely Twilight Sparkle becoming an alicorn princess and that Season 3 would supposedly be the final season. Fans were shocked and many were outraged at the very idea, the debate over whether or not Twilight should be an alicorn divided the fandom and quite a few threatened to leave the fandom all together if indeed Twilight becoming an alicorn turned out to be true. Amidst all this drama, almost no one seemed to pay

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Although she had been seen frequently throughout the season, Twilight had yet to get an episode centered around her since the premiere. Well, that was all going to change. And it was also going to be a Discord episode and a sort of sick day episode. Suffice it to say, the title for the episode was incredibly accurate because there was a lot on this episode's plate. Ed Valentine was on tap to write it, but strangely enough Meghan McCarthy was helping him. Considering Meghan had already done a

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Season 2's second half was not looking so hot after Derpgate overshadowed "The Last Roundup" and "The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000" left no question in people's minds that M. A. Larson wasn't as on top of the world as he had appeared to be earlier. Cindy Morrow, coming off her forgotten episode "Family Appreciation Day" and still riding a high from "Sisterhooves Social", cranked out this episode centered not on Applejack but on Rainbow Dash even though she'd already gotten two focus episodes

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So, after only the original "Equestria Girls", there was a really long wait for Season 4 as fans were both anticipating it and dreading it, and it all stemmed back to one thing: Alicorn Twilight. There was a very big asertik about what (if anything) would be different now that Twilight had wings and a royal title. Meghan McCarthy, the show runner once again, was tasked with trying to answer those questions in this two parter. Was she up to the task, especially after "Equestria Girls" came and

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So we had what would be a key episode and an episode continuing the plot for the Equestria Games. An episode like this should've been a top priority, but for whatever reason it was given to relative newcomer Corey Powell who had never written a focus episode for any mane six member before. And keep in mind that Corey had gone from "Sleepless in Ponyville" which was highly praised to "Just For Sidekicks" which was rather forgettable and disappointing. So Corey was definitely out of her league

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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

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Season 2 seemed to be doing well for most people up to this point, and there's no denying that with "The Return of Harmony" through "Sisterhooves Social" they were showing a desire to be more bold and explore avenues and characters that hadn't been explored before. Lauren Faust's contributing presence likely helped, since now the writers didn't have to worry as much about trying to please both Lauren and Hasbro (at least for the time being). However, this is widely regarded as the first true

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So after "Castle Mane-Ia" established a new method for delivering the aesop and also teased the prospect of a continued search for the keys, what was next for Season 4? Well, the short answer was not much. The search for the keys would not in fact take up every episode even just in the background, and in what was ultimately a sign to come the show would not commit to the possibility of a story arc. Dave Polsky was brought on to write again despite his track record in Season 3 being rather mixed

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So the writing team had been assembled and every writer had written at least one episode by now. But after ten episodes the show was all over the place, quality was impossible to pin down and the show still didn't seem to know what it wanted to do. For the last episode to air in 2010 the show decided to do an episode involving winter, or rather cleaning up after winter. Cindy Morrow returned to the writer's chair here, but all anyone ever talks about is the song of the same name? Is there a

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It looked like Season 7 had finally found what could be said to be a central theme for it with "Forever Filly" and "Parental Glideance", family. We had an episode of Rarity going through a mid-life crisis and accepting that Sweetie Belle was growing up which turned out to be better than it had any right to be. But then we had a painfully annoying episode in "Parental Glideance" that way overdid it on the embarrassing parents trope and suggested Rainbow Dash was in the wrong for being mad at her

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Season 7 finally had a hit on its hands with "Rock Solid Friendship", but there was still no clear direction for it after four episodes. What (if anything) was the overall theme? Where was this season going to take our characters? Well, this episode wasn't going to offer up much in the way of answers. What it would feature was another "achieving the dream" episode, in this case it would be Fluttershy achieving her never before mentioned dream of opening an animal sanctuary. And who was

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So it was that Twilight was now freed up from having to be Starlight's teacher, which meant her character could hopefully get back on track after Season 6 seemed to exaggerate her flaws more than was necessary. And for the sake of fanservice, this first episode to focus on her as an individual in over a season would involve a concept so many fanfics had been written about: Twilight foalsitting her niece, Flurry Heart. However, much like "Castle, Sweet Castle" we had two new writers making their

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And so we come to the finale of Season 7, the salvaged plans for the pillars after Hasbro insisted on ending the show at nine seasons and just over 220 episodes. By now, Josh Haber had taken back the reigns of story editor completely from Lewis and Songco, beginning with "Secrets and Pies". The IDW comics had been promoting the plans for quite a while now via their Legends of Magic comics, and Nicole Dubac was being brought on to help write this two parter with Josh Haber (Haber retained solo

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Because a Christmas episode in May is totally not out of place or anything like that. Yes, I know the episodes are not set in any particular order, but seriously why is that we only got one Christmas themed episode that aired in time for Christmas and the rest all aired far in advance? Well anyway, Season 6 really needed something to get it back on the right track after "Newbie Dash" bombed and even "No Second Prances" was hotly contested, almost like the opposite of the one two punch

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Fun fact about this episode, because it got bumped around in production order it ended up airing a day after the big 2017 movie premiered in theaters. Coincidentally, this meant we got to see an interesting comparison of Twilight's character because of this episode. Her last two focus episodes had involved "A Flurry of Emotions" and "A Health of Information", largely seeming to pair her up with others even though she was now freed from being Starlight's teacher. A new writer in the form of

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By now, Season 7 was having its episodes aired early on Treehouse T.V. in Canada, so spoilers were a plenty in this season. Meanwhile, in what seemed to be a common trend for the season, it would go from something good or even great to something equally bad as we went straight from "Hard to Say Anything" to "Honest Apple" and one of the worst OOC performances Applejack ever had. To get things back on track, Lewis and Songco were writing this episode which was to be the very first royal sisters

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So, after Season 2 had its first true dud in the form of "The Cutie Pox" what was next? Apparently this, an episode about Rainbow Dash wanting a pet, which is something fanfic writers had already explored (not much but it was there). And who did they pick to write the episode? Charlotte Fullerton, whose track record consisted of "Look Before You Sleep", "Suited For Success" and "A Bird in the Hoof" in that order. Not exactly a record of high quality, but then again maybe she could turn in

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With Season 4 half over it looked like things were on a roll, nothing could possibly stop it. This episode was heavily touted ahead of time for what it was, a return appearance by Flutterguy. And it was written by Amy Keating Rogers, the very same Amy who had rose to new heights with "Pinkie Pride". But by the time the dust settled on this episode, controversy would rear its ugly head once again with Amy at the center of it. Has that controversy overshadowed the episode? And if so does that

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If you thought my opinions on "The Return of Harmony" and "Luna Eclipsed" were unpopular, just wait until you see my opinion on this two parter. So many people still hold it in high regard, I daresay there's not a two parter more popular than it or more highly praised than it (the only one that comes close is "Shadow Play"). Happening to coincide with the MLP franchise's 30th anniversary, many still say this is where the show reached it peak and where it should've stopped. And this is despite

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With the Cutie Mark Crusaders having started to mature in Season 4 and move away from obsessing over their cutie marks, Season 5 looked as if it were going to revisit that. Josh Haber was picked to write this episode, but his most recent writing endevor at the time had been the utterly bland "Leap of Faith" which had starred Applejack. So, was Haber more comfortable working with Apple Bloom, or did he only end up proving that Apple family characters were not his forte for interesting stories?

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