My Review of MLP:FIM season 8 episode 7 Horse Play · 7:58pm Aug 5th, 2023
Grading Scale:
A (fantastic episode)
A- (an excellent episode with at least one flaw)
B+ (a great episode with a couple of flaws)
B (a good episode which still could have been better)
B- (a good episode with numerous flaws but still rewatchable)
C+ (a decent episode)
C (eh... it’s not terrible but not good either)
C- (it’s not worth rewatching although it does have good elements)
D+ (a bad episode with a few good things in it)
D (a really bad episode with wasted potential)
D- (a terrible episode with badly written characters and butchered moral)
F (horrible and unwatchable)
Greetings, everyone! This is Mr. J back with another MLP episode review for today! This afternoon, I will be reviewing the seventh episode of MLP season 8 entitled "Horse Play". As I re-watched this episode earlier, I can tell this was a daring episode to make on the writers' part; it gave some strong important points in regards to trust, honesty, and authenticity. Plus, they weren't afraid to give extra layers to Celestia's personality--thus, making her a three-dimensional character in the process. Aside from Twilight being an annoying pain in the ass, this was a near-perfect episode.
The episode begins with Twilight and Spike informing Princess Celestia of the 1,111th anniversary of her first raising of the sun, and they are planning to make an actual play based on it. Hearing this, Celestia is genuinely thrilled of the idea...and she happily prances around the throne room. This catches Twilight and Spike by surprise as they've never seen her this excited before. Ha, who knew she had this in her? Admittedly, it was kinda cute seeing her prance like that.
She tells them she used to love watching plays and theaters as a filly and always embraced the significant impact of those plays. This inspires Twilight to instantly invite Celestia to become a leading actress in their play, surprising both Celestia and Spike.
Celestia hesitates at first because she has zero acting experience. Wow, that's very humble of you, Celestia! I admire your honesty! Because it would be certainly stupid and unwise to take on a responsibility you aren't qualified for, right? Without experience, it would be impossible. I do hope Celestia doesn't make that same mistake in rashly handing over the kingdom to Twilight in season 9--OH WAIT!
Anyway, Twilight convinces her she's just playing herself which would seemingly make it less difficult. Despite certain doubts, Celestia accepts it and joins them for the rehearsal. Oh, funny thought, isn't it ironic that Nicole Oliver, a great talented voice actress, said the "no acting experience" line? I can imagine how hard it was for her to not, at the very least, chuckle at that line in the recording booth.
So we go through some comedic shenanigans with the Mane Five and Starlight, and now we jump to Celestia trying very hard to deliver her line on stage. Twilight tries to make her do better but failing miserably. Not gonna lie, it was really hard to sit through that part...seeing the princess of Equastria struggle in being a good actress. Nonetheless, it was a great idea to show this 'cause not even all-powerful alicorns are perfect in everything.
Twilight has Celestia take acting lessons, and there, she doesn't do any better. Applejack constantly advises Twilight to tell Celestia the truth about her being a terrible actress, but Twilight refuses as she didn't want to hurt her feelings. They thought about cancelling the play before anyone could ever hear about it and Celestia's upcoming role, but Rainbow Dash already told everyone about it.
So here we have another example of someone who is afraid of telling someone the brutal truth because of obvious reasons. As the episode later teaches, honesty is a crucial component of friendship and every other relationship. Even if it hurts, it's important to always be honest with someone when it comes to anything that happens in life. Surely, Twilight sticks to that lesson and becomes a better person in later episodes and in season 9, right? RIGHT??
It's now nighttime, everypony is assembled, and the play should start any minute now! But uh oh, disaster occurs and it drives Twilight over the edge. Then she finally vents her frustration about Celestia's bad acting, not realizing she was right behind the curtain and heard everything. Upset that she's been lying to her the whole time, Celestia flies off.
Twilight apologizes for her dishonesty and tells her that because Celestia has done so much for her, she wanted to do something for her as gratitude. Celestia reminds her of the importance of honesty between friends which is something Applejack always reminds everyone about. So they have a heart-to-heart, blah, blah, blah, Celestia creates a plan to save the play, all that good stuff.
Everything is done as planned with some improvising here and there. Everypony is happy and pleased (except Luna apparently) with the performance, and the day is saved. So overall, I did enjoy this episode for its unique storyline, character development, and a great moral to live by. But once again, Applejack is ignored because God forbid we solve our problems with truth, sincerity, and honesty the moment unfortunate circumstances arise. If these characters just simply listen to Applejack and stop brushing her off because it's "inconvenient" or whatever, then these episodes would be over in less than 10 minutes. But anyway, I will give this an A-.
Peace!
I agree with you on all these points. This was another episode from Season 8 I remembered enjoying, particularly because of its humor, faithful character portrayals, and its well-executed moral.
My favorite scene in the episode was this part: