Episode Re-Review: Between Dark and Dawn · 4:48pm September 7th
Season 9 at last found some consistent quality near the end of its first half. Ironically, it was a Starlight Glimmer focus episode that first brought things back to a good level of quality, as "Student Counsel" showcased how far Starlight had come as a character. Then there was "The Last Crusade", which finally showcased Scootaloo's family and home situation, though it was not without controversy and not just because of her aunts. Still, for the first time all season, Season 9 had back to back successes. And now, closing out the first half of the last season, a brand new writer was coming onboard in the form of Gail Simone, who had previously written for two vastly different DC animated superhero shows: Justice League Unlimited (the swan song of the DC animated universe), and Batman: The Brave and The Bold (a tribute to the campy silver age of DC comics). Seems kind of odd to be debuting a new writer so close to the end, and this would not be the last time Season 9 would do such a thing. As for this episode, it tends to be overshadowed by many of the high notes of Season 9's first half, and the controversies of Season 9's second half (especially the last three episodes). So does that mean it's a hidden gem, a forgettable disaster, or something in between? Well, let's find out.
The episode begins with the mane six (and Spike) battling a creature called a tortosie snap at Sweet Apple Acres. It's basically a giant tortosie with trees on its back. The most obvious inspiration is Tortetta from Pokemon, but Tortetta itself is based on Chinese and Japanese mythology about giant turtles/tortoises who carried entire continents on their backs. Plus, this tortoise snap wants to snack on Applejack's trees, and in the process Spike ends up being grabbed by its tongue.
Twilight begins delegating authority to her friends and making a plan to save Spike, and it seems to be going well. But then, right as Twilight is ready to wrap things up and teleport the tortoise snap away, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna show up uninvited and resolve the problem themselves. And the mane six are not too happy about this.
We're then treated to a brief montage of sorts of Celestia and Luna intervening completely unprompted to help the mane six around Ponyville, even when they insist they don't need help. So the mane six and Spike (but not Starlight) gather at Twilight's castle to complain about the royal sisters helping out even when they don't need to. As it turns out, their experience from "The Beginning of the End" has made them overeager to get involved. Twilight, however, insists that the two should go on vacation and spend time doing what they've always wanted to do. And she convinces Celestia and Luna that she and her friends can keep things under control in Canterlot, giving them practice for when Celestia and Luna step down for good. Kind of weird how just two episodes prior, you had the mane six and Spike in Canterlot for a "Spring Solstice" celebration whilst Starlight was in Ponyville overseeing the School of Friendship, and now we have this episode where the mane six and Spike go to Canterlot and Starlight is nowhere to be seen. Like when "Twilight's Kingdom" opened up with Twilight and friends being called to the Crystal Empire even though the previous episode had taken place there, it's probably just unfortunate ordering of the episodes since this and "Student Counsel" were likely not worked on together. But it's a shame that they couldn't have combined or intertwined the two to make it another "Made in Manehattan"/"Brotherhooves Social".
So Princess Celestia and Princess Luna go to prepare for their sister roadtrip, though there is a hint of trouble when they can't fully agree on what to do. Luna wants to just relax, saying that because she spends so much time in "intense dreams" that she doesn't want more excitement. But Celestia says that because of how boring her everyday life is dealing with meetings and decrees, she wants to do high intensity thrill seeking activities. It's too bad she doesn't think to call up Twilight Velvet, who we know is also a thrill seeker.
Fortunately, the two sisters insist they'll compromise and take turns. They then give Twilight a special amulet that contains some of their magic, allowing her to raise and lower the sun and the moon on her own. However, as they leave they inform Twilight that she and her friends will have to deal with a "Royal Swanifying". Twilight insists that despite the long scroll detailing what the swanifying is, she and her friends can handle it. And this prompts her to dismiss Fancy Pants and his entourge when they come trotting in, offering their services. They are surprised to learn about Celestia and Luna leaving unannounced, but still seem to be in good spirits about it until Twilight shuns them and shoes them away. Why does she do it? Because she claims that if she and her friends have to accept help from anyone else, they'll be admitting they can't actually manage the responsibilities of ruling Equestria. Nevermind the fact that Twilight has delegated authority to others multiple times without incident, and twice was shunned by her friends for wanting to help when they were clearly in over their heads. To say nothing of all the times she was happy to rely on or encourage others. After all, wasn't the whole point of "What About Discord?" that Twilight had to learn that even she wasn't always perfect and should admit to that?
This is something that Rainbow Dash or Applejack would do, dismiss help as soon as it's offered and without bothering to see whether they could handle the responsibilities on their own first. Granted, Twilight does sort of get called out for this when Spike reads off everything they'll have to do as part of the swanifying, and her friends all glare at her, prompting her to give off a nervous laugh.
Meanwhile, we cut to Celestia and Luna as they prepare to set off on their roadtrip, and that leads into the song "Lotta Little Things to Try". It's a fantastic song, and it helps that Aloma Steele is much better as Princess Luna's singing double this time around compared to her debut in "Luna's Future". I'm not sure what changed, maybe she just got better direction, but she sounds nowhere near as distracting.
By the time the song ends, however, Celestia is already overruling her sister and dragging her into exciting activities that she (Luna) wants no part of. And as we go back and forth on this plot, we also continue to occasionally check in on Twilight's plot. As it turns out, not only is the royal swanifying taking place, but there's also a sanitation workers strike going on that's causing garbage to pile up in the streets. Fancy Pants is the one to bring this to the mane six's attention, and he repeatedly hounds them for doing a poor job. It begs the question of whether Princess Celestia and Princess Luna knew about these problems ahead of time and neglected to inform the mane six, or if the princesses themselves were unaware of them. It's never made clear which is the case. I think we're to give the princesses the benefit of the doubt, but them hoofing the reigns over to Twilight, Spike, and the others without letting them know what they were getting into doesn't exactly make them look good.
Fancy Pants kind of come across the same way, but keep in mind that his offer to help was rejected and he was being very curteous about it. He comes across as kind of a case of "Jerkass has a point", because he likely would be far less harsh on the mane six and Spike if they had been willing to let him help them out. Though it does beg the question of why he's not at least trying to solve the sanitation workers strike, since it doesn't seem like Canterlot has a mayor (Prince Blueblood was originally going to be a duke, but it was changed to prince because they thought target audiences wouldn't understand or know what a duke was). So I guess it's kind of like Washington D.C., although even that place at least does have a mayor (albeit one that can be overruled by the federal government). We then cut back to Princess Celestia and Princess Luna as they each drag each other into activities that they don't really care for: Extreme sports and face painting (along with a scene of Luna being amused by the presence of a post office, likely a nod to her having been banished for a thousand years and still adjusting to modern society) respectively. And it leads into the reprise of "Lotta Little Things to Try", as it becomes clear we're going back to the two arguing like petty teenagers just like in "A Royal Problem". And this time, there's no Starlight Glimmer to magically swap their cutie marks to force them to see the other's point of view.
Oddly enough, when Princess Luna complains and argues that Celestia just wanted her (Luna) back to boss around, Celestia doesn't dispute it and just angrily orders Luna to "calm down". Of course, since that's actually the worst thing you can say in the midst of an argument, it doesn't work. And so the royal sisters decide to go their separate ways, each doing the activities that they wanted to do without the other around to ruin it. Try as they might, though, the two sisters can't help but be reminded of each other. And their own activities lead to unexpected complications: Such as Princess Luna getting bad sunburns because she didn't wear sunblock (not knowing it was a thing), and Princess Celestia getting lost in a forest and being frightened by a chicken. As for the mane six and Spike, they find themselves overwhelmed in Canterlot, to the point where the swans are growing impatient and threatening to attack. Wondering aloud how Celestia and Luna manage all this chaos by themselves, Fancy Pants finally points out that the princesses don't, that things such as the planning committee he oversees (presumably as its head) exist specifically to tackle the problems the princesses either can't or won't deal with. This prompts Twilight to swallow her pride and allow for Fancy Pants and his entoruge to pitch in. The tortosie snap even comes back as Pinkie uses it to clean up all the garbage piling up in the streets.
And as for Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, they end up meeting back up with each other on the same hilltop overlooking the setting sun. They reconcile with one another, having realized that they can't live without each other, and even remembering the times they spent together in the past. After they apologize, they witness the sun and the moon being raised at the same time. This causes them to speculate that Twilight might be having trouble, so they cut short their vacation and fly back to Canterlot. It's a good thing they do because as it turns out, Twilight breaks the amulet by accident while trying to reset it (Spike mentioning that there are instructions from Sunburst on how to do it).
And that's the story, so what do I think of the episode? Well, I probably sound a touch more critical of it than I actually am. Don't get me wrong, it's not even close to being a perfect episode and there are things that needed to be done better. The biggest problem for the A plot with the royal sisters is that it goes back to "A Royal Problem" for their characterization, which just feels insulting and like it's compensating too much in the opposite direction for them being these wise, powerful leaders. It's even more pathetic here because they're on vacation, there's nothing to get in their way, and the episode itself previously hinted at them compromising and resolving the issue. If they wanted to have the two sisters split up, why not just do that from the beginning after "Lotta Little Things to Do", and have them meet back up at the end of the episode when they're ready to reconcile? It does shed a little bit more light on their characters: Princess Celestia is an extrovert with a fun loving nature, and Princess Luna is an introvert who prefers quiet activities. But those details get overshadowed by the scenes of them arguing and behaving like petty teenagers. Just because it doesn't last as long doesn't mean it's not frustrating and annoying to see them be reduced to such a level. And as for the B plot, Twilight looks unbelievably stupid when she rejects Fancy Pants' offer to help just because she thinks accepting help makes her look bad. She only partially gets called out on this, and the revelation of a sanitation strike raises questions about whether the princesses were aware of it before they hoofed the reigns to Twilight. Assuming you had to have a plot of Twilight and friends getting in over their heads because they won't accept help, why not use Prince Blueblood again and play up his behavior from before? That would lend a much better in-universe justification for Twilight to refuse to accept help, and could even have her friends temporarily join in.
Yes, the moral about how it's not a bad thing to delegate authority to others (so long as they can be trusted and so long as they're qualified to handle the task or tasks given to them). And it's probably one Twilight needed to learn before taking the throne. However, when she goes on to break the amulet while trying to repair it, and the episode ends on that note, it prevents us from seeing that Twilight has learned or that she can in fact manage. If anything, it makes her look hopelessly out of her league if she needs the royal sisters to come and bail her out. An easy fix to this would be to trim most of the royal sisters bickering and arguing, and have them come back to help Twilight fix the amulet, then comment on what a great job she did on everything else, and Twilight could sheepishly confess about everything else that happened in the royal sisters' absence. Even if we would get to see Twilight handle herself much better in "The Summer Sun Setback", the fact that such developments occured off-screen makes the transition feel jarring. It's also weird that after this episode, it changes to only Twilight taking over the throne on her own rather than having her friends rule alongside her. And yet that's what she'll basically end up doing anyway when she establishes her Council of Friendship. As for Fancy Pants, he once again only really becomes a jerk because of how everything unfolds, and in this case because his offer to help was rejected for no good reason. All in all, I feel comfortable giving this episode a solid B. It's good, but it could be a lot better. There's good moments and good characterization in places, but some of the decisions made feel unnecessary. A little polish would've made this episode a lot better.
So it is that we have only half a season left, only a few more episodes of Season 9. But first we're detouring back to "Equestria Girls" for the penultimate special "Sunset's Backstage Pass", a Groundhog Day plot.
This is one of my favorite episodes of the season.
It's just a lot of fun.
5802788 There's definitely some fun moments throughout it.
This is the final speaking appearance of Fancy Pants, so here are his first and last lines spoken in the series.
Correction: It's Pinkie who reads off the necessities, not Spike.
While I admit Twilight's rash decision can come off as a bit forced, I'm actually willing to defend her reasons for doing so. The way I see it, Celestia and Luna's insistence on helping the Mane Six with every little problem they have only ended up wounding Twilight's confidence in her and the other five succeeding them as rulers. The strongest evidence being this line here:
So in addition to thinking the Royal Swanifying Ceremony wouldn't be too hard for the Mane Six to handle on their own, Twilight may have wanted to use this as an opportunity to regain the confidence she lost from the royal sisters being "Innocently Insensitive" and prove to them that she and her friends can handle anything.