Season 4 episodes 1 & 2 · 7:10pm Nov 23rd, 2013
So, just watched them (took me nearly a whole hour, crappy internet connection) and wow. Just...wa-HOW!
For some reason I noticed the music a lot more during this episode than normal. I usually only pay attention to the music during the songs but I think that William Anderson (is that right) really outdid himself with the incidental score in this one. The style changed so often, but so fluently, particularly in the moments involving Celestia or Zecora.
Something weird I noticed was that, after not watching any episodes for so long, not since June at the latest, was that it took me a little while to get used to some of the voices again, especially Rarity. I think my memory was playing tricks on me a bit, because once I got into it there was nothing wrong with Tabitha's performance. In fact I think Tabitha st Germain and Nicole Oliver were the really highlights of this show, Ms Oliver in particular getting to show a lot more depth than the script usually allows Celestia.
As much as I loved the episode overall, can we officially be done with the whole 'Twilight's friends reject her/ignore her/act like jerks leading to the Plot Mandated Friendship Failure right before the climax' thing now. It worked well in Return of Harmony, it was just about plausible in A Canterlot Wedding but here it was downright stupid. What did they possibly hope to accomplish by sending Twilight away?
Overall though, I loved this episode and, while I know we won't get a thorough and far reaching exploration of the new status quo I do hope that it isn't just forgotten about.
And we have a story arc! And it looks like episode will be about this arc too! What else would they be researching in the ruined castle? I hope there's a satisfactory resolution to this, and based on the quality of this episode I'm hopeful there will be.
A final thought: before this episode aired everyone thought that the Equestria Games would be the season long story arc. In a way, as much as I like the idea of a magical-quest storyline spanning the whole season I would be disappointed if the games were only mentioned in one single episode so...anyone think we might be lucky enough to get two story arcs?
