Finalysis, Season 4 Edition · 5:53pm May 21st, 2014
Hey all, sorry to be so dead around here. There are reasons, although they are not especially interesting—but I will describe them in a blog post to be made in a day or so.
First, let's talk the season 4 pony finale! Since, you know, the entire site hasn't been doing that for a whole week+ already. Spoilers ahoy!
So I have mixed feelings about this finale, or I suppose I should say I really liked it but with reservations. I'll see if I can go in order—making this sort of a... deadblog? Zombieblog? (I should note: I binged to catch up for the finale because I was falling behind pretty severely for most of the second half of the show, which is one reason why I haven't been terribly active lately)
I'm glad that the show chose to address that Twilight's life doesn't really seem to have changed since she was made a princess, but at the same time it's sort of re-raised all of the issues I had with the initial decision to princessify her. Having decided that “Princess” is a title that can be earned/given, I do think it's good that the show remains firmly in the camp that “actually being a princess means that you have an extra large responsibility to the world,” rather than glamorize the royal perks and privileges. But I maintain that if you make being a Princess all about having duties it kind of makes it difficult to have Twilight participate in the slice of life stuff that makes up like, 85% of the show.
Moving on, I seriously expected whatever the foreign dignitaries were there to discuss would actually matter, but it turned out to never be mentioned again (maybe in Season 5? I would really like to see a trip to an actual different country, not just the South American jungle/frontiersville down the block). Now I am given to suspect that the dignitaries were actually just popping in for a quick hello, and Luna, Celestia, and Cadence kept them over while they got their story straight about why Twilight wasn't allowed in the meeting (and practiced singing it in harmony).
Speaking of! The song excited me and then actually bored me rather quickly. I think it needed more musical variation. I really liked the lyrics for the first verse when Twilight was singing but then it seemed a bit more forced after that—though I haven't given it another listen. Luna singing was fabulous, though. And I'm happy to have a Celestia song that isn't paradoxically really good and also an embodiment of everything that frustrated me about season 3.
And then there's Tirek! Best villain introduction since Discord? I don't know, but once again McCarthy gave us a really threatening villain who pushed the story forward and the characters to the point of desperation, which is something she's good at (Sombra was a misstep in that he should have basically been faceless corruption like the thorns were in the S4 opener—I have no idea what the deal was with Sunset Shimmer though). I confess I thought Tirek was way creepier when he was still in his cloak, and based on his initial growth spurt I had expected him to gain wings or creepy extra limbs or something, but I guess if you're reviving a Gen 1 villain you're going to be somewhat bound by 80s character designs (of which, SO MUCH MORE later). It was definitely a cool nod to the show's history.
The decision to send Discord after Tirek made a ton of sense and I'm glad that this episode decided to utilize him in a logical way. I also really liked Tirek's attempt to seduce Discord to the dark side—but I really expected Discord to be playing him? I mean Discord's flaw has basically always been pride, but this was more stupidity. I guess my issue is actually with the scene where Tirek hands Discord his medallion and Discord takes this as a sign he can trust the scary power-hungry magic thief. Clearly they needed the scene where Twilight still frees Discord despite his betrayal—and to be fair, if Discord was playing a long game that becomes more of a story about trusting Discord than about Twilight doing her duty. Still I was kind of expecting him to hastily hide the window that revealed Twilight's existence to Tirek (alternatively—if Celestia's whole plan was reliant on Tirek not knowing Twilight existed, why did nobody smash that window before he showed up?).
Speaking of which! Great episode breaks are also something McCarthy does well in 2-parters, and “We have to get rid of our magic,” is totally on par with “I'm so sorry!” / “You will be.” Also continuing the tradition of pony 2-parters being "a ton of setup" followed by "a ton of action," but it seems to work out pretty well here (as it usually does).
To jump back for a second—I feel like the show sort of treated Discord reading the mane six's diary as a violation, but they were actually writing it with the understanding that other ponies would read it at some point. It was not a bad way to bring the “Digimon Crest” episodes together and explicitly tie them to the box (which would have been a lot more mysterious if “rainbow power ponies” hadn't been advertised everywhere since about halfway through the season... oh well). However, when you straight-up say how the other characters embody their elements, it really does draw your attention to the fact that “magic” is not actually a virtue, or even a personality trait, despite what the title of the show says (although I suppose that may be the point—Twilight actually chooses the “friendship” part of “friendship is magic” to fulfill her element).
And then of course we get to the part where The Magic is Quadrupled as the memes would have it—which was a pretty badly needed tension breaker, considering just how dire things have gotten for our heroes. It was also just a really funny set of scenes in general, which is good, because Twilight was not a dork nearly enough this season.
I feel like—as in the Crystal Empire eps—there's an issue where Celestia insists to Twilight that leaving her friends out of the loop is necessary, and Twilight goes along with it as if she hasn't learned by this point that she basically needs her friends to use anything like her full potential. I could have used a scene where she decides to tell them what's going on—since I mean, Tirek was not going to randomly pick them to interrogate unless he already had a pretty good idea they were his biggest remaining threat, so I'm not sure why them knowing puts them at risk other than them wanting to protect Twilight, which they would anyway. That, and Celestia's plan badly needed some sort of counterattack operation, because “we all lose our powers and Twilight goes into hiding” is not a long term solution. Or a solution, full stop. Maybe just an acknowledgment that Celestia was counting on Twilight to figure out a strategy? It is sort of the logical extension of "Twilight, I need you and your friends to go do X and save Equestria," for Celestia to finally just go "Here, Twilight, have my powers and you figure it out."
Anyway, Discord betrays the mane six and Tirek is big and his voice is more generic villain-boom and less scary, AND THEN—
THEN HE BLOWS UP TWILIGHT'S TREE.
So I know much ink has been spilled on the subject but I'm really actually sad about that. I mean I've written stuff from that tree's point of view! This is like, even if Twilight wins in Twilight vs the ELA it is now officially a tragedy because she loses her home anyway (well, it would be if I was bothering to place that fic within the canon timeline).
And the books! From "Trade Ya!" She saved those books because she decided they were important reminders of how she had learned and grown!
Anyway that brings me to another large hangup I have about the finale. The fight scene that ensues between Twilight and Tirek is... well it's very spectacular but in some ways it felt to me like the kind of the thing the fandom would create and maybe the show shouldn't. I don't mean that to disparage the fandom per se, but in its DBZ-ishness the fight felt a little wrong to me. I thought about it for a while—it is more violent than ponies has ever been in the past, certainly. I know that friendship lasers and exploding forcefields can be classified as a kind of violence, so perhaps pretending that ponies really maintained an anti-violence stance before this is disingenuous, but even if you look at something like A Canterlot Wedding, the fight there is very cartoony and silly and referencing The Powerpuff Girls. This one was, as I said, more of a DBZ fight and trying to be very action-y and intense.
But what I think it really is, is it's the first time a hoof is raised in anger in the show by one of our heroes. And I think it was earned, but I also think that violates something in the spirit of the show. Obviously, I am not opposed to the idea in and of itself, because I'm writing like the angriest Twilight ever for Twilight vs the ELA, and she certainly has some heads to knock together before that story ends. But I feel like it breaks the show's character to some extent to ever treat violence as something that person could enter into willingly, with the sort of borderline eagerness to inflict pain that comes with anger? I suppose the finale maintains that using violence like that doesn't work, though I would note that in past instances the ponies have always lost violent confrontations and here Twilight fights Tirek to a standstill. Anyway, that's what I mean by feeling like a fan production, because "what if the show had a different tone?" is one of those questions that fanworks can handily explore.
Incidentally, I was sort of lost for an explanation as to why Tirek couldn't just steal Twilight's magic during that fight. Sheer scale or something? I mean any other time someone attacks him with magic it seems to basically fizzle and he just eats them, so why even a superpowered Twilight could actually inflict harm on him with magic was sort of lost on me.
Sidenote: I think the show really missed an opportunity when Tirek ate Discord's magic and it behaved exactly like him eating any other magic source. The episode made a big deal out of Discord's powers being different from anything ponies have—I mean it's like, the raw power of chaos that Tirek just munched on. Even just making his powers more “chaotic” in nature (although I would have liked that to be the scheme—that Tirek couldn't control Discord's power and that made him vulnerable somehow).
So then we get rainbow ponies and god those designs were painful and gaudy. I think Rainbow Dash's was the most 80s you could possibly get without adding eyeliner. I would like to reiterate that whoever is doing the concept designs for ponies lately needs some color coordination lessons. They also stayed Rainbow-ified just slightly too long for my tastes but I am (as we all are) very grateful it was a powerup and not a permanent change. I mean, considering that the animators used to forget AJ's freckles when she was running, I kind of assumed that nobody was chomping at the bit (to use an appropriate metaphor) to cover the mane six in tons of miniature cutie marks and other obnoxious detailing.
However, the element-keys were awesome and I look forward to blowing too much money on replicas of them at some future convention.
The rainbow song was okay but mostly made me think of Skittles commercials. OH! But seriously they blew it by not having Twilight present to restore Celestia, Luna, and Cadence's powers. That would have been so emotionally satisfying after all the time this finale spent discussing how Twilight fits in with the other alicorns. (Also I could probably have found a way to shipping goggles Twilight restoring Celestia's power, just saying...)
Incidentally, it would have been interesting if Tirek only stole “magic”-magic, i.e. he only preyed on unicorns or alicorns. But that would have been a very different story. More world-buildy and interested in societal consequences perhaps than “oh no an evil dude is conquering everything!” Somebody write that and I'll put it in my read later list for like a year without actually reading it ('cause that's just how I roll).
And then Twilight and her friends got a LITERAL Hall of Friendship™ with like thrones and everything (it was even made of crystal!). Does this mean that the entirety of Season 5 is going to be the mane six addressing bureaucratic friendship problems and basically the show will become The Wisdom of the Gnomes? (I have to admit, my response to Twi being made princess was to figure she would be Princess of Friendship and have to like, settle friendship problems for everyone everywhere in Equestria including kids bickering like “SHE STOLE MY CRAYON” and it just being the most frustrating thing ever)
Anyway as reluctant as I am about Twilight being officially moved over into “Princess with actual princessly duties” territory, I really appreciate that the show is essentially “upgrading” her friends in the same way, and making them part of her life as a princess. Whatever they do with Season 5 it at least appears that they are not going to inherently separate what Twilight is doing from what everyone else does (though to be fair, Twilight does get all the plot episodes and not many of the slice of life episodes since about season 2). I mean certainly the title “Twilight's Kingdom” was cause for concern that they might put Twilight on a shiny rainbow-colored bus and have her leave Ponyville and therefore not really participate in the normal goings on of her firends' lives, so it's a relief that she's staying.
I'm still sad about the tree, and no number of built-in-defiance-of-permit-and-zoning-laws Halls of Friendship™ can really fill that gap. However, I have a reasonable assumption that Twilight's new home will be the main subject of episode 3 of season 5, given the pattern established in the past (eps 1 & 2 are the big exciting opening, 3 addresses the new status quo, except in season 3 which was weird in general). And I expect the result of that will either be somehow regrowing the library or her learning to move on. I'd really like the former, but I'll be honest, the fact that the Hall of Friendship™ is clearly tree-themed probably means we're not getting that (though it is also thematic with the Tree of Harmony, so I won't rule it out entirely).
Or maybe they never meant for Twilight to live there at all? It does feel more like a courtroom/place of business than a residence, and you'd need to staff a “castle” with like, servants and guards and stuff, and that doesn't really feel like Twilight (that, and the mane six's homes are often explored in episodes, but "castles" in the show we have usually focused on their public meeting spaces, so they don't really feel home-y). I guess we'll see—in a way, it's the same question we've been asking since Magical Mystery Cure: “So now that Twilight is a Princess, what's changed?” Season 4 was kind of a prolonged non-answer to that question which has left Season 5 to actually answer it. And so, naturally, we have an extra long hiatus!
But in the end, I quite liked the finale. I think it's somewhere below “Princess Twilight” and “The Return of Harmony” but above “A Canterlot Wedding” and the pilot, which I group together 2-parters (with “The Crystal Empire” episodes below that and “Magical Mystery Cure” at the bottom). The top tier being the “great” class, I think this makes “Twilight's Kingdom” the “quite good but not amazing” class.
Now if you'll excuse me, I am going to go hug a fondly-remembered book to a tree.
I think it is important to note that Twilight's fight against Tirek doesn't gain her any sort of victory. She wins when she stops fighting and shows herself to be a good pony.
Heh. Finalysis. Smooth.
Oh wait.. other words...
Oddly enough, for all my action, dark or random fics where violence is used, this felt off to me as well. It's like that boundary we should have between those 'what if it was more X" and canon was suddenly blurred.
2132439 It's true, it's true. She isn't exactly chastised for fighting him head on either, though. It's pretty clearly a wash. But that might have been too many beats for one fight--she had to have something that she was giving up by surrendering, so I suppose victory had to feel like it was within her grasp, and showing her destructive power as having consequences would possibly have muddled the issue (like if she had caused some collateral damage to Sweet Apple Acres or something). Which is why I guess I question invoking that sort of anger at all if you don't have the space to do a "oh no what I have done?"
I really enjoyed this finale, my only hangup (aside from the silly transformations) being Celestia's not-plan. At this rate, I'm beginning to feel like the fandom is overstating Celestia's abilities as a master strategist.
2132510 I prefer to think that it's just the fandom rejecting something that makes no god-damned sense to begin with.
Celestia's supposed to be really old and beloved, but she's repeatedly shows as being short-sighted, weak, judgemental, and, frankly, a dullard. It can only be atrocious writing at this point.
But then, I despised this finale with a passion, so...