Season 5 Ep:1&2 and My Return [spoilers]

I’m back. Four months hiatus and I have returned.

Why was ever gone you say?

Well let’s just leave it at as a college student I am currently broke. Since I am broke, I could not replace a computer that began to malfunction around Christmas time. A computer that put me out of pocket for quite some money. You see the dilemma I faced. Thus I was regrettably absent for the lead up to the new season. Resigned to only occasionally checking my phone for updates and such.

Thankfully my ever gracious relatives have reimbursed me with a new device to expunge the written word upon. Just in time too, the new season haveth arrived!

So to rejoice in my rebirth, I have decided to start up reviews again. You know the thing that every person on the site and thus you the viewer will get exceedingly tired of after about the third one. Yeah those!

So Season 5

SPOILERS

I liked it. It wasn’t spectacular. It was very good but not great. Simple as.

It didn’t fall into the usual trope of being an aftermath story which was refreshing. In case you’ve been living under a rock the promos of season 5 kind of give the story away.

Twilight gets a new castle which is still as ugly as sin. All I could hear was ‘marketing noises’ every time I saw it. It has a magic map and thrones in the vein of what I can only suppose is the knights of round table from the Arthur legend. Shame no one wise cracked at how absurd the castle looks in a tiny colloquial village.

They are summoned by the map to some godforsaken place at the back end of Equestria. Where it turns out, surprise surprise, the village is an extremely creepy place where everyone has an equal’s cutie mark. OH NO COMMUNISM!

Yes, the group has fought demons, mad gods and monsters but nothing can prepare them for the evils of socialism. Free health care and equal rights. The Sick Bastards.

Joking aside, the town is actually legitimately creepy and the animation does lend well to this. Naturally the group are also quite creeped out by this. The town is very much brainwashed and there is some not so unsubtle Nazi imagery during the villain song. There was a lot of promise here. Ultimately, they meet the leader of the town…Aria Blaz-I mean Starlight Glimmer.

In truth she is a pretty obvious villain. Her design is similar to one of the Dazzlings so I can't speak on originality. In terms of personality, there is no conflict really. No side of her that shows that in her heart she thinks that her manipulation is the right thing, instead it’s all about power. I suppose that’s okay but didn’t we cover this angle with Tirek already? Instead she is a sickeningly sweet cult leader, that reminds me of a condescending school teacher. I suppose props on having a villain that makes me dislkie her almost immedieately.

She ultimately preaches her philosophy and such and the group are immediately sceptical. What? You mean a creepy cult headed by a charismatic leader is out of the ordinary? I should really know better. Apparently, all the cutie marks previously owned by the citizens of the town are stored in a cave? It doesn’t make a lot of sense really, then again I’m criticising this like it was bloody Citizen Kane. Starlight claims she has an item that steals cutie marks. While this could have been interesting, it ultimately leads to a disappointing reveal that it’s just Glimmer’s magic. *Sigh*

Shock and surprise, the obvious villain is the villain, I don’t know what I believe in anymore. She quickly steals the groups cutie marks even though they don’t automatically become slaves for some reason. Then how on earth did she brainwash the rest of the town?

Twilight forces Fluttershy to convert in an attempt to infiltrate the town. She does so and finds out that Glimmer is in fact a hypocrite and actually still has a cutie mark. I had very much suspected it since it was clear the rest of the town can’t use magic yet there leader can. How hasn’t anyone called her out on this? Sorry I was thinking logically again.

Glimmer gets really excited about the prospect of converting Twilight because of her status. I originally thought that Glimmer could steal cutie marks and apply them to herself in the vein of Tirek, thus she would have all of Twilight’s power but that’s not the case I guess. I don’t know if Celestia would exactly be very happy if she heard her student was in a cult. Might raise a few eyebrows in fact.

Glimmer is subsequently revealed as a fake. There is some nice Animal Farmesque idea that Glimmer preaches equality but is in a position of being more equal than others. A hypocrite in other words. It’s actually a pretty nice nod to the decadence of the ruling classes in Soviet countries while claiming that they were equal to the people they opress.

Glimmer freaks out in which is actually a pretty intense moment where she becomes enraged. She flees and the town get their cutie marks back. Some pretty bland side characters attempt to stop her. She then proceeds to try to kill them. You Know For Kids!!

Twilight easily smacks her spell aside after regaining her cutie mark in a pretty badass display of power. Twilight proceeds to give out the same old boring lecture when Glimmer interrupts and tells her to stuff if before running into a cave.

Instead of pursing her to make sure she does no more harm, our hero’s valiantly sit by and let her get away because the cave is too dangerous. Yeah, that was a pretty lame excuse to have a recurring villain in the future. She is certainly not a step up from Tirek.

And that’s it really. Despite my harshness, I actually enjoyed the episode. It’s a step forward. There were flaws but they did the best they could in the time limit they had. Animation was quite nice. Had some cute Pinkie and Fluttershy moments that had actual character. They acknowledged Twilight’s importance as a princess. The others didn’t do much to be fair.

Things looking up for the new season. it was a solid

7.5 or an 8.

Writing will also be commencing. Hope to get something new up for next week.