Season 5 Reviews: The Cutie Map · 10:19am Apr 6th, 2015
So the wait is finally over, season 5 is here at last. I had counted the days down for months, anxiously anticipating the day when the first two parter of season 5 would premiere.
And to say it was worth the wait, would be an understatement.
This is without a doubt the best two parter this show has ever made, and likely ever will be made. It's also in line for the best episode of the show period. You would never have thought that you would have found an episode this grey, deep, and adult in this show. But Friendship is Magic respects it's audience and it's fanbase, and is prepared to give us truly amazing stories such as this one. I have watched this episode twice and it's an episode which gets better and better every time I see it, it really is that good.
So what is the story?
It's been a while since the events of season 4, and the mane six are tasked with the duty of spreading friendship across Equestria through a map which appears out of the ground in their castle. Following their cutie marks, which appear on the map to show where their suppose to go, the mane six arrive at a town where everyone is smiling and has the same cutie mark: an equal sign. They seem very friendly and welcoming, and Fluttershy is constantly enthusiastic and respectful of them, despite Pinkie thinking that something is wrong. They meet the towns leader: Starlight Glimmer, who explains the towns philosophy to them. How everyone has the same cutie mark because competing and being better than anyone else at something is wrong and ruins friendship. She believes that she has the answer to the the worlds problems, and how the reason why people argue is because they are different and believe that they are special, so the solution is to make everyone the same.
Despite Twilight acknowledging that their way of life makes them happy and nearly leaving; after staying in the town for a while, the mane six realize that some of them indeed want their special talents back, and just how tyrannical Starlight is. After talking to some ponies about the Staff of Sameness and the vault where cutie marks are stored, the mane six follow Starlight into the vault. When Starlight finds out that the ponies the mane six spoke to wanted their cutie marks back, she feels that the mane six are inspiring FREE THINKING in her village by having cutie marks, and so she steals their cutie marks, locks the mane six up, tries to brainwash them into converting to her way of thinking, and discovers one of the ponies that wanted their cutie mark back, and locks him up too as a punishment for not having her views.
Fluttershy however lies that she agrees with Starlight, and realizes that Starlight indeed has her own cutie mark when she spills water on herself when locking up the mane six's cutie marks in her house for security, despite making everyone else get rid of their's. After revealing to the town that Starlight has her cutie mark, Starlight reveals that the Staff of Sameness is just a fraud, and that her magic is needed to take away the cutie marks of the other ponies, and to manage the system.
After finding out that Starlight is a hypocrite, the equal ponies say that either they are all equal or none of them are. When Starlight refuses to give up her cutie mark, due to her feeling she deserves it due to her being the one to take the cutie marks away, and how she believes she was the one that created harmony within the village. The ponies of the village then rebel, get their cutie marks back from the vault, and help the mane six get back their cutie marks back from Starlight, who escapes from her house in an awesome chase scene across the mountain range. The ponies and the mane six eventually win though, and say that difference in opinions and personalities can strengthen a friendship rather than weaken it, that it is YOU and yourself which defines a friendship, and that it was the difference in Twilight's friends personalities that got her to alicornhood. Starlight eventually leaves the village and escapes. The town withdraws it's communist reign, and has a celebration with the mane six.
And what's so good about it? Well, what's a review for.
The reason why this episode works so well is just how gray it is. At the start, the equal ponies actually seem ahead of the mane six, and Starlight does have a real point.
Starlight Glimmer is a fantastic villain, and undoubtedly the best this show has ever produced. This is great, because since Discord, all the two parter villains have been awful. Like Discord, Starlight has a unique moral code which she follows, but unlike Discord, she actually makes very good points, and is not against friendship and harmony, but has a false idea of friendship and harmony. She also doesn't reveal herself as the villain straight away, which is really refreshing.
In fact, the only things that make her evil is that she tries to force her beliefs on others and is a hypocrite, other than that she genuinely wants to do good and thinks that she is doing good. It's also great to see her as a normal unicorn, because if she had been a monster like the others it would have been far less effective. The fact that she's a normal unicorn paints her in a light which is not necessarily evil, if she was a monster, communism would have automatically been painted as bad, but as she is a normal pony, it allows a sense of grayness. Communism is painted as bad at the end, but the episode acknowledges that the idea is great, it's just how it needs to be run in order for it to work and the individualism it stops which is bad.
I also love the that not all ponies in the village have the same views. All of them have been brainwashed to a degree by Starlight's teachings, but some actually want their cutie marks back as shown in the episode. What makes Starlight so evil is that she is tyrannical to those who don't agree with her, even when those teachings do make sense. The mane six's ideology ultimately wins out in the end due to Starlight's ideology forcing friendship though equality, rather than just being yourself and creating friendship naturally like the mane six did. Her beliefs make sense, but in practice they create false friendship, and that individualism is the key to creating true and great friendships.
This works on 2 standpoints. On the one hand it's a very good moral about friendship to teach kids that everyone can understand, but as I've also pointed out, Starlight Glimmer's actions are very similar to the communist dictators of the Soviet Union. It addresses the problems with communism, how whilst it's a good idea, in practice it contradicts itself in order to work, and sucks creativity out of the world. The way they used communism in a context which worked in Friendship is Magic is genius.
This episode is a complete masterpiece, and I hope it wins some kind of award like Heart of Ice did in Batman: The Animated Series. It's one of the most thought provoking pieces of kids entertainment ever written.
It's great to look back at The Princess Promenade right now. To see how in just 9 years, how this franchise has gone from one of the most awful to one of the most thought provoking and great.
Starlight Glimmer also wasn't really defeated. So I think it's incredibly likely that she'll return for the season 5 finale, perhaps to explain her backstory, and how she came to think this way. They already hinted at it with the thing with Double Diamond.
S5 is off to an amazing start. If this continues, this will be the best season without question.
Thoughtful and intelligent, The Cutie Map provides a brilliant grey conflict, a great villain, and does nearly everything right. This is a step forward for kids entertainment, is worthy of an award, and will be remembered by the fandom for years.
A+
Is sad that not everyone is loving the propaganda stuff on "We hate what's happened to MLP".
2952088
Are you saying you didn't like this episode.
I said I hated EQG. And yes, I thought it was going downhill a little bit in terms of two parters, until this episode came out. This is without a doubt better than the two parters of the first 2 seasons, I'm sorry my friend. But you should be happy, this was closer to the tone of the first 2 two parters, because it had all the mane six in an equal spotlight.
2952088 Did you like this?
2952652 You clearly have misunderstood the meaning behind my post. I said i was sad that people dosen't like the propaganda thing. I liked this episode and i agree that is one of the greatest two-parter episode ever made. Great morale, great villain and characters who finally act like they should.
My, wasn't that a misleading start to the season.
3603758 Indeed. This episode was the exact opposite of the rest of the season in lots of ways. It was an episode that was dark, meaningful, and had lots of real substance.