MLP Episode review: One Bad Apple · 12:27am Apr 21st, 2016
So, a Broad Street Bully? A Sweat hog? Maybe. Nah. Dump out the barrel and roll it out, because we've got...
One Bad Apple
We open at Sweet Apple Acres, so we know I'll view this favorably. :) Apple Bloom is nervous and trying to get dressed for... going to the train station, according to Applejack. We even get Apple Bloom channeling a bit of Rarity. Emulating your future sister-in-law? ;) Ah, they're picking up her cousin from Manehattan! And they've never met. You know what would make a good impression? Being on time! And Applejack is a mare after my own heart. They've got no cutie mark in common, and before Apple Bloom can become Pinkie's newest clone, she races off to get the other Crusaders!.
At the train station, the Crusaders are excited. Applejack is... annoyed. Scootaloo even manages to fly a bit! Sweetie Belle fires off a small firework, too! Finally, the Friendship Express arrives. Apple Bloom... loses at the 'guess who your cousin who you've never met before' game. There's a puff of steam, and we see Babs! She's small, with a mane she keeps blowing out of her hair. And a Noo Yayk accent, to boot. She loves the Yankees and hates the Red Sox! The Crusaders kinda... crowd her, and I'm feeling a bit of sympathy for her. We hear some exposition about the Summer Harvest Parade, and the Crusaders have a float. No root beer, though. Her eyes are covered, and when they're opened... she's tied up in a warehouse and held for ransom?! No. They're at the clubhouse. We see a shiny shot of Scootaloo's and Sweetie Belle's butts-which is creepy-and Babs' tail covers her own flank.
She gets the executive tour of the place. Babs is less than impressed, natch. They have a confab and decide to show her the float. In the barn is a legit impressive-looking pumpkin float. They shall ride it eternally, shiny and chrome! But... *Groan* Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon show up to be assholes. No, Spoiled Rich does not exist, and I still feel like she's an asspull/hate sink. They notice Babs, and another covering of her flank by her tail.
And Babs... turns on her family/the only ponies she knows in Ponyville and joins the Dark/Lame Side of the Force. "More like the Cutie Mark crybabies!" Diamond Tiara likes it, and Babs kicks off one of the float's wheels. The strut collapses and the entire fucking thing rolls out of the barn. Apple Bloom says she'll tell Applejack, but Babs threatens her. Snitches get stitches, and my sympathy for her is bottoming out.
Confession: I got bullied at school and at home, thanks to my asshole of an ex-stepfather. I have issues.
Babs leaves with the assholes, and Scootaloo even says, "I think Babs just went to the Dark Side." Star Wars confirmed to be a known quantity in Equestria! :p Sweetie Belle says to tell Applejack. I am... not sure if she's right. I'm out of it when it comes to this kind of stuff nowadays. My gut says to tell someone, but I'll cop to being possibly wrong on that.
Scootaloo says they're not babies! "Then why do I feel like crying?" Well, Sweetie, because Babs is a jerkass. Apple Bloom says they'll build a new float... which will get wrecked, too. Sweetie Belle is again the possible voice of reason. Apple Bloom says they're not snitches and she's only there a couple of weeks. They'll simply avoid her. I must now hug all the Crusaders.
We get the song Babs Seed. It's catchy, but also sad if you listen to the lyrics. Brings back some bad memories for me. And finally... she and Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon have kicked them out of the clubhouse. I am wondering how the hell none of the adults at Sweet Apple Acres have noticed anything, but adults are useless, yadda yadda yadda. Fuck you, Babs. Fuck. YOU.
Sweetie Belle cries, and at her house-hi, Magnum! We see him fishing-we also learn Apple Bloom's been kicked out of her own bed. I have negative sympathy for Babs, now. They need to fight back! And they see the floats, hear the anti-parasprite song... and they're on the jazz. While Babs sleeps in Apple Bloom's bed, the Crusaders signal her, and they go to the barn. They have supplies, including 'luster dust' from Sugarcube Corner. At least according to the captions on my DVD. "That must be what Rarity uses on her emergency edible boots!"
...
We're walking, we're walking.
We get an A-Team montage, complete with a damned fine pastiche of the original theme. Even a false cutie mark sighting. No, Scootaloo. Season five!"Is this it?" Please let me kn-ow! If this ain't love... wait, no. Probably not a good idea to start a Huey Lewis and the News song. I'll be here all night.
the next day, it's parade time! The Three Stooges... no. No, they're not that cool. They find the Golden Apple float. Symbolism... ! They manage to reverse-psychology Babs into riding it. Sweetie Belle sets a timer and the Mission Impossible theme cranks up. Babs butt-bumps them onto a cooooonvenient mattress. As they shake their hooves at her, Applejack finally shows up. Good lord, where have you been?! She's proud of them letting her drive their float Apple Bloom channels a super-villain, and Applejack is still oblivious. Applejack exposits that Babs had been bullied back at Manehattan. Oh, of course... A little bit of guilt. The Crusaders say that they're the bullies! No, no you're not. That much I'm sure of.
Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon cheer Babs on. The Crusaders try to explain things to Applejack, but conventient marching band is right there to mess things up for them. I forgot that part. We see an Shot of a Cliff and muddy river below. They catch up to Pinkie's float. "Let us in!" "Funny joke!" It took me a while to get that one, admittedly. She lets them in and they zoom up to the float to warn Babs the float is booby-trapped. And Pinkie shouts, "Veggie Salad!" as the float crashes. "Seriously?" Scootaloo speaks for me as Pinkie gorges herself on vegetables.
Anyway them timer goes off and the float goes out of control. The Crusaders manage to get Babs out of it... and they crash it themselves. That's... that's not Karma or even really right. They crawl out, covered in mud and in pain. "Maybe we'll get our cutie marks in 'dtupidest ideas of all time'." Ugh... Babs comes down, amazed and all apologetic. Babs, should've been you in that slop.
Back at Sweet Apple Acres, the Crusaders are doing their usual cleaning up after a failed series of shenanigans. They confess to booby-trapping the float to get back at her, and ended up being bullies themselves. Sweetie Belle snaps, and I'm right there with her. "Oh, why does life have to be so ironic?" I don't know, Alanis. Why? They apologize, and so does Babs. She should've gone first. And Applejack says... they should've told her from the beginning. From what I've read, that is the beginning, and sometimes doesn't even work. Babs asks if they can start over.
At the clubhouse, we get some overwrought ceremony to induct Babs into the Crusaders. Eh, fine.
At the train station, Babs is gonna start a Manehattan Crusader branch. And talk to her sister about the teasing back home. And then the jerkasses show up and start their bullying. Applejack... does NOTHING. Way to sink your own damned moral within five minutes of it! Babs instead steps up and threate to tell their mothers about their bad attitude. Babs, that's not gonna do a THING. And she backs them over the train platform and into a mud puddle. Is that ironic? And we get Sweetie Belle doing a monologue. And end.
Thoughts
Eh... not so good for me. Like I said earlier, I got bullied for most of my schooling, at school and at home thanks to my ex-stepfather, may he rot in hell. I... just don't have much sympathy for Babs. Some, but not a lot. She turns on the Crusaders when they tried to be her friend and was vicious doing it.
Applejack, to be honest, does not come off well here. Very ineffectual at best. She misses the obvious bullying, withholds vital information, and at the end proves to be completely useless concerning Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon.
As for the moral/message... tell someone, yeah, but that's not the end of it. Or even the beginning of the end or end of the beginning or anything like that. I don't know at this point.
And I still hate those two assholes.
So... this episode is just... eh, at best. Not sure how to rate it, or even if I can. Talk among yourselves, folks. 
The moral's more "Tell someone" and "Don't use the way others treat you as an excuse to be a bad person."
...I just realized it's a continuity error for Tiara to even react to that. Or... a reverse... continuity error... hm.
I mean if you consider the later characterization given to Spoiled Rich you'd expect Tiara to just be like "go ahead and tell her, she thinks you're all trash and will be proud of me putting you in your place". If anything it's pretty clear her father is the one you'd talk to about it.
3885331
Yeah, there's a lot of desire for righteous retribution, occasionally even outright revenge fantasies, among the nerd crowd.
And this episode points out that many -- not all, by any means, but many -- bullies become bullies because they want to escape the role of the bullied one themselves. And that it's easy for people with justified grievances, like the Crusaders, to go overboard because. And that together, this tends to create cycles of violence, and at some point someone or other has to stop, call for a truce, and forgive, or the back-and-forth will consume them all.
3890428 Yeah but Mom will tell Dad.
3890967 Yep.
3890967 My favorite is Lightning Dust. She's Season 1 Rainbow Dash who accidentally almost fucked up a couple of civilians who entered a military airspace.