Points of Canon: S6x23 - Where the Apple Lies · 7:03pm Oct 8th, 2016
I haven’t written a line all day!
Anyway, back to our regular chromatic hippology investigations…
Since this episode touches on Apple family history, it can go pretty far in terms of canon consequences. This one goes further than most, even though we still see no hide nor hair of the missing Apple parents.
- Filthy Rich insists to be called by the second part of his name. Again. First time was in Family Appreciation Day.
- Today is a season’s shipment of Zap Apple Jam. While zap apple harvest is not a strictly looping event, and there’s probably a certain give of a few weeks in either direction, this episode is on an annual boundary with the corresponding scene in Family Appreciation Day. And for the record, Apple Bloom has her cutie mark, so it’s after Crusaders of the Lost Mark. Not that it does us a lot of good, since almost all of the episode happens far away in the past.
1. Which josses just about every story that had identifiable Sweet Apple Acres cider turn up anywhere outside Ponyville. Which is a huge number of them.
Applejack mentions that Granny Smith has strict objections to wholesale sales of cider. I.e. it never gets exported, it never goes to outside retail, and as the story-within-the-story goes, Granny Smith has been adamant about that for decades. And her reasoning, as it turns out, is that cider doesn’t keep at all.1 I do wonder why does it even get bottled, then, because Filthy Rich went away with something.
- Rich’s season’s shipment of zap apple jam is only four boxes, and probably, only a hundred jars, like in Family Appreciation Day. Just what kind of money does he charge for it, I wonder?
- Big Mac prefers hauling boxes on his head, rather than his back. I wonder why.
2. Flash assets. Get your mind out of the gutter. :)
The story is dated to “just a little older” than Apple Bloom, both siblings have their cutie marks, so it postdates the scenes in Cutie Mark Chronicles, and has to happen after both parents have already evaporated. Notice Applejack’s interesting body type when she is “just a little older.” That’s what an early teenager looks like, I presume. Apple Bloom urgently needs new assets.2
- If Applejack is the one with the ideas how to run the farm, the whole idea with Big Mac’s hypothetical plans to go to college that the mysterious death of their parents shot down doesn’t work. I wonder where do his intellectual tendencies come from then, like O&O and theater skills… Unless he’s just roleplaying, because for most of the episode, it seems like he is. He was FAR more talkative at the time.
- Apples need to be sprayed for apple blight. I’m not sure what “apple blight” is exactly, but other things called “blight” in relation to apples are typically bacterial diseases and the solution is spraying with antibiotics.
3. To cite sources from multiple levels, Cloudy Quartz is not Cloudy Quartz Pie, when everyone else in the family is a Pie. Twilight Velvet and Night Light share no name components, Shining Armor shares no name components with the rest of the family at all, Fluttershy shares no components with Zephyr Breeze. So relatively few families do anything of the sort, and most that do are earth pony only families. But actually seeing a pony change the name upon marrying into the family is a first.
Whoa! “Spoiled Milk” is the maiden name of “Spoiled Rich.” This is the first piece of hard evidence that ponies may change names upon marriage. They don’t always do3 but apparently at least some families adhere to this pattern.
- Notably, the name “Spoiled Milk” is even worse than her current name, and has a double entendre feel to it. How, exactly, did she end up with that? I think that if anything shoots down the theory that ponies can change their names upon receiving a cutie mark, it would be that. There’s no way a sane pony would keep that, there’s no way she would change her name to that, and she changed out to a slightly less dubious “Spoiled Rich” when she got the opportunity.
- Filthy Rich ran much of his father’s business back at the time of that story and was authorized to make purchasing decisions.
- “Zap apple jam jars preserve the flavor for moons.” Properly stored jam can last anywhere from 6 to 24 months, so I suppose it fits.
- Cherilee turns up in town with her hairdo from old photos in Call of the Cutie. I don’t recognize the pony she’s talking to, but I do recognize Sea Swirl in the same shot, looking exactly as she does now. I remind you this had to have happened 10-15 years ago.
- Cup Cake is in town already in that period.
- Rich’s threat of stopping doing business with the Apples wouldn’t be very threatening if zap apple jam was the only product of theirs that he purchases. Therefore it isn’t. Applejack later reiterates that the farm will go under if he stops purchasing.
- Now we will never know why does Big Mac wear the yoke all the time. Or how he got the cutie mark. Never.
- There’s a white earth pony in the hospital with a boot for his cutie mark, and what looks like an, ahem, cutie mark inflammation… ???
- Screwy is there too. In bandages.
- The microphones for calling the nurses are already there. Audio equipment isn’t even a particularly new technology, it seems.
- I spy, with my little eye, Derpy with bandaged eyes!
Something doesn’t add up. It doesn’t add up really bad.
- Filthy Rich is about to get married.
- Spoiled Rich, nee Milk, is the mother of Diamond Tiara.
- Diamond Tiara is about the same age as Apple Bloom.
- Diamond Tiara isn’t born yet at the time of that story, because the marriage that produces her has yet to happen.
- Apple Bloom is nowhere to be seen, but that can have any number of explanations. But, Apple Bloom is about the same age as Diamond Tiara, and if Diamond Tiara was younger than Apple Bloom to any significant degree, I’m betting she’d get beat up on regular basis for her antics.
- Therefore, Apple Bloom does not yet exist at the time of that story either.
But Apple parents already don’t exist, because otherwise, all those conversations about who gets to run the farm make no sense – the missing Apple parents would!
P.S. Also, some of the discrepancies in ponies appearing out of place will have to be explained away through narrative bias for the series to remain internally consistent in terms of timing and age groups, I think. I mean, those two twins from the Shining in the background?… Yeah.
P.P.S. I got a left field hypothesis that is bizarre, and yet might turn out less bizarre than anything else: “Aunt and uncle Orange” are the actual missing Apples, expelled for one reason or another. They’re still alive. They’re just ponies non grata on the farm.
Well, it's entirely possible that Spoiled's pregnancy will be a few months shorter than normal...
But yeah, Apple Bloom's absence is more than a little bizarre. I can only assume the blight needed all available hooves and one of the neighbors is looking after her.
As for Spoiled Milk's name, I actually do like how it reflects her parenting abilities and general disposition.
And yes, the Crusaders really could use some new asset assets.
4246583
Sure. Still doesn’t add up.
1. If Diamond Tiara were a year or more younger than Apple Bloom, most of the taunting wouldn’t be taken very seriously. Age difference of one year is very significant when it’s more than 10% of your total lifespan.
2. So let us assume that the age difference between the two is less than that. That means that Apple Bloom has already existed for X months, and Diamond Tiara will be born in Y months, and X+Y <= 12.
3. Applejack and Big Mac gleefully talk about who gets to run the farm. If X < Y, they’re being awfully happy about the recent death of their parents. If X > Y, Spoiled Milk doesn’t look pregnant at all.
Possible solutions:
Diamond Tiara is adopted and she doesn’t know.
Apple Bloom is adopted and she doesn’t know.
An Apple lied. Since Applejack isn’t the one telling the story, that’s not her, but she’s condoning it.
I’m not sure which offers a better dramatic opportunity, actually. :)
My mind went to the gutter and never came back.
I will be watching this ep soon. I've been reading this from a bunch of different folks on fim about Apple Bloom and Diamond.
Could posit that Apple Bloom is with someone else at this time. I've heard a wet nurse as an option.
Spoiled Milk could be pregnant, and the whole marrying Filthy could be a shotgun wedding setup.
Diamond Tiara could be present but like Apple Bloom off screen. Possibly with Filthy's first wife? Unless she mayhaps died in childbirth and is with a wet nurse. Maybe with Apple Bloom. Perhaps another smaller reason she dislikes her so much is they shared a wet nurse.
Big Mac did talk a lot when he was cross dressing...so maybe he is talkative because he really disagrees with Applejack. And becomes rather taciturn later on because they have resolved their issues around the farm. So feels there is nothing left to say. Or he had some epiphany out in the fields and no longer sees a need to speak so much.
I rather liked this episode.
I prefer pastel equine disquisition.
Good point. I think "harvest seasons" on an earth pony farm are pretty much constant for most produce, based on the frequency we've seen them harvesting Apples it looks like earth ponies can pump out a full harvest a month or so. Zap Apples are different though: They're tied into the Timberwolf mating cycle somehow, and the Apples have a lot less control over them. So Zap Apple harvest does seem likely to be an annual event, unlike every other harvest. That might actually be part of why Zap Apple Jam is so popular: In a world with earth pony farmers, any fruit or vegetable you want is probably on sale year round at the peak of freshness..... except Zap Apples, the only seasonal food there is.
Wish those angry British censors had noticed this, because it means SWA Cider has to be nonalcoholic.
That is a logical conundrum I missed. Good catch. Hmmmm, maybe my previous statement was wrong and they do create hard cider, because otherwise according to Granny Smith it would be "spoiled." Granny said all cider is sold at SWA fresh... but the actual beverage applejack is produced from cider....
Puts rough upper bounds on the ages of the siblings. They can't be much older than twice Apple Bloom's age, if they weren't much older than her. Also, Big Mac is only a year or two older than Applejack. If you say Apple Bloom is 12 now, hard to say Big Mac is older than 27. Rough lower bounds too, they can't be less than twice her age, unless off-screen Apple Bloom was like 7 or something. So if Apple Bloom is only 10, Big Mac has to be at least 21?
Also, ponies are allowed to drop out of school and work the farm full time when they are only a little older than Apple Bloom.
Yeah, I was surprised, but it's good to learn that some ponies do this. Though of course, the Rich family is implied to be an incredibly important family in Equestria, so it might be an exception for them. Unfortunately, it's hard to judge something as socially non-intuitive as name rules from such a small sample.
......What did we just say about naming rules applying to only some ponies?!? It's definitely true that Spoiled Milk is her birth name, but just because some ponies believe in changing their names doesn't mean all would, for the same reason Twilight Velvet isn't Twilight Night. Spoiled, unlike Filthy, doesn't seem to dislike her own first name. Maybe her sweet grandma who raised her was Spoiled Milk senior. It's also possible the name is a reference to "don't go crying over Spoiled Milk," a name to make her pragmatic, traits she displays in this episode.
Bad pony names aren't really an argument for either the pony or the parents picking the name, because why would the parents be more likely to pick Spoiled Milk than Spoiled herself? If anything, it's an argument for the fanon theory of mystical destiny forcing moms to pick weird prophetic names for their foals.
Just now, in this episode, it should be remembered. Also noticed how Spoiled seems super proud of Filthy, even as she kind of looks down on everything else. And how the store we saw is only a fairly small general good store, but a decade later Filthy is incredibly rich. Either he's Sam Walton himself (which I think is a likely possibility), or Spoiled brought a lot of money into the marriage. Also she didn't have the botched nose job yet.
Clearly moons here is a measure of the optimum Ph balance for jam.
My guess is the Rich family is their wholesaler for everything outside of Ponyville.
Remember, we saw a younger her in Pinkie Pride with crossed eyes already.
Now let's talk about the Ursa Major in the room: I think this episode implies Apple Bloom is being wet nursed by Braeburn's family. Why Braeburn's family? Big Mac mentions recently talking with Braeburn, and of course they'd go visit their baby sister frequently.
4246583
4246610
Here's where cutie marks come in: If you watch Apple Bloom's first episode, she has zero distrust or dislike of DT before she gets her cutie mark. This suggests Diamond hasn't bullied Apple Bloom before now. A cutie mark is like puberty happening all at once, especially in the social sense. I think it "outranks" a year or two of age. If you had a ten year old that had gone through puberty, and it was immediately and undeniably obvious (don't want to get too specific, but you can fill in the blanks here), I could totally see them teasing the crap out of a 12 year old who had not yet started to undergo puberty.
It actually helps explain why adults care so little about Diamond and Silver teasing the CMC: How concerned would you be if some kids were being teased by younger kids, as oposed to kids their own age? There's never a hint of physical violence until Babs shows up and takes over the Adorabullies, and if Babs were a year or two older than DT and SS, it would explain why they were so excited to welcome this girl into their little clique and let her basically take it over.
Now, the difference isn't that big, I think 4247154 has a point that Spoiled Milk already has a bun in the oven at this point and it just hasn't started to show yet.
Anyone else kind of felt this episode was harsh on Big Mac? He only lied to help cover for his sister, nearly got his leg sawed off, and at the end acts like he's as guilty as she is.
4247331 I was guessing that Granny was just playing along at that point, and she wasn't really going to saw off anypony's limbs. That said, her shocked "Big Mac!?" does point against my guess...
4247154
One quick way out of this is a common fanon squick that Apple Bloom is Applejack and Big Mac's daughter, so your mind is not deep enough in the gutter yet. :)
4247790 Sadly I already went there. I tend to hold back because most people are a little to sensitive. I have yet to come across anything that truly squick's me. Incest and children of is barely lewd at this point.
Apple Bloom being Applejack and Big Mac's daughter makes to much sense. Given how wonked the cannon is toward timelines and character ages when things happen.
4247331
I have a deep, instinctive aversion to watching characters try to mitigate one stupid action with yet more stupid actions, repeatedly. I understand that this is probably just me, and to most other people it was probably funny, but I found this episode a rather trying experience. To a more objective eye than mine it was probably quite good, there certainly aren’t any really glaring writing problems.
But they do need a lorekeeper on staff.
That would make it a criminal investigation rather than science. :)
Also notice that bottled “cider,” or whatever it actually is, gets packaged into other unlabeled crates. You don’t do that with something that spoils so fast that it won’t survive outside retail.
There’s probably some correspondence education option for classes beyond a certain level anyway…
…Wouldn’t it be “Spilled” Milk though? This is kind of a big difference. :)
Neither, I’m pretty sure. Reasoning: Later on we find that having no business with the Rich family would ruin the Apples.
Eyeballing the size of Sweet Apple Acres and keeping in mind they produce multiple apple harvests throughout the season, means that they have to produce tens, possibly hundreds of tons of apples a year, not to mention other crops. The Rich family is the only distributor who can handle this kind of amount, or at least, the only distributor who can be located while the crop is fresh, which is why the relationship with him is so critical. Can they retail that much through their small general goods store? No way.
So it looks like this:
Rich’s Barnyard Bargains is the Original Seed Business of the Rich family, that started by selling to Apples (and their homestead neighbors who eventually turned up) and retailing their produce. But the hundred jars of zap apple jam is more of a token of good luck than anything at this point, the next generation of the Rich family expanded the business significantly into selling farmer’s produce to Canterlot and beyond, and have their hooves in every kind of pie now. The original Ponyville store is training wheels and final exam for the designated heir. The store itself is not that important economically and has primarily symbolic meaning. Handling it on their own means the heir is on the fast track up to inherit the rest of the Rich businesses when the current head of the family retires.
This is why Granny’s threat to talk with Filthy Rich’s grandfather is a very serious threat: breaking ties with the Apples would be seen as mismanagement.
Well, that’s as good a place to stick her into as any. Although, where are they? In Over the Barrel, Appleloosa has only existed for a year.
That might be.
But I still think the best way to explain all the discrepancies is to think that this entire episode is a story told by Apple Bloom to a third party, like the rest of the CMC, about how she found out why Applejack never lies. Spoiled Rich is in it because Apple Bloom encountered her recently, but she was a wife, not fiancée, by that moment. Diamond Tiara turns out to be younger than Apple Bloom, because that’s how Apple Bloom would like it. Other random ponies turning up are there because Apple Bloom mentally populates Ponyville with ponies she knows. Big Mac never shuts up, because Apple Bloom would like to hear him talk more. The actual reason that bottled cider never goes to outside retail is something else entirely.
Did you notice that the entire story starts with a lie? “Your big sister lied so much when she was a filly, the whole family ended up in the hospital.” This is technically correct, because that’s where the story ended, and all the Apples present were in the same room at the time, but the normal meaning for the term is being afflicted with something.
So it’s still “Where the Apple Lies.” Just a different Apple. None of it is, strictly speaking, a lie – but there’s a lot of stretching and creative truth-telling to make the story more exciting.
4247826
I can definitely see your point. Every time Applejack added another layer of stupid to the lies, I was annoyed, I just loved seeing young Rich, the breakout star of this episode, and talkative Big Mac. Teenage Applejack was pretty annoying.
Do they? I wouldn't have guessed. How long has this person held their job, and do they keep an eye on the comics?
Crap, it is Spilled Milk, isn't it? Ok, regardless of who picks the names, why are ponies named this at all, or Flim and Flam?
Genius, that ties it all together! It explains why the Rich family is so big and important, they probably supply half the grocery stores in Equestria with their produce. My only quibble would be that this suggests if Filthy is moved up to the store, his father is running the overall empire, so why would he be scared of Granny telling his Grandfather? My guess here is that Stinkin' Rich is in an old folks home now and retired, but Filthy is still a dutiful son who wants more than anything to make his beloved grandpa proud, even if Grandpa no longer has a direct veto on his prospects.
We keep getting more and more deeply invested in the Rich family these days. Are you reading the Silver Standard by Patchwork Poltergeist? It has a fantastic level of analysis of the Rich and Silver families and how they operate.
Dodge Junction maybe?
On the one hand, I have to disagree with the likelihood that this is a 3rd-layered meta story related by Apple Bloom with double-unreliable narrators. On the other hand, damn if you don't come up with the coolest, most intriguing prospects from the least likely episodes. It's like watching Rapunzel spin straw into gold.
4247331
Good catch.
Better catch.
4247850
They need one. They don’t believe they need one, and they certainly don’t have one.
My guess is… There’s no destiny. Rather, this is destiny manipulation: By giving the child a certain name, ponies expect to confer the destiny upon the child. The name itself leads to the child being interested in certain prospects from a very early age, which eventually leads to success… Or doesn’t. Filthy Rich is named so because he’s a Rich, and because his parents wanted him to be filthy rich when he grows up, and expand the family fortune. So he’s interested in business, gets a cutie mark with bags of money, and lives up to the name. Even though he doesn’t like the connotations of his name, because ponies who dislike him for whatever reason always shorten it in the wrong direction, he never tries to change it or uses a nickname.
But sometimes, it goes the other way. There’s that joke, probably severely racially insensitive in this day and age, wherein a Native American child asks his parents why is his brother is named Rising-Sun, and told that his brother was conceived at sunrise. He then asks why his sister is named Blue-Flower and gets a predictable answer about a field of blue flowers. He never asks why he is named Torn-Rubber, himself, that is implied. Yeah, don’t read it, it’s bad. But the idea is the same: Sometimes, the name is given to a child in hopes that they work against this name in the future. “Spoiled Milk” was named this to motivate her to marry into money. And her cutie mark is a diamond engagement ring. Literally her entire life’s purpose is to marry into money.
I’m not sure what kind of story Flim and Flam have in this interpretation, but it’s probably quite interesting.
Because the empire is big enough for his father to be running a regional subdivision while the grandfather is still the overall head having executive authority over everything.
No, but I suppose I should. :)
Likelihood? There’s no such likelihood at all. That is, I am certain that this wasn’t the authorial intent.
But I also suspect that our authors remain entirely unconscious while writing for at least half the time, because there’s no way they wouldn’t notice that and numerous other glaring flaws if they were awake. :)
4247826
Fuck it. Let's just say that Granny Smith was making a weak justification for a tradition that only applies to some of their cider.
I also really like this explanation.
The Apple Family apparently has branches all over Equestria. Appleloosa is just the most recent place they've settled. Braeburn and his parents could be from any number of other places. Probably one of the locations mentioned in Apple Family Reunion.
4247826
Adding to the list.
Agreed on all of this.
4247850
Suddenly, I think I understand the author’s thought process for the name “Spoiled Milk.” I found this little gem in a collection of riddles and jokes for children:
What do you get from a pampered cow? (Spoiled milk!)
…You know what, screw the author. :)
4247862
Yes, you should. It's really really good.
4247862
Dang it Oliver, way to get my hopes up with my misreading of your words!
Yeah, they should at least make themselves a show bible. I feel like this is an area where they are slacking a bit at Hasbro. You know at Hasbro every Friday they get to leave early? It's a fairly chill work environment, but the writers could stand to put in a few long nights and nail this stuff down.
It's a "Boy named Sue" kind of thing. I think that's the best excuse I can think of, though I do like the idea that Spoiled comes from simple dairy farmers. I think Flim and Flam were named that way to work against their names and be honest business ponies, it just failed spectacularly. I like the idea that this is a widespread pony cultural thing, I could see it as a tradition.
That would be the Pony Inquisition, and non expects that. A disquisition is just a fancy name for a treatise.
4247868
I am terrified of Oliver on peyote. Normal person takes peyote or another hallucinogen, comes back and says "oh man, the entire world is just the dream of some tiny bug on a leaf somewhere." That's hilarious. Oliver comes down and says "the entire world is just the dream of some tiny bug on a leaf somewhere" and he has 14 irrefutable points that prove this. Then how would I ever be able to sleep again?
4248197
Exhaustion, I guess.
4248197
Not so much slacking as simply can’t do much about this, due to the way the production process works, I bet.
1. Networks can and do show episodes in whatever order they please, so they have to strive for commutativity of individual episodes.
2. Scripts apparently have to pass a gauntlet of executive meddlers and stupid oversight groups, and get to production a long time after they were written.
3. Multiple episodes are produced in parallel by directors who don’t have time to talk to each other.
4. They easily forget that ponies are not really human. Most people do. :)
Because of all that, and the lack of strong, monolithic creative control, the general attitude is that even while at least some of the crew wants continuity and consistency, they also think it is an exercise in futility, and trying to is risking their jobs.
It’s a happy accident that it’s any good. It’s pretty much a miracle that it’s still as good as it is.
I really wonder what sort of pony would we get if a serious Japanese studio with experience in making ultra-long-runners were to be making it. The result would not necessarily be good, but it would be very interesting to see even if it sucked, if only for the science of it.
4248203
Scheah right, what if my sleeping is what causes the bug to wake up?
Apple Bloom's timeline makes sense if the Appleparents are still alive somewhere else, and she's either in gestation or yet to come. This is the point where I start goofing on the Bonny and Clyde of the Mild West, the terror of town banks and stage-coaches alike, Fuji and Gala Apple, pony outlaws.
BTW: are the Oranges Granny's children, or a niece and nephew?
4408962
No canonical indication whatsoever, we don’t know.
One interesting theory holds that the Oranges are Applejack’s real parents. They are just non-grata on Sweet Apple Acres for reasons of abandoning their rigid farmpony ways.
4408971 The Oranges seem to be fairly well-off, well-off enough to raise their own children if they wanted. Why wouldn't they keep Apple Bloom if they were the biological parents? They seemed to tolerate Applejack well enough while she was there learning her manners. She left on her own hook.
4408975
Two options.
They simply aren’t very good parents.
Granny Smith held some sway over them and pressured them to give up Applejack, only to reconsider when Applejack herself decided to live with them.
I don’t like either on general interpretation policy grounds, so I don’t subscribe to the theory, but I can’t deny it has some merit.
Shouldn't that make it two chronons for the timeline, rather like Cutie Mark Chronicles?
You…do see the conflict here, right? okay, the endnote says you do. Oh, wait, Applejack being a little older then than AB is now.
4248288
leads nicely into a side note that took most of my note-taking attention:
❧The cider censorship is a late whack-job. How could I tell? I had CCs on and a third of them (well, 5/15, plus one "juicin'" for 16) said "cider" when the voice was saying "juice". [timecodes for netflix, no-commercial version]
"juice" = cider @ 0:54, 2:01, 4:34, 4:51, 6:28
vs
"juice" = juice @ ~:50, 3:34, 5:20, 6:35, 6:50, 6:58, 7:03, 7:20, 8:2?, 15:50, 21:28
and juicin' 6:22
❧
Ditzy Doo with bandaged eyes in that flashback.covered4247331
Even where I live, the "guy who owned the first general store" made multiple millions and built several mansions. He doesn't have to be Sam Walton.
Huh. An option.
4248203
I cannot resist the opportunity, given the Shining twins cameo. "Play with us, Danny[J]!"
4522714
Before "Viva Las Pegasus" I would totally have agreed with you. Early Diamond Tiara struck me as precisely "big fish in a small pond," as the daughter of the owner of the dry-goods store. But the fact that ponies in Las Pegasus recognize the Rich Family name as one of the wealthiest families in Equestria suggests they are pretty darn wealthy.
4522810
It's very hard to draw conclusions from that segment because nopony in the scene is acting in earnest.
If we're going to treat it as 0-level (no deception), then an alternate interpretation that doesn't require that assumption is "Gladmane knows Flim&Flam have been all over and trusts their word on who's monied".
Alternately, and with even less assumption, Gladmane has researched AJ and Fluttershy, enough to recognize on-sight. AJ does business with Filthy Rich.
Alternately, there really are only a dozen (at most) towns of note in Equestria. (Implausible, but…) If he's studied Ponyville's history…plausible because AJ has been a target of his study, the Apple family's all over, and she's close enough to the founder Granny Smith.
One way for him to do this research really easily is for Flim and Flam to be disowned/blacksheep Apples, which their cutie marks suggest.
Crossposting to that episode because yeah.
4522870
That sounds like a fairly reasonable assumption.
This one less so. Gladmane knows AJ and Fluttershy because they have a stained-glass window of them, and its his job to know the names of any celebrities that might visit his casino. I'm sure he reads the newspapers and never forgets a face. The idea that he does detailed research on who the business partners are of every possible celebrity who could show up at his casino seems less likely.
I've always suspected that might be a possibility. Heck, they both have identical fur/coat combos as Apple Bloom! I wonder if their unacknowledged offspring from an Apple making deliveries to the city of Philadelphia a few decades ago...
separate question: wait, did they say "juice" at all in the original airingfimwiki has me here, it's just the Netflix version that got censorwhammied so that they never said "cider".(They helpfully point out every time in the transcript, without gaslighting! Calloo! Callay!)