They Are All Made of Stars [episode spoilers!] · 1:20pm Jun 21st, 2017
Lots of new review blogs, no time to waste, gotta watch the episode! >:B
I had a lot of expectations and hopes going into the Appleparents 'sode, and... I'd like to say I wasn't disappointed.
I mean, this wasn't quite what I wanted, I guess? But it's heaps better than Family Appreciation Day as far as Apple-based history lessons go, and it's up there with Amending Fences in terms of grown-up feels. ;_; I'm not crying, you're crying.
Where to start? It took me about ten seconds to go "OH WAIT THAT'S SHATNER" and also I like how "Grand Pear" sounds like the French word for "grandfather". :) I cringed a little at AJ and Big Mac's reaction to the pear jam, entirely because of how many silly fanfics there've been where Apples have strong negative reactions to non-apple fruits. But it wasn't too much of a stretch to realize, oh yeah, this is about feuding, and anyway, we had Strawberry Sunrise already. :B
It's nice to see Goldie Delicious is still kicking around. CATBALL. And I'm just literally going to replay the episode in my mind and react to it as I do, aren't I? c.c
Okay, but Applejack's parents are disgustingly cute throughout this entire episode, and I love it. From the buttercup thing when they were foals (strange how they don't look much older than the Cake Twins in that shot, but they're talking perfectly well; I prefer to think they were actually babbling at each other and understood what they were saying because babies) to... like literally everything else. The best part was when they bowed to each other and 'danced' across the market space. Like, that's when you know, shit this is real. It's bringing tears to my eyes just thinking about it. ;____;
And hey, the writers pulled out all the stops vis-a-vis historical stuff. I got really excited seeing the Mare in the Moon again, and hot damn, Mayor Mare's pink hair! :D (Also how the fuck long has she been mayor?) BUT HOLD THE PHONE
BECAUSE THE BIG REVEAL IN THIS EPISODE -- AND YES I AM TYPING THIS IN ALL CAPS -- IS THAT MRS. CAKE'S NAME USED TO BE CHIFFON SWIRL. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? I THOUGHT HER NAME WAS CUP CAKE. DO YOU CHANGE YOUR ENTIRE NAME WHEN YOU GET MARRIED? WHEN YOU GET YOUR CUTIE MARK? WHY HASN'T APPLE BLOOM? WHY DIDN'T PEAR BUTTER DO THE FORMER? I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS AND NO GOOD ANSWERS FOR THEM.
Okay, enough of that. c.c Song was great. Major props to Felicia Day; she's always a good choice to do anything. (I looked up the VAs for Burnt Oak and Bright Mac, since they're new to the show, too; the former has done a lot of voice work and regular acting. The latter? This is his fourth role ever. How the hell do you get a major role in an episode off of three previous gigs spread out over as many years?) Oh yeah, and Burnt Oak I really liked, it's not often we get male characters with striking character designs, but that mustache is tops. :D
Okay, but why isn't the song named after the episode? c.c
You know what's funny? All that rigamarole and we still don't know why the Apples and Pears feuded. AJ and Big Mac didn't know at the start, and no reason is ever given. It just seems like Grand Pear and Granny Smith flat didn't like each other. Reasons why? None. And I kind of love that.
In all, this one's solid. Maybe not toppest of top tiers, which is probably why I feel a tad unfulfilled, but that's really just being greedy on my part. And I have a feeling it will only get better on a second watch. :) Here's to the actual hiatus!
But yeah, the Apple parents are hella dead. :B
A Royal Problem
The Perfect Pear
Parental Glideance
Honest Apple
All Bottled Up
Rock Solid Friendship
Forever Filly
A Flurry of Emotion
Discordant Harmony
Hard to Say Anything
Celestial Advice
Not Asking for Trouble
Fluttershy Leans In
You're in My Head Like a Catchy Song
Best Friends Until the End of Time
Battle for Sugar Belle
As they should be. Now all we need is to see Scootaloo marching out of the orphanage.
Honestly, I didn't realize that was Shatner until I saw the credits.
Changing names post-mark is a frequently held hypothesis in pony fiction. It's nice to get support for it. (Though that would mean that Spoiled Milk chose to keep that name.)
And I'm pretty sure Burnt Oak is just supposed to be Sam Elliot in pony form, especially since he was selling firewood to the Dude.
So yeah, great episode.
I somehow didn't realize this was the Shatner/Day episode until I read this.
This episode was amazing. I don't even care that it didn't tell us anything about, oh, why the Apple parents aren't there anymore, and indeed just raised even more questions about when and how it happened because apparently even though they had three kids that seem a good number of years apart, even the oldest doesn't remember anything at all about them. But nevermind that because oh my god that song made me cry.
Episodes strongly based on family ties always get me, which is part of the reason I tend to love episodes based on the Apple family.
I'm not even going to lie. I was a bit of an emotional wreck throughout the entire episode. I just finished watching and there are still tears on my face. Such a sad and sweet episode at the same time. The song absolutely wrecked me. Throughout the whole thing I was just so happy for the Apples that they got to learn about their parents and so sad that all of this had to be post-mortem.
Beautiful goddamn episode. Very much top-tier for me, and I don't know how I'm going to be able to watch this one with a friend of mine without being teary the whole time.
4578069
Someone else mentioned this, and I totally missed it! D:
4578103
I never really expected to get an answer to what happened to them. :B That's one of those things you come to realize the show will never tackle.
Also, baby shipping. Yes.
I'm very surprised... Just how amazing this episode was!
I have tears and just smiled of the love the characters and the history that just seems like this might be the best Ponyville history episode we ever seen the past 7 years...
I don't know if any other episode would be able to pull this off. This season had two greatest episodes we have and they are both parents from Rainbow Dash to AppleJack. I do hope for a Scoots family episode...
Now the next one is about Twilights parents which I'm a little worried about because the episode is her trying to spend time with the family while trying to keep other ponies happy...
I'm willing to bet that the it was the grand-père pun that sparked the whole idea for this episode! The amount of detail in so many scenes was wonderful. Letrotski hauling a wagon of carpets made me laugh out loud. This one gets a 5/5 from me!
Oh yeah, and Apple family mares also confirmed for smokin'-hot babes!
But then:
How do the Oranges fit in?
Mike, Always Wondering
Present, you missed the real issue here. None of the Apple siblings ever knew their mother was called Pear Butter. And as an explanation, Granny says: "Well, we always called her Butter Cup, and pear butter looks close enough to apple butter..."
Which means the Apple Siblings always just assumed their dad was an Apple, and so was their mom. So at the least, they assumed cousin, and none of them took issue with this.
Just saying... maybe some branches of the Apple Family tree don't fork as often as they should.
4578138
They don't. :/ They are to remain unloved and forgotten.
4578161
...Oh dear god.
4578161>>4578321
Um. Or, you know, they could have assumed their mother wasn't an Apple, nor from a family the Apples had a vicious rivalry with, but from any other family.
4578321
Another little tidbit that amused me to no end... 131456 hours is 15 years. Assuming these two are eighteen (legal age to get eloped) he's considering their anniversaries to have started from age 3, which looks like the age they were when they first met.
Bright Mac was a giant nerd, but a sweet one.
4578327
Ignoring the implications don't make them go away.
Okay, I was waiting for someone else to be "that guy", but I've just got to say it: Wow, what a pear!
Hang on... if Grand Pear had never come back to Ponyville until now, does that mean he didn't even come back when Pear Butter died? There are ways round that I know, eg having the Apple Parents die somewhere else, but it's where my mind went.
4578532
She was already dead to him.
4578542
Yeah, exactly. Even allowing for a feud, it seems bloody harsh.
Is it bad that I was waiting for the camera to pan to a pair of gravestones throughout 70% of the scenes?
4578563
Honestly, realizing things like this makes the ending all the more poignant. It's far too late for Grand Pear to undo his mistakes, but he can certainly start making amends for them.
ttttthhhhhhhhhhiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiissssssssssssssssss
4578485
Hush you.
Chiffon Swirl. Clearly descended from Star Swirl. Because slight similarity = obvious connection.
4578571
I was hoping for it. They're dead. That's not in question anymore. I just wanna know why. If Sesame Street can do that Mr. Hooper episode, MLP can tell us how they kicked the bucket. Maybe some delayed Romeo and Juliet thing...
But yeah, great episode. Been waiting for Shatner, and he did very well here. One of the best of the series. The Apple parents are so adorable together. Based on that, my guess is that she died giving birth to AB, and he died of a broken heart not long after.
I almost feel bad about my serial killer Applejack fic now...
"Mom and Dad left us something ta remember them by."
They are hella dead.
But man, that ep was sweet. And I really love seeing the minor characters get roles, so watching Mrs. Cake, Mayor Mare, and Dude-They-Introduced-And-Will-Immediately-Forget was really cool.
And dat song.
Man, S7 has been like one part gold hidden beneath two parts crap.
4579091
ethicsalarms.files.wordpress.com/2016/01/head-exploding.jpg
I HAVE to read that fanfic.
I must. I have never needed something so much.
4578138
4578321 The better question is: When will we find out Strawberry Fields is Applejack's long-lost sister?
This was as close as any pony episode has ever come to bringing a tear to my eye socket. DHX has still got it.
Competition for a small market share turned personal, perhaps? I assure you it's possible; I lived in a tiny island community for years, and you would not believe how petty people can be in such cultures.
4578341
Well, of course. We've known since Season 1 that
he'shis son is good at "fancy mathematics."4579143
Yeah. And going by the order, it's like they're bundled like old movies: an "A" picture with a "B" picture. Fortunately, this does not mean we've reached the dreaded shark-jump; just that you never know what you're going to get.
4579284
I believe that was a trait we knew about Big Mac, not Bright Mac.
4579387
Must be where he got it from!
4579459
MLP parents are... different. They always seem to be inspired by the children, instead of the other way around. In that respect they are more like the parents of Homestuck, except in Butter Cup's case apparently Pinkie jumped into the machine with AJ's slime clone, and Bright is a combination of AB and Big Mac.
Great episode, easily best of season so far, and that's not relying on it having the best song since probably Hearth's Warming Tale.
Knew Bright Mac's voice had to be someone's I'd heard before, but didn't put together who (the Shat wasn't Shatting) until this thread, and I knew who Burnt Oak (I know he sells firewood, but the name had me immediately thinking to whisky--new/old charred oak barrels) had me thinking of, but didn't know the name or exactly where.
History was done well, preferred it to the TS/FS Appalachian feud. Couple was adorable, giving Cup Cake and Mayor Mare significant roles was nice. Perhaps overobvious, but I did like the Grand Pear foreshadowing.
Definitely caught the "we're cool with you marrying your cousin, just not a Pear" implication, and especially after that, Granny Smith seemed to accept Buttercup really fast. Actually kind of sad that she apparently made the transition so completely that she never did pear butter again--and, in fact, if she ever did, apparently her mother in law would explode. (Or I can take the charitable view that Granny only started doing that after Buttercup died. :p But seriously, why doesn't at least Big Macintosh remember anything about them?)
Is this the last one before the hiatus? If so, good note to go out on.
4579472
I like that comparison.
4579143
Might say more like 1:1:2 or 1:1:1 great/crap/eh. With songs, however, it's absolutely 1:2 great/crap.
4579571
Shatner was Grand Pear, not Bright Mac
Well, now I know the feeling of having your most popular story knocked out of canon.
4578807
Chiffon Cake, nee Swirl, nicknamed Cup because "Chiffon" is a mouthful of a name, I mean really.
4578053
Leaving it in flames behind her?
4579731
She got the name because her sibling, when young, could only get "Cup" out of trying to say "Chiffon".
4579640
Mixed up the names in the post, you're right.
I really shouldn't have watched this before going to work. This episode hit me way harder than I could expect, and I will be an emotional wreck the whole day now.
4579284
" I lived in a tiny island community for years "
Inspiration for one of your fics?
4583411
(Spoiler'd for off-topic.)
Well... partially. But it wasn't quite as awful as that.