Forgotten Friendship Review · 7:58pm Feb 17th, 2018
And now the moment the fandom has been waiting for for years...
Sunset Shimmer in a bathing suit.
Oh, and something something Celestia, whatever.
So I love the opening scene, Wallflower Brush makes great comically serious material. But yeaaaah, kinda obvious she's the villain. Even if she doesn't act evil here, come on writers, whenever you introduce a new character in a show, they are the first choice to be pegged as a villain. I do appreciate they immediately set Trixie up as the obvious villain, but obvious red herring is obvious. Also, while the smoke out joke is great... how did that door lock itself, Trixie opened it when she came in.
"Dear Princess Twilight. I still have dreams about that time we sang a duet together." Aw.
And now the swimsuits. Really surprised they did this, sure those swimsuits are very conservative but this is still a beach episode with the teenage girls in swimsuits, on a family show. Also, why does Sunset's swimsuit have studs? So, hang on, if the spell or whatever's going on erased all their memories, shouldn't Twilight not know who she is at all? Good on Sunset to immediately notice something is wrong and use her empathy magic to see AJ's memories with her not in them.
I like the continuity here, mentioning Sunset texted Pinkie while pretending to be Applejack, like they implied in the first movie. And now Princess Twilight. I have a big "hmmmm" over Sunset's mane style, it's different from the other side view, but I don't recall clearly seeing that side before since they didn't do that in the animation often when we saw her as a pony before. It'll take getting used to. I'm still not over her new color scheme frankly but I'll let it slide. Twilight has never hard of memory spells like this before, I raise an eyebrow at that buuuuut thinking it over I don't recall spells like that either outside the S3 finale, so I guess this is apt. Twilight makes the suggestion to consult somepony else.
Here we go. The moment everyone was hyped for. Twilight is so awkwardly adorkable here, but how is she supposed to act? Sunset swallows her pride and apologizes while asking for help, and Celestia comes forward. "I've missed you." And hugs. Feels are had all around. And then Twilight squees and we laugh. And then bookhorse is a bookhorse. I have no words, this entire library segment is milking the Twilight book joke for all it's worth and then keeps yanking anyway, and it's hilarious.
Major props to the show for not tying Star Swirl the Bearded into this. S7 finale aside, Star Swirl has long been the show's go-to ancient spellcaster to link stuff to, I really appreciate they bring up Clover the Clever here. Also, Clover is a he, go figure. They recount a cool tale of him chasing a sorceress who had a stone that could erase memories.
Back with the humans, I at least appreciate the idea of Sci-Twi worrying about Sunset, since she hasn't had the same level of bullying from her the others have. And then Trixie is Trixie. And she's in a swimsuit too, I have no problem with this. Sunset decides to go home while Twilight stays to keep reading, what a shock. And then goodbye to Celestia with moar feels. And then shipping fuel. And then Trollestia strikes hard. Sunset returns and tells the group about the memory stone, and also shows them the pictures on her phone. Um, hang on... this is a pretty big plot hole I think. Wouldn't the rest of them have group pictures, too? And why didn't Sunset pull out her phone earlier? Trixie laughs and smokes out, and Sunset crushes Twilight's drone by accident.
At the school funny scene with Microchips and then Sunset spies Trixie. EPIC STAREDOWN!! Trixie pulls out an awesome poster and Sunset confronts her about the memory stone. To no one's shock, Trixie has no idea what that is. Sunset almost lets out a bad word. She realizes Trixie really isn't the culprit, and major writing props to Trixie realizing Sunset is actually having a problem here because the ham deflates instantly and she consoles Sunset. "So you have this idea of how you're supposed to be, but no one else at school sees you that way..." said as other students laugh at Trixie's poster.
*smashes a wine bottle* I hereby christen the S.S. SunTrix ready to sail!
Trixie offers to help Sunset and of course we know what she wants in return. Back in Equestria, Twilight finds out a time limit about the memories being able to be restored, and heads off to warn Sunset. However, Sunset left the journal in her locker and leaves with Trixie. A pretty big oversight, girl, you KNOW Twilight is researching on the other side of the portal. Trixie asks Sunset who would be willing to erase everyone else's memories of her reformation, and Sunset admits it could be anyone since she was meant to everyone back in the day.
And then Maud is here. And she's Maud. And rocks. Sunset looks over the yearbook info and says they've questioned everyone in school. Except for one girl that Trixie notices has no photo. No prizes for guessing who. "Who's Wallflower?" "I'm right here." As Trixie talks to Wallflower, Sunset gets Twilight's note about the rock formation where Clover buried the stone, and shock of shocks, she lowers the journal to see a picture of the same formation on Wallflower's computer; the school garden, and she's president of the gardening club. Sunset grabs Wallflower's hand and has a vision of her finding the memory stone and info on it, and when she decided to use it, jealous of how much everyone loves Sunset.
And now song. Technically a villain song, since it's Wallflower's, but it's not a typical villain song ofc. She despairs being invisible and alone. While she's singing Sunset slips off to look through her bag, and the song abruptly stops when Wallflower notices. "Let's not antagonize the person with the all-powerful mystery rock!" This should be on a T-shirt. Wallflower erases their memories and makes her getaway, locking the two in the yearbook room. Trixie asks how they can figure out what's going on and Sunset realizes she was clever - she used Twilight's drone, which I guess happened to be there, to record the conversation, and wrote herself a note, too.
Sunset gets Trixie to trick them out of the room, and Trixie needs a pep talk to do it. She somehow does, smoking through the locked door, but forgets Sunset. She smokes again and they swap a few times before she resigns herself to being locked in, telling Sunset to go get 'em. Sunset confronts Wallflower, who breaks down and uses the stone to try and erase ALL the group's memories. Sunset intercepts the beam and loses her memories of the group in a pretty horrifying sequence. Sunset is on all fours, confused about where she is because she has no memories of the human world now. She asks the group who they are and they accept her as a friend after seeing what she did. They touch her and the geodes activate, and they all pony up. And new costumes from before, why not? Let's move that merch. Rainbow Friendship Beam fires, memories come back, the group forgives Wallflower, she apologizes.
So this was a great special. I dunno if it was the intent but it feels like the finale to the EqG series. The very idea of it focusing on the yearbook implies the end of the school year is near, maybe even their last year, and it works as a great framing device to call back to the previous films and show Sunset's growth. Wallflower is a fine antagonist, very believable for a high school girl and it was pretty Buffy-esque with how magic was used to explore teenage problems, in this case a socially awkward teenager using memory erasing magic to try and make others like her. I dislike how she tried to go full blown evil at the end but it isn't a deal breaker.
Again, great special and if this is the last of full-length EqG we get, it's worthy sendoff.
I never thought about that yearbook detail. But apparently we've got at least one more special coming this year, no word on what is or when it'll be out though.
Also, Sci-Twi's selfie drone is probably gonna end up at the center of an invasion of privacy lawsuit one of these days.
There will be a second special that will air this summer. It revolves around a visit to an amusement park but no real synopsis yet.
we cant have a EG final untill sunset wins princess of the fall formal when she dotn even enter just wins by write in that would be the perfect end
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Oh god that's totally how its gonna end. Then Pinkie will shut off the lights and leave, much to everyone's confusion.
There's still at least one more special left.
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According to a certain leak, it looks like the limbo dimension from Mirror Magic will play a part in it.
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Oh? Where'd you get this info?
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It's common knowledge.
This felt more like a pilot episode in my opinion but that's just me
I really wanted a scene where memory-missing SciTwi tries to explain who talked her down from destroying the universe.
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Spike?
4800190 While I would love to have seen this
images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51yruBu%2B6wL.jpg , the memory stone doesn't seem to be able to add or alter memories, only take them away. I think Twilight just has some weird holes in her memory.
This was one of the best EqG things I've ever seen, buuut I was expecting a lot more feels than that at the reunion.
I mean that was it?! Hoped to see a few tear leaks and Princess Celestia/Sunset bear hug or something. Maybe even a breakdown. But nowadays Hasbro tones it down a lot. A lot of fanfics are much better.
Anyway, cute swimsuit for Sunset, the rest were okay. Trollestia's back
(wait, you mentioned it).
Was actually missing the time Sunset was queen bee, because I couldn't look at her that way anymore... until now, when everyone treated her like ol' times. Whaat?!
Plus Trixie shining here was satisfying to me.
Plus plus this part:
"You have magic you do not understand. But it is nothing compared to the magic of-"
"Yeah yeah, we get it. BLIND HER UP LADIES!!! Oor something like that. I didn't get what she said.