"Yakity-Sax" Review: Tolerance is the Key to Happiness

So, despite this being an old-fashioned Pinkie Pie episode, I actually find myself a little bit more interested in this one again than it's usually the case with Mane Six episodes these days. I'm still quite a bit peeved over it that it isn't a Yona episode, even though the title implies this to some extent, but this is one of the rare episodes where we can still see a new side and some personal development from a member of the Mane Six, so I enjoyed this one more.

Shortly after the episode started, we have seen Pinkie Pie going through some interesting development. In many episodes, we've seen her reacting immediately depressed, aggressive or even violent when her friends did not give her much attention or when they gave somepony else more attention than her. The reactions of Pinkie that we saw in "Party of One" and "Pinkie Pride" are prime examples for this.
This time, Pinkie Pie still became depressed after her friends told her that it would be best for her to stop playing the yovidaphone because she isn't good at it. But unlike in similar situations of the past, she took it rather well, seemed to roll with it just fine and developed depressions only hours later. And even then she did not act aggressive (except for screaming at the poor waiter in the yak music hut), but rather internalized her feelings, stayed isolated from her friends and then, ultimately, moved away from Ponyville and to Yakyakistan in the hopes this would give her new happiness.
Of course, internalizing your feelings instead of letting them out isn't a good thing to do either, but this shows that Pinkie Pie is trying to deal with depressions in a slightly more productive way than in the past and that she is on the path of developing a better and healthier way to deal with them.
This progression she made there, combined with trying to learn how to play a new instrument, something we haven't seen her doing so far, already make this episode slightly more interesting than I would have expected it these days from a typical Pinkie Pie episode. But there is a little twist in this episode that increases this a bit more still.
While it looked like it's one of these episodes where we see Pinkie Pie deal with attention deficit from her friends at first, the end of the episode revealed that her problem was actually something else.
When Twilight and the others told her she should stop playing the yovidaphone because she isn't good at it, they did this for their own sake, rather than for Pinkie's, because they were annoyed by her bad way of playing it. They only did this to do themselves a favor, but they didn't respect that it was fun for Pinkie to play the yovidaphone.
So, what made Pinkie ultimately depressed wasn't that her friends didn't give her attention, it was that they didn't respect what she likes and that they denied her doing something that is fun for her because of that.
I like the lesson this episode brings a lot, because it conveys one of the most important principles of friendship and also of social coexistence in general:

Even if one of your friends, or anyone, does something that you don't like or that annoys you, you should not berate them on it or tell them to stop with it. In any kind of relationship, tolerance and accepting different things that others like are very important virtues. And this episode shows nicely why. Because, if you do what Twilight and the rest of Pinkie's friends did when Pinkie played the yovidaphone, you might be stopping something that annoys you, but you could also end up destroying something for someone that is fun for them and gives them happiness or even a feeling of accomplishment in their lives.
If you approach someone and tell them to stop with something they're doing, this can have far worse consequences than you accepting it and just dealing with it, even if it isn't to your liking. At the end of the day, it will be easier for you to accept something you don't like, than it will be for someone to stop or even just limitate or hide what they like to do.
Because all you have to do is to expand your horizon a bit, while the other party would have to restrict themselves in something they not only enjoy doing, but that also gives them meaning and identity.
This is a lesson that seems like an average friendship lesson at first, but if being looked at it more closely, it is valuable for all of society. And because of the effect it could have on someone else, you might wanna think about the lesson of this episode and try to apply it if there's someone in the subway playing music on their phone you don't like or even just eating something whose smell you don't like, instead of complaining about it and telling the person to stop or to go away. You will contribute to a better society overall, where everyone's personal happiness is being respected and you might even find unexpected happiness for yourself that way.

In this context, we also learned something interesting about yak society: Despite that their introduction to us made it look like they always want everything to be perfect, it was Yigrid who told Pinkie that her yovidapone playing is perfect because it makes her happy.
This is a very different perspective of the yaks' sense of perfection than what we saw in their very first episode. Apparently, this sense of perfection isn't a general part of their culture and Prince Rutherford and his delegates were only complaining about things not being perfect when Twilight invited them to Equestria because they saw it as disrespectful that Twilight wasn't able to imitate their culture exactly despite trying to appease them with the goal that they get into a diplomatic relationship with Equestria again.
Most of the time, the yaks see something as perfect when it is fun for the one who makes it or creates it. This is a surprising reveal about them, that they deem happiness of others as the most important thing, and shows that their culture is not as primitive as we previously thought.

Aside from Pinkie Pie, I found it to be very interesting how Fluttershy used the term "creature" when she thought that an animal is suffering, as she heard Pinkie's yovidaphone playing for the first time. "Creature" is, as this season's opener "School Daze" taught us, the term that is used in Equestria for citizens of other kingdoms and nations that aren't ponies. Yet, Fluttershy used it to talk about an animal, which shows nicely that animals are as equal as ponies, hippogriffs, changelings, ect. to her.

Lastly, this episode finally showed us Peach Fuzz and Lily Longsocks again, for the first time in Season 8! We've seen Lily happily carrying two Pinkie-shaped balloons and then talking to Sparkler:
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In fandom creations, Lily and Dinky often know each other and are friends or get shipped. Seeing how Lily talked with Sparkler there, maybe Dinky and Lily really know each other.^^

Even more interesting than Lily's appearance, is Peach Fuzz' appearance:
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I'm intrigued by that scowl she gave Pinkie there. In "A Flurry of Emotions", it was shown that Peach Fuzz stays always cheerful and optimistic, even in hard situations. Yet here, having seen Pinkie's depressed reaction, she just scowled and looked anything but optimistic. Why is that?
I'm wondering if Diamond Tiara and/or Silver Spoon, who Peach Fuzz has become friends with after they stopped being bullies as we saw in "On Your Marks" and who are known to be less optimistic than Peach Fuzz, have painted off on her? Especially Diamond Tiara is probably often negative and pessimistic because of the hard life she has with her mother. Which makes Peach Fuzz just the perfect friend for her, with her constant optimism. But could it be that Diamond Tiara's negativity becomes too much for her to handle and is slowly affecting her?
Another possibility is that Peach Fuzz' very own optimism is the reason for this scowl she gave Pinkie there. Maybe, due to her own optimism, she doesn't approve of it when other ponies are depressed, pessimistic and give up and that is what earned Pinkie that scowl from her?
We got another exciting insight into Peach Fuzz' personality again with this episode, similar to how it happened with "A Flurry of Emotions" last season, and I love it to learn more about her! :)

Well, that's it for this episode. It's one of these Mane Six episodes that still show something new of a Mane Six member and are more interesting because of that. But Mane Six episodes like these are rare nowadays and with the little number of Mane Six-focused episodes the show has today, only three in this season so far (while Season 7 had already four at Episode 18), it shows that the creators at DHX let them slowly fade out as mane characters. Maybe next season, we will only see them as side characters with occasional appearances anymore, similar to Shining Armor and Cadance, while the Student Six take center stage?
The next episode seems to be continuing that trend, as it looks to be a Starlight Glimmer & Trixie episode. I will write my review for this episode probably a few days later than usual, as I'm at a convention on this weekend and I'm not sure if/how I will be able to watch this episode when it airs, but I will not have to skip writing it like it happened with "Friendship University".
See you soon!