Father Knows Beast Review · 4:44pm Oct 6th, 2018
I want to thank all of you for your outpourings of sympathy in response to my recent loss, they were a big help. I'm doing fine for now and I'm glad to know so many of you were willing to give sincere sympathies. Anyway, onto the episode proper, this episode had an already flimsy premise as it is with the idea that after all this time Spike's father would just show up. But the writer for this episode is Josh Haber, the same Haber who in Season 6 was the story editor for the season where Spike got his big break, and more recently wrote "Molt Down" which despite some clear instances of "first draft syndrome" actually managed to place itself on that increasingly rare list of good Spike episodes. So, was Haber able to save Spike from a season that seems bent on character derailment at every turn, or has he too succumbed to the trappings of bad Spike episodes? Well, let's find out.
We begin with a scene that means my fic "After the Molt" is now un-canon, Twilight is teaching Spike how to fly and Smolder ultimately decides to take over because Twilight isn't accounting for the lack of feathers. It's a relatively nice scene, even though it does harpen back to Rainbow Dash teaching Twilight (they even acknowledge the similarities, right down to the "big finish").
The episode begins proper when a flaming fireball crashes into the ground and makes a crater, from the crater emerges a fat slob of a dragon called Sludge. He immediately dismisses Spike and Smolder as baby dragons (which I'm pretty sure Smolder isn't, I always got the impression she was a teenager) but he's too injured to fly away. Spike takes him to the castle right away, and his friends decide to let Sludge stay until he's back to full health. But Sludge is just intent on being a fat, lazy, freeloader. And not the interesting, Garfield variety either.
We get a montage of the mane six (but no Starlight) all trying to accomadate Sludge in various ways, Rarity makes him a sling from her silks, Fluttershy gives him lots of pillows, Applejack tries to have him help on the cider press (but Sludge just drinks all the cider), Rainbow Dash basically unloads him onto the Wonderbolts (or two of them at least, I think they're Spitfire and either Fleetfoot or Misty Fly, or it could be Blaze who often gets mistaken for Spitfire), and Pinkie Pie admittedly seems to have the best idea of the bunch, using a cupcake on a string to dangle in front of Sludge and make him move.
At last Sludge is back to full health and ready to leave, but then he drops a bombshell. He claims to be Spike's father. And no, it's not at all like when Darth Vader revealed himself as Luke's father.
Sludge's story is alledgedly that Spike's mom was sent by the dragon lord to pick the migration route, which could take a life time. So she gave the egg to Sludge, but Sludge took off to find her and ended up in a land of scale traders where he was imprisoned and made to give up Spike's egg. But immediately the mane six start poking holes in his story, and Sludge doesn't answer them, yet Spike believes him and that's good enough for the rest of his friends to believe it. So we have the trappings of a bad Spike episode, in which he drags everyone else down with him.
We do get an admittedly cute montage of Spike doing all the things he's wanted to do with his father, but then Sludge decides he wants to show Spike how to be a real dragon. This leads into the song "You Can't Be a Dragon Here" in which Sludge starts taking away all the pony stuff from Spike, claiming he wants to show what a real dragon does with. But by the end of the song he makes it clear that he's just hoping to freeload off of Spike and live in the castle. Twilight, unaware of any of this for some reason (even after Starlight is thrown out the window in a bathtub, which is the only scene she appears in by the way), checks up on what she thinks is Spike only to be greeted by the grotesque form of Sludge. She leaves the room only to find Spike carrying a huge breakfast to Sludge because he says Sludge wants to show him what a real dragon would do with it. They could not be anymore stupid if they tried.
And then we get to the scene that will really make you wanna rage. Twilight tries to express her worries to Spike about Sludge's behavior (after even her friends see Sludge freeloading off of Spike) and Spike basically accuses Twilight of being resentful of the fact that he has an actual dragon parent now. They even show Twilight's heart breaking because of this! At this point in the show, even if you don't quite see them as mother and son, you cannot deny that Twilight is more or less the closest thing Spike has to family and to a legal guardian! She's even admitted as such, even if it was just a throwaway line.
So it takes Smolder realizing the obvious for Spike to realize he's been played, and he and Smolder devise a plan to expose Sludge. The next day, Spike goes to Sludge and says they're leaving the castle, and then Smolder informs them of a cave they can live in. Sludge refuses to leave and admits that he's not Spike's father.
Sludge leaves and Spike quickly apologizes to Twilight in an admittedly heartwarming scene, but unfortunately it's very brief and the episode just ends on a joke rather than letting us dwell on that last line. So the whole scene with Twilight earlier was just to play with you feels and emotionally manipulate you. That's really something I would expect from say modern Family Guy, when they expect you to take seriously whatever issue they're talking about even when they do a half hearted job and use their usual comedic cutaways.
And that's the story, so what do I think of the episode? Well honestly, I can't get too offended by it. This is sadly kind of become the norm for Season 8, to take concepts or ideas that already sounded sketchy and just do a poor job on them for whatever reason. It's really just "Dragon Quest" with slightly different window dressing, but of all the bad Spike episodes to revisit why would you want to do the one that is arguably the worst of all? Besides, wasn't "Gauntlet of Fire" kind of "Dragon Quest" done right? It's obvious from the get go that Sludge is irredeemable and just a lying, lazy, fat slob. Even Smolder admits he isn't like other dragons, meaning even dragons wouldn't be as heartless and freeloading as Sludge. The fact that everyone just buys into Sludge's nonsense makes this all the more insulting, especially when they previously acknowledge his story makes zero sense. You'd especially think Twilight would either write to Princess Celestia or do a DNA test. What might be most puzzling though, is Starlight Glimmer's unexplained absence. In most episodes it might not be a big deal, but we've seen her living in the castle with Spike and interacting with Spike a couple of times. Even if it was just for one or two scenes, you'd expect her to have a say on Sludge's behavior, maybe even have her be the one who questions Sludge is doing only for Spike to accuse her of being jealous. Even if they were to have made Sludge Spike's father, that wouldn't magically make any of this any better because Sludge would still be a terrible character either way. In the end though, I can't get too mad about it, there are a few self contained scenes that are actually kind of good and the song by itself is harmless (though why couldn't we have Spike actually sing in it?). In the end, I give it a D-, putting it below even "The Mean Six" which at least started off and ended on a somewhat positive note (even though everything in between was cliche and stupid) but above "A Matter of Principals" since at least the one who did wrong here gets called out on it, something that "A Matter of Principals" was sorely lacking.
Well, next week is the finale and I think it's safe to say that baring a really strong finale, Season 8 is going to be the first season in my book to not surpass the previous season in overall quality. The finale is "School Raze" in which the magic of friendship failing causes the mane six to leave the school and get stuck in Tartarus, allowing Cozy Glow to take over. There's actually an interesting quirk in the finale, but we'll get to that when it comes around. Though admittedly Cozy Glow as an antagonist was a spoiled revelation.
Spike was a huge d
k in this episode if you pardon my language
I can *Somewhat* understand your opinion, but I think the episode is solid overall.
Regardless, you take care and sort out your personal life.
It does make me wonder that, because of his freeloading, did the previous Dragon Lord, Scorch, exile Sludge from the Dragon Lands? I mean, Smolder revealing dragons do anything but freeload, I can see where that could be a possibility. And like I said in my own blog, the fact that Spike's "Dad" would reveal himself and say he was looking for Spike, immediately sent up red flags for me, and I would have seen the mother being more set on finding her hatchling. A mother would know her child anywhere in most iterations, in my opinion.
Yeah, Spike was being a big jerk to Twilight
, but I'm glad they made up in the end
.
Where?
What? What "character derailment" are you talking about? The only instances of that that I can think of are "Non-complete Clause" and "Marks for Effort."
Twilight's been known to get jealous of others on multiple occasions, so this argument isn't exactly unwarranted.
I feel like if they had included Starlight in this episode, it only would have made it worse since she's the most polarizing character on the show in recent memory. It also wouldn't make sense to accuse her of jealousy from a storytelling perspective given that she's not known for her jealousy, unlike Twilight, who is.
Honestly, the only good thing that came out of this episode was Spike's line about how Twilight raised him, which makes the scene of him accusing her of being jealous all the worse. We finally have confirmation that Twilight is seen as more or less Spike's mother in-universe. Twilight is the one who raised Spike, not Celestia.
4949160 What?
How was Spike a dick in this episode?
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Admittedly, that would have probably made for a better episode. It could have really packed a punch with the feels between Spike, his mother, Twilight, and Celestia.
Well, I can definitely understand your points on all of this. And now I will share an episode re-write idea I've had since reading the "Recap" page for the episode on TV Tropes:
"Mothers Know Best" (which, of course, would be a title-modified version of this episode; and yes, the plural on "'Mother'" IS intentional): There is an opening rampage involving an adult female dragon looking for something, the Mane Six, Spike and Smolder go to investigate and try to talk to the female dragon before anybody gets badly hurt. The adult female dragon (you can decide on a name) sees Spike and acts like she has found what she is looking for. From there, we get a flashback taking up the entire first act explaining that this adult female dragon is Spike's biological mother and the incredible circumstances that lead to Spike's egg coming into Celestia's possession and why she has been legitimately unable to come looking sooner). Act two, well, it involves Twilight and Spike explaining matters to the female dragon and Spike trying to adjust to having BOTH of his mothers in his life (and, for the record, seeing how good a job Twilight has done raising Spike has been enough to calm the female adult dragon down considerably and she shows herself to be an extremely nice lady when she is calm - ESPECIALLY by DRAGON standards). Act three then basically boils down to the female dragon agreeing to leave Spike in Twilight's care (with the provision that Twilight and her friends continue to take good care of him) but also visit as often as she can.
That is, of course, unless you have a far better idea (which, I will concede, is not only possible, but also likely).
For me, this is the sixth weakest episode of the season, with the second weakest song of the season.
Before even this episode, though, i considered this to be the best season yet.
The finale only cemented that opinion
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There's one scene where Rarity talks normally at Zecora's hut and then goes back to talking loudly because she's lost her hearing. And there's no in-universe explanation as to why Smolder didn't mention the wings as part of the molting phase. Not to mention the phoenix feathers contradict the fact that we've seen ponies around phoenixes and Celestia even keeps one as a pet, yet none of them lose their hearing even though Philomeena was shedding feathers in her debut.
Discord in "A Matter of Principals", Pinkie Pie in "Yakity Sax", Fluttershy in "Fake It 'Til You Make It", and Twilight in not only the episodes you mentioned but also "The Mean Six" and "A Rockhoof and a Hard Place".
Doesn't mean Spike had any right to accuse her when she was trying to warn him.
For the reasons I just mentioned above.
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I could see a different possibility of Spike's Dragon Mother showing up in Canterlot, speaking with the princesses, and than sending a letter via dragon's breath to Twilight and Spike to come to Canterlot, where they reveal the whole situation of how Spike ended up in Twilight's care, and why the Dragoness mother of Spike entrusted him to the ponies. As far as her taking over being Spikes mother, I would say that she makes a compromise to let Spike stay with the family he knew, and would stay herself, even helping pony kind not fear dragons so much.
A little more far fetched idea would be the dragoness being considered the dragon goddess of her fellow dragons, seeing how the immortals so far are "mostly" female, giving Spike an even greater revelation that he is also a dragon god.... or at least dragon demi-god. Would explain the survival of the belly flop he took in "Dragon Quest". That belly flop even felt as if I had done it. *sudders*
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First of all, Smolder probably didn't mention the wings because the writers wanted to keep it as a pleasant surprise. Secondly, Philomena is a bird. Spike is a dragon. It's been shown in-universe that dragons are vastly different from birds. Birds molt naturally; it's a part of life. While the molting process for dragons is a totally normal part of a dragon's life, it only occurs once as far as we know, so of course the effects of a dragon's molting are going to be completely different from Philomena's, who, as I stated, is a bird. Therefore, I see no contradiction here. The only contradiction here that I can see is that this contradicts what was stated in "Secret of My Excess."
Discord is a trickster. I'd actually be surprised if he wasn't being vindictive about Starlight being headmare. That's a part of his character.
I don't see how Pinkie Pie's character was derailed here. She is very childlike. She found something that she loves and her friends took that away from her because they were personally annoyed with it. I don't blame her for wanting to leave Ponyville. I'd want to leave too if my friends treated me like that. Of course she's going to be depressed because of that. That's true of any child, of anyone. This is why so many of us don't want to think about what's going to happen when the show ends, because it's something that we love and having it taken away is going to be heart-wrenching for so many people.
Again, I don't see any instances of Twilight's character being derailed here. I think you might be confusing evil Twilight for the real Twilight. And the same goes for "A Rockhoof and a Hard Place." Had her character been derailed in that episode, she would've gladly turned Rockhoof to stone instead of trying to talk him out of it. Had you said that her character was derailed in something like "A Canterlot Wedding" or "It's About Time", I would've agreed with you.
Now we come to Fluttershy. I don't see how her character was derailed in this episode. As far as I'm concerned, she was merely playing a role and took it too far. Again, had you said that her character was derailed in an episode like "Putting Your Hoof Down", I would've agreed with you.
I took the liberty of reading through your blog posts regarding these episodes and even rewatching all of these episodes myself and couldn't find anything. The only thing I could find is the fact that you don't think Pinkie is an idiot, but that's not true. Pinkie's behavior in "Yakkity Sax" is no different than her behavior in "Party of One" or "Filli Vanilli."
But he didn't accuse her of anything; all he said was, "Maybe you just don't like that I have a real parent now." That's literally all he said to her.
I have a feeling if Starlight was present in this episode, it would've just ended up like most of the other episodes she appeared in that you've criticized where she's the only character allowed to have a brain. Again, Starlight can be a good character, or at the very least tolerable, when the show isn't blatantly trying to shove her down our throats by doing everything in its power to make her just as popular as Sunset Shimmer.
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Him saying that exact sentence was stating that Twilight was his adoptive mother, since she had know him his whole life, and now when the supposed blood relative shows up, he's basically accusing her of trying to keep his blood family from being in his life.
I have to agree with SuperPinkBrony12 here. Spike had no right to treat and accuse Twilight the way he did. He may be a child still, but even then it's still does not give him the right to give the mare who watched over him that kind of treatment.
4949280 Except she had a good reason for doing that. Sludge was being a bad influence on him. She's not stupid. She saw right through Sludge.
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All the more reason Spike's treatment towards her in that scene is unjustified.
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Yeah. I have to admit, of the two possibilities, the first one seems like the much more likely. But I DO thank you for sharing the idea.
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no prob
4949251 Pinkie Pie's behavior in "Party of One" is VERY different from her behavior in "Filli Vanilli" or "Yakity Sax"! Pinkie actually put two and two together in that episode and was able to successfully stalk Rainbow Dash all the way to Sweet Apple Acres.
Oh, how the mighty have fallen...even Josh Harber has failed to pencil in a decent episode.
Well, all hopes on the finale and that it somewhat makes up for the complete drivel this Season has been overall.
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To be honest, these ideas are better then the episode what we got here.
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To be honest, I thought that Zephyr Breeze couldn't be topped for worst MLP canon character. But Hasbro and the MLP staff proved me wrong. At least with Zephyr, he had some finesse to his freeloading. With this episode, I was thinking, "Seriously. Are you ponies that blind to not see his freeloading, and kicking him out?"
While I might understand that they didn't put two and two together about him not being Spike's dad, and not wanting to hurt Spikes feelings once they realized Sludge was a freeloader, I can not fathom how they didn't pick up on him freeloading off of Spike. I seriously wanted to yell "WAKE UUUUUUUP!!!" Then again, if I was able to "somehow" do that, I feel I get this reaction:
I'm very relieved that Sludge really isn't Spike's father. I have planned a concept of his real parents that are to be mentioned in a fanfic I'm writing on here.