Ranking The Valentine's Episodes of FiM (From Worst to Best) · 12:12am Feb 15th, 2019
I'll probably do another list like this covering other types of episodes (season premieres, season finales, mid-season finales, and if Season 9 is the last season maybe eventually the episodes for each of the main characters). Anyway, with today being Valentine's Day, I feel like it's worth covering one of the only other holidays to get a pony equivalent in Hearts and Hooves Day. Compared to Hearth's Warming and Nightmare Night, Hearts and Hooves Day definitely hasn't attracted as much attention. I think that's partially because Halloween and Christmas are holidays that young and old alike can celebrate and get into, whereas Valentine's Day is usually a holiday that kids celebrate and then grow out of when they're older (until they enter into a relationship). Today, we're going to look at the episodes I consider to be Valentine's themed.
Like with my list covering the Hearth's Warming episodes, the criteria is a little different from usual rankings. In this case I'm looking at how well the episode plays as part of a theme (specifically the theme of romance/love). And that theme has to be a central part of the plot, it can't just be a sideplot like it was in "Slice of Life" which was focused more on how the town dealt with a wedding while the mane six were on one of their friendship adventures (basically it was "What's a day in the life like for the typical residents of Ponyville and not the mane six?"). And as always, this list is purely the result of my personal opinion so please respect it.
5. The Break Up Break Down (Season 8, Episode 10)
Why it's on the bottom: Despite being the second episode to officially take place on Hearts and Hooves Day, this episode really doesn't do anything to stand out. You could easily make it any other day and not much would change. It also unfortunately has plots that go nowhere. Spike and Discord's bet and Discord not believing in love quickly get forgotten, and Discord is demoted to a supporting role where he's really insensitive to Big Mac's concerns and tells him to break up with Sugar Belle before she can do it to him (with Spike giving the equally dumb advice to hide so she can't find him and thus break up with him). We also have the subplot of Sweetie Belle thinking she has a secret admirer, but the episode makes a fatal mistake. We already see Big Mac send Sugar Belle a package with a bell on it, and had he written an address instead of a name the package wouldn't have gone back to Sweet Apple Acres for Sweetie Belle to receive. Because we the audience already know it's not for Sweetie Belle, the plot loses interest because we're just waiting for the mix-up to be revealed. Whereas had they not showed the package prior to it being opened by Sweetie Belle, we'd have reason to be invested (the idea of Sweetie Belle having a secret admirer could've made for a fantastic episode in its own right). Meanwhile, Big Macintosh's plot is the cliche "Misunderstanding due to overhearing part of a conversation out of context" that has become tiresome at this point, and Sugar Belle doesn't get to do much beyond having her heart broken. If not for the few hints of development for Big Macintosh (including a more believable explanation about why he doesn't like to talk much) and Discord revealing the role he played in getting Big Mac and Sugar Belle back together, this episode would've been a complete bust. Some call it "Slice of Life for secondary characters" but when secondary characters has been a catch all term the show hasn't bothered to properly define, using that label leaves audience members confused (since secondary was used for Starlight and Trixie, why are they not part of the episode but Spike is even though he didn't have the label last time).
4. A Canterlot Wedding Parts 1 and 2 (Season 2, Episodes 25 and 26)
Why they're low: Despite being the "Princess of Love" I don't think the show has ever really established what Cadence's title amounts to outside of a ceremonial one, especially since it seems her powers relate mostly to rekindling relationships between couples that might be on the fray (and we only have one example in-universe to go off of, expanded universe material explains why Cadence was taken in by Celestia and why she's an alicorn, and her being Princess of the Crystal Empire is a position that makes sense given what we've seen of her abilities). And yes, the elephant in the room is that neither Cadence or Shining Armor had been introduced to us prior to this finale. Shining Armor being in the royal guard does lend some support to why Twilight never talks about him, especially since family isn't a subject the mane six talk about often (particularly in Rainbow Dash and Rarity's cases). But admittedly the first part is us seeing things from Twilight's perspective and Twilight's perspective alone, so we don't quite get to see why the rest of the mane six think she's so jealous and possessive because her brother is marrying Cadence. "Lesson Zero" did showcase Twilight slowly losing her grip on reality but it also showed that the rest of the mane six weren't completely dismissing her concerns even if they didn't think it was such a big deal (Applejack's advice probably would've worked had she told it to Twilight before the picnic, when Twilight was in a mood to listen to reason). The two parter is still good in spite of all those hiccups, we can understand why Twilight would think the way she does and why she'd resort to something so drastic (Twilight can easily slip up if she thinks she's right and doesn't always stop to think if she should do something). Subsequent episodes and "The Best Gift Ever" have definitely done more to flesh out the relationship between Shining Armor and Cadence (to varying extents) but it's definitely a finale that could've and should've been given some time to build up, some time for us to get to know the characters before hand.
3. Hearts and Hooves Day (Season 2, Episode 17)
Why it's in the middle: Remember when the fandom went crazy over I-Tunes leaking this episode early, the first such episode to ever be leaked? If you'd told us back in 2012 that leaks would become a thing of the future and that we'd get sick of them by the end of Season 8, the fandom would've thought you were crazy. Jokes aside, there's nothing particularly bad about this episode, and in fact for the first Valentine's one it does a good job of establishing the pony equivalent and even adds in some lore to try and explain the origins of the holiday (like "Luna Eclipsed" attempted to do with Nightmare Night). What throws this episode off though is the revelation about the love potion actually being a love poison and the recipe for it is contained within a book that Twilight just happened to have. If the potion/poison really produced that bad a result for a long ago kingdom, who in their right mind would put the recipe into a book accessible through a public library? This is why we have those bold warning labels and disclaimers, because you know without them someone will be dumb enough to try it. And Cheerilee really didn't have the authority to punish two thirds of the CMC the way she did. Big Macintosh was right there and gave his approval, so she could do whatever she felt was right for Apple Bloom. Scootaloo is iffy, but Sweetie Belle definitively is outside Cheerilee's jurisidiction without the presence of her parents or Rarity. Considering the show went on to tease us for several seasons with CheeriMac cameos, it also feels a little harsh in hindsight to tease us at the end of the episode like this, and then abruptly dump the relationship seasons later without much fanfare. Plus, the titular holiday quickly takes a back seat to the CMC trying to play shipper for their teacher. And I'd be remised if I didn't mention how "The Perfect Stallion" singlehandedly brought Button Mash and ButtonBelle to the forefront of the fandom, until Jan Animations got on the wrong side of Hasbro and had to basically scrap all his plans.
2. The Perfect Pear (Season 7, Episode 13)
Why it's not number one: If there's one thing about this episode that isn't perfect (pardon the pun) it would be that the romance is already a foregone conclusion. We already know Bright Mac and Buttercup have already gotten together, had kids, and most likely died of unexplained reasons. We already know that they're going to be together despite their families' feud with each other. The focus is primarily on how the two met and how their relationship developed, and the episode is fine because of that. It allows the Apple siblings a chance to learn about their family's past, and them being half-Pear definitely opens up potential in the lore. It'd be nice if we got to see Bright Macintosh and Pear Butter as actual parents, and a little bit of clarification on what exactly happened to them. It's a fine love story, but when them getting together is already a foregone conclusion it does sort of take you out of it (what keeps us invested is what drove them to be together despite the feud and why Granny Smith and Grand Pear never spoke to each other despite the marriage).
1. Hard to Say Anything (Season 7, Episode 8)
Why it's on the top: This episode understands that love isn't a fairytale or a popularity contest, you don't win someone over with dramatic romantic gestures or heroic displays. You win someone over by showing that you care about them, that you understand what motivates them and what they like. Much as I loathe the fact that they just abruptly discard CheeriMac and the CMC expecting romance to play out like a fairytale despite two episodes prior establishing that they were getting older and weren't little children anymore (alongside the jab at Spike for not being fearsome), I appreciate what they did for Big Macintosh. Much like with "Brotherhooves Social" it's his desire to upstage what he views as competition that pushes him to get out of his comfort zone. At the same time he's not willing to completely discard who he used to be, he's not willing to go against what he personally believes in just to be someone else. But most importantly, Sugar Belle isn't just a target of affection or a prize to be won over. She is an actual character with real desires and a personality. And any good relationship stems from the importance of treating your significant other as an equal and not a lesser. It shows what Valentine's Day is supposed to be about, not some commercialist message to spend money on a gift, not an attempt to make you feel ashamed if you're single for any reason, but a desire to promote love in its purest form, a understanding that love means doing nice things for others out of the kindness of your heart and without expecting repayment beyond a compliment. So because of all that, I'm putting this at number one.
For me, it would be:
Perfect Pear
Hard to Say Anything
Canterlot Wedding
Hearts and Hooves Day
Break Up Breakdown, which is the one I go back to the least
5013627 Kind of surprised to see A Canterlort Wedding ahead of Hearts and Hooves Day.
5013632
It depends on my mood.
I consider Canterlot Wedding to be slightly better written overall, but Hearts and Hooves Day is more amusing overall.
Yeah. I kind of have to agree with this list. Anyway, if you are interested, Hopeful Ink Hoof did a Valentine's Day one shot yesterday called Sentry of the Library. Maybe you could look it over. Admittedly, it was off a pairing idea I gave HIH the idea for, but the story itself was all HIH's. Anyway, the story is actually pretty good for a one-shot fluff piece.