Ranking the Season Premieres, Version 2 (From Worst to Best) · 4:25pm Apr 7th, 2019
With one final premiere to add, the time has come for this list to be updated. I'm sure you're all very curious as to where the new premiere lands compared to the others. Well, here's the first verison, let's see what changed. Same disclaimers for all my ranking lists apply.
9. Celestial Advice and All Bottled Up (Season 7, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why they stayed on the bottom: It's still odd to think that Season 7 was the only season to have two stand alone episodes for its premiere, whereas every other season has kicked off with a big two parter. I still stand by the theory (hypothesis to be scientifically accurate, theory rolls off the tongue better) that "Celestial Advice" was going to be the two parter premiere for Season 7, before Hasbro for whatever reason turned it down and told Joanna Lewis and Kristine Songco they were getting two stand alone episodes back to back. Again, there's nothing that really ties these two together aside from Starlight, and even then the connection is thin at best. Watching them back to back, you wouldn't believe they were meant as a double length premiere. "Celestial Advice" remains decent, but "All Bottled Up" drags the entire premiere down with it.
8. The Return of Harmony Parts 1 and 2 (Part 2 is weaker than Part 1) (Season 2, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it moved down: This was originally going to be the grand finale for the entire show, the last episodes Lauren Faust directly contributed to (she was involved a little with some early Season 2 episodes like "Lesson Zero" and "Sweet and Elite" but that's about it). For whatever reason the show decided to make this the premiere of only its second season, and decided that it was fine as it was and didn't need to be reworked or retooled. The pacing is still a huge problem, scenes either go by way too fast or drag on for longer than they should. Twilight just suddenly gives up out of the blue, and out of the blue her friendship letters are all it takes to get her to snap out of it. Then we don't even really get a montage of her restoring her friends, only Applejack and Rainbow Dash are given any real focus. And Discord's defeat is very anti-climatic, he sits there and does nothing.
7. The Crystalling Parts 1 and 2 (Season 6, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it's still in the bottom three: The entire first part drags on and on without much happening, to the point where you can be mistaken for thinking that the Part 1 in the title is a typo and this is just a single, stand alone episode. Only when Flurry Heart breaks the Crystal Heart do we actually get something that warrants investment. The most we get prior to that is a lot of focus on Starlight Glimmer, she and Spike really end up carrying this two parter, especially when in its second half it decides to cram more subplots on top of the plots that are already ongoing. And it's saying something that this was the first two parter where Celestia and Luna weren't totally helpless or irrelevant, where they actually did something. That's probably what keeps this from dropping any lower.
6. The Crystal Empire Parts 1 and 2 (Part 2 is weaker than Part 1) (Season 3, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it's still in the bottom half: It's really jarring to see Sombra not learn from his only mistake here, not accounting for Spike. If not for Spike, Sombra would've won. He had Twilight trapped, and all he had to do was bide his time until Cadence's barrier faded again. Sombra still lacks a bit in presence in this two parter, and the attempt at a climax for the end of the first half is hastily resolved in the second half. Not to mention the fact that Shining Armor's sacrifice gets no build up and then that's the most he does until the climax of Part 2 when he tosses Cadence to rescue Spike. I still don't know if this was the best way for Celestia to test Twilight to determine if she was ready for the events of "Magical Mystery Cure" and we never know what would've really happened if Twilight had failed (would Celestia and Luna have stepped in then?). On top of that, Cadence doesn't play nearly as much of a role as she should, given that it's her empire and her cutie mark is the same as the artifact that protects her empire.
5. School Daze Parts 1 and 2 (Season 8, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it moved down: Time has helped to lessen the sting of some of Season 8's failures, and it looks like Season 9 has potential to learn from them and do them right. Again, the biggest problems with this two parter stem from the timeline it's supposed to take place in. After we spent an entire movie of Twilight not listening to her friends as a plot point that she was called out for, her repeating that very mistake with the School of Friendship feels like a bad case of "Aesop Amnesia", to say nothing of how her friends aren't able to cheer her up but Starlight is by basically telling her to make her own rules. The student six end up stealing more and more attention as time goes by, but even then they're never shown to be in any real danger so we don't get the sense of urgency that comes with their leaders ready to go to war to find them. It's also really saying something when this was the most Sandbar was ever actually relevant. His entire existence was just for one plot point where they couldn't use any other character. And they just never developed him from there.
4. The Beginning of the End Parts 1 and 2 (Season 9, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it's in the top half: This two parter definitely feels like it's borrowing a lot from "Princess Twilight Sparkle" and after "School Daze" mostly toned down Twilight's freak outs this one opted to play them up again (albeit with a lot more lampshading, seems like it's not just Shining Armor and Cadence who can call Twilight's freak outs now. I'm just surprised it's taken that long for everyone to do so). But as rushed as it can be, and as much as it seems intent to throw everything it can at you to keep you interested (without giving you time to breath), for the last premiere in the show's history and the set up for the grand finale, it does enough to keep you invested. I'm grateful that they didn't forget about the princesses or the pillars (even if they only actually used Starswirl and didn't mention the ones we know live in places Sombra targeted). However, Discord and Sombra felt like they were there for fanservice more than anything. Sombra loses a lot of his appeal when he never has to really fight for anything, and even in the climax when we know retroactively that Discord could've taken him out at any time but didn't want, it just makes Sombra's defeat seem too easy. It also doesn't really make sense to bring him back and have him be the one to go off on his own. There's nothing in his character that suggests he wouldn't, but canonically what we've seen of Chrysalis and Tirek suggests they'd be more likely to go rouge first. Grogar definitely has appeal as the final big bad, though time will tell if he and Season 9 can stick the landing. Depending on how well they do, this premiere may end up higher or lower with time.
3. Friendship is Magic Parts 1 and 2 (Mare in the Moon and Elements of Harmony) (Season 1, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it stayed the same: From here on out, all the premieres are the same as they were before. There's no change, and not much I can say that wouldn't be repeating myself. Still, looking back on this premiere and comparing it to Season 9's, it's truly remarkable how far things have come. The villains have more of a presence and backstory now, Celestia actually has a role in helping to save the day, and the mane six really have come a long way from their humble origins here. It's interesting to compare them side by side from the beginning of their journey, to the near end of it. If you'd told anyone in 2010 and 2011 that this premiere was but the beginning of something much bigger and much grander, they probably wouldn't have believed you.
2. The Cutie Map a.k.a Cutie Markless Parts 1 and 2 (Season 5, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it stayed the same: Again, I feel like the long hiatus that preceeded this premiere really helped to build up the hype surrounding it. If it had come just on the heels of "Twilight's Kingdom" and even "Rainbow Rocks" it probably wouldn't have been anywhere near as memorable. Heck, considering "Castle, Sweet Castle" lists Meghan McCarthy as story editor, it's not hard to imagine that this premiere only existed because of the hiatus. If not for the hiatus, "Castle, Sweet Castle" probably would've been the premiere for Season 5 and who knows what they would've done from there.
1. Princess Twilight Sparkle Parts 1 and 2 (Season 4, Episodes 1 and 2)
Why it's still on the top: As much as "The Beginning of the End" may have tried to capture the magic of this two parter (though it was never a direct rip-off, it still felt unique enough to be its own thing despite all the similarities), sometimes you just can't beat the original. Even if it was written as far back as August 2012, this premiere for what some consider the best season of the entire show did a lot to set up the reoccurring elements for Season 4 and show that it could work with the new changes brought about by the end of Season 3. It was the kind of reassuarance fans needed that Twilight as an alicorn wasn't going to magically make things different for her or the show. In fact, because it worked so well here, the show seemed to adopt this approach of downplaying Twilight's role as a princess until roughly Season 6/Season 7.
And there you have it, hopefully a fixed version of the episode rankings will be up later today. If not, it should be out sometime within the week, and be sure to stick around for my Q&A followup to my Seven Year FiMFictionversary (you can check out the blog post if you're interested in participating, the deadline is Tuesday night at 11:59 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time).
For me, it goes:
1. Beginning of the End
2. School Daze
3. Celestial Advice/All Bottled Up (mostly for the latter episode. If it was Celestial Advice on its own, it would be near the bottom)
4. Cutie Map
5. The Crystalling (mostly for the Starlight and Sunburst side of things)
6. Princess Twilight Sparkle
7/8. Crystal Empire/Friendship is Magic (these two tend to flip back and forth depending on my mood)
9. Return of Harmony
Yeah. I can see the reasoning for these positions. Excellent points overall.
Though it might be interesting to see one of the villains (your choice which one if you choose to do your own spin on it) say "Look, Grogar, I mean absolutely NO disrespect because, believe me, I AM grateful for the shot at payback. However, let me give you a bit of free advice - Major villain team-ups just DO NOT work. And you know why? Because LITERALLY EVERYBODY - myself included admittedly - is too egotistical to easily follow orders AND looking to betray everyone else at the first opportunity. You want to go with the team approach? Fine. But you would be better off going with lower-tier Dumb Muscle villains who are strong enough to be useful, but JUST stupid enough to follow orders without question as well as talented mercenaries who are willing to do anything you ask as long as you pay them well enough." basically showing this villain is Genre Savvy enough to know these sort of things and give a good reason to not go with the team-up.
For me. the ranking is
7. Celestial Advice (I don't really count All Bottled Up as part of the premier, but if it was, it'd probably be tied for 6th)/School Daze
6. Friendship is Magic
5. The Crystalling
4. The Cutie Map
3. The Beginning of the End/The Return of Harmony
2. Princess Twilight Sparkle
1. The Crystal Empire
I somewhat understand what you say about The Crystal Empire, but I loved it because I thought Sombra had a really strong presence and added a ton of tension to the episode. It also had amazing music and animation. The red lighting in the Sombra scenes also added to the tension. In terms of tension, I think this is one of the best episodes of the show. And in general, it's one of my favourites.