Going to Seed Review (Spoilers for American Fans!) · 9:45pm May 27th, 2019
With every episode up to episode 13 having been aired in Italy, they also had a reliable translation service ready to crank out the English episode (most likely, Hasbro exports the English version to other countries and then they redub the material for their countries. It's like a reverse anime dub). However, that also means that for those who want to wait for the episodes to hit the airwaves, there's a ton of spoilers! Naturally, although it goes without saying:
So if you haven't clicked elsewhere by now, you're obviously consenting to the spoilers. Anyway, this episode was written by David "Dave" Rapp. He wrote one episode last season, "The Parent Map" which changed direction several times. Prior to that he had never written solo, but had written episodes such as "Newbie Dash", "Flutter Brutter", and "Where the Apple Lies". That last one is going to be crucial to this episode for a detail that will pop up later. Was Dave able to deliver a decent episode despite the track record of Applejack focused episodes as of late (not usually bad but often just forgettable), or did he just prove that a live action writer isn't cut out for writing for animated programming? Well, let's find out.
We begin with Applejack preparing the whole family for an important harvest, one that only happens every once in a great while where all the apples in the orchard are ready to be harvested at the exact same time. Big Macintosh has been working hard on a plan for such a harvest and is quite exhausted. Since Twilight and her friends are all busy with the school, Applejack decides they'll need help. And Granny Smith reveals that she already has somepony in mind, Goldie Delicious. A bit of an odd choice, the only reason why I can think of them using her is to conserve the voice acting budget since Peter New also voices her (Applesauce and Apple Rose had their voices recast from Tabitha St. Germain and Ashliegh Ball last season). I suppose sacrifices had to be made somewhere to afford Patton Oswalt and his family (and supposedly Weird Al too). Kind of wish they'd at least mention Grand Pear, he wants to be closer to his grand kids after all.
Goldie Delicious arrives and mentions something called the Great Seedlin', a magical creature that if you can catch it will bestow you an orchard that is harvestable all year round. So it's kind of like a leprachan (catch it and you get its pot of gold). Apple Bloom takes interest in trying to catch it again, much to Applejack's annoyance. It doesn't help that Goldie Delicious and Granny Smith seem to be goofing off more than helping. I guess they don't need the other Golden Horseshoes Gals to pal around.
The next day, a trail of apples is left in the orchard, and Goldie Delicious encourages Apple Bloom to keep searching for the Great Seedlin'. Applejack suspects it's Goldie Delicious herself doing it for whatever reason, but Goldie denies this as do Granny Smith and Big Macintosh. Granny Smith then tells the story of how Applejack used to be so obsessed with finding the Great Seedlin' when she was apparently even younger than Apple Bloom is now. In a flashback we get to see a young Granny Smith and the Apples' parents (including a baby Apple Bloom). However, there's a problem. Applejack doesn't have her cutie mark yet, and Big Macintosh is only about as tall as he was in flashbacks during "The Cutie Mark Chronicles". "Where the Apple Lies" established that Filthy Rich got engaged to Spoiled after Applejack had her cutie mark and Granny Smith was older, but Apple Bloom hadn't been born yet and neither had Diamond Tiara (unless they're implying Filthy married Spoiled solely because he got her pregnant). This was done solely because Dave Rapp knew fans were questioning where the Apple's parents were in "Where the Apple Lies" and then he took to social media and stated that he intend to say they were on vacation at the time. Except, by trying to correct the "mistake" from that episode here, he ended up creating a much bigger mistake. All it would've taken to fix it would've been use to the character models from "Where the Apple Lies" instead of "The Perfect Pear" and "The Cutie Mark Chronicles". All this does is further lend support to the theory that Apple Bloom is Applejack's daughter, something I doubt the show staff want to imply.
Anyway, Applejack fell into one of her own traps and spent half the day stuck in a hole. Meanwhile, her parents tended to the harvest without her (Bright Macintosh hooked Big Macintosh up to a plow, and Pear Butter had Apple Bloom on her back while she was working). Because of that, Applejack felt she'd let the family down (even though they completed the harvest no trouble despite that) and decided then and there that she was too old to still be believing in something like the Great Seedlin'. I will say that this is actually a pretty good explanation of Applejack's workaholic tendencies and why she's so tied to Sweet Apple Acres. She used to not take responsibility and played around too much, and this caused her to realize that work comes before play. It's something we could've and should've gotten much sooner. It's sort of like the moral of "The Ant and the Grasshopper".
She decides on a half and half compromise, she'll let Apple Bloom set up traps in exchange for Apple Bloom working to help the harvest. Except it seems like Apple Bloom's traps only cause further complications. Still, Applejack is convinced that everything will go back to normal the next day. But on the next day when all the traps are sprung and there's still a trail of apples, Applejack on a whim starts to believe that maybe the Great Seedlin' is real for some reason. So she decides to join Apple Bloom in setting up more traps, even staying up at night to try and catch it. This does lead to a pretty sweet moment where the two bond, and then they fall asleep. That night, they're woken up by the sound of one of their traps being sprung. Except now Apple Bloom is suddenly scared for some reason. The two get cornered near the barn, unable to get inside. But then it's revealed that the Great Seedlin' is just Big Macintosh sleep walking (or sleep trotting?).
He's been all up night every night bucking the orchard to harvest the apples, and because of that the work is done with time to spare. Goldie Delicious prepares to depart with her cats as Applejack cheers up Apple Bloom by telling her that it's okay to keep believing in and hunting for the Great Seedlin'. Then they notice that a trail of carrots has been left out (I didn't know the Apples also grew carrots, though then again they were shown growing corn in earlier seasons and Applejack mentioned bean and celery stocks in "Applebuck Season") and Big Macintosh didn't touch them. So they run off to pursue what they believe must've been the Great Seedlin' as the episode ends (though for all they know it's just Discord messing with them, I wouldn't put it past him).
And that's the story, so what do I think of the episode? Well, it's alright, that's really all there is to it. Like most Applejack episodes nowadays, this one offers next to nothing of substance but unlike some more infamous ones like "Applejack's 'Day' Off" or "Honest Apple" this one doesn't really delve into character exaggeration or assassination territory for Applejack. It could've easily been yet another episode where she doesn't listen to Apple Bloom at all and has to learn to treat her sister as an equal, but it isn't. The moral, however, zig zags all over the place as does the story. It goes from "There's no such thing as a Great Seedlin'!" to "The Great Seedlin' must be real!" to "The Great Seedlin' was just someone else." to "Maybe the Great Seedlin' was real?". Applejack's early suspicion of Goldie Delicious doesn't make any sense because why would Goldie want to mess with Apple Bloom? The biggest problem I have might be that neither Applejack or Big Macintosh bother to say anything when they're clearly having problems (for Applejack she keeps her anger about others slacking off bottled up inside, and for Big Macintosh he just keeps going on without once saying he's tired and needs to rest even though everyone can clearly see it). This feels very much like a "Believe in Santa Claus" type of story, except it mixes in hints of "The Ant and the Grasshopper" for a confusing message. There's nothing wrong with believing in Santa Claus even after you know the truth, but it's also important not to automatically believe in things without proof just because someone claims that's the case or neglect your responsibilities. The bit with Applejack's parents in the flashback should've been this episode's saving grace, but it all does is call into question even more details about Applejack's past because the animators used the wrong models. In the end, I give this episode a borderline C/C+ putting it above "The Point of No Return" which unless it means we've seen the last of Twilight's freak outs serves no point at all, but below "She's All Yak" which actually was doing alright for itself until that third act when it all fell apart.
I'm going to definitely try to at least get through Episode 12, possibly Episode 13 depending on whether or not Episode 12 leaves a bad taste in my mouth. So come back tomorrow (unless the episode gets pulled from online) for "Student Council" in which Starlight starts to like her new job but finds it hard to manage amidst other obligations. I'll say this much, it's not a rehash of "Every Little Thing She Does", which is nice considering we've gotten enough rehashes already this season.
I would've watched this episode early if I found the plot interesting (same goes for "Student Counsel"). I'll watch these episodes when they air in America. I watched "Sweet and Smoky" early because I enjoy Spike episodes. I watched "The Last Crusade" because.... Scootaloo's parents. I watched "From Dusk to Dawn" because hiatus episode and because of what they made Celestia and Luna do in the episode.
For me, this is the weakest episode so far, precisely because it's alright but nothing special.
At least Uprooted and She's All Yak (the other two alright episodes so far this season (the rest I think are good to great)) had a really good song
5065642 I didn't care for "Uprooted" because it was a disappointing rehash of an already disappointing episode, and the song only confirmed how it was intent to just be "Castle, Sweet Castle" but with the student six. "She's All Yak" had an enjoyable Rarity song with Yona, and I wish they'd spent more time with those one on one interactions instead of that third act which brought the whole thing down.
5065695
While I don't disagree with Uprooted being a bit of a rehash, I still found the episode enjoyable enough that I didn't mind it.
And the song really hits home, especially the line, "It's hard to say farewell to something you hold dear".
She's All Yak never really hit any highs or lows for me outside of the song, which is among the best of the series.
Both of those, and this episode, ARE still better than the weakest episodes of any previous season
5065732 Not quite for me, though I will say that outside of "Uprooted" and "Sweet and Smoky" this season hasn't hit the kind of infamous lows of the previous season. But then again, Season 8 didn't start out bad and even going into the second half it looked salvegable. It was only once the last few episodes hit that I knew it wasn't going to top Season 7 for best season or come anywhere close.
I can honestly say Bright Mac and Pear Butter being in this episode caught me so off-guard. It’s cool to see them again.
I know you’re not allowed to share links but where did you find the English version?
5065780 It was provided to me by a fellow Brony via Discord.
5065772 It was, but their presence here ended up raising more questions than they were supposed to answer.
5065793
In terms of continuity and animation errors, I think it was just trying too hard to tie things together.
5065755
For me, the last few episodes of season 8 were all pretty solid for the most part.
Sure, they weren't all great, but I felt the ones that were great were among the best of the series at the time.
I will say this about this season, though, as someone who has already seen the remaining 3 early episodes:
At this point, it's matched some of the previous seasons in terms of the amount of episodes I absolutely adore, and has even had an episode that managed to dethrone Crusaders of the Lost Mark for my personal favorite (won't say which one just yet).
Combine that with the aforementioned lack of super low lows for me (even though this episode isn't that great, I'd still give it a 7.5 or 8/10, whereas my least favorite episode in previous seasons land more in the 4-6 range), and so far, this season is currently my favorite overall.
Even the episode comparisons I've done reflect that, though there is something kind of funny I noticed about the wins this season has over the others. I'll get into that when you do yours, though. (Speaking of which, do you plan to do that right after you watch episode 13, or will you wait until the official US airing and then post that?)
Swinging back around to this episode, when I read the premise, I was actually kind of excited, since I initially thought the magical creature Apple Bloom was after had something to do with their parents.
If that had been the case, I'd have probably loved this episode at least as much as I ended up loving Sweet and Smoky, which I actually initially thought was going to be the "Alright but nothing special" episode of the two.
I have to admit, this did cause confusion for me about the whole "When Apple Bloom was born bit." Only explanation I have for "Where The Apple Lies" now, is either Spoiled Milk/Spoiled Rich had Diamond Tiara from a previous marriage, or she is Diamond Tiara's stepmom. That would be the only logics I can deduce to put Apple Bloom and Diamond Tiara in the same age group. And you said something about the Apple Parents being on vacation. I can only assume then, that that means Apple Bloom was with them, too young to be away from Pear Butter's side.
5065950 I could imagine it's possible Spoiled Rich is Diamond's stepmom, though that would raise the question of what happened to her first mother.
5065952
Well, they never explain why the Apple Parents are no longer around, and everyone assumes they passed away based on the fact that they are not with the rest of the family in present day, and we have no clear verbal or physical indicator they have passed away. They had a funeral scene in Hearts and Hooves Day, so there's no reason they can't have a tombstone shown, or a mention in conversation that cements the indication the parents are no longer there.
Anyways it can be left to speculation Diamond's mom either passed away, or divorced Filthy Rich.
5065971 Except Diamond says in "The Pony I Wanna Be" "I've been told my whole life what to do, what to say." with the implications being pretty clear that Spoiled has been doing this to her for as long as she can remember. So unless Diamond's birth mom died or divorced Filthy while Diamond was really little, there's no way she wouldn't remember.
5066140
I'd be leaning towards passed away or divorce Filthy, while Diamond Tiara was too young to remember her.
I felt bad for Big Mac as he had to do some work and ended up getting exhausted. There were some good parts like having the Apple parents back in a flashback. When I saw the synopsis of the episode, I thought the ending will show the actual Great Seedlin’, but I still enjoyed it.
Well, this episode makes no logical sense within the timeline. They completely obliterated any chance of this episode making sense within the timeline. This picture puts it all into perspective and explains it better than I ever cold.
5076874 I agree, the flashback used the wrong models and therefore creates too many plot holes. Apparently this isn't the only time the animators slacked off on the job, some scenes of Babs Seed in "The Last Crusade" had her without her cutie mark even though in other scenes she had it.
5076875 The thing with Babs was more than likely an animation error due to rendering.
It was a nice touch bring back Bright Mac and Pear Butter. The rest of the episode left me a bit confused.