Mini Re-Reviews: "The Cutie Mark Chronicles" & "Owl's Well That Ends Well" - Season 1 Episodes 23 & 24

RAINBOW DASH: "I look like I have a mohawk blowing in the wind, don't I? Yeah, I think I just got about 20% cooler."
FLUTTERSHY [off-screen]: "What? But, um... I thought you said it was lazy and uninspired to just quote fan-loved moments for these intros..."
RAINBOW DASH: "Do as I say, Fluttershy, not as I do. When you're as awesome as I am, guidelines can't keep you grounded."

There was probably not a single episode in Season 1 that I was more excited to revisit then "The Cutie Mark Chronicles". Like many, it was one that, despite its excellence, I had not seen in quite some time. Yet despite that, it's something of an early poster boy for episodes universally considered to be favorites by the great majority of viewers. You don't hear it talked about too much these days because, well, you don't hear episodes that old being talked about in general (it happens when your series goes on for 9 years across 221 episodes - 227 if you count the specials and shorts, 231 with the Movie, and that's still omitting EqG altogether), but if all the old articles and posts are to be believed, this was a truly beloved episode.

And for good reason - it's one of those episodes that it's easy to see why it's so beloved, for it does two things that fans adore. It takes a unique high concept for the show and pulls it off masterfully, and it is filled to the brim with delicious backstory and lore, all of it for our main characters in this episode. As the episode that gives the cutie mark origin for the Mane 6 - and Spike's birth to boot - it's extraordinary, but not altogether surprising, just how much fan content is directly influenced and based off of what we learn about the Mane 6's origin from this story. Not Rarity's so much, and Applejack's not a huge amount either (mostly as the Sonic Rainboom doesn't really change their circumstances the way it does with the others), but the remaining five? Oh god, yes. From all the early stories about Pinkie's childhood prior to Season 4/5, to Rainbow and Fluttershy's youth in Flight Camp, to Twilight's beginnings as an archmage protege, to Spike's literal origin, there are tens of thousands of fanfics that wouldn't exist or would be wildly different were it not for this episode coming along when it did. Outside of possibly the Premiere two parter and A Canterlot Wedding - the latter solely for introducing changelings, as well as Shining Armor and Cadence - there are no other candidates for individual episodes with such a huge impact on fan work.

But about the episode itself. For an episode with a very clean structure - six 2-3 minute flashbacks of the Mane 6's Cutie Mark origins - it uses a clever trick to ease us into it, which is that it begins disguised as a Cutie Mark Crusaders episode, and by the time it's clear that this is a backstory-for-all-the-main-characters episode (around the time it's clear that Fluttershy's story wasn't about Rainbow Dash, it just featured her was all), we're long since won over. In many ways, were you to show this episode to an average adult with no MLP familiarity, they would peg the formula right away but admit by the end that it used the clean-cut structure to its advantage (in a way that, even for the fans, marks this episode out - perhaps it's a good thing this structure of multiple vignettes was never done again, as this episode thus remains unique).

When it all wraps up with the unsurprising revelation that Rainbow Dash was responsible for all of their cutie marks arriving when they did, there's an unusually complex sense of closure in how the flashbacks all tie together and reinforce the sense of destiny. I think this ending works as well as it does because of the attitude of the Mane 6 as they were telling their stories; there's a definitive tone of them looking back wistfully at their youth. You get the sense that they haven't thought about these events in a long time the same way that we don't think of such important-at-the-time events as our first day at school, or our day of graduation, or when we got our first big job; they seemed important at the time when we were younger and the world actually made sense, wasn't so complicated and destiny, in a manner of speaking, was instantly obvious. I've mentioned before how the way the show balances the attitudes of the kid ponies and the young adult ponies when both are around, as in The Show Stoppers, is much better and more nuanced and deep then it has any real right to be, and that continues to hold true here.

With a structure done cleanly but with the right subversions to ease the user through the formula hurdle, and all the moments a fan could want through, that leaves only for the user to have a delightful fun time with all the vignettes that don't take themselves too seriously in-the-moment, filtered as they are through a nostalgic narrator in each case. They are all, of course, excellent, and the only absolute statement I am willing to make is that Rarity's is probably the weakest, or at least the more trivial (though she's already a functional seamstress at that age - guess Sweetie Belle making wearable costumes in "The Show Stoppers" isn't that unusual, it probably runs in the family, at least that generation). On some level, there are probably better episodes that are more "perfect" this season, but I find no honest fault worth discussing in this one. "The Cutie Mark Chronicles" ranks as the first episode to get a 10/10, setting the gold standard to which all future episodes must be compared to.

STRAY OBSERVATIONS
- To judge from Twilight's flashback, numerous ponies had moms identical at the time to those those ponies are now, from Lyra to Minuette and everyone in between.
- Before "The Cutie Re-Mark" came along, there was also a whole host of "what-if" fanfics based on the premise of the Sonic Rainboom never happening too. To be fair, it's obvious why, as characters' journeys and lives going is a certain direction because of one specific event is so narratively appealing.
- Once again, this is an episode that came as just the right time. Viewers have had half a year of airing, or 462 minutes of programming (after omitting opening and closing credits), to get to know the characters and wonder about their personal histories. While the fandom was obviously quite big already in April 2011, the onslaught of fan content and such hadn't quite begun yet. Had this episode come later - even in early Season 2 - it might have been tough to reconcile with our own headcanons. It also falls into the category of origin stories told not at the beginning, but some time later, that really help to colour our perception of their beginnings all the better and add to their mythos in just the right way. A Season 5 episode of Teen Titans does the same thing, and The Powerpuff Girls Movie is another really good example of this at hand.

SPIKE: "All right, about time I got a starring episode! Sheesh, you would almost think this show only had six main characters of equal weight, not seven."
OWLOWISCIOUS: "Whoo."
SPIKE: "'The Mane 6'?!? That's the term those marketing people are using? I'm in basically as many episodes as them!"
OWLOWISCIOUS: "Whoo."
SPIKE: "What do you mean that market research showed that little girls will buy toys of female ponies but won't touch a male baby dragon?!?"

And so we go from one of Season 1's top candidates for best episodes to one of its worst just like that. Were it not for "Owl's Well That Ends Well" coming when it did in the episode lineup, we'd have an uninterrupted 9-episode streak of truly top-tier pony goodness, with S1E22-26 (omitting 24) of this season and S2E1-5 of the next (or a 10-episode streak if the replacement episode was as good as the rest, rather then just closing the gap). Trust me, we'll have plenty of time to talk about that streak later.

Spike-starring episodes are a peculiar oddity for the fans. I have it on good word that for many seasons, after they had enough examples to go on, fans generally didn't look super-forward to most Spike-centric episodes when a new one was coming. Much like Applejack, he was considered to lack a great episode by most for a long time, until "Gauntlet of Fire" in Season 6 (personally, the high praise for that episode at the time was influenced heavily by the mediocre streak for that season to that point). That's all opinion, but there are some decisive facts that Spike episodes have to deal with. Firstly, the Mane 6, by and large, tend to take a background role in his episodes, and so it usually falls on him to carry it by himself. Cutie Mark Crusader episodes have a similar thing going on, but they have the benefit of being able to bounce off of one another. Spike usually has to carry his episodes alone in terms of the central focus, and as such one's tolerance of him being both a buttmonkey as well as a butt himself at times can affect the episode quality and enjoyment level
Despite him being my second-favourite of the Mane 7, it's clear that Spike is a tricky character from a writing standpoint. The series' setup makes it hard to do character plots between him and the rest of the Mane 6 past Twilight and Rarity (one of the few episodes that does do that, "Spike at Your Service", is one of the worst-regarded episodes of the first 3 seasons by many; despite starring my two favourite characters, I cannot argue against that too heavily), so his episodes tend to be off in their own bubble. Except when they deal with Rarity, and, well, then they have her manipulation of him to deal with. It's not always pleasant being exposed over and over to the manipulative side of Generous Pony. But all that's a way in the future. For now, we have this episode.

Believe it or not, for Spike's first starring episode, it does not initially seem like this is the case. In fact, for the first six minutes of the episode, up until he wakes up to an owl doing some of his work, it's a perfectly fine Season 1 episode; a little rough around the edges but perfectly capable of slotting in with most of its brethren. Spike becomes an unusually large jerk after that first third like someone flipped a switch, but to that point he's perfectly fine, and the episode has the benefit of the meteor shower scene that is beautiful both in and of itself but also for the sense of familial camaraderie it shows among the Mane 7 and the CMCs (I always love shows where friends transcend to being family; there never isn't a good reason for that, as far as I'm concerned). More then that, the early peeks we get into Twilight and Spike's bond are wonderful; I could do without the repeated of the phrase "Number One Assistant", but I've accepted that Spike's early exclusion from the intimate inner-inner circle of the Mane 6 is just one of those things the show did in the beginning. Their relationship is complicated but always amusing in its sort of maternal older sister feel. And the guilt Spike feels about burning the book is enough to feel sympathetic for the guy, even as an owl comes in to help Twilight while Spike is snoring away (though how and why Twilight didn't just grab the scroll in the wind is beyond me).

But pretty much from the moment Owloiscious is introduced to Spike, it all comes crashing down, as he acts wildly out of character both for his character to this point and as he is in the future. Really, from there up until the third act when he runs away, the episode is an irritant, as we watch Spike's jealously be blown way out of proportion and him utter malicious statements. There are compensations; the sequence where he looks for a quill, first with none at a store that literally sell one other item, then Pinkie dumping all manner of other items beginning with "Q" on him and finally wrestling with a chicken for one, is perfectly fine to take as it's just Spike being a buttmonkey in laugh-worthy situations. But then it's right back to him being off-putting; even watching him in a hat and clack twirling his moustache doesn't prove all that funny.

Thankfully, the episode's last 6 minutes return to the normal Season 1 quality of the first six. Seeing Spike as a sad sack comes as a welcome relief after the previous 9 minutes, and it doesn't hurt that it's wrapped around more peeks into typical dragons either, giving the episode an action burst that serves to wrap it all up very nicely (and uses some effective camera pans and tricks to pull off the sense of scale and movement during the chase, a standout moment in an episode that's not shabby at all on the visual front). Even when Twilight and Spike reunite, it's all earnest and soft-spoken and tender, and even has more proper acknowledgement of their relationship (you have no idea how happy I am to hear her admit that he's her best friend, and that he always will be; it fits it both with my headcanon and M.A. Larson's belief that Spike had gradually transitioned to being her first true friend shortly before they moved to Ponyville). The ending is suitably good too - just as it seems Spike is writing out the moral rather plainly for the audience, he dozes off, and much like Twilight, we're left shaking our heads and saying "Oh, Spike". You may be a butt at times, but we love you just as much as the Mane 6.

In many ways, this feels like dealing with a later season episode that does many things really well but drops the ball on one crucial aspect that ends up crippling it quite a bit. We have here an opening and closing 6 minutes that are really good, but which sandwich 9 minutes of near-continuous cringe. I'm flabbergasted at how Cindy Morrow managed this given that the fingerprints of the show's best-feels writer are all over the first and third act. Perhaps that middle third never got beyond a first draft, or schedules meant someone else quickly wrote it, or they were just having trouble figuring out Spike's character, and turned him into a version of Bloo from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends that even in that show would seem extreme. That said, there are still enough amusing moments even in that middle half that I would rather watch this episode then the somewhat-dull "The Ticket Master", even if it is probably worse. 6/10 here; one of the weakest episodes of Season 1 no question, but still watchable due to only half of it being as bad as most people remember.

STRAY OBSERVATIONS
- Owlowiscious himself is kind of framed of a villain-y light for most of the episode, doubtless due to us seeing it from Spike's viewpoint. Like with Spike, his characterisation matches him in later episodes during the episode's third act only. So he basically suffered from the writing there too, it's just less obvious at first because he's a new character. But a welcome one all the same - still can't believe he basically vanished from the show bar one or two cameos after "Twilight's Kingdom".
- Another great touch is Rarity's mention of a pet playdate with Fluttershy; it both solidifies their close friendship as established in "Green Isn't Your Color" and also foreshadows the event in "May the Best Pet Win" nine episodes down the line.

Comments

[Loganberry]

Okay, here I am again. At this rate I'll finish these comments by 2200, definitely!

Not a lot to say about "The Cutie Mark Chronicles", since pretty much everyone agrees it's great. I can't think of anything much I'd change about it, either. You have a point about Rarity's filly segment being the weakest, but she does get the wonderful "Dumb rock!" line -- which is a great partner for her sister's "Dumb fabric!" back in "The Show Stoppers". Larson did so well with this -- to have so much happening, and important stuff too, in barely 20 minutes and not make it feel rushed is a real achievement. In that sense it has a claim to be his best written single-part episode ever, though "Amending Fences" may run it close.

As for The Owl Episode... it's interesting you didn't find the "silent movie villain Spike" sequence very funny. That's not an especially common reaction -- I wasn't around in the fandom when the episode first appeared, but it's certainly very common for fans to like that bit more than the earlier and later parts. This may be because Owlowiscious has never quite wormed his way into the fandom's affection in the way that the likes of Tank and Winona have. I didn't find the episode terrible by any means, but it was sandwiched between two of my favourite S1 eps and so probably suffered from that.

[Ghost Mike]

5247424
Man, going back to these reviews of nearly four months ago is a bit surreal. Even apart from not squeezing two episodes into a review any more (I stopped that after “Return of Harmony”), they’re a bit surreal to digest. Mostly just stylistic differences in how I approach both the episode deconstruction and the prose construction of such, you know.

Don’t know what to tell you about Spike’s section not felling with me. It’s not that I didn’t find it funny, but the episode’s writing of Spike in this middle section is just... cringe. Not Season 8/9 cringe (this is leagues better then something like “Non-Compete Clause”), but cringe nonetheless. Whether the humour can override characters concerns depends on how good the comedy is and how severe or not severe the character stuff is. I just reviewed “Too Many Pinkie Pies”, which I adored, and while one could feel some character things there, namely the Mane 5 not spotting Pinkie from the duplicates easily, were done wrong, I found it not a problem in context. Differs from episode to episode.

As for Owlowiscious, the episode isn’t really about him, so I don’t judge him in the same character way as the rest. It’s why I don’t find Garble being... well, Garble in “Dragon Quest” that problematic (plus, there a few hints of layers to him there totally lacking in his later appearances).

Of course it’s not a terrible episode. Just a mediocre one. That will happen when nearly half is that middle section, but the rest of typical Season 1 standard.

By the way, Logan, have the pace of your re-reviews of the series slowed down? You seem to only be doing them once a week now.

[Loganberry]

5247732

this is leagues better then something like “Non-Compete Clause”

"You callin' me a liar?" demanded Applejack. She snorted.

Rainbow smiled. "Nah." The smile widened to a grin and she took off.

"You're not smart enough for that!"

***

That, which I just wrote in 30 seconds, is better than "Non-Compete Clause."

By the way, Logan, have the pace of your re-reviews of the series slowed down? You seem to only be doing them once a week now.

Yes, they have, though I'm not doing that deliberately. It's just that life is, for obvious reasons, all over the place at the moment and I don't seem to have as much time as I did. Yes, in spite of being at home every day. Huh. :P