Thoughts On: Every Episode of Season 8

I didn't like Season 8. It was an awful combination of being out of ideas, not understanding what made me like a lot of the show in the first place, and simply not thinking any of the implications of their stories though. Honestly, the most fun I had this season was telling my friends who stopped watching the show about the absolute absurdity of what happens in this season.

School Daze - Bad
The racism in this episode is never really addressed and it's a little uncomfortable. Sure, Neighsayer is treated as the villain, but Celestia watches this dude make a bunch of racist comments and doesn't care that this is the person in charge of the country's school system? Also he caused a foriegn affairs disaster and almost started a race war, continuing to instigate while other ponies were attempting to deescalate the situation and Celestia didn't fire him. Considering the nonsense this guy gets away with it's no question how Twilight is able to get away with her milder racism throughout this episode.
The resolution in this episode wasn't handled well either. Instead of Twilight pointing out that you can't teach friendship like you can teach math, or really asking to have more than a week to make a functional school Twilight just decides that she's making the school because she can, and just ignored the research of how to run a successful school. Not only is this unlike the studious character we know and love, but also teaches a bad moral.
Lastly, this episode acts as a "repilot" to introduce the student 6, only I don't think it did a good job showing us their personalities. The Changling and the Hippogryph are handled well, but the pony has no personality and the other three are just stereotypes of their races. I'm hoping this is just a bad intro and not a case where four of the characters just suck.

The Maud Couple - Sigh
Pinkie is no longer the character I fell in love with. She used to put her existence into making others happy, complete with detailed notes on how to please everybody she ever met. Now she's more spoiled than ever, throwing parties to validate her own ego and going to extremes whenever she doesn't get her way (such as blowing up the tunnel in Rock Solid Friendship). It's good that the episode understands that Pinkie is the bad guy here, but this is still too far away from how Pinkie should be acting, and without the comedy that I've come to expect from Pinkie episodes this one just upsets me.

Fake It Til You Make It - Good
I don't have much to say about this episode, I just thought it was funny.
Also I guess the distance between Ponyville and Manehatten is like, 3 miles now, based on how fast characters travel back and forth in this episode.

Grannies Gone Wild - Watchable
Standard cartoon plot with a standard lesson. It's whatever.
The only thing I can think to talk about is that the episode didn't spell out the moral, which might be a problem here because I can see children interpreting it as "Ignore safety and have fun."

Surf and/or Turf - Good
This episode uses the CMC to solve a problem that's close to "what do I want to do with my life," without being a retread of the last 20 episodes spent on that topic, making this the best use of their characters in a few seasons. On top of that, we get a ton of world building of new cultures, making this an overall well done episode.

Horse Play - Watchable
Does the characterization of this episode entirely make sense? Not really. Is it moderately entertaining to watch bad acting jokes for 20 minutes. A Little, yeah.
Hey Celestia, I thought you said you couldn't raise the sun and the moon at the same time because it's an abuse of power, yet here you are, doing exactly that for a small play.
Also, shouldn't Luna have appeared in the play at some point?

The Parent Trap - Flawed
I was fully expecting Parental Glidance part 2, where Sunburst's and Starlight's parents not learning anything and the children having to learn to love their parents despite how condescending they are. Thankfully that didn't quite happen. The parents do apologize for being condescending, but not for stubbornly being unhelpful and not listening to why what they were doing wasn't helping. On top of that, the episode treats the children as being more in the wrong and places the responsibility of making up to them, basically outright saying that yelling at their parents was wrong, but if you think about it, yelling at their parents is what made them realize that what they were doing was wrong, implying that it was the right thing to do. The parents apologized by themselves, they didn't have to be told what they were doing wrong after being yelled at.
For what it's worth, I rather liked the first half of the episode, so with a little tweaking this would have been a great episode. Instead I can only praise it for not being as bad as Parental Glidance.

Non Compete Clause - Boring
I've been hoping that the competitiveness of Aj and RD would be explored more since S1, but this episode didn't really further their dynamic and just said "yeah they still do this, even when they really shouldn't be." That's not a huge issue compared to the episode's structure, which is similar to Horse Play where the moral is spelled out three times and the protagonist ignores it. It's a boring way to tell stories because it locks itself into a repetitive cycle that doesn't have time to become as interesting as a long one could. At least Horse Play was almost funny.
Also the student 6 finally reappear, and the characterization from the pilot has unfortunatly held consistant, except the pony had a little more personality. This isn't a good sign for other Student 6 episodes.

Break-up Breakdown - Ugh
This episode is just that romcom trope where the whole plot would end in 5 seconds if the main characters would actually talk to each other. They even lampshaded it with Spike's wild guessing. So close guys! To make it worse, the B plot is another plot driven by dumb assumptions.
Discord in this episode is... I'm glad they found something else to do with Discord that isn't just maximum pettiness, even if I don't care for the romantic cynic character, but he felt so sterilized in this episode. I always feel like he should be doing more chaotic nonsense, and heck at this point I'd be okay with the pop culture referencing Discord from Season 4. He's been a wasted character since reforming and it's clear the writers have even fewer things to do with him now.

Molt Down - Good
I enjoy fantasy puberty episodes, and this one provided a good sense of danger which hasn't been present all season, so that's apprciated. The more I think about it, the more similarities I find between this episode and the Teen Titans episode "Transformation" The main exception I can think of is Starfire already knows everything while Spike learns from Smolder, which is cool that Smolder is finally given something to do even if her personality is still just "Dragon." Zacora is in this one too so that's nice.

Marks for Effort - Watchable to Good
The CMC lean on one of the issues with the premise of a friendship scool, that being that it doesn't teach marketable skills. If it did, then the CMC would be able to attend.
Knowing that Cozy Glow is evil is making me question her plan, but I'm assuming it will be revealed later so I'll comment later. I do wonder why she told Starlight she flunked on purpose as that would undo any progress she was making.
Why were the CMC excited about graduating? They wanted to go to school there to avoid doing normal boring school things. Getting a diploma doesn't change that. Becoming a child laborer--I mean Tutor makes sense but you don't need a diploma to tutor people.

The Mean 6 - Boring
This episode is weird. It feels like it almost wants to be one of those indie films were people just talk and doesn't really have a conflict with a twist of having anti-versions of all the main characters, only it doesn't want to commit to not having a plot and it's compressed for time so nothing interesting is allowed to happen because we have to follow fourteen different characters. In the end, the Mean 6 just die in an anticlimax and the Mane 6 never realize what happened (because none of them are smart enough to piece together that everyone did things they don't remember doing and that's fairly concerning, as it could be a big magical threat or a gas leak) and get over themselves. This could have been a cool episode and instead it's just nothing, albeit experimental nothing.
I will admit that I thought Mean Rarity was fun to watch so the episode isn't without merit.

A Matter of Principals - Bad
This episode manages to include everything I love and everything I hate about Discord. On the love side, this is the most anticy he's been since Keep Calm and Flutter On, and all of the gags and stunts and chaos he pulls are clever pranks or funny jokes. The staff finally realized why Discord was so good to begin with...
Only he's somehow pettier than usual. I'm not saying Starlight was completely in the right, but when Discord wanted to help he should have helped anyway, but actually have been helpful. Starlight would have seen his value and let him participate, which is what he wanted. Only he decides he needs to be actively awful to everyone and then throws a tantrum when he's fired for abusing his power because "good friends would let me be a dick to everyone!" What's worse is Starlight caves in and is about to give him all the power and let him help out because letting abusive assholes have positions of power over children after they throw a giant temper tantrum is a good strategy that won't get anybody hurt.
If this wasn't bad enough, it's then revealed that Discord sent the Mane 6 away on a fake mission so that he could torment everyone. I'm appalled that this show considers this to be acceptable behavior.

The Hearth's Warming Club - Good
Another episode that's pressed for time, but overall I like the premise. The student six are finally fleshed out more, and I'm starting to like Smolder and Griffon boy (Yona is still annoying) and while I don't love Sandbar, his personality of Totally Kyle came through a lot more in this episode than previous ones. This biggest thing holding this episode back is that most of the holiday tradition stories are not very interesting. Part of that again is having so many in 20 minutes, but even so I felt like they could have done better.
Like most Friendship School episodes, there are some more unfortunate implications. Twilight threatens to keep all the students at school over break, and maybe pony law is different than human law, but isn't this illegal? I don't think schools can force students to stay at school over breaks. Even if it isn't, most of the students she's keeping there are foreign nationals. That's a bad Foreign Affairs move, especially after a war was nearly started 13 episodes ago.

Friendship University - Bad
Twilight has long had a problem of seeing the minor adversaries she's had as the devil and not offering them a chance to become better (yet she's fine doing this to anyone who tries to end the world. Clearly Trixie should've gone more evil to get Twilight to forgive her.) While I think she was supposed to have gotten over this, she's clearly upset with Flim and Flam. However, pretending to be nice to them would've been the smart PR and diplomatic move (coughcough) while launching some other form of investigation, maybe pretending that it's to help them better the school (after all, more friendship can only be a good thing, right?)
Ultimately, "Twilight is wrong and has to cope with Flim and Flam being legit now" is a much more interesting story than "Twilight is right, Flim and Flam are still con artists" as well as the first story wouldn't have Twilight's bad behavior going rewarded. Man, that's a theme of this season isn't it.
Rarity implies that she's going to use her students as a sweatshop under the guise of being a friendship lesson. That's uh, not cool. Don't do that Rarity.

The End in Friend - Great
I've seen complaints about this episode saying that the message should've been about Rarity and Rainbow Dash learning that you can be friends in a group without necessarily hanging out 1 on 1 often, and while I agree that's a fine message I don't have an issue with what this episode did. If you're close enough to roll in the same crew, you're eventually going to find something the two of you have in common, so even if you don't have super long chats you can still have them, or find something you both like to do.
They force the two of them to find something they both like in the end, and it's a great sequence. The mystery adventure through a swamp is something we haven't seen, and a fun sequence of events. One minor complaint is that I would have loved if Rarity (heck, or Dash) figured out it was a setup and explained it to the other one. It's a common trope, but it would have fit into this episode very well.

Yakity Sax - Boring
This is all stuff we've seen before, only now Pinkie is set into depression by... not being good at one instrument. Even though she can play every other instrument fine. It's... well, flanderization.
The Mane 6 telling Pinkie to never play the sax again was a bit harsh, but telling her to just play very loudly and annoy everyone else regardless of what they think isn't really a good answer either. Obviously she should practice until she's tolerable then play in place were people might want to hear it... Actually, I guess most places she was playing this episode were places you'd find musicians irl, but you know what I mean.

On The Road to Friendship - Eh
Glim Glam has gradually been losing the snark that I love her for, as well as her crazy plans being less based on odd interpretations of instructions, resulting in me becoming less and less interested in Starlight episodes. Her relationship with Trixie has been pretty hit or miss for me too.
This episode is on the lower end for me because Starlight is completely unbearable throughout. Trixie has done tours before, she knows what she needs to do this well, but Starlight's just like "Do you really need all of this stuff?" and eventually trades Trixie's wagon after Trixie said no multiple times. The moral is eventually "Don't sell other people's stuff" (yeah, no kidding) and Trixie eventually decides that touring sucks, even though it's much more accurate to say that touring with rich friends who are going to judge your low income lifestyle and completely ignore the fact that you know what you're doing sucks. Mostly Starlight just doesn't apologize enough at the end and learn how awful she was this episode.
Also guys, kidnapping and pony smuggling are crimes. I know it was unintentional, but you're still going to have to hide the body.

The Washouts - Watchable
I'm glad Lightning Dust came back.
Yeah, this one is okay.

A Rockhoof and Hard Place - Boring and Questionable
So this is the episode with a questionable handling of a suicide allegory! It's more than a little messed up that Twilight eventually caved in and was willing to turn Rockhoof to stone, however, it's hard for me to get pissed off at this because, as Twilight says, she's planning on bringing him back to life eventually. This makes it hard for me to read it as a clear 1-1 with suicide, so I'm not nearly as angry as I would be if Twilight couldn't bring him back to life. There's also criticism that someone finding something they're good at and having friends tell them "you're so valuable" isn't going to stop the deep seated issues and mental illness that leads to people killing themselves, and thus this episode is teaching children the wrong way to help their depressed friends. Again, it's not bad enough for me to be angry but I would agree that this wasn't the best way to handle this subject.
Also, without these controversies, this episode is incredibly forgettable.

What Lies Beneath - Great
Oh hey I actually like the student 6 now I guess. They're starting to justify their existence a lot more, even if they aren't getting enough screentime to really feel like a necessary addition. Here they all struggle with being bad at friendship by default, thanks to Cozy Glow (who's plan isn't foiled by herself this time). I like this struggle because it's applicable to children who are a different race or might grow up to be gay facing cultural discrimination. Even if the episode doesn't fully call out the racism at play (why would it, this is season 8) this episode is showing characters rise above it and...okay it doesn't make up for all the other racism but it's nice that not every attempt at addressing it was a colossal failure.
Nitpick alert: I'm not sure how well thought out the tree's fear factory plan is. Yes, it shows that the characters who were strong enough to beat their challenge came back for their friends, but this didn't test everyone. Sure, maybe it didn't have to in order to prove it's point, but there are other scenarios the tree was gambling wouldn't happen. What if everyone needed help? Or what if everyone challenged their fears and won without help? Imagine how awkward that would've been at the entrance.

Sound of Silence - Great
Yeah, everyone agrees this is one of the best of the season, so I'm not going to labor about it for too long, but I love the Kirin, both in terms of design and lore, the message and conflict are great, and it just a well done episode. It's pretty telling when the song is the worst part of the episode, rather than being the only good part of a meh episode like so many others.
Man, it's pretty convenient that the river of silence is right next to their village, right? Imagine if they had to travel across the world or something to take the vow. My headcannon is that they cursed it and left it so they could make foals silent (or they just lost control. That theory is more fun, and there aren't any foals in the episode that I remember.)

Father Knows Beast - Boring
Wow, who could've guessed that he wasn't really Spike's father?
The thing that gets me about it is that the mane 6 acted suspicious, but didn't follow through with questioning it.
The song's bad, and... yeah, this one wasn't very good.

School Raze - Great
So, I actually really like the episode where they send a 8 year old to hell. I still think this aspect is bad, even though the show gives some amount of logic to it. Cozy wants power and won't see the error of her ways, and Neighsayer sees that his racism is wrong and becomes a good guy. I don't think this is realistic, as 8 year olds still have time to grow from being power crazed freaks, and Neighsayer realizing his baseless claims against the other races was wrong wouldn't be enough to change the minds of a lot of racists. After all this is over, wouldn't he still want to enforce the rules and EEA guidelines? Was he only pretending to care about rules to be racist? You're telling me something this racist only needed one positive experience to drop all of his racism? At this point I'm a little surprised there wasn't a sad backstory about how griffons hated him as a child which made him racist for the rest of his life.
That said, the rest of this episode is really good. The stakes and the tension are high, and the episode does a good job at jumping around between all the characters involved. Cozy's plan and undoing by the students are believable and well executed.

Best
1: What Lies Beneath
2: Sound of Silence
3: School Raze
4: The End in Friend
5: Molt Down
6: Fake It Till You Make It

Worst
1: A Matter of Principals
2: School Daze
3: Friendship University
4: A Rockhoof and a Hard Place
5: Yackity Sax
6: Breakup Breakdown

Great: 4
Good: 4
G/W: 1
Watchable: 3
Boring/Questionable: 9
Bad: 3

Season Average: 2.9