Episode Re-Review: Castle, Sweet Castle · 7:07pm Apr 19th, 2021
Season 5 unveiled some new writers as well, though nowhere near as many as had been introduced in Season 4. Jonna Lewis and Kristine Songco were introduced, the two having previously worked together on Butch Hartman shows like The Fairly Odd Parents (which Ed Valentine had also written for) and T.U.F.F. Puppy. Meghan McCarthy was also credited as story editor here, which may be either an indicator that this episode was meant to be the Season 5 premiere originally, or how it's been well known now that M. A. Larson hated being story editor. Well, either way, this episode was poised to address something fans had written so many fanfics about: Twilight Sparkle mourning the loss of the Golden Oak Library. An episode like this really didn't seem like the kind of place to debut new writers, especially not from shows not really known for their emotional moments. But maybe this duo could find a way to make it work? Well, let's find out.
The episode begins with Twilight helping Fluttershy give her animal friends a bath, but when Fluttershy insists it's time to go home Twilight refuses and ends up kicking Angel into a mud puddle so that she'll have to stay later to clean him up too. Later on, Fluttershy finally sends Twilight away and suspects something is up. Meanwhile, Angel runs inside and locks Fluttershy out of her cottage.
Then, during a pancake breakfast at the castle, the rest of the mane six all talk about how they've noticed Twilight keeps looking for any reason to hang out with them and they suspect something is up. Heck, Twilight is so sleep deprived that she falls asleep atop her pancakes and uses them for a pillow. We also get an interesting gag when Pinkie Pie mentions losing a measuring spoon in the batter and gets the pancake that has said spoon in it. This ends up waking up Twilight, and after her friends discuss their concern Twilight willingly confesses that she's been avoiding her new castle because it doesn't feel like a home. The rest of the mane six (at Rarity's suggestion) offer to redecorate the castle to make it feel more welcoming, right before Spike comes in and asks if he missed the pancake breakfast. Yes, that's right, not one of Spike's friends or even Twilight bothered inviting him to a pancake breakfast and without asking if he wanted to be part of it.
We do see Spike with a Rarity plushie, which is a nice little detail and an indication that his crush on Rarity is still relevant and hasn't been forgotten like it was throughout just about all of Season 4 (for no explained reason). Rarity then convinces Spike to take Twilight to the spa while the rest of the mane six decorate the castle in her absence. Spike agrees, after grabbing a few pancakes for the road. Then we get into the song "Make This Castle a Home", which starts off on a very bad note by noticeably auto-tuning Rainbow Dash even though Ashliegh Ball is an experienced singer and musician. The song itself gets really repetitive really fast, and each individual verse involves the same premise: Each mane six member opts to decorate the castle according to what would make them feel at home. So we're going for the cliche "Too many cooks spoils the soup" plot.
The castle is naturally quite a mess and each mane six member complains about what the others brought while refusing to take down of their own decorations. Interestingly, we have Fluttershy scolding Pinkie Pie when Pinkie asks Fluttershy to make her bird friends stop pecking at the balloons. This is only the third time Fluttershy's ever noticeably gotten upset with Pinkie, though it seems to be more of an evolution of the scene from "Griffon the Brush Off" rather than "Putting Your Hoof Down".
Spike then happens to stop by the castle and realizes it's a mess. He's then tasked with stalling for time (until sunset) with Rarity basically taking advantage of his feelings to make him do what he should already be naturally inclined to do. Unfortunately, much of Spike's stalling involves subjecting himself to things like a very heavy duty massage from Bulk Biceps (who has attended the Kool-Aid man school of entering).
Eventually, Twilight and Spike do come across the still charred remains of the Golden Oak Library and briefly mourn its destruction. Twilight even mentions how she realizes it was a home to Spike as well. Then, Spike stalls for more time by deciding he wants to get a new bed since his old basket got destroyed. Once he can stall no longer, he and Twilight return to the castle to find that everything is the same as it was when they left it. But then it's revealed that the rest of the mane six managed to somehow unearth the entire stump of the library (during a reprise of "Make This Castle a Home") and move to the ceiling of the throne room. And they've placed special crystals to encase various memories of their adventures. You might think this is going to replace the friendship journal as a new delivery device for morals, but nope this will never get acknowledged again and the Golden Oak Library's stump will just be for decoration. And somehow, this is all that's needed for Twilight to accept her new castle.
The episode ends by revealing that Pinkie Pie still has confetti cannons hidden throughout the castle because she can't remember where she put them. But I guess Twilight eventually found them and removed them even though they could make a good security feature.
And that's the story, so what do I think of the episode? Well, the major focus unfortunately is on the rest of the mane six being stupid and selfish once "Make This Castle a Home" kicks in. The fact that they think decorating Twilight's castle based solely on what each believes would make them feel comfortable and at home reeks of low effort. Rarity in particular should be above such a belief because she's in a profession where the mentality is "The customer is always right". And much of Twilight and Spike's plot is just spent on Spike subjecting himself to things he wouldn't otherwise do just to buy time for his friends to undo their mistakes. Twilight missing the library is only barely acknowledged and her visiting the libraries remains carries little weight after we've spent so much of the episode on comedy by watching the others bicker and argue. The resolution feels like an afterthought. In fact, it feels like this entire episode was done solely because they knew fans wanted to see it but the show staff had no desire to actually do it, so they just did a half hearted job and called it a day. Lewis and Songco would eventually become relatively respectable writers for the show, but their debut here was pretty bad. This episode did not play to their strengths, in fact the very premise worked against them. As a result this episode gets an F+, it's a waste of a perfectly good plot point.
And now comes a rather interesting episode that would mark the start of a transition for the CMC, as well as the third and final installment of the LunaxCMC dream trilogy in "Bloom and Gloom".
Good plot, but wish they done better. Not the worse episode since there are many more worse episodes then this
Honestly, while I don't think this episode is great, it's still pretty fun to me overlal.
I think this episode solely exists to acknowledge the immense hatred that Twilight's castle received after the Season 4 finale.
An F+? Really? I mean, okay, this episode is far from perfect. But come on, it's not that bad.
I really loved the tree visit and the memory shards. Other than that, I don't have too many thoughts on the episode. I like it and I thought it was funny but I can see why you'd find it annoying.