It's that time folks. The arc that has lead us to one of the most driving points of this series! This arc never got a official name, as at the time I didn't bother to make it into part's to establish its arcyness...

...

Ignore that. Anyway, I have come up with the arc name, and that name is...

Get it, cause you know who betrays Bugze, which intern releases the Nightmare's power?

...

Well I think its clever!

Ahem, anyway lets get this review rolling!

The episode starts off with Bugze getting flashbacks to when he re-met Cadence in the castle. Specifically how he managed to cheer her up with a song and a hug. Since he can't think of any songs (i.e I couldn't think of any that wasn't Pinkie's song) he decides to just go in for the hug.

Despite being put off by how he flinched at his approaching, which Bugze himself notes its most likely because he's a wanted criminal, he manages to give her a hug after noting the sadness in her eyes.

A bit overdramatic, oh you bet. This is hammed up like nobodies business, but then you have to remember that everything the ponies do in this dimension is over-dramatic all the time. So it makes sense that she's this upset over a wanted criminal not knowing who she is.

Anyway, Trixie isn't very receptive of the hug and tries to break out of it but Bugze holds on. As he hugs her he tries to think of ways to cheer her up after telling her its okay that he doesn't know her. After dumping a few ideas he decides to go with a Doctor Whoves reference and claims he's a hermit. I would explain more, but I think I'll let the reference explain for me:

So yeah this manages to cheer Trixie up, and with that done Bugze decides to follow a last minute plan to further cheer her up, and help him clear up his debt with the Doctor (yeah...this doesn't work).

Bugze manages to convince Trixie to go to Ponyville for her next show. There she will preform her act until she says a code phrase. Then he would jump on stage and act as the 'evil' Hooded Offender. They do a mock fight, he get captured, then Trixie breaks him out and they split the reward money.

Simple right? She gets her name known across all of Equestria, and he gets some money to pay off the Doctor! Nothing can possibly go wrong!

...

If you couldn't tell, that last bit was said with huge amounts of sarcasm!

Even though this plan has so many hole in it a plane can fly through it, Trixie still manages to cheer up from this plan and even agrees to it. I personally think its mostly due to Bugze using Jack Sparrow's accent and catchphrases near the end of the plan, but what do I know? Also, can't forget to add this:

Good: +1 Cheered a mare up

I wonder if this one is going to be as frequent as the 'Making a mare cry' will be? Only time can tell!

So with that we go into a three to four day montage of their road trip from Manehatten to Ponyville. To save some time I'll only give summaries of each day!

So Day 1 is basically Bugze planning ahead for once! He knows that since Twilight can now cancel out his Teleport he'll need some non-magic moves. So he takes out the 'Kung-Fu For Dummies' book and reads up on what will be his two main moves till the Power Glove is gained in season 2, the 'Shoryuken' and the 'Falcon Punch' moves!

Trixie helps him practice the moves, and afterword the two sit down and relax sharing stories and enjoying each others company. Bugze even thinks that Trixie is really trustworthy and a good friend, and that he can trust her to go through with their deal.

*Deep Breath*

Take this video and make it a hour long, that's all I have to say.

Day 2 has Bugze, with the help of Trixie, practicing the rarely used 'Force Field' spell to make it stronger. He succeeds, but not without escaping some brain damage due to the bowling balls they used to throw at the shield hitting his head a good couple times. This is shown in a clever joke via doing this:

serious signs of blain damage-amage-amage-amage-amage-amage...

Day 3, the final day ala Zelda, has some father-daughter bonding time between Bugze and Nightshade. After Trixie goes out for supplies, and making sure no one is looking, takes Nightshade out of the Inventory. Course Nightshade latches onto her father with her iron grip and rapid fires her worry for her Daddy.

Bugze teleports out of her grasp and tells her everything is going to be alright. After this Nightshade smiles tells her father she loves him, and that he's her hero.

Urk! Heart...shutting down...from...adorableness....Bleh.

Course the touching moment is ruined by Nightshade's stomach growling. Bugze simply chuckles this off and puts away his cloak before shape-shifting into a pony. He also transforms Nightshade into a regular unicorn via a 'Transformation
spell Trixie taught him the day before.

Ah, yet another spell made null by Season 2's skills. Thank you transformation potions!

But yeah they eventually find a 'Olive Grotto' that is having a endless food sale for cheap. This of course is perfect for Bugze and Nightshade (Bugze the cheap part and Nightshade the food), but they end up getting kicked out for almost eating the restaurant out of business.

On the bright side they don't have to pay cause they were kicked out, on the other hand Bugze decided to speak his mind about the service of the restaurant rather...loudly. So...

Evil: +5 Almost putting restaurant out of business

I'm pretty sure its later reveled that the Hooded Offender did this, so I'm keeping it here. The plus five is cause I don't exactly know the total number of people who work at a single Olive Garden, nor do I know how many people would be effect by this. So five is the number I'll be using when I just don't know how many people effected.

After that the episode ends in Ponyville, and Trixie just saying the code word. And the Hive Mind is left to decide how Bugze should act...and begin his decent into a world of crazy like no other!

This episode...is admittedly good! The jokes are solid and the plot is pushed forward at a solid pace. There's some nice character bonding between Nightshade and Bugze which is always nice. The one downside of this episode is that the pacing is very rushed, moving from one thing from the next without much focus going on the anything at once.

I blame my inexperience as a writer back then for this, and the episode suffers because of it. Not enough to get a low rating, but enough to keep it out of the usual 6-8 rating that good chapters usually get.

Now I have to go pretend to be evil during the Breezie Migration, so while I practice my evil laugh on my way over here's the Title Segment!

*Walks off with a cheesy evil laugh*

Favorite Moment:

“It’s all right, Nightshade. I got your drawing and I’ll always make sure noling ever harms you” you reassure her.

Nightshade smiles and says,

"You're my hero daddy. I love you."

You can't help, but smile at the filly's love for you.

I'm a sucker for adorable moments like this, and I love the relationship between Bugze and Nightshade. It always makes me feel good when the two go into loving family mode so expect those moments to be in the favorite title.

Embarrassing Moment:

"I'm kinda a hermit you see."

Trixie wipes her tears and raises an eyebrow at you suspiciously and says "How can you be a hermit if you have friends?"

You start to wonder how she even knows that you have friends, then you remember how you screamed Nightshade's name at her a few minutes ago. You chuckle in in embarrassment and quickly say,

"It's... It's a group. Hermits United. We gather around, and share stories about... caves! It's lots of fun. For a hermit."

This isn't embarrassing as more that I could have done more with this joke. Made it more of a reference and just worded it better. Ya know?

Oh The Irony Moment:

I can really trust her. Sure, I have to keep Nightshade and the fact that I'm a changeling a secret, but I definitely trust her to go through with our deal and save me.

I repeat:

Welp that's it for this review! Reply if you have any questions concerning this chap, for me in general, or to just tell me what you thought of this chapter as well! See ya all tomorrow with the next ep!

Bugze's Skills:

'Royal Canterlot Voice (RCV)' Learned: Episode 6

'Forcefield' Learned: Episode 6

'Teleport' Learned: Episode 6

'No Shadow Kick' Learned: Episode 23

'Free Running Skill' Relearned: Episode 23

'FUS RO DAH' Adapted from Previous Skill (RCV): Episode 26

'Sophisticated Talk...But Not Really' Learned: Episode 30

'Stun Spell' Learned: Episode 34

'Shoryuken' Learned: Episode 40

'Falcon Punch' Learned: Episode 40

'Transformation Spell' Taught by Trixie: Episode 40

The Karma Counter:

Good: 19
Evil: 24

Plot Hole Count: 4

Rating: 5.5/10

Question: How will the Karma points be calculated with events where there are large undefined numbers of ponies like the Gala or FIllydelphia?

Personally the Olive Garden thing should NOT be counted as evil as the restaurant did go back on it's word by kicking them out even though they clearly said "all you can eat"

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Those one's will be assigned numbers I believe will be responsible for their settings, as well as taking into account any ponies mentioned by name during said events.

As for the Evil points for this review. Well simply put this is in the eyes of the ponies, not us. To us Bugze's reaction and behavior seems justified since he got cheated out of food. To the ponies running the place, they just see it as some random guy and his daughter almost ruining their business. Hence why the evil points will stay, as its the ponies views and not ours.