Usually wait a little later to start the episode discussion thread, but I may as well start it now.

The next episode of My Little Pony:Friendship is Magic is coming up, and this one is called "The Big Mac Question", by Josh Haber and Mike Vogel, two regulars on the show.

My assumption is that this isn't about fast food, and probably revolves around Big Macintosh. Maybe he's taking off to go live with Sugar Belle? Of course, this could be the life and times of Big Mac, too, with him Eeeyepping across the years in a series of flashbacks. I wouldn't mind finding out more about him, as he's usually been a pony of few words.

This'll be the place to speculate about the episode if you haven't watched it, and discuss it when you have!

This is also the last regular episode. Next week's the two parter, followed by and epilogue episode, all on the same day, and that'll be it for season 9 and the show.

Or is it?

Not talking about G5 here, but I did just hear something. If you're familiar with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you might know that while the show only went up to season 7, there is a season 8 for it. It was just all comics, not tv episodes.

And now I'm hearing about a season 10 IDW comic series coming out! Andy Price is involved.

Anyways, this is the discussion thread, so have fun! I finished season 8 (Mostly. I'll go back for two of the episodes later.). Maybe I'll start season 9 this weekend.

--Sweetie Belle

fluffy right love muffin bunnies angry rhyming apple apples blagheeggh

7012609
What flavor of muffin bunnies?

--Sweetie Belle

the soft honey sweet kind i was just throwing words around to scramble a hint only the one who saw the episod would get.

7012592

Wow..... So, Hasbro wasn't just like "Yeah, sure, if you still make good money with them, you can continue with the comics" but actually went to IDW and told them "So, we don't want to continue My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic as an animated TV show, but we want that there will be a Season 10 and that the show gets continued with the comics and we want you guys to make Season 10!".
This is significant. I can't get behind it why Hasbro wants to continue with Season 10 in the comics when it is still interested in seeing the show continued, even though an animated series would obviously be better, but this shows that Hasbro still has a huge interest in Generation 4.
This development increases the chance that Generation 5 will be a sequel tremendously. Maybe we can all breathe calmer soon.

7012609

This doesn't sound like anything what Big Jim hinted about regarding this episode, but I read the word "muffin" in there and that pleases me. I hope Derpy has a large role in this episode and steals everypony the show. Except for Applebloom. Nopony steals the show from Applebloom.
Derpy needs and deserves a large, impressive kaboom all to herself before My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic ends. Or, at least ends in animated form with voice and sounds..... We need to see Derpy move and hear her talk one last time!

Who'd have thought back in Season 1 that the show's last "regular episode" would be the resolution of a long-running romantic sideplot and basically a sequel to half a dozen other "regular episodes"?

7012655
Oooor it's basically

"Yeah, sure, if you still make good money with them, you can continue with the comics"

but with better branding to make it clear these stories take place after the show.

Don't know why you think it points to a sequel either - other shows like Buffy and Charmed that went this way have never returned to TV without rebooting, although admittedly they weren't cartoons. Once the comics writers start being allowed to change things, then it's much harder to watch the show without having to read the comics, which has always been a rule. So this seems to rather reinforce the idea that this world will not be returning to TV. Although as with your opposite hopes, this may just be me reading what I want into it.

7012592
For a moment there, I thought you were going to say that G5 would be like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But then, I realised, no, that’s Equestria Girls.

7012663
I thought Buffy was already G4. We already have Spike and Angel. A Watcher? Well, they should be surrounded by books of magic. Living in a library sounds like a good start. And we already have a Scooby Gang...

--Sweetie Belle

7012663

Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But then, I realised, no, that’s Equestria Girls.

That's a very faithful way of approaching EQG. A little too faithful. You should go and watch Buffy again. You sound like it's been a while.

7012668

And we already have a Scooby Gang...

You give me ideas for pictures..... Which is rather welcome. I'm going to draw them A TON from now on.

7012592

I'm hearing about a season 10 IDW comic series coming out!

YEEEEESS!!! YesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesathousandandonelevelsofYES!

7012592
You have no idea how long I’ve waited for an episode like this

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Yeah, it’s definitely been a while. I acknowledge that the only similarity is tenuous at best* and doesn’t apply to all the EQG media.

*both being set in a town built on top of a rupture between dimensions—Hell in Buffy and Equestria in EQG—that leak evil/Equestrian magic that the heroes have to deal with.

It just amuses me to think of EQG like that, because inevitably, I think of the reverse... What if Equestria had been on the other side of Sunnydale’s Hellmouth all that time?

Lyra and Bon Bon proposed to each other!!

7012592
Only 3 episodes left

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Season 10? Season 10. Season 10! SEASON 10!!!

I’m melancholy about the final regularly scheduled episode of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. Never again will I worry about being in front of the TV to catch a new episode featuring Twilight ‘n’ Friends at 11:30 Eastern Saturday. Never will I write another follow up while keeping an eye on the college gridiron action. We are down to a few days until this show is put in the rearview mirror.

I know, we still have some Equestria Girls stuff, and there’s good reason to believe we’ll get another theatrical film in 2021 or 22. It won’t be the same.

Onto the episode at hand.

I like these eppys told from various points-of-view. Josh Haber, a seasoned hand at MLP by now, did a fine job with this one.

We finally got another wedding, and it looks like Big Mac and Sugar Belle will take over Sweet Apple Acres after Applejack becomes co-ruler of Equestria. While the lovers’ plans for a romantic proposal go haywire, it ended up all right in the end. To be fair, once you involve Discord in a plan, it’s sure to go places you’ve never imagined it would go.

The wedding itself was beautiful. However, I thought the whole dang town would’ve showed up to see Mac and Belle get hitched. I expected the rest of the Mane 6 to attend, at the very least, to give AJ emotional support as she bawled her eyes out watching her brother take a giant step in his life.

Huge laughs from me about Granny Smith’s dreams! We never got to see Starfleet ponies, but we do get a description here. Extra props for Granny dreaming Grand Pear into Kirk’s role (since both are played by William Shatner) and Mud Briar into Spock’s role. She even had Discord/Q in there for some Next Generation flare. I only wish they could’ve gotten Shatner to do a few lines, as Grand Pear did attend the wedding of his grandson.

“Uhh, Sugar Belle? Ah noticed you invited some-a yer friends from Equaltown to the weddin’, but you didn’t invite Starlight Glimmer. Do ya still have a grudge agin’ her?”

“You mean that evil, lying, conniving pony who brainwashed me, stole my cutie mark and forced me to bake the most bland baked goods for years? No. Why do you ask?”

“No reason…”

Somewhere, Cheerilee, Fluttershy and Marble Pie are sharing a table at a bar and drinking their sorrows away. Or not. Seriously, I never got the shipping between them and Big Mac.

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I think of the reverse... What if Equestria had been on the other side of Sunnydale’s Hellmouth all that time?

Now, THAT is a more pleasant thought to have. I'll reward you with an upvote for that.
It's not really possible for Sunnydale specifically, unless we theorize that it's a dark and twisted alternate universe Equestria (the universe in which the Pony of Shadows won and Stygian was never freed from the Shadow, which you can see in the final issue of "Legends of Magic" and "Nightmare Knights" would work with that theory), because if I remember the end of that show correctly, the entire town collapsed into the ground and got swallowed by Hell. Which is something Equestria wouldn't quite do. Not even with a town full of humans, I guess.
But I love the imagination of gates to Equestria that are hidden on Earth. If I would find it, I'd leave for Equestria instantly.

7012936
It's not that impossible - while a lot of the "hell dimensions" are , well, hellish, there's also a fair bit of prejudice involved and there's no reason a pleasant place like Equestria couldn't be lumped in too - especially since there are large parts of it's world that are quite unpleasant and full of monsters.