Also, c/p my original reaction post:
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Holy crap that was a good episode

I think after so many story-heavy eps lately I've kind of forgotten how
funny this show can be.
The character work is just top-notch. Pinkie especially; the physical comedy bits like rolling around everywhere on skates, and bouncing on her tail like it's a medicine ball, but particularly the way she reacts to Fluttershy during the first group party (slooowly sliding the bag of candy off the table) and later at the spoooky tea party ("What?!"). I haven't seen Pinkie written this well in I don't know how fuckin' long.
Story-wise it's also very well put together. I've seen story structures like this before, where someone puts their mind to something and ends up being wildly successful beyond all plausibility, and there's clues all along the way as to what's going on that you can pick up on if you're really trying, and in this case it wasn't exactly a huge challenge... but it was all in service of a nice message that played well on prior milestones in Fluttershy's development like "baby steps", which is neatly in keeping with the show's original premise as a sort of self-help primer for kids. Fluttershy is
actively working on changing how she interacts with the world; sometimes she makes progress, and sometimes she overreaches her aim and has to scuttle back into her cave to recuperate. But this is an honest-to-goodness arc for her, and it will figure into her future stories, if past ones showing up here is any indication.
But it's the sight gags and background details that make this a goddamn laugh riot:
- I love that they're playing up Twilight's castle being big and dark and cold and spooky with hardly anyone living in it
- Spike continues his tradition of great costume choices

- I don't know what the fuck kind of ghost story would have ended with the bit we heard from Pinkie, but it sounds perfect for something you just pick up right in the middle
-

"I just told you. The mannequin comes to life and haunts all the dresses."
- I guess Equestria has a space program if RD's space helmet is anything but the realm of in-universe sci-fi. Also, that shot of it all full of candy BAAAHAHA

- The Nightmare Moon poster with her tongue sticking out
- Also a neat bit of unspoken continuity: RD can regain her attitude in seconds after being spun around a bunch, like on the dizz-mo-tron in Wonderbolts Academy. Never expected to see that bit ever show up again, but I'll be damned if it wasn't the perfect way to callback to it.
- Granny Smith as a cackling Warner Bros. witch made me LOL. But seeing her skull fall off her body was like

—gave me the same vibes as the snail on the stone Twilight in Stare Master.
- Horsemask

- Derpy, fuckin' perfect
- Just all the random dishing between the characters, like Applejack rationalizing whatever is going on in the pit, and Rarity trying costumes on Fluttershy, and pretty much everything they all say to each other throughout the episode. In fact, I just have to give special credit to Fluttershy's spooooky tea party narration, and the way it's handled: all the stuff she says and the "mistake existential horror and psychoterrorism for jump-scares" gags are great on one level, like Bender trying to scare Fry ("There is no god and your idiotic human ideals are laughable!"); but even better is that none of the other ponies even know how to begin to react. They could have had AJ and Rarity and Pinkie flip out at this little manifestation of PYHD Fluttershy twisting the knife into their deepest darkest psychological fears, but honestly that's been done, and it would have turned the scene into slapstick. Instead it was really quite poignant, as we see Fluttershy trying to recap her PYHD performance and having it backfire horribly (even if the worst reaction she got out of them was just confusion, like, realistic human confusion, like the way you or I would react if we found ourselves in exactly that position). That was a scene that started out a certain way, telegraphing to me that it was going to go in a certain direction comedically and dramatically, and then it went off at a 90-degree angle from that, and left me with one of the most rich and human scenes this show has ever done.
Oh, and—
- "Harry" is now confirmed for official retcon as the bear's name, rather than just being a thing Fluttershy came up with off the top of her head trying to put Pinkie off the scent of her surprise party plans
Moral: sometimes you need baby steps, sometimes "no steps" is the answer. Even if stepping outside your element is really goddamn funny.