S06E06: No Second Prances

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Re: S06E06: No Second Prances

Postby Aramek (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 5:27 pm

The Ghost Of Ember wrote:If you want to feel guilty about liking a character that's your business, don't put that evil on me.

No, it's the other way around. I don't feel guilty, and I like the fact that she doesn't really either. At least not in the "YOU NEED TO CONSTANTLY PROSTRATE YOURSELF FOREVER" sort of crap we get from a lot of shows. Like all of her "Welp, I was a real Dr. Doom there, wasn't I? WHOOPSIE DOODLE!" is the absolute best thing, and I wish more characters were like that. I really relate to that, and that's why I adore this character, and I like her even more than Sunset.

Sunset, I think, feels too badly for her past mistakes, and I find myself going "Wow, you're still beating yourself up for this, huh? Man, this sure makes for good TV *yawn*. :pinkieshrug:

All this is getting away from the moral of the episode anyway. :v: That second chances are good, and both Trixie and Starlight have committed themselves to being good ponies, and, in the end, that's what matters. In fact, it seems to clearly show how Twi going "Yeah, I don't think you're sorry enough" toward Trixie only causes more problems than it solves.
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Postby Wayoshi (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 5:35 pm

Fizzbuzz wrote:The Ghost Of Ember is an ex-Jehova's Witness and he was bothered by how lightly the show has handled Starlight Glimmer's village and her whole thing of being a cult leader. He wrote an interesting Cottage thread about it a couple months ago: viewtopic.php?f=33&t=13411

There was potentially a suicide attempt in this episode glossed over too. There are some major issues that this show just won't tackle, despite continually pushing new bounds. :pinkieshrug:
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Postby Mechanical Ape (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 5:38 pm

I think one difference between Sunset and Starlight is that Starlight knows -- from repeated personal experience -- that you can't change the past. I do think she regrets how she used to behave, but I also think she's come to terms with it and is focused on changing for the future. She's probably really tired at this point of clinging to old pain.

Again, that doesn't mean that she doesn't feel bad about how she was, only that letting those regrets burden her is not going to be helpful in her goal to improve.
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Postby Aramek (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 5:41 pm

Mechanical Ape wrote:I think one difference between Sunset and Starlight is that Starlight knows -- from repeated personal experience -- that you can't change the past. I do think she regrets how she used to behave, but I also think she's come to terms with it and is focused on changing for the future. She's probably really tired at this point of clinging to old pain.

Again, that doesn't mean that she doesn't feel bad about how she was, only that letting those regrets burden her is not going to be helpful in her goal to improve.

Exactly. And that's what I'm touching on with the moral of this ep, like, Twi was all uppity about Trixie because of the "Hmm, you don't look maudlin enough, you must not be reformed yet!" point of view. Starlight knew what she did was bad, understands it (as well as one could, I suppose), accepts that was bad, and has chosen to be different now. Being a sadsack wouldn't help shit, except make the characters still mad at her feel superior.
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Your MRI results have shown total infection to now be approximately one fifth of the full mass of the tissue.

"So you're saying..."

Your brain is about 20% tumor.
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Postby Daring Do (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 6:25 pm

Fizzbuzz wrote:The Ghost Of Ember is an ex-Jehova's Witness and he was bothered by how lightly the show has handled Starlight Glimmer's village and her whole thing of being a cult leader. He wrote an interesting Cottage thread about it a couple months ago: viewtopic.php?f=33&t=13411


This is... Wow. I had no idea the Jehovah's Witnesses were like that...
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Postby Mechanical Ape (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 6:42 pm

Starlight also has the advantage of living in a more forgiving and healing environment (happy pony land) as opposed to Sunset's surroundings (the snake pit that is high school). If I were trying to get over an old shame, I know where I'd rather be.
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Postby The Doctor (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 6:55 pm

Well that's one glaring problem with the EQG story. There was absolutely zero reason for Sunset not to go back with Twilight after the first film. She stayed because there was a sequel coming.
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Postby Fizzbuzz (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 7:16 pm

The Doctor wrote:Well that's one glaring problem with the EQG story. There was absolutely zero reason for Sunset not to go back with Twilight after the first film. She stayed because there was a sequel coming.

I thought that Meghan and the gang had no idea that Hasbro was going to want to make another EqG movie, and thus had to scramble to find a purpose for Sunset Shimmer and a way for Twilight Sparkle to get back to Dougworld despite the time limit previously imposed on the portal.
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Postby Aramek (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 7:34 pm

The Doctor wrote:There was absolutely zero reason for Sunset not to go back with Twilight after the first film. She stayed because there was a sequel coming.

She was forever banished under threat of Celestial disintegration I thought.

e: Along with everything sent through the mirror. The Sirens were "banished or die".
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Your MRI results have shown total infection to now be approximately one fifth of the full mass of the tissue.

"So you're saying..."

Your brain is about 20% tumor.
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Postby SlateSlabrock (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 7:37 pm

Fizzbuzz wrote:I don't know, I liked things as they were. Twilight scrambling to find other friends for Starlight helped drive home the point that she was worrying way too much and being too much of a control freak. Her behavior didn't seem especially unusual to me, but then I did rewatch Feeling Pinkie Keen just the day before this episode aired, so that was still fresh on my mind.

I mentioned this briefly in my first reaction, but this really isn't a Starlight story. It's a Twilight story. Starlight's decisions are never called into question, while Twilight has to deal with her prejudice against Trixie. Twilight smothers Starlight in her attempt to be the big teacher. Twilight tries to put on a dog and pony show for Celestia. Twilight has to apologize to Starlight and Trixie for being too controlling and distrustful.

So the conflict is basically that standard season 2 Twilight freak-out, right down to the "ha ha she's so OCD" neurosis. Even in the premiere, Starlight is only worried about Sunburst rejecting her because of her past, but he worries about the same thing. The episode ends with Twilight moping about how she's a bad teacher. We haven't really gotten a true "Starlight learns a lesson" episode yet.
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Postby Daring Do (?) » Mon May 02, 2016 7:42 pm

Btw, as I haven't actually said anything about this episode yet - I enjoyed it. Wasn't flawless, but seemed to have a good feel to it in general. Part of that, I think, was the mystery of whether Trixie would turn out to be good or bad - Like a toned down version of Canterlot Wedding, with its "Is Twilight really just being jealous" question. I've got criticisms of this episode, too, but I'll maybe keep them to myself for the moment.
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Postby Wylie (?) » Tue May 03, 2016 3:32 am

I remember seeing a tweet from either the episode's writer or Josh Haber this week sometime that said something to the effect that the antagonists in this episode are the character flaws of the protagonists, and it makes a good bit of sense. Twilight's is her control issues, Trixie's is her need to one-up Twilight, and Starlight's is her fear of making a friend, which is really an inability to trust.
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Postby Wayoshi (?) » Tue May 03, 2016 5:21 am

Wylie wrote:I remember seeing a tweet from either the episode's writer or Josh Haber this week sometime that said something to the effect that the antagonists in this episode are the character flaws of the protagonists, and it makes a good bit of sense. Twilight's is her control issues, Trixie's is her need to one-up Twilight, and Starlight's is her fear of making a friend, which is really an inability to trust.

Everyone is somewhat in the wrong in the final conflict, which would have been really cool if said climax was given a chance to breathe.
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Postby Soft Snow (?) » Tue May 03, 2016 3:43 pm

Twilight seems to be doing through what I can only describe as a Dragon Ball Z phase of unicorn friends. Each unicorn opponent she encounters seems to be stronger at magic then the last one. First Trixie then Sunset Shimmer then Starlight Glimmer. I can only imagine how powerful the fourth one will be. But in a way that does make sense. If Rainbow Dash had to constantly challenge other pegasi to a race you would want her to face increasingly faster opponents. It wouldn't make sense to pull back the strength of her next opponent unless you gave her a gimmick as an obstacle to overcome as opposed to another power up boost.
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Postby Fizzbuzz (?) » Tue May 03, 2016 4:09 pm

Soft Snow wrote:Twilight seems to be doing through what I can only describe as a Dragon Ball Z phase of unicorn friends. Each unicorn opponent she encounters seems to be stronger at magic then the last one. First Trixie then Sunset Shimmer then Starlight Glimmer.

And the interesting thing is that each time she's beaten them a different way. Boast Busters had Twilight winning through sheer magical force, by severely straining herself to get the Ursa Minor asleep and back home. Meanwhile, Magic Duel had her use illusions and tricks to convince Trixie that she and her false amulet were better at magic. Then, with Starlight Glimmer, Twilight beat her by convincing her that a direct fight against her was utterly futile, instead talking to her and finding out the root cause of her problems; i.e., Twilight used friendship.
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Postby Mechanical Ape (?) » Tue May 03, 2016 4:17 pm

Yes, I like the constant reminders, in this episode as elsewhere, that Starlight is really phenomenally good at magic, because what makes it interesting is that Starlight doesn't seem to realize it. It's not an acknowledged core of her character the way it is for Twilight the child prodigy, or Sunset the former Celestia pupil, it's just there.

It looks to me that Starlight has always had the picture of Sunburst as the talented one (which is only true in a certain way) and doesn't realize the extraordinariness of her own power, though everypony else seems to. Whatever character flaws Starlight has or used to have, "I am best at magic, obey me" is not one of them. She used the Staff of Sameness to make herself the most powerful unicorn in town, and she didn't even need to. Unusually for villains on this show, a big part of her being evil was her low self-esteem, her need to force everypony down to her perceived level of non-specialness. And even though she's not evil now, she still doesn't seem to realize how special she is.

I just think it's an interesting thing about her.
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Postby Aramek (?) » Tue May 03, 2016 5:11 pm

Yeah, which is why I loved Starlight as an opponent, because, in the narrative, she was smarter than Twilight. Like, that's the only way they could still maintain that action tension, we had a baddie that genuinely out thought the protagonist.

The good guys only won because Twilight convinced her to stop winning. With friendship. :allears:
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Your MRI results have shown total infection to now be approximately one fifth of the full mass of the tissue.

"So you're saying..."

Your brain is about 20% tumor.
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Postby Mechanical Ape (?) » Wed May 04, 2016 4:24 am

Just thought I'd say, this outfit is grand. :vogue:

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Trixie episodes are the only episodes where Rarity has the second best hat.
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Postby Nicotico (?) » Wed May 04, 2016 6:10 pm

So I've been avoiding this season after the season opening. But this one seemed interesting so I watched it. Oh boy did I enjoy it. Book horse was great. Trixie was great. Glimmer was great.

Indeed the discussion on Glimmer underestimating her power is understandable. Sunburst was her idol it that sense, and even in the opening we see that Glimmer is much better than Sunburst once she gets shown how to do it. She hasn't really made any friends since sunburst (except the mane 6) and she clearly is as magic reliant as twilight was in season 1.

I guess it's time to watch some reactions!

EDIT:

Also Cranky is friends with Celestia, after all she came to his wedding. On the other hand Luna did forget to get the presents for them so I guess Cranky feels Celestia stills owes him something.
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Postby Chaos Sonic (?) » Fri May 06, 2016 11:04 pm

Mechanical Ape wrote:Which includes Trixie, to bring it back to her! "Magic Duel" implied that her performances were her livelihood, but we never saw her pulling in any cash. She scammed a couple of kids out of a free smoothie, I guess that counts. But "Boast Busters" left me with the impression she didn't want money, her only motivation was she's Great and Powerful and everypony must know. :smug:

I figure she pulled her wagon into the center of town to give a "preview" performance, then would later set up somewhere outside of town where she could charge admission.
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Postby Corpy (?) » Tue May 10, 2016 4:56 am

Trixie and Starlight Glimmer didn't kiss. 0/10
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Postby Fizzbuzz (?) » Tue May 10, 2016 12:39 pm

Corpy wrote:Trixie and Starlight Glimmer didn't kiss. 0/10

Twilight's teaching Starlight about friendship, not romance. :-P
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Postby SlateSlabrock (?) » Wed May 11, 2016 12:28 am

Fizzbuzz wrote:Twilight's teaching Starlight about friendship, not romance. :-P

and the fans already have this angle covered
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Postby Captain Rufus (?) » Wed May 11, 2016 1:29 am

SlateSlabrock wrote:and the fans already have this angle covered


And that's why I hate fandoms. :-/
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Postby Soft Snow (?) » Wed May 11, 2016 3:57 pm

After thinking about it, Trixie's voice sounded a bit weird. I think this is really the first time she spoke in her normal, non-theatrical voice for this long of time. I think before I only remember her doing that in one or two sentences. So it seems a bit off when I hear it like it is now.
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Postby Fizzbuzz (?) » Wed May 11, 2016 4:18 pm

Soft Snow wrote:After thinking about it, Trixie's voice sounded a bit weird. I think this is really the first time she spoke in her normal, non-theatrical voice for this long of time. I think before I only remember her doing that in one or two sentences. So it seems a bit off when I hear it like it is now.
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That's a comment I remember seeing around the fandom. Like you said, I think the thing there was just that Kathleen Barr has never really had to play a gentler side of Trixie before this episode, so it's very slightly strange to hear her like that.
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