S05E10: Princess Spike

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Re: S05E10: Princess Spike

Postby Applepie (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 4:24 pm

Great Spike centered episode. At last more Canterlot ponies. :yay:
Pinkie Pie: So, you see this here? This, um, this is um, a big, round room. It's known for its roundness, and bigness, and did I mention that it's round?
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Postby Mechanical Ape (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 4:33 pm

SlateSlabrock wrote:Since the chat was grousing about this being a "Spike screws up again" episode, I'll say preemptively that it seemed like a much more natural "you're in over your head" scenario.


Yeah, agreed. There were believable reasons, rooted in circumstances as well as Spike's character, for things to go wrong. It wasn't "Spike sucks because he sucks."

Gem Nerd is probably Maud's roommate at rock college.
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Postby Corpy (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 4:36 pm

Not a great episode. Marge pony was great; did she get voice credited? I missed the credits.
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Postby SlateSlabrock (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 4:41 pm

Corpy wrote:Not a great episode. Marge pony was great; did she get voice credited? I missed the credits.

Trevor Devall as Fancy Pants, Sad Delegate, Delegate 2
Jason Schombing as Manehattan Delegate
Tabitha St. Germain as Whinnyapolis Delegate, Nerdy Delegate, Princess Luna
Terry Klassen as Annoyed Delegate
Peter New as Public Works Pony, Horticultural Pegasus, Delegate 1

Good luck sorting out who's who! :cheese:
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Postby Mr. Big (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 4:46 pm

Anyone notice that series directors Jayson Thiessen and Jim Miller got story credits? Nice to seem them being involved in the writing side.
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Postby LunarRainbow92 (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 4:55 pm

Well I usually don't give a flip about Spike but this was hilarious!, he really got himself into deep do-do this time! :gotcha: and poor Twilight with that angry mob, I thought she was going to get creamed! (Why spike?, why do you get Twilight into these situations?) and that ending OH NO SPIKE DON'T SNEEZE!!!!!!!

(And I liked seeing Cadence in this episode too)
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Postby RudeCyrus (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 5:01 pm

Some cute moments, though I wish Spike would get another moment to shine.
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Postby Wayoshi (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 5:33 pm

SlateSlabrock wrote:I'll say preemptively that it seemed like a much more natural "you're in over your head" scenario. If anything, I'm a little confused about the "don't abuse your power" moral, since none of the gem-eating or massages caused any trouble; it was just the first few decisions Spike made on Twilight's behalf that spiraled out of control, and those were the ones he made out of desperation when Cadance asked him to keep things quiet!

The first couple decisions were Spike overpanicking about noise and realizing he could use the Princess Twi line to get things quiet. Then ponies also listen to him about friendship issues due to the same reason, with Spike mostly giving decent advice on his own. Then he starts the royalty treatment since he's jealous of the princesses (set up in cold open).

So it's definitely some of both. :pinkieshrug:

SlateSlabrock wrote:Trevor Devall as Fancy Pants, Sad Delegate, Delegate 2
Jason Schombing as Manehattan Delegate
Tabitha St. Germain as Whinnyapolis Delegate, Nerdy Delegate, Princess Luna
Terry Klassen as Annoyed Delegate
Peter New as Public Works Pony, Horticultural Pegasus, Delegate 1

Good luck sorting out who's who! :cheese:

Sad Delegate is probably that cloud pony who was named in Tanks...
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Postby Aramek (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 5:40 pm

Marge wasn't from Minneapolis, but Brainerd, and there's no way to make a pony pun about Brainerd.
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Postby Just Scuds (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 5:42 pm

:allears: :"Today, I'm going to trim the ivy growing on my house, and then I'll finally get around to pulling weeds from my garden."

:grumpydash: :"Ugh! What you gotta be such a horticultural pegasus you - you - equine paraquat!"

:nnngh: :"I - uh - I - uh, I'm just - I was just ........ WHAT"
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Postby PonyHag714 (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 10:08 pm

:whyme: I guess everypony likes the princesses best.

:twasnothin: Aw, we like ya Spike.

:here: Really?

:vogue: Why, we simply couldn't put on special events without Spikey Wikey to do all the grunt work.

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Postby Wildfire (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 10:18 pm

For the first time this season I missed the new episode. :deflated: I went to bed at 7 and completely forgot about it.

So I watched it now. An ok episode, I give it a 6. Not the first time a cartoon has used a storyline where someone does some bad choices that leads up to a major problem.
I felt my blood sugar spike a bit when Twilight made a bed out of the books. :3:
And so we have another new city name. Keep on world building. :yay:
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Postby Octavia (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 10:20 pm

Cute episode with some fun parts, but it wasn't anything special. William Anderson had a couple cues I really liked, like the montage with all the pizzicato strings and Spike-being-bad jazz. :chillin:
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Postby Discord (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 10:48 pm

A really good low-key episode. Well put together, funny, entertaining and I'm a sucker for stuff that shows little girls how to be princesses. :allears:

By not letting dumb BOYS do anything. :gotcha:


Also I like that Spike wants to be a princess because of the power entailed in the role. A nice bit of subversion.
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Postby Headless Horse (?) » Sat Jun 20, 2015 11:52 pm

:memories: What does a princess do?

:ohboy: Fix water mains!


This guy was a mess, he needed Twilight's help for at least two different things:

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Postby PaulloDEC (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 12:12 am

So initially I was like "Oh, it's a Spike-ruins-everything kinda deal, that's a shame", but looking back, Spike is actually pretty on-point with his decisionmaking.

Getting rid of the polo game, the jackhammer and the chainsaw were pretty reasonable responses to his orders. He wasn't told to manage the upkeep of the Canterlot grounds; he was told to ensure Twi wasn't disturbed.

Having the two delegates share the stage was a little undercooked, so we can maybe chalk that up as a loss.

All of the other little decisions seem to work out fine. If there's any negative consequences to any of them, we never see them onscreen.

So really, his only major failing was not anticipating a freak accident relating to a bunch of really incompetent polo players.
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Postby The Doctor (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 1:00 am

:fluttersmith: Cadance set Spike up to fail. She's tired of him getting all the praise in the Crystal Empire.
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Postby londonarbuckle (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 1:24 am

I thought this episode was pretty boring, but I just wanted to ask: Did Twilight sound REALLY different to anyone else during the last part of the episode, from when she wakes up on? Like, not like Tara Strong, and more like Andrea Libman or someone subbing in instead?

Either that, or the upload I watched was sped up and that was somehow the only time I noticed it. :pinkieshrug:

edit: yeah never mind, I think it was sped up. Thanks for linking to it and not mentioning that eqd
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Postby Headless Horse (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 1:32 am

I think Tara really did a heck of a job sounding exhausted in the beginning.
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Postby Minty (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 1:44 am

The lesson seemed off to me. It should have been "Be more direct when asking someone to do something" (That is, Cadance should have made Spike simply keep an eye on Twilight, and told him to call her or the sisters if something else is needed), or don't put too much pressure on kids.

Like, Spike wasn't even being that "bad" so to speak. If he'd grown again to Spikezilla and was yelling "OBEY PRINCESS SPIKE", that'd be different.
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Postby Highbrow Dash (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 1:57 am

Yeah, he didn't really do that badly :pinkieshrug:

It was an ok episode, nothing special but it had fun moments. Though it's weird how this show went from premises like "I have two tickets and 5 friends!" to "pony world expo organization" :-I
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Postby Headless Horse (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 1:59 am

In that vein, I get the feeling that this script really needed a bit more thought put into what events were to have a negative effect later, or were to feed into the message of the story. The fact that the things that went wrong were all the result of reasonable decisions by Spike and/or accidents that couldn't have been foreseen (the water main, the pruning), and that the decisions that Spike undertook purely out of self-interest or self-aggrandizement didn't have any consequences at all or were good things (the gem nerd, Fancy Pants' shakedown), feels like the result of a half-baked story idea that wasn't really properly thought through all the way.

The statue was the obvious Chekhov's Gun, and sure enough it got destroyed... but it wasn't the result of anything that was even Spike's fault except through a series of unrelated accidents that didn't necessarily even have to have happened as a setup. He could have sneezed on it for any reason (without being instigated by the flowers which just happened to end up in the ballroom through coincidence); and similarly, when he did sneeze on it, he could easily have turned his freaking head and not destroyed anything. Ultimately it all feels like "just a bunch of stuff that happened" more than a tragic tale of hubris and the insidious nature of good intentions, and it sends really mixed signals to the audience about what you should do when a friend or loved one needs your help.

I hesitate to make a pronouncement like this right off the bat, but it feels kinda like Jayson and Jim had a solid concept, and they gave it to a new writer who didn't really realize how difficult writing a script with callbacks and mini-callbacks and foreshadowing and internal consistency and a coherent conclusion from them all is, and simply got in over his head.
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Postby Headless Horse (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 2:05 am

:eep: Are those dragonsneeze flowers?

:hi: It's just a name!
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Postby londonarbuckle (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 2:33 am

Headless Horse wrote:In that vein, I get the feeling that this script really needed a bit more thought put into what events were to have a negative effect later, or were to feed into the message of the story. The fact that the things that went wrong were all the result of reasonable decisions by Spike and/or accidents that couldn't have been foreseen (the water main, the pruning), and that the decisions that Spike undertook purely out of self-interest or self-aggrandizement didn't have any consequences at all or were good things (the gem nerd, Fancy Pants' shakedown), feels like the result of a half-baked story idea that wasn't really properly thought through all the way.

The statue was the obvious Chekhov's Gun, and sure enough it got destroyed... but it wasn't the result of anything that was even Spike's fault except through a series of unrelated accidents that didn't necessarily even have to have happened as a setup. He could have sneezed on it for any reason (without being instigated by the flowers which just happened to end up in the ballroom through coincidence); and similarly, when he did sneeze on it, he could easily have turned his freaking head and not destroyed anything. Ultimately it all feels like "just a bunch of stuff that happened" more than a tragic tale of hubris and the insidious nature of good intentions, and it sends really mixed signals to the audience about what you should do when a friend or loved one needs your help.

I hesitate to make a pronouncement like this right off the bat, but it feels kinda like Jayson and Jim had a solid concept, and they gave it to a new writer who didn't really realize how difficult writing a script with callbacks and mini-callbacks and foreshadowing and internal consistency and a coherent conclusion from them all is, and simply got in over his head.


Sums it up pretty well. Plus Spike could've just gone "Sorry, she's unavailable, find another princess" at any time.
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Postby Wayoshi (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 2:35 am

I would have liked some synonym name for Dragonsneeze instead of a literal thing. Spike being allergic gives you all you need to know without the name, so... even some Latin-esque species name would have been cool.

https://en.glosbe.com/en/la/sneeze

Draco sternumentum :3:

Obviously the incompetent polo players or whatever leading to "chain of unfortunate events!" was cartoon humor, but I think it was meant to be read as Spike not taking into consideration that the trees and pipe really needed to be fixed, and that Twi was fine up in the tower so he was overdoing it.

Also he didn't take any notes on all the gems so he did fuck that up :flutterdear:
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Postby Angel Beat (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 2:42 am

I couldn't really get into the episode, but it was nice overall.

I'll have to rewatch it later when my mind is clearer. :v:
Wayoshi wrote:I would have liked some synonym name for Dragonsneeze instead of a literal thing. Spike being allergic gives you all you need to know without the name, so... even some Latin-esque species name would have been cool.

https://en.glosbe.com/en/la/sneeze

Draco sternumentum :3:

Gesundheit. :v:
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Postby MrPeaches (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 5:35 am

Hello! I have Words to say about ponies!

First of all, I enjoyed the episode. The visuals, music, and designs were excellent, and there's so much setting material to mine from it! But I personally feel that Spike has been overlooked for a character arc! Because the writers of this show are so excellent and attentive, it feels weird!

I used the episode list at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_M ... c_episodes and looked through Spike-Centric episodes to try and trace his path of character growth. These are my personal findings:

+ Dog and Pony Show: Spike helps Rarity out and tries his best to save her. Nice!

- Owl's Well that Ends Well: Instantly jealous of nocturnal bird, destroys property to frame bird, runs away, endangers Twilight and Bird. Learns not to be jealous.

- Secret of My Excess: Birthday presents turn him instantly evil, he hulks out and destroys half of Ponyville. Learns that being greedy is bad. Disturbingly, I haven't heard canon that says dragons can grow apart from greed and evil (see Zecora's description in the episode.)

+ Dragon Quest: Spike does good! All young dragons he finds are evil, but he doesn't compromise his virtues.

+ Crystal Empire: Acts heroically, saves Crystal Empire. Good job Spike! This episode and Dragon Quest feel like the end of a character arc; Spike has faced his unsavory instincts and has chosen to act honorably.

- Spike at Your Service: The birth of Incompetent Spike. He means well, but boy oh boy he's a buffoon lol! Spike doesn't appear incompetent when he's not the focus of an episode.

- Just for Sidekicks: Slobbering at the chops for gems, he neglects pets for the whole episode. At the end, he learns being greedy is bad. Again.

Image

- Power Ponies: Spike only pawn in game of life. (Revenge of Incompetent Spike)

+ Inspiration Manifestation: Props to Spike! He talks Rarity down from omnipotent magical madness.

- Equestria Games: Recognized for saving the empire, Spike instantly becomes megalomaniacal and humiliates himself. Has to learn that being selfish and greedy is bad. Again.

- Princess Spike: Incompetent Spike, Greedy Spike, and Selfish Spike join forces to destroy a summit and achieve the Equestrian record for Fastest Misuse of Royal Authority. Spike learns that being greedy and selfish is bad. AGAIN.

I'm being deliberately over-the-top in places for humor, but even though in 4 episodes he steps up and rocks it, in 7 episodes he's an utter buffoon or learning the same lesson about greed and selfishness. Instead of moving on and growing, I see Spike swirling round and round in episodes that say "Hey, did you know being greedy is bad?" I trust him less today than I did at the end of the second season! Don't you think that after all Spike has been through with his friends, everything he's seen, and all the interaction he's had with the princesses, that Spike would be capable of more by now?

TL;DR: Don't you think Spike has earned the right to mature and grow a little bit? :(
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Postby Lapis Infinitas (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 5:47 am

This episode actually got a couple of guffaws out of me. The ending cut to black was great. Solid ep.
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Postby Marimo (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 6:32 am

MrPeaches wrote:- Equestria Games: Recognized for saving the empire, Spike instantly becomes megalomaniacal and humiliates himself. Has to learn that being selfish and greedy is bad. Again.

What? He enjoyed the praise he got, but he didn't become megalomaniacal, and that was not the cause of his humiliation. His nerves got to him when it came to lighting the torch, he's just excited about thinking that he unlocked a new ability when he tried to set things on fire with his mind, and him volunteering to sing the anthem song was him trying to make it up to Equestria. Even after he got a cool moment and saved the games by breathing a giant flame at an oncoming giant cloud of ice, he still felt bad because his problem was that he hadn't been able to forgive himself the whole time, and did the fireworks to help get over it. The message wasn't about selfishness and greediness being bad, it was a message about being able to forgive yourself of the disappointments in your past.

No matter how many times others tell you you're great, all the praise in the world means nothing if you don't feel it inside. Sometimes to feel good about yourself, you gotta let go of the past. That way, when the time comes to let your greatness fly, you'll be able to light up the whole sky.
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Postby MrPeaches (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 6:53 am

Marimo wrote:What? He enjoyed the praise he got, but he didn't become megalomaniacal, and that was not the cause of his humiliation. His nerves got to him when it came to lighting the torch, he's just excited about thinking that he unlocked a new ability when he tried to set things on fire with his mind, and him volunteering to sing the anthem song was him trying to make it up to Equestria. Even after he got a cool moment and saved the games by breathing a giant flame at an oncoming giant cloud of ice, he still felt bad because his problem was that he hadn't been able to forgive himself the whole time, and did the fireworks to help get over it. The message wasn't about selfishness and greediness being bad, it was a message about being able to forgive yourself of the disappointments in your past.


Fair enough! I was thinking of the scene where he was hamming it up for the ponies that wanted his autograph and extrapolated that out too far. I still feel the same about Spike having to learn the same lesson ad nauseum, but he's had a lot of great moments in the series too. If anything, the reason I'm inspired to write about ponies on the Internet is that the show's team has done such a great job making us care for these characters!
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Postby Daring Do (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 7:42 am

Wildfire wrote:For the first time this season I missed the new episode. :deflated: I went to bed at 7 and completely forgot about it.

So I watched it now. An ok episode, I give it a 6. Not the first time a cartoon has used a storyline where someone does some bad choices that leads up to a major problem.
I felt my blood sugar spike a bit when Twilight made a bed out of the books. :3:
And so we have another new city name. Keep on world building. :yay:


I nearly forgot the episode too. I think it's the 3 week hiatus that's doing it - We're still not used to having pony every week again.

Anyhow. I liked the worldbuilding in this episode (and Cook and Price's OCs from the comics). Twilight said there were delegates from over 50 cities, right? So now we know there're at least 51 settlements in the kingdom - But that's presumably including Canterlot, since there's a Canterlot delegation too. Has anyone tried counting the number of gems in the statue? I figure they didn't really plan out the number (since I heard that RD's birthday candles in Pinkie Pride don't mean anything), but still, it would be fun to know.
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Postby MurdER_weapOn '78 (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 8:59 am

The best part was when he was properly abusing his power and saying "by order of the princess" to everyone (hello Gustav!)

Some of those delegates seemed insufferable, and Fancy Pants was very cheeky, asking for extra priviliges/unlimited access :-/

I wondered what was going on with Twilight in the cold open, she sounded a bit mashed. :gotcha:
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Postby Highbrow Dash (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 5:16 pm

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Postby ROBOT B9 (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 5:18 pm

The book bed was probably one of the cutest moments of this season. :allears:
:plonk: Image :)
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Postby PonyHag714 (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 6:00 pm

Image Mr. the Dragon, I must see Princess...heh...Twilight at once.

Image I'm sorry, but I have strict orders. Twilight is not to be disturbed.

Image And just who gave you those...strict orders?

Image Princess Cadence.

Image The same Princess Cadence who promised me a warm welcome on my inspection tour of the Crystal Empire...and there wasn't one?

Image Ms. Harshwhinny, that is not fair!

Image I am the Harsh. I don't have to be fair.

:here: And you're doing a fine job.
:speakest: The fun has been doubled!
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Postby Aramek (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 6:20 pm

The Doctor wrote:Image



I adore these edits.
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Postby PonyHag714 (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 6:24 pm

The magic bullet. :liarjack:
:speakest: The fun has been doubled!
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Postby theGECK (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 6:59 pm

Aramek wrote:Marge wasn't from Minneapolis, but Brainerd, and there's no way to make a pony pun about Brainerd.


Breigh-nerd? Brain-herd? :pinkieshrug:

As much as it pains me to do it, since this episode has a Minnesota reference, and that reference references both cold weather and Fargo I'm bound by the contract of living in Minnesota to proclaim this episode as "Greatest Episode of MLP Ever".

It wasn't a bad episode, it just felt like a Fluttershy episode where the lesson learned was the same as before but from a different angle. He learned not to do things solely to benefit himself. Except...he didn't. What did Spike learn? Oh, I know! Do preventative maintenance before everything in your society collapses and creates bigger problems. Even with the odd story structure/moral, I definitely liked it more than last week's episode.
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Postby Niels Olof (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 10:40 pm

It was a Spike episode.

What I found interesting (apart from the many different pony designs and outfits) was how the angry mob (rather surprisingly led by Fancy Pants) illuminates the power dynamics of the Equestrian state: While princesses are universally obeyed by default (I suppose because they usually form decisions based on rather more than mere reptilian brains), bad decisions can and will be challenged, and answers will be expected. The princesses are not operating our kind of absolutist autocracy. The form of the whole conference suggests that while ultimate authority lies with the princesses, they rule informed by their populace. (Another strike against annoying fanfic that paints Princess Celestia as a despot :applejargh: ).

Also, it was a Spike episode.
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Postby Master_Twig (?) » Sun Jun 21, 2015 10:55 pm

I don't like Spike episodes. If I had to make a list of my top 10 least favorite episodes, I bet half of them would be Spike episodes. I just don't find him to be that compelling of a character, and like MrPeaches pointed on earlier, the problem is that Spike never learns anything. People complain about Pinkie being inconsistently written, but I feel like that happens just as often if not more with Spike. This episode wasn't really BAD, but it just wasn't interesting at all. I was mostly bored with it and probably wont even remember much about it down the line. I liked the delegate ponies, especially the Whinneyapolis one, but that was about it for the episode.
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