History Headscratchers / MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagicSeason2

*** Not to mention their motivation for doing so is plain ridiculous. Rainbow is ALWAYS full of herself! Her entire measuring stick for her potential pet in the last episode was they have to be as awesome as she is. She is always tooting her own horn, and yet they never saw a reason to want to mess with her before now? And furthermore she has every right to considering, you know, she's the only pony to ever pull off a Sonic Rainboom. Three times. Not to mention she literally saved at least half a dozen ponies lives, which call me crazy, but it's at least excusable to get wrapped up in the praise that brings just a little bit, isn't it? Up until the Welldomare shows up, she was basically just playing to the crowd and putting on a good show for her fans enjoyment. There was nothing about her behavior in this episode that called for them doing what they did.
** I don't know though, I felt they really only turned up as Mare Do Well when Rainbow Dash started getting so full of herself that she started botching the "hero-ing" part of being a hero. The crashing balloon? She herself blew it off to do autographs, and Mare Do Well got down to business. (side note: episode didn't say who was in costume that time, but we know it wasn't twilight because she was in the crowd, and given the situation was probably Pinky.) The Runaway wagon? AppleJack waited until after Rainbow boasted and after she failed to save them. Applejack not then stepping up and trying to save the wagon would have been irresponsible, but she did wait and give Rainbow Dash her shot at it. The collapsing construction site? actually took both Rainbow Dash AND Pinky working in tandem to save everypony. The Dam? Rainbow made a bad situation worse before Mare Do Well got there, and it took Twilight to save the day. In my mind, the only thing the 5 are really guilty of is using the costume to make the point. Rainbow really was either screwing things up or getting in over her head on her own by the time Mare Do Well showed up.

*** Further, for good or for ill the series as a whole seems to send the message that "just talking about a problem won't work, someone has to be shown the problem." It wouldn't surprise me if Twilight came up with the plan, because Celestia is her mentor and Celestia refuses to just tell you something when a BatmanGambit will do. And Twilight seems to have taken the "Batman" part of that literally in this case...

** True, the episode could had ended with a catastrophe akin to 'Lesson Zero', with Rainbow Dash completely losing it and literally nuking Ponyville 'You shall remember me no matter what'-style or causing a major disaster only she could solve, but from what we saw so far, it's quite hard to cause lasting damage to Ponyville and it's denizens due to Cartoon Physics. They probably assumed she would try to upstage MDW, then try to unmask her if it failed, and acted accordingly. If she slipped into depression instead (which would be very out-of-character anyways), they'd likely abandon the whole thing before it went too far.
** You also bring up an interesting point mentioning ''Party of One,'' you'd think Pinkie of all Ponies would realise locking someone out from what they like doing could have a massive adverse effect on them. If she'd witnessed Dash's " Then why am I all alone" speech I'd imagine she'd change her tact pretty fast.

* Do the mane charicters really think stopping bragging is the only or even main reason humility is a good thing?humility is not a good thing because it stops you bragging, bragging can be annoying but I think it’s a persons purgative to enjoy their accomplishments, and it’s arguably pretty selfish to stop them just because you find it annoying. it's sometimes a good thing because arrogance can make you over confident when your doing what ever your arrogance about, a problem rainbow dash didn't seem to display in this episode nor did the characters site it as a reason for their behaviour, making it unlikely it was one of their motivators in their behaviour. what rainbow dash did display where signs of social reclusion over the loss of, and extreme recklessness in trying to reclaim that which she uses to define her self and make her feel special (E.I her heroic persona), which is the down side of humility which the others never even considered

*** I assumed RD wasn't going at full speed, but was flying fast enough that she assumed Flutter would never catch up to her
** Fluttershy does not like to show off or bring about attention to herself (e.g. the perfect antithesis of RBD in this episode). The only time we've ever seen her fly badly was in "The Cutie Mark Chronicles" and that was because she was a lanky filly then. (Her inability to fly in "Dragonshy" due to fear doesn't count). Thus to anyone else, a pegasus pony that stays close to the ground and rarely shows off her flying abilities is likely to be seen as a "poor flyer". But give her an outfit that completely disguises who she is, and she's probably all ~yay~ and ready to speed off to do what it takes for her friends.

* Why do people think the others of the Mane Six were ''trying''' to make Rainbow Dash freak out? They visibly respond to her fit over Mare Do Well with confusion -- they weren't expecting this. They were expecting her to learn her lesson from this. They also stop trying to show her up after that fit -- the next we see Mare Do Well, it's at a parade in her honor organized by the citizens of Ponyville. They ''had'' to show up for that -- what were they going to do, say "Oh, we're sorry. We were just trying to put Rainbow Dash's dangerous arrogance in check. So... just cancel the parade and pretend this never happened, okay?"
** Well, one big reason is that they really ''should'' have known that would be Dash's reaction - they know she ''hates'' losing. It's strange that they would think that her reaction to being outshone would be anything ''other'' than utter loathing. And their confusion comes right after a scene that's pretty easy to misinterpret as them laughing at Rainbow Dash. And of course Rainbow's breakdown is never addressed at all, so when the Mane Cast emerge at the end acting as if everything went according to their plan (even though it clearly did not) it's possible to misinterpret the breakdown as being ''part'' of the plan. Basically the entire episode is filled with scenes that look really ambiguous, so if you forget the Aesop about always expecting the best from friends, it's pretty easy to interpret their actions in negative light.

* Why didn't Rarity bring up any of her or her friends' genuine accomplishments? Fluttershy singlehandedly stopped a dragon. Twilight Sparkle is Celestia's personal student and prize pupil -- there's very few other ponies in the series who are even ''possibly'' closer to the Princess than her -- and she's defeated an Ursa Minor. Rainbow Dash is a likely candidate for the Wonderbolts -- as seen in "Sonic Rainboom" and "The Best Night Ever", they distinctly have their eye on her and are impressed with her abilities. Although the Apple family isn't upper-class, it surely has '''some''' influence. Fluttershy single-handedly stopped a dragon and is a former famous model. Pinkie Pie stopped the first major Parasprite infestation in so long that even Princess Celestia didn't seem to know what they were. Rarity herself has had Hoity Toity and Sapphire Shores as clients. All of them have saved Equestria '''twice'''. And that's just going into the accomplishments the upper-class ponies may have heard of or care about. They may not know their names, but it's hard to believe they don't at least know their reputations.

** First, ya gotta understand how you form an image for yourself in these things; you go to as many events as you can until you're a common feature in all the high profile functions, once the invites are really coming thick and fast, you start being picky on where you go from now on. Second, no matter what you do, no matter how world changing the effects of your actions are, it's all about how stylish you are with the kind of people you see Rarity deal with in Canterlot, and Rarity is painfully aware that her own inner circle is nowhere near the definition of the word as her new connections understand it.

** Rarity's dreamt of becoming part of high society her entire life. So much so that the very thought of having an actual chance of achieving it excites her into bouncing and screaming like a schoolfilly. She's loving every second of the attention she's getting and terrified of failing here, not unreasonably given how it all happened over the course of a week or so. As far as she knows, one blemish on her record (like a quintet of less-than-classy ponies showing up as her friends) might cause her to lose all her newfound favor. If she were thinking straight, she would probably be more discerning in her appearances. When she's ''this'' emotional, not a chance.

*** I apologize for overblowing it, it's just that their behaviour was so jarring in that scene. The problem with most Aesops that tell you to "Take pride in who your friends are and what they're like" and others similar in concept is that the friends in most of these cases are either loud, odious, and difficult to respect in most cases, or become that way when it's time to deliver the {{Aesop}}. (I'm also referring, in part, to the glaringly steryotypical redneck pony that showed up just to set up the drama Rarity put herself through in this episode. ''Nobody'' else in Ponyville is anything like that.) It's not just high class expectations that they don't know being trampled on, it was also common decency; they intruded on a private party and wreaked havoc on most of the guests, seemingly on a whim.

*** Heres a much simpler explanation. Twilight and Pinkie Pie are socially unaware, AJ and RD do not know how there supposed to act in high society events, and Fluttershy has spent lots of time alone or with animals. This is probably why they were all described as rustic.

** It's pretty commonly noticed, and an interesting point. I suppose someone needed to watch over her library in her absense? Maybe Twilight had a private birthday party with Spike first before leaving for Canterlot?
* Anyone else find it odd that two ponies that Rarity has bad history with, Blueblood and Photo Finish, were seen in prominent cameos, but weren't confronted or even focused on? The former at least, has every reason to want to start an arguement or undermine her newfound celebrity, but no. I don't know why they bothered if nothing came of it; if you don't have time to do something with a character, don't throw him in when it wouldn't make sense for him to be anywhere near that scene looking so pleased.

*** He may also not have as many issues with Rarity as Rarity would with him, since it seemed that the only thing he seemed to care about when Rarity was chewing him out was that she was covered in cake. Maybe because of that it never sank in that she was saying some seriously awful things about him, even much later.

* One explanation for a good half the fridge logic here is that the show has an anachronic order and the Gala simply hasn't happened yet. It's even said that the Gala was still coming up, and the mane cast probably wouldn't be that excited to go after what happened last time.

** She is fan of pony Michael Jackson

* Why didn't someone - Celestia for e.g - tell Twilight how Spike would grow up? He turned into Giant!Spike purely because he was put in a situation which provoked and allowed him to indulge in greed, with ponies who had absolutely no idea of what he was doing. He's treated essentially like a baby pony, and the innocent acts of generosity and friendship turn out badly. It's possibly significant that this happened when he had his birthday with more people and gifts than he was used to. If Twilight had any idea that being in that sort of environment could bring out the worst in Spike, she would have learnt to manage it, or at least attempt to - Twilight being how she is - long before it became an issue. Sounds like an awful lot of grief that could have been avoided. Fortunately Status Quo is God and we'll presumably see no backlash against Spike, but somepony would surely jump to nasty conclusions about having a baby dragon around.
** Given we have yet to see another domesticated dragon, it's likely that nobody even knows that much about a dragon's life cycle. The vet they went to, at least, didn't even recognize what were apparently the normal effects of him ''growing up.''

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* So...what was the significance of the Christmas tree in their holiday's history? I was expecting the tree to be a Tree of Peace or something.

[[folder:[=2.11=] Heart's Warming Eve]]

* One explaination for a good half the fridge logic here is that the show has an anachronic order and the Gala simply hasn't happened yet. It's even said that the Gala was still coming up, and the mane cast probably wouldn't be that excited to go after what happened last time.

** No. British people are hardly a minority no matter how you slice it, the show already has a male main character, and Pip (as far as we know) is a one-off. Read the trope.
*** Yeah....that main male character you speak of? How much exactly does he really do? Is he ever really involved in a main plot outside supporting? Even if TokenMinority isn't with Pip, it is definately with Spike.

* Shouldn't it be Celestia's responsibility to educate Luna in the differences of etiquette and socialising in modern times as compared to 1000 years ago? She's had at least just over 6 months to do so going by the fact that up till last episode the friendship reports were weekly. Or is Celetia just being Trollestia again?
** Whenever we see Celestia, she's busy. (Royal duties, scolding an irresponsible student, etc.) Maybe she hasn't had time to teach Luna etiquette. Or, wild mass guessing, Luna insisted that she catch up on everything by herself.

** Rainbow's wearing a Shadowbolt costume. Which means that the idea's fresh in her mind ... from when she met them in episode 2. Assuming the Summer Sun Celebration is around 21 June, and Nightmare Night is 31 October ... that's barely over 4 months to get caught up on one thousand years of culture and changes.

** VillainsBlendInBetter.
** Possibly whatever had corrupted her was doing the speech-writing.
*** It's not so hard to handwave it if you keep in mind that "thou" is singular, while "you" is plural, and most of Nightmare Moon's lines were addressed to multiple ponies. The lack of the RoyalWe could send a message that she doesn't consider her subjects ''worth'' speaking for; she doesn't speak for the nation, she ''is'' the nation. Or...or something.

* The demon-winged pegasi that brought Luna in, is that a costume? Or are there demon winged pegasi?

** They ''could'' be demon-winged pegasi. They don't have to be a seperate race or sub-breed; pegasus ponies like Dash and the Wonderbolts sometimes leave a unique contrail, maybe there are variant wing patterns. Bat wings might just be a very rare variant, or maybe just rare in the regions we've been shown, though actually the norm in the area where Luna recruits her servants (Pranceylvania, of course).

*** Given that the only candidates we see for "the ponies in charge" are Big Macintosh and Granny Smith...

* When Applebloom starts speaking French, Applejack, horrified, screams, "She's speakin' fancy!". When Zecora convieniently appears when Applebloom's cutie pox gets worse, Applejack asks if her "Zebra Sense" brought her there. So is Applejack a kid-friendly racist now?

** As for the French thing, I didn't really take that as racist. AJ's horrified because her little sister's been rendered unable to speak any other language ''at random''. I could imagine that being geinuinely creepy in real life. The fancy talk comment could be either playing up the idea that French is archaically seen as a refined language when compared to rural American-English (which stems from French being the traditional court language in many European monarchies, such as Britain's) or trying to avoid naming France directly due to Equestria not being on Earth. And yes, I know Fluttershy name checked the french previously.

*** It could be that in the poniverse, French is actually called "Fancy". It's not likely there's a country called France in this world, after all.

*** Alternate explanation: perhaps we misheard her line and she said "She's speakin' ''Francey''!" As in Applejack just knows that's how they speak in France but doesn't actually know the name of the language? Or maybe she's mispronouncing "Français"? Well, okay, maybe not. But gratuitous French words ''are'' used a lot by high society snobs, so I guess it could be "fancy" too…

** I guess she subconsciously figured "hey, all the other pets had cameos in my dream, why not?" [besides, note that Gummy does make noises, just very rarely (his sneeze in Party of One is an example)].

** So far I've been assuming she got a little caught up in her own drama. If no help ''actually'' came for a couple of hours, she would probably get tired of it and either pound on the rock until it cracked, dig at the ground until she could free her wing, lure over a Quarry Eel and have trick it into slamming into the rock, make a cloud from ambient water vapor and have it hit the rock with lightning a couple of times, or ''something''.

** Because Captain Annabelleisa needs an owner 20% cooler than Rainbow Dash.

* They introduced a pony who is very likely Twist's father and... absolutely no-one seems to care. Usually, when something like this happens, the fandom goes crazy, but I haven't actually seen anyone mention it.
** [[SarcasmMode Oh, I'm so terribly sorry for our laziness.]] Look, sometimes minor characters just don't catch out eye all that well or quickly, if you're so interested in him why don't ''you'' make some fanart, you bastard.
*** It's not just that there's not fanart. I mean that no-one's even commented on it that I've seen, besides myself. Even my attempts to bring it up rarely get replies. As for fanart... I can't draw. Literally. Motor dysgraphia.