Well that middle part was eh, but otherwise a good episode.

The Treehouse of Harmony, as gaudy as it is, looks to me like a better replacement for Golden Oaks than Twilight's Castle.

Sadly, "The Beginning of the End" did everything I feared it would to King Sombra:

1. Erased all his Character Development and Worldbuilding ^note Princess Amore, Radiant Hope, the Umbrum, etc. from the comics, and made him a Generic Doomsday Villain all over again.

2. Replaced the unique, Crazy-Prepared No-Nonsense Nemesis from before... with a clichéd, Stupid Evil Big Bad Wannabe.

More lines and screentime =/= automatically better character.

Remember #NotMyLuke? Well, this is #NotMySombra.

Edited by Peridonyx on Apr 10th 2020 at 12:05:17 PM

"The Hearth's Warming Club" is quite good. :)

"The Hearth's Warming Club" is quite good. :)

Edited by Peridonyx on Apr 10th 2020 at 12:03:22 PM

God I love Sandbar. He's the world's biggest moron and it's great.

Thoughts on "Uprooted":

I like!

The little insights in the other species' day-to-day lives were nice ways to worldbuild in an organic way. I liked the dragons' way of resolving things — you want me to give you permission to go do something? Arm-wrestle for my amusement and if you win I'll let you leave!

Silverstream's art project looked pretty good, not gonna lie.

The crystal house was... interesting. It looks good — it looks real good. I kinda wish Twilight's castle looked like that, actually — I've always wanted it to have actual leaves. I remember thinking a while ago that Thorax and Pharynx's designs are perfect examples of how the second take on something is always better than the first, because the creators have had time to go over the first attempt and look closely at what didn't work as well as it could have or just didn't work the first time, and the crystal castle and crystal house are another perfect example of this, I think.

Also, I like the idea of the tree needing the heroes rather than the other way around, and of it changing in a fundamental manner — it does make its relationship with the cast feel a bit more balanced and nuanced.

Heartily seconded.

Like, Sandbar is a person who's never had an actual problem in his entire pretty pony life and it's wonderful.

When all those cupcakes showed up in the beginning, I assumed that Sandbar had established a fear of cupcakes that I had forgotten or something.

Also, I found it interesting how they consistently referred to the tree as "gone" rather than "dead".

The show is never going to acknowledge the comics, and in the show, Sombra had no previous personality to go on. So this complaint makes no sense.

It's funny because I was getting the feeling that Season Nine was going to be "Season Four Redux except it's good."

I mean, the first two-parter was Princess Twilight Sparkles except it was good.

And, if this forum is correct, this story was the moment where the magic tree creates that flippin' eyesore of a castle in Sparkles's Kingdom except it's an entire story and it's...good/better.

I feel like the writers are intentionally trolling the fans by bringing back Sombra, one of the most humourless and creepily ambiguous villains in the earlier seasons, and revealing him to have a completely narcissistic personality and voice that won't shut up about himself.

Grogar's an interesting Big Bad, but I get the feeling he's going to be another case like Cozy Glow, a villain savvy enough to half understand why friendship and teamwork keeps working out, but just can't work against his own villainous impulses, still viewing allies as patsies to be cowed or kicked around. The fact he seems intent on calmly biding his time and convincing Sombra to join him, and then in the end just seems to vindictively go "Screw him, my team doesn't have losers" suggests he can't keep onto a solid pragmatic approach, he's almost certainly gonna drop the Villain Ball in the end.

Edited by Psi001 on Apr 13th 2019 at 10:52:45 AM

To me Grogar doesn't FEEL old. I don't know if it's his design or his voice or what, but I'm just not picking up this super ancient vibe he's supposed to have going on. Like, Tirek says he was old even when he was young, but Grogar doesn't act like he's been around forever, nor does he look it. Compare that to Discord, who is the embodiment of chaos. Every scene he's in, every action he takes, everything about him just screams "chaos being." I just don't get a similar vibe from Grogar that says "ancient."

Gorgar was the first pinball machine to ever speak, and I keep getting Grogar and Gorgar's names mixed up.

Edited by WillKeaton on Apr 13th 2019 at 4:26:39 AM

... you know, that actually isn't a half-bad way of putting it. These last few episodes did feel a lot like a second take on "Twilight's Kingdom" in terms of basic conflict, resolution and plot devices — i.e., Twilight is scared because she doesn't know how to princess, the characters lost the Elements but find a new way to unleash the Rainbow of Lig- I mean the power of Harmony, the a crystalline treehouse magically grows from the ground — but with Twilight's concerns actually addressed, the gaining of the new powers not as haphazardly plotted and the tree-growing-out-of-the-soil bit spun off into its own entire episode.

Huh.

"King Sombra was in the comics."

...THAT'S why so many people are upset at this episode.

Alright, so is the finale in November? Because I'm going to have to go to hyper-mode if I'm going to catch up before the finale. One season a month, at best.

...I really do not want to say this yet the possibility has always been in the back of my head.

I am putting off liveblogs until I have caught up.

I will still give my opinions yet they will not be as loquacious as before so good things are happening.

Every two-parter will be given different treatment, a bit more articulation then normal stories.

Edited by fredhot16 on Apr 13th 2019 at 7:53:55 AM

@Peridonyx: You are right that giving a character more dialogue and "personality" does not equate to a good character (Metroid fans after Other M can attest to this) and making Sombra pompous might not have been the best way to go about it, but it's foolish to think that the writers would even consider incorporating aspects of the comics into the show. Heck, most of the time, it was to the show's benefit to not include aspects of the comics (Fiendship 3 and EQG Holiday Special, anyone?).

Sombra's problem in his debut had actually less to do with Sombra but the plot fighting with itself over whether to prioritize Sombra or the Crystal Faire. By the time it felt like Sombra actually became threat, it was already over (Storm King had a somewhat similar problem along with just being annoying). The idea of an encroaching evil power is not a bad idea. Cutie Re-Mark proved it with his Bad Future being easily the most popular amongst all the villains. However, because everyone was ridiculing him for being boring and unpopular (to be fair, he at least left an interesting impression. Can't say the same for Unalaq), the writers do what they always do — see if the complete opposite works. I will say that while I was entertained by him, but I think there could have been a better way add a personality or an interesting quirk while keeping him ominous.

I felt like the best option to make him entertaining was to give in to the edginess of his design and make him dramatic and dark in his language.

Sombra: There is no place for this "ours" in the shadows. The shadows shall engulf the land of crystals and all who wish to shine a light on them shall be forever lost in darkness.

Cozy: Gosh, I have no idea what he just said.

Grogar: How bold, claiming to take over the Crystal Empire and defeat Twilight Sparkle and her friends all by yourself.

Cozy: Oh... Why didn't he just say it like that?

Edited by AkoSiKuya23 on Apr 13th 2019 at 1:01:51 PM

For what it's worth, I liked the new Sombra. Even if he was a cheesy cartoon villian.

Edited by Peridonyx on Apr 10th 2020 at 12:05:20 PM

Post of the Day #2485

Posted by Erik S on Sun, 19th Jun '11 1:51:43 AM - Post #7607 in the old thread

"Friendship University" is another good one. It was quite nice to see Starswirl the Bearded as a Cool Old Guy. :)

Except he's also an idiot.

There was one part I was confused about. Why did the Flim Flam Brothers need to start up another scam when they're already running a successful resort? :S

Because it ain't about the money, it's about the hustle!

~It's all about the game and how you play it!~

Or maybe the resort is expensive and they need more moolah.

I remember thinking it was a shame the early seasons didn't really have a developed Rogues Gallery, it seems just now, in the final season, we're finally getting one, just at the price of warping some of the series' Knights Of Cerebus to meet the quirky variety.

Edited by Psi001 on Apr 14th 2019 at 11:58:31 AM

Didn't they explain that in the episode? IIRC, they wanted to make some improvements to the resort and they needed money to do it.

Of course, the Flim Flams would probably never stop hustling even if they didn't need the money.