LOCAL MARE RUINS EVERYTHING

The second half of pony season five has been going on full swing! I have surprisingly generally liked it. The most recent episode has been the type of episode I'd been eagerly anticipating for quite a while now, Pinkie's FAMILY! Not just her sister who came out of nowhere Maud, but her entire immediate family. Unfortunately I cannot say this was one of my favourites of the second half of the season despite the content of the episode being something I found interesting due to some weird and stilted writing or character-decisions here and there. My favourite Pinkie-based episode is still "The One Where Pinkie Knows" which was the last episode and that had a fairly light premise that'd be hard to stretch into twenty-two minutes, yet they managed it with the excellent comedy. Though I can safely say it comes in second, though not by too much. Including Pinkie's map episode with Rainbow, this is Pinkie's fourth episode this season, though again you can say she shares it with AJ like her map is shared with Rainbow, but that's still more than RD herself, Rarity, AJ, and especially Twilight (one episode so far) and Fluttershy (zero!). Though thanks to the goddamn leak I know next episode is a Fluttershy one. (Is the Discord episode considered a Fluttershy episode? Since we only have six episodes left and the finale is always a two-parter it probably is.)

Anyway, I digress because I do want to discuss Pinkie's family. Waaay back in season one when I first watched Cutie Mark Chronicles by far the most unexpected Cutie Mark story was Pinkie's because her origin not only came out of nowhere but has seemingly no real influence on Pinkie herself. When you look at this super hyper pink rocket of happiness you don't immediately think of the word "Amish." We don't really get another glimpse at Pinkie's family until Maud's sudden appearance in season four, and she seems to have carried on the Pie family tradiiton of being very involved with the topic of rocks, a tradition only Pinkie has broken. A few people were disappointed by that episode because they were expecting the introduction of Pinkie's sisters who had appeared during Cutie Mark Chronicles instead of a whole other sister, but then Maud turned out to be a fan-favourite and we get an episode about whole family a season later! It's win-win!

As for this episode, well...it was apparently written by the writer who did Party Pooped which was not an episode I was especially fond of. Like I've mentioned before even though Pinkie is my favourite pony she's also very hit-or-miss for me. When she hits, she hits hard and I declare her best pony of all the land, but when she doesn't everything falls flat. You see when I was younger I was very much involved in that whole cringeworthy internet phase where I would say the word cheese or spoon or whatever and find random humour hilarious. I despised that phase. Whenever Pinkie falls anywhere close to that type of so-called "humour" I simply gawk like a shocked bystander instead of enjoying the episode like one is meant to. This is why after I finish an episode I always pay attention to whoever wrote it afterwards if it's a Pinkie episode. Just to see if they happen to write Pinkie again if she'd be the same flavour from before. Certain writers get Pinkie down pat and those are the ones I wish Hasbro would employ for however long the series lasts. It's a gamble usually because writers who have favourite characters they like to write tend to get the episode with that character and sometimes that's not a good thing, personally, if I don't like their Pinkie brand of humour.

But to each their own as Twilight said this episode. Pinkie wasn't too bad anyway, not at her worst. But whenever she isn't at her best it's always a disappointment to me. The episode involved a lot of callbacks and while continuity is good, basing your comedy on callbacks is always a risk to take. If it's the exact same joke as before it's not really that entertaining as we've seen it before, but if it's your own original take on something that happened before, it's downright hilarious. Unfortunately too much of the former happened instead of the latter. Pinkie's multiple limbs on-screen happened again for instance, but aside from adding more limbs there wasn't much of  a twist or change to the gag, it was simply repeated straight. Applejack was bewildered unlike last time when no one reacted but her reaction was rather subtle and easy to miss, especially since most of it was in the background, so it didn't have much of an impact. Same with Maud's "singing" at the end of the episode. I was hoping she's just sing deadpan instead of calling her reading out a poem as "singing". It was simply a repeated gag from Maud's original episode.

Applejack explaining why Hearthswarming existed was just an entirely wasted scene when you could've used that screentime to develop more of the large cast of the episode. The first Christmas-themed episode had an entire play based on the tradition, so the audience already knows why it exists, and Apple Bloom was there watching too! I hardly think Apple Bloom would forget considering her sister was part of the play as well. They typically don't fall out of your memory. If it was exposition meant for the little kids in case they forgot...well that's a pretty poor reason. Little kids would just associate the Christmas-clone holiday as...Christmas, so it's not a big deal if they know the origins or not. (And if they follow the show, again the episode for that already exists!) The gags where Pinkie and AJ repeat the same things or AB/Pinkie eat very messily (or take a bite out of the exposition prop) felt like a very juvenile, typical little kids show gag and I have come expect better from the show than that. I also find AJ repeating everything Pinkie says rather out-of-character. There has yet to be a build-up to AJ picking up Pinkie's quirks. She just suddenly started doing it. It'd have been more believable if it wasn't quite as long (like the second time they did it) or if they had more of a reason to repeat the exact same things (again, like the second time they did it) so there was that.

But of course, the biggest reason anyone would be excited for this episode is PINKIE'S FAMILY! Here are some shockers.

1) Pinkie is not the youngest, like I had predicted.
2) Maud is NOT THE OLDEST, like I had predicted.
3) There are indeed twins in the family, but it's not between the two-until-now-just-introduced-sisters-who-had-somewhat-similar-colour-schemes, but of PINKIE and MARBLE.
4) Limestone is the oldest, though she looks shorter/younger than Maud. (It's those eyes!)
5) The oldest is at first not your typical "nurturing motherly wise eldest sibling who takes care of the rest" but rather aggressive and angry. She is however in charge of the farm, so she must still be the one who takes care of everything, just with not the personality you'd expect.
6) Marble is Fluttershy.

I don't think their parents are quite that old that Limestone should be the one calling all the shots (you'd think it'd be the father or something) but she must have that domineering bold personality that allows her to take charge anyway. Perhaps her parents are in the "retired" territory. ...people retire on farms right? That doesn't actually sound correct to me. The stereotype is that farmers are poor and farmers retiring doesn't make sense as they always need to work to make a means. This is why poor farming families have lots of children, like the Pie family, so there are more hooves to work. I guess Granny Smith doesn't work on the farm anymore and Applejack calls of a lot of the shots but Granny Smith actually looks old enough that she probably shouldn't have those jobs anyway. She may be somewhat forgetful and obviously doesn't have the strength, but physically I do not see that coming from the Pie parents. Ah well. Mayhaps a lifetime of hard labour has forced them to pass the responsibility of the farm to their eldest daughter sooner rather than later. Who knows.

Speaking of the parents, they spoke more Ye Olde English than I expected. I don't even know how Amish people speak, but I don't think it'd be jargon from the Middle Ages? I dunno. The fact that they essentially met due to an arranged marriage makes sense, aside from the choosing stone thing, but if they work on a rock farm...

This episode was basically Apple Family Reunion + Pinkie Apple Pie + Maud Pie + Christmas put together. I did like Pinkie Apple Pie and Maud Pie better though. Anyway it was a sweet story. Maud was on point as per usual. I liked Limestone. Marble was basically what happens if Big Mac and Fluttershy had a kid that was somehow mixed with Pie genes...uh, but the fandom seems to be super-shipping those two. (It was cute, but ehhhhh not fond of the "THEY'RE BOTH EXACTLY THE SAME THEY MUST BE IN LOVE!!" type of shipping.)  How Pinkie interacted with her sisters is quite interesting as well. She seems to really look up and respect Maud (which is why I thought Maud was the oldest) while she sort of scoffs at Limestone like what two quarreling "love-to-hate hate-to-love" type of sisters would be like, and then she seems to be super protective of her little Fluttershy twin which might explain why Pinkie likes to call herself Auntie Pinkie Pie around Fluttershy when Fluttershy is older than her, pft. So it's like Pinkie shows off every stereotypical sibling trope with each of her sisters! It's awesome! 

I guess another reason I thought of Pinkie being youngest and Maud being oldest (aside from Maud not being there in the flashback, thus I assumed she had left for boarding school for rocks or whatever and she was the one old enough to leave) is because Limestone reminded me a bit of Buttercup. That one scene when she has that evil grin towards Applejack attempting to drink her rock soup especially. That aggressive personality feels like the stereotypical bratty middle child who acts like so for attention as they tend to be the unfavourite, but hey, plus scores for avoiding the normal stereotypes! It makes everything all the more interesting I say! After all, Applejack is the middle child and she is DEFINITELY not the unfavourite in her family, hahaha. (That Big Mac episode is still most emotional episode ever. I don't care how much Pinkie and AJ cried this episode. That one scene in Brotherhooves Social was so poignant!) Speaking of which I did find Pinkie and AJ crying a bit too easily, especially when AJ "cries on the inside" and Pinkie has demonstrated her stepford smiling so heavily before. I think they would cry in this episode yes, but Pinkie did it twice and AJ cried pretty openly (in that cave, sure, but still she ran away to cry. That's not something I expected from AJ...but WHAT IF SHE ACTUALLY DOES THAT!? That's some pretty heavy implications. Everyone thinks AJ cries on the inside, but really she never wants to show any "weak" emotions to others being the one responsible of the family and all, so when she can't take it she runs away to cry. Aw that's sad. D: ) 

I need to bring up the twin thing again. When spoilers came out about Fluttershy having a brother, I was wondering if he should be older or younger or what have you. I thought about possibilities that'd make the relationship more unique. Since aside from RD, Fluttershy having a sibling means there are no only children in the cast. (RD is honourary big sis of Scootaloo now too, so it's almost like there are NO only children) and with a cast of six you'd hope at least one would be an only child and I thought Fluttershy would be the perfect candidate, but noooo. I guess RD has to take the role now. Anyway, since there were already two big brothers I figured Fluttershy could have a younger brother, but then I thought "how about they're TWINS instead!?" or maybe her brother is adopted! Or maybe to make it even more interesting, Fluttershy is the one adopted! No one does that, now do they? Or maybe they're BOTH adopted! Or they could be half-siblings or even step-siblings...THE POSSIBILITIES ARE ENDLESS I SAY! Well, I don't think they'd quite go into "foster sibling" territory as that's too dark, but you get what I mean. 

And all I've done is basically made that no matter what form of relationship Fluttershy has with her mystery brother, I'll be disappointed...because I came up with too many interesting possibilities that I doubt the show would touch on. But then, Pinkie ended up being a twin instead! Granted, she's a fraternal twin, but there aren't too many fraternal twins in media, especially same-sex ones. They're usually opposite sex because you cannot have identical opposite-six twins, but somehow media portrays them very similar-looking anyway, so it's pretty different. Plus, one twin being prominently featured and the other being minor never happens in media. TWINS MUST ALWAYS BE TOGETHER! So that's another cool thing I liked about it.

Of course the prospect of a twin sort of brings up some inconsistencies in the earlier seasons. Someone on a Reddit comment mentioned that the plot of Party of One suddenly becomes a little harder to believe. It's one thing to forget your own birthday, but if Pinkie is a twin that means she shares the birthday with her twin! That makes it even more unbelievable to forget a momentous occasion like that! Even if Marble doesn't have the most noticeable of presences, Pinkie never forgets other ponies' birthdays, so why would she forget Marble's? It is indeed a very good point. But that was four seasons ago and it's a pretty minor point. I like Pinkie being a twin, so I don't mind that it makes Party of One a bit harder to swallow. I guess in the flurry of Gummy's after-party and her own psychotic-break, forgetting her own birthday (and her twin's) is a thing that can happen! Anything can if you're Pinkie Pie. 8D

And considering how bizarre the Pie family traditions are maybe they didn't even celebrate birthdays until Pinkie started with her parties. Of course since she in her whole young life also never celebrated birthdays she may have never associated parties with birthdays until she moved to Ponyville, so remembering not only her own birthday but her family's birthdays probably isn't something high in her priority list. It's only a theory though, nothing concrete to answer how Party of One can be. 

Oh and another thing. A lot of people are like "HOW IS PINKIE RELATED TO THIS FAMILY SHE MUST BE ADOPTED" because of them all she does not do the rocks and also she is bright neon pink in the middle of dreary greys, but considering Pinkie when her hair is down she does look related to them all. Her natural not-balloonified hair is similar to the straight hair a lot of her sisters have, so Pinkie just happened to come out with lots of recessive genes or something. 8D She shares her eye colour with her mom though. (I think Maud does as well... and I understand Limestone needs LIME eyes 'cause duh but I wonder where that colour and Marble's lavender eyes come from. Igneous Rock's eyes are the same as his coat colour...and his grey hair looks like his original hair coloured greyed instead of being his natural)

....I just realized Pinkie's dad is bald under that hat. (He isn't wearing it when sleeping) Maybe they ARE older than I thought...thus Limestone being in charge! Huh.

Anyway I thought the episode was decent and its content made me type all that out, but I thought for what it was it could've been much better. I've certainly liked and hated episodes more than this one I could've super ranted about, but because PINKIE'S FAMILY OFMGFGMFGGM this post exists. Sooooo, yeah! This been Spotto and such.

EDIT: The writer of the episode does not consider them twins. He thinks they were all born like a litter, kind of like a cat or a dog... uh. That's not how pony birth works. If pony birth isn't similar to human birth than twins would be incredibly rare.  Plus we've had twins in the form of the Cake Twins, so I always assumed since this is MAGICAL PONY LAND that they would have babies similar to humans. Plus every sibling we've seen until now appears to have an age-gap of some form (Rarity/SB, the Apples, Twi/Shining) so it implies ponies have one foal per pregnancy like real horses do. So Pinkie and Marble must at the very least be twins...but since he seems to think ponies show up in litters, I wonder if the writer is possibly implying they're all quadruplets or something. THE POINT IS CANON IS A MESS SO WHATEVER, THEY'RE TWINS!

EDIT 2 A DAY LATER: "Well technically it's never said who's oldest in the episode so anything is still possible." Alright the writer kinda retracted their statement. I"M SURE somewhere out there like in a con or another twitter we'll one day find out for sure who is the oldest or youngest. As for Maud. her not being in the original flashback (probably being independent pursuing education or something) but then SUDDENLY appearing in the picture frame OF Pinkie's first party in Pinkie Pride sort of breaks that theory, but even then in that picture Maud looks the oldest of the four sisters. SO WHO EVEN KNOWS AT THIS POINT. Even canon is hopelessly inconsistent! What I do know is that Pinkie and Marble are the youngest. The other two's age-status is pending.

EDIT 3: Okay even the director said Limestone is oldest. I WILL STOP STALKING THEIR TWITTERS NOW.