just text this time, too lazy to image it
Jan. 9th, 2012 07:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
spotto Half asleep but I feel like throwing this out there.
There will be a Valentine's episode for pony. Like, an actual episode with hearts and cards and other gooey stuff, etc. I stopped caring about this so called holiday when I was nine. NINE. Well it's not actually Valentine's Day I am so against, but more so how season two keeps throwing in more human-like attributes to the ponies that make the season less unique as season one.
Damn, I've fallen into the "Season two is terrible!!" crowd.
Well that isn't true either, some of my favourite episodes in the entire series are in season two. The problem is I remember early on in season one when you saw Twilight eating daisies, Pinkie getting on her hind legs and waving her front hooves like an actual excited horse, smacking the ground with their hooves to indicate clapping, horse sounds occasionally being heard such as when RD made a frustrated snort in Over a Barrel, etc. I could list many many many things. Ponyville felt like a very small humble town and the entirety of Equestria really felt like another world.
But what have we seen this season? First, there's Nightmare Night. I'm a bit biased for this one since Luna Eclipsed happens to be one of my favourite episodes, but the fact that they have a near identical holiday to Halloween seems strange. It is even more strange considering episode one nopony except Twilight knew who the hell Nightmare Moon was, so how the heck did this tradition come about? I can forgive it I suppose, considering each part of its similarity to Halloween makes sense, as everything is explained. That does not explain Hearth's Warming Eve, which while has a different backstory to Christmas, still mysteriously has Christmas trees and candy canes. I thought, fine, throw a few human holidays in there if you'd like, grab easy plots for a few episodes...but Valentine's Day!? Unless it's a Spike/Rarity episode (again...) it will either touch on romance somehow, or change the holiday to something where you appreciate friends or something. I certainly hope it's the last one because love is not a topic touched on at all so far in the series, and for it to suddenly come up would be very strange. I wouldn't mind if it were say, two random ponies no one cares about, but anything major with a member of the mane six is like having a TV family suddenly having a baby. It jumps the shark.
Not to mention ponies can operate cranes and bulldozers supposedly to build buildings... i am not denying the existence of actual construction ponies since they existed in Sonic Rainboom, but the material they were using to build stuff looked far more modern than the rather medieval or fantasy-like buildings that exist in Ponyville. It'd make more sense for Canterlot, but even then....those iron bars, the soldering...seriously. There was a well once, they apparently developed a water tower by now...
My other beef with season two is the lack of mane six together as a group this season. It doesn't even have to be all of them, could be four of them like how Green Isn't Your Color went about, but there should actually be something between them! That is a large part of why I watch after all, ever since Twilight stopped writing letters every week they had an excuse to not use her, but most episodes in season one were fine with her within the plot anyway. Seeing as Twilight isn't necessary that means no other pony has to be either. I know Pinkie Pie is my favourite pony, but I actually have sort-of low expectations for Baby Cakes, if only because I heard it'd be mostly about her and the other mane six may not appear. I like her dynamic with the others and it may not even be in the actual Pinkie episode! The other reason is one of the animators or storyboarders or whatever tweeted that Baby Cakes would be a controversial episode. He said he may like it, but others will not. The only PP episode this season and it could become a MMDW!? No!
Luckily there is another rumour that one of the better writers is writing it, so I may be blown away, but it's still just a rumour. I generally like Pinkie Pie episodes though it's usually because she is interacting with others, and the others were there. I didn't like Feeling Pinkie Keen quite as much due to it only being her and Twilight (and they're not even interacting, it's just Twi being subjected to slapstick comedy most of the time while Pinkie twitches...plus it felt more like a Twi episode than Pinkie anyway) And that same writer did Over a Barrel, who I'm assuming is awesome at dialogue because that opening scene/train scene was brilliant. Unfortunately I'm still not fond of how he wrote Pinkie.
Also we have seen the titles and synopsises of the next five episodes....still no Fluttershy or Scootaloo. Sigh. We got another RD one coming up but at least the synopsis sounds interesting. (Then again MMDW's synopsis was interesting too...and it turned out rather underwhelming)
Don't get me wrong, I defend MMDW to death, but it is a very difficult episode to actually defend. It's not as bad as people say, but it has flaws and I cannot deny them. I rewatched it the other day and actually noticed the complaints. I didn't like how Pinkie was characterized when I first saw the episode and I still don't. The others' bragging about MMDW in front of Dash did seem a little harsh (not to mention their laughing) but it was a humorous episode, I give them that. Predictable, uncreative, and characters a little OOC/exaggerated, but it was humorous. But you know, if the synopsis is interesting, hype is generated a lot quicker, and so expectations are even higher. That may be part of the reason Sweet and Elite was so beloved at first, due to its rather generic and boring synopsis, we were pleasantly surprised.
So I guess I may end up loving the shit out of Baby Cakes. Who knows! It's a bit sad to be looking forward to the Last Roundup, not only for the AJ but because we get confirmed MANE SIX interaction. Well, mane five at least if AJ is gone the ENTIRE episode. I feel like something like that shouldn't be happening though, to look forward to an episode for an element of the show that existed in most of the first season. I am not saying Season Two is worse than Season One, just different. Parts of what made me love Season One so much are being downplayed this season, like the significant lack of screen time for my favourite ponies, the lack of dynamic happenings between each other, and the humanization of pony culture and technology. I do not watch for humans. I do not watch for love. I do not watch for RD-is-a-bastard, Rarity-is-vain, CMC, or the Apple Family. I watch it for the Mane Six as a whole.
One reason I am not quite as excited for Touhou anymore is due to the introduction of the extremely underwhelming ex-boss of TD. Even though I enjoy so many aspects of the fandom, the tanuki kind of killed most of it, and MokouKeine could only keep me entertained for so long. Now I mostly just listen to its music and sporadically check up on images/videos. It definitely sucks to enjoy the antics of an unpopular cast in UFO, where I cherished the dynamic for so long and TD comes along and kind of changes it rather abruptly. Especially since it had been SO LONG between UFO and TD's release. UFO did nothing to SA, SA did marginally anything to MoF, MoF only grabbed Aya for a bit from PoFV, PoFV is way too different from the other bullet hells to compare, and IN was originally intended to be first but PCB and EoSD were made to introduce more characters to fight the IN bosses. TD doesn't make any of the UFO cast anymore important than usual except maybe hate on Byakuren for a bit, and then demotes Nue to extra mid-boss into a more one-dimensional of a character from what my head formed. I guess too much of my love on Touhou relied on headcanon. It is unfortunate because I find the fandom to be one of the most talented and intelligent of all fandoms. (Yes, more than ponies)
Ponies though will always be the nicest, even if certain communities are...say, not quite as tolerating as the rest. One of the first communities I encountered was Ponychan, which was about eight million times better than any other chan out there ever. Though they occasionally touted that they were the friendliest place on the internet, the fallout after MMDW soured their reputation for me, and nowadays I just see a lot of whining/complaining there. It was inevitable really, due to the image board system allowing the anonymous, and due to the popularity of the fandom growing. On the other hand, I discovered the MyLittlePony subreddit on....reddit, which had many systems in place to keep the nasties out, including having to sign up to post anything, an adorable emoticon collection which could masquerade witty jokes/quotes that allow mini-RPs to come about pertaining to the post at hand, and a rating system. Upvotes for content AND comments. So if some troll showed up. their stuff would be pushed to the bottom in no time, and won't even be shown because it had too many downvotes. All the quality stays on top, and the community is truly very kind. Anonymity kills people's sense of morals.
Not only that but say, image-bombing and raids are far more difficult, and due to an actual searchbar, reposts occur rarely. The only downside to the subreddit for me is that they're not quite as up-to-date in terms of Pony News, like the announcement of an episode synopsis isn't likely to be discussed over there, and actual proper debate doesn't happen quite as often due to the system. (This is where Ponychan comes in and is better in that case) I still visit Ponychan because /pony/ is not the only board, so other areas might be fun to poke around. I've tried a few other communities as well, like forums (Canterlot comes in mind) ...but who actually uses forums these days? Or the comments section of anything, be it EQD itself or Ponibooru. Since the comments and comment areas tend to attract the nastiest of people apparently, they aren't exactly the best place to look. (EQD moreso for how well known it is as a pony site, and Ponibooru moreso for its anonymity, again)
And I don't care if it's /co/, I will never look at the 4chan community. It's 4chan, porn can randomly be posted, and /co/ isn't just about ponies. So yeah.
The only place I've yet to mention might be the Tumblr community, but it's a little more difficult to really get around there. It's more like some sort of little RP community with pictures or something. Ask-Tumblrs are a really awesome evolution of RP in my opinion, with a way to showcase tons of art in various ways due to the number of interesting questions! You know I could have this same discussion about Touhou communities! Like how Shrine Maiden is probably the most popular place, but lacks the discussion I am so interested in which I could only find at the TvTropes community. The chan is a bit disjointed, being a chan of course, and there is a Tumblr community as well, very tight-knit and entertaining. There's also a place for newer fans I'm not quite as fond of due to its completely awful site layout (bright red because it's Lunatic Red, ARGH) and any place else....like Doujinstyle or Vocaloid-Otaku.
I wish I could have included fanfiction communities if I knew of any and read fanfiction beyond a few. It sadly isn't my medium of choice anymore, due to my narrow preferences, my higher standards, and my lower-attention span. Anything I read in Pony nowadays is Adventure or Crossover, usually both. I decided to stop torturing my mind with pointless grimdark stories. In particular I've been reading a crossover between ponies and the Tales series of video games, which I found rather interesting. I particularly loved how Applejack was characterized in it, but it's always sad to see AJ developed more/is more interesting than her canon self. That is sad, and so every week I will hope she'd get something to improve her character and make me like her more, but it just doesn't happen. DO NOT FAIL ME, LAST ROUNDUP!
Ah well, I will retire to bed repeating this to myself. "Have faith in the writers, have faith in the writers, have faith in the writers, have faith in writers..."
Have faith in the writers.
That is all. This has been Spotto.
There will be a Valentine's episode for pony. Like, an actual episode with hearts and cards and other gooey stuff, etc. I stopped caring about this so called holiday when I was nine. NINE. Well it's not actually Valentine's Day I am so against, but more so how season two keeps throwing in more human-like attributes to the ponies that make the season less unique as season one.
Damn, I've fallen into the "Season two is terrible!!" crowd.
Well that isn't true either, some of my favourite episodes in the entire series are in season two. The problem is I remember early on in season one when you saw Twilight eating daisies, Pinkie getting on her hind legs and waving her front hooves like an actual excited horse, smacking the ground with their hooves to indicate clapping, horse sounds occasionally being heard such as when RD made a frustrated snort in Over a Barrel, etc. I could list many many many things. Ponyville felt like a very small humble town and the entirety of Equestria really felt like another world.
But what have we seen this season? First, there's Nightmare Night. I'm a bit biased for this one since Luna Eclipsed happens to be one of my favourite episodes, but the fact that they have a near identical holiday to Halloween seems strange. It is even more strange considering episode one nopony except Twilight knew who the hell Nightmare Moon was, so how the heck did this tradition come about? I can forgive it I suppose, considering each part of its similarity to Halloween makes sense, as everything is explained. That does not explain Hearth's Warming Eve, which while has a different backstory to Christmas, still mysteriously has Christmas trees and candy canes. I thought, fine, throw a few human holidays in there if you'd like, grab easy plots for a few episodes...but Valentine's Day!? Unless it's a Spike/Rarity episode (again...) it will either touch on romance somehow, or change the holiday to something where you appreciate friends or something. I certainly hope it's the last one because love is not a topic touched on at all so far in the series, and for it to suddenly come up would be very strange. I wouldn't mind if it were say, two random ponies no one cares about, but anything major with a member of the mane six is like having a TV family suddenly having a baby. It jumps the shark.
Not to mention ponies can operate cranes and bulldozers supposedly to build buildings... i am not denying the existence of actual construction ponies since they existed in Sonic Rainboom, but the material they were using to build stuff looked far more modern than the rather medieval or fantasy-like buildings that exist in Ponyville. It'd make more sense for Canterlot, but even then....those iron bars, the soldering...seriously. There was a well once, they apparently developed a water tower by now...
My other beef with season two is the lack of mane six together as a group this season. It doesn't even have to be all of them, could be four of them like how Green Isn't Your Color went about, but there should actually be something between them! That is a large part of why I watch after all, ever since Twilight stopped writing letters every week they had an excuse to not use her, but most episodes in season one were fine with her within the plot anyway. Seeing as Twilight isn't necessary that means no other pony has to be either. I know Pinkie Pie is my favourite pony, but I actually have sort-of low expectations for Baby Cakes, if only because I heard it'd be mostly about her and the other mane six may not appear. I like her dynamic with the others and it may not even be in the actual Pinkie episode! The other reason is one of the animators or storyboarders or whatever tweeted that Baby Cakes would be a controversial episode. He said he may like it, but others will not. The only PP episode this season and it could become a MMDW!? No!
Luckily there is another rumour that one of the better writers is writing it, so I may be blown away, but it's still just a rumour. I generally like Pinkie Pie episodes though it's usually because she is interacting with others, and the others were there. I didn't like Feeling Pinkie Keen quite as much due to it only being her and Twilight (and they're not even interacting, it's just Twi being subjected to slapstick comedy most of the time while Pinkie twitches...plus it felt more like a Twi episode than Pinkie anyway) And that same writer did Over a Barrel, who I'm assuming is awesome at dialogue because that opening scene/train scene was brilliant. Unfortunately I'm still not fond of how he wrote Pinkie.
Also we have seen the titles and synopsises of the next five episodes....still no Fluttershy or Scootaloo. Sigh. We got another RD one coming up but at least the synopsis sounds interesting. (Then again MMDW's synopsis was interesting too...and it turned out rather underwhelming)
Don't get me wrong, I defend MMDW to death, but it is a very difficult episode to actually defend. It's not as bad as people say, but it has flaws and I cannot deny them. I rewatched it the other day and actually noticed the complaints. I didn't like how Pinkie was characterized when I first saw the episode and I still don't. The others' bragging about MMDW in front of Dash did seem a little harsh (not to mention their laughing) but it was a humorous episode, I give them that. Predictable, uncreative, and characters a little OOC/exaggerated, but it was humorous. But you know, if the synopsis is interesting, hype is generated a lot quicker, and so expectations are even higher. That may be part of the reason Sweet and Elite was so beloved at first, due to its rather generic and boring synopsis, we were pleasantly surprised.
So I guess I may end up loving the shit out of Baby Cakes. Who knows! It's a bit sad to be looking forward to the Last Roundup, not only for the AJ but because we get confirmed MANE SIX interaction. Well, mane five at least if AJ is gone the ENTIRE episode. I feel like something like that shouldn't be happening though, to look forward to an episode for an element of the show that existed in most of the first season. I am not saying Season Two is worse than Season One, just different. Parts of what made me love Season One so much are being downplayed this season, like the significant lack of screen time for my favourite ponies, the lack of dynamic happenings between each other, and the humanization of pony culture and technology. I do not watch for humans. I do not watch for love. I do not watch for RD-is-a-bastard, Rarity-is-vain, CMC, or the Apple Family. I watch it for the Mane Six as a whole.
One reason I am not quite as excited for Touhou anymore is due to the introduction of the extremely underwhelming ex-boss of TD. Even though I enjoy so many aspects of the fandom, the tanuki kind of killed most of it, and MokouKeine could only keep me entertained for so long. Now I mostly just listen to its music and sporadically check up on images/videos. It definitely sucks to enjoy the antics of an unpopular cast in UFO, where I cherished the dynamic for so long and TD comes along and kind of changes it rather abruptly. Especially since it had been SO LONG between UFO and TD's release. UFO did nothing to SA, SA did marginally anything to MoF, MoF only grabbed Aya for a bit from PoFV, PoFV is way too different from the other bullet hells to compare, and IN was originally intended to be first but PCB and EoSD were made to introduce more characters to fight the IN bosses. TD doesn't make any of the UFO cast anymore important than usual except maybe hate on Byakuren for a bit, and then demotes Nue to extra mid-boss into a more one-dimensional of a character from what my head formed. I guess too much of my love on Touhou relied on headcanon. It is unfortunate because I find the fandom to be one of the most talented and intelligent of all fandoms. (Yes, more than ponies)
Ponies though will always be the nicest, even if certain communities are...say, not quite as tolerating as the rest. One of the first communities I encountered was Ponychan, which was about eight million times better than any other chan out there ever. Though they occasionally touted that they were the friendliest place on the internet, the fallout after MMDW soured their reputation for me, and nowadays I just see a lot of whining/complaining there. It was inevitable really, due to the image board system allowing the anonymous, and due to the popularity of the fandom growing. On the other hand, I discovered the MyLittlePony subreddit on....reddit, which had many systems in place to keep the nasties out, including having to sign up to post anything, an adorable emoticon collection which could masquerade witty jokes/quotes that allow mini-RPs to come about pertaining to the post at hand, and a rating system. Upvotes for content AND comments. So if some troll showed up. their stuff would be pushed to the bottom in no time, and won't even be shown because it had too many downvotes. All the quality stays on top, and the community is truly very kind. Anonymity kills people's sense of morals.
Not only that but say, image-bombing and raids are far more difficult, and due to an actual searchbar, reposts occur rarely. The only downside to the subreddit for me is that they're not quite as up-to-date in terms of Pony News, like the announcement of an episode synopsis isn't likely to be discussed over there, and actual proper debate doesn't happen quite as often due to the system. (This is where Ponychan comes in and is better in that case) I still visit Ponychan because /pony/ is not the only board, so other areas might be fun to poke around. I've tried a few other communities as well, like forums (Canterlot comes in mind) ...but who actually uses forums these days? Or the comments section of anything, be it EQD itself or Ponibooru. Since the comments and comment areas tend to attract the nastiest of people apparently, they aren't exactly the best place to look. (EQD moreso for how well known it is as a pony site, and Ponibooru moreso for its anonymity, again)
And I don't care if it's /co/, I will never look at the 4chan community. It's 4chan, porn can randomly be posted, and /co/ isn't just about ponies. So yeah.
The only place I've yet to mention might be the Tumblr community, but it's a little more difficult to really get around there. It's more like some sort of little RP community with pictures or something. Ask-Tumblrs are a really awesome evolution of RP in my opinion, with a way to showcase tons of art in various ways due to the number of interesting questions! You know I could have this same discussion about Touhou communities! Like how Shrine Maiden is probably the most popular place, but lacks the discussion I am so interested in which I could only find at the TvTropes community. The chan is a bit disjointed, being a chan of course, and there is a Tumblr community as well, very tight-knit and entertaining. There's also a place for newer fans I'm not quite as fond of due to its completely awful site layout (bright red because it's Lunatic Red, ARGH) and any place else....like Doujinstyle or Vocaloid-Otaku.
I wish I could have included fanfiction communities if I knew of any and read fanfiction beyond a few. It sadly isn't my medium of choice anymore, due to my narrow preferences, my higher standards, and my lower-attention span. Anything I read in Pony nowadays is Adventure or Crossover, usually both. I decided to stop torturing my mind with pointless grimdark stories. In particular I've been reading a crossover between ponies and the Tales series of video games, which I found rather interesting. I particularly loved how Applejack was characterized in it, but it's always sad to see AJ developed more/is more interesting than her canon self. That is sad, and so every week I will hope she'd get something to improve her character and make me like her more, but it just doesn't happen. DO NOT FAIL ME, LAST ROUNDUP!
Ah well, I will retire to bed repeating this to myself. "Have faith in the writers, have faith in the writers, have faith in the writers, have faith in writers..."
Have faith in the writers.
That is all. This has been Spotto.
