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theeternalpegasister-blog · 7 years

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My little pony season 7 episode 14 (Fame and misfortune) review

Wow, now here is an episode that subverted my expectations. I very much expected this to be a very forgettable episode, given the emotionally powerful experience we had last episode, in addition to the long stream of good, even excellent episodes we’ve been having this season it only seems natural to have one episode that just didn’t live up to the expectations set by the other episodes. Especially upon reading the plot synopses I didn’t expect anything specially. “Oh, they publish the friendship journal from season four and the pony public argue over which lesson is better. What are we just goanna have another moral about how every contribution is worthwhile? I’m sorry but Made in Manehatten already did that moral practically perfectly, there’s no point in re-treading it. Or what? Are they going to have a moral about how arguing is bad? What a terrible moral! Arguing can be very healthy in a friendship! God this is Where the Applejack lies levels of incompetency and simplicity! This episode is goanna suck!” I foolishly thought, and as I can be a self righteous, close minded twat at times, I failed to see any other potential in the set up. But, low and behold, this episode actually ended up being a constantly hilarious, charming, intelligently written and adorable tale with a unique yet important moral that I never could have seen coming. Wow wasn’t this an eye opener, sorry M.A Larson, I’ll never doubt your writing abilities again, sure you’ve had a few bad episodes, like, in my opinion It’s about time, but for every bad episode you’ve made you have many excellent ones such as The cutie mark chronicles, Magic duel and especially Amending fences. It may have done me some good to research the fact that you were writing this before I saw the episode; that may have caused me to not as harshly judge it before even seeing it. Any hooves, enough with the filler, lets actually get started with the review

So the story begins with Twilight taking a casual stroll through Ponyville, where she discovers two Fillies having a petty argument as children are prone to do, though she uses the moral of friendship being something difficult but ultimately being worth it, that she learnt all the way back in The return of Harmony, to calm the two down; however this causes her to remember the friendship journal and she rushes back to her castle to find it. Now what I really like about this opening as it shows how Twilight operates as the princess of friendship on a smaller scale, sure we’ve seen her deal with massive, cutie map related friendship problems, act as a mediator between her friends and even take on a student in the form of ex-sociopath Starlight Glimmer. But here we see her acting on her feet and using morals that she learnt a long time ago to help the friendships of others, this shows how Twilight as a character has grown both from the socially isolated introvert we saw in season one to the competent yet still quirky leader we see today, as well as how she has gone from student to teacher, delivering the basic friendship lessons that she once learned to others; it’s a small moment but I still think its note worthy. Moving on. So Twilight goes back to casa-de saw thumb, where she finds the friendship journal… Looking like it’s just survived being in the middle of a “best ship” war. Thus she has Starlight create multiple copies of the journal using her magic for each of the other mane six and Starlight herself. Side note, I have no idea why Starlight isn’t considered part of the mane group yet, I mean she lives with Twilight, has proven herself to have moved past her old self, leading the pony suicide squad to save Equestria, she’s even been called upon by the cutie map! Come on DHX; give her a throne at the round table. Regardless, Twilight then proposes to the group that they should have the journal published so that the lessons inside can enhance the lives and friendships of all the ponies of Equestria. The group unanimously agree and we see copies of the journal being delivered all around Equestria… Ok we only see it being delivered in Ponyville and Manehatten but come on, use your imagination here. And so the journal becomes a huge hit with many Equestrian ponies loving it.

We see the initial positive effect of the journal with young foals in Ponyville being guided by it, however we quickly see the mane six’s initial positive intent has allowed for a variety of negative outcomes such as the CMC using it as a marketing tool and a group of ponies from Philidelphia only having it as a collector’s item. We also see many Ponies taking objections with them messages within the journal, as well as begin to see the mane six differently. Now here is where we see the episode’s now infamous Meta humour and commentary come into play, as we see Twilight roaming Ponyville, viewing how the response to the journal is impacting each of the other members of the mane six individually, we see the surrounding ponies imitating common complaints and mindsets that the brony fandom have toward the show. For instance some stuck-up ponies at a café complain about how Rarity isn’t really learning anything, practically all the townsfolk who have known Pinkie for years begin to claim that she “is even funnier in person”, neglecting to see her as a four dimensional, complex character who experiences very real emotion as she is “the funny one”. We see Flutershy being pestered by a group of ponies who want to know why she keeps learning the same moral over and over again, and we see both Applejack and Rainbow Dash being constantly harassed by raving fans that deny they have any faults and believe they didn’t to learn anything to begin with. This is incredibly intelligent writing on behalf of M.A. Larson as it shows that both he and the writing staff in general, are aware of the issues that many people have with the show, however it also counters them by giving reasons for why things are the way they are, for instance Flutershy is able to stand up for herself and ask her critics if they were ever able to completely change themselves after only one experience. As stated previously, this is a very eye opening experience and this is an example of why, as Flutershy is correct, people can’t completely change themselves after learning something one time, thus counteracting the common complaint that Flutershy is just learning to be assertive all the time as, through doing so, she is going through a natural progression of coming out of her shell and thus a better and more active friend. Through this, Larson has shown that, just how the ponies missed the true meaning of the journal by nitpicking small details, bronies can sometimes miss the true meaning of an episode by nitpicking similar small details. I don’t think he meant any malicious intent with this as some people generally enjoy prowling for small details and finding small things that go past the eyes of other viewers, there is no incorrect way to enjoy something, he was just showing that he, nor any of the other writers are perfect and they will occasionally let small things past by them, thus there is no point in looking down on an episode for such small details as imperfections are something to be expected and specifically looking for these imperfections with the sole intent of looking down on the episode and taking away its credibility goes against the nature of the show and shows that you were never really a fan of the show in the first place. I repeat myself, looking for small details for the fun of it, CinemaSins style, is fine, but trying to present these ultimately insignificant complaints as actual criticism is not.

The thing that really ties this all together and proves it however, in my opinion is the ending and the moral. So at the end of the episode, the mane six, without Twilight make their way past a barrage of critic ponies and reach Twilight’s castle. They all seem in very emotionally fragile states, especially Rarity (#Stresscouture), due to the strain that has been added onto their lives due to the publishing of the friendship journal, Twilight is has also become emotionally fragile throughout the course of the episode, to the point of window staring! All seems lost until Starlight gets an idea and teleports away, creating a genuinely good suspense for how she will fix the situation. Though Twilight also decides that something needs to be done to calm the raging bronies… I mean ponies that await them outside. Now this leads to what is easily one of my, if not my absolute, favourite part of the episode, after some admittedly very funny satire of bronies as the critic ponies very blatantly spell out common complaints with the show from the fandom, one journalist even straight up tells Twilight that her “character would have been much more interesting if she had stayed in Canterlot”. Following this however is the song “Flawless”, which was, in my opinion, one of the best songs of the entire series. On the surface this song focuses on how the mane six are in fact not flawless, nor is anypony, and that it is are flaws that make us who we are, “we’ve got dents and we’ve got quirks but it’s are flaws that make us work”, and any good friend will look past your flaws and love you regardless of them; as Twilight says right after the song “without our flaws, there probably wouldn’t be any friendships at all” showing how it’s are flaws that bring us together and what test us to stay together; if we were perfect, we would have no drive to interact and would have no way of experiencing true joy. However looking deeper into the Meta commentary of this episode adds even more depth to this already fantastic piece. See, this entire time, the critic ponies have represented the brony fandom and the journal has represented the show, which naturally means that the mane six, who wrote the friendship journal represent, not just the writing staff but the entire Friendship is magic production crew. Hus when the mane six are literally singing “we’re not flawless”, it symbolises how the production team themselves don’t view themselves as perfect and that the very fact is something to be celebrated. The nostalgia critic says in his “Can a film be so good it’s bad?” video on YouTube that if a film is too good it can create a disconnect between its audience and the film maker, making the film less enjoyable over all, the film needs to show some cracks in its armour to show that the film was still made by humans, making it more identifiable; the same thing goes for friendship is magic. If every single episode was perfect, no animation errors, no cringe worthy writing, no out of character moments, there would be nothing to critique, nothing to praise or dismiss, but there would also be no hype as there would never be the possibility that an episode may not live up to it, we would get used to everything be perfect all the time and it would become boring very quickly. So it’s the flaws of the show, and its makers, that allow us to have fun critiquing what is done wrong but also enjoy and praise what is done spectacularly. Simply put: if there weren’t any flaws in MLP, there would be no brony fandom, no community where so many have found a sense of belonging. And besides, without any flaws in animation at least, there would be no Derpy Hooves, and I don’t want to live in a world without Derpy Hooves.

Astonishingly however, taking pride in and dealing with our flaws is not the only moral this episode presents! This is shown once the critic ponies fail to comprehend Twilight’s message and begin to argue amongst themselves, forcing the Mane six back into the castle. Here, Starlight reappears with the two Fillies that Twilight confronted at the beginning of the episode, who have now had their friendship restored thanks to the positive influence they received from the friendship journal. The two then thank the mane six for this, which causes them to calm down and respect that even though so many ponies misinterpreted their good intention, turning it into something negative, the very fact that it has had a positive impact on somepony else makes all the difference. This relates very much too real life as people can often get distorted when they have a good intention when releasing something they put a lot of hard work into out into the public and it gets rejected, however if that project has a positive impact on even just one person the hard work is still worth it. However it also relates to the Meta commentary as it shows that the production staff are above being petty about the aggressive cries of the loud minority of a fandom that on the whole has nothing but respect for them, as if even just one person learns something about friendship or if just one person praises them for what they’ve produced, they know their hard work was worth it. I also love Flutershy’s line about how “we can’t change the way other ponies think about us, but we can change how we let it affect us”, showing just how mature the production team are, but also giving a little moral about how we just encourage more aggressive behaviour if we give those supplying it the reaction they want.

Overall, Fame and misfortune is not only one of the best episodes of season seven, but in my opinion, one of the best episodes of the entire series thus far! On the surface it provides a an excellent episode for those un aware of the brony fandom, giving lots of excellent humour in the form of superb facial expressions, stress rarity in particular, showing how far the show’s animation has progressed since its opening, as well as a superb and unique moral about taking pride in your flaws and how friendships ultimately rely on them. For those who are aware of or even a part of the brony fandom however, this episode provides excellent commentary and satire on how the production team view the common complaints that bronies have with the show, as well as showing how they know they’re not perfect and take pride in that fact. Moreover, I think it’s important to note that M.A. Larson had no ill intent towards the brony fandom with this episode, shown by how Twilight didn’t “deal” with the critic ponies at the end of the episode, letting them instead just use the journal as they will and that the fact that the journal had a positive impact on other ponies is what is really important, suggesting that Larson, and the others in the production staff, have the maturity to let others enjoy the show how they will because it’s the fact that others are taking away something positive that is really important. Besides, the moral of this episode is to celebrate are flaws and what would we be if we didn’t embrace ours to, just like it’s the flaws of two people that draw them together as friends, it’s the flaws of the brony and pegisister fandom and friendship is magic that pull us together. In conclusion, I really have nothing majorly negative to say about this episode, wow for an episode about flaws it surely didn’t have a lot of them, the only bad things could say about it would be petty nitpicks such as where was Spike during all of this? So over all this is one of the best episodes of Friendship of magic I have ever seen, and whilst I do still believe that The perfect pare is still the best episode of the season, as it is still my absolute favourite episode of the series, but this is a very close second for me personally. So what more can I say? If you haven’t already, give this perfectly imperfect episode a watch.

10/10!

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