Wonderbolt Academy: My Little Pony Friendship is Magic

[Immoren]

I'd watch it
Maybe I should read this.
Dynamic trio
Hah! Gaaayyy!

[Esparmuran]

LMFAO!

An internet cancer, yes. We'll just have to wait until it evolves into an actual cancer.

[Ifreann]

Hah! Gaaayyy!

Oh lawd, I done exceeded mah bandwidths.

[Ozzy]

LMFAO!

An internet cancer, yes. We'll just have to wait until it evolves into an actual cancer.

Oh yeah! About that, I apologize!

We should create a Fallout Equestria role play, together! You know, just us ponies. No one to bother us and troll us.

And no, I won't troll you! I'm acting silly of the moment, but I'm SERIOUS about this post and our role play!!!

[Esparmuran]

An internet cancer, yes. We'll just have to wait until it evolves into an actual cancer.

Oh yeah! About that, I apologize!

We should create a Fallout Equestria role play, together! You know, just us ponies. No one to bother us and troll us.

And no, I won't troll you! I'm acting silly of the moment, but I'm SERIOUS about this post and our role play!!!

[Immoren]

le meme

[Ozzy]

(Image)

What are you trying to prove?

[Lazssia]

Everypony do as she says!

[Quidomne]

I have anthro older Demoscoota-butt. Yeah.

Ifreann, I will send it to you along with smut.

Because butts.

---

That's a good idea for me as well. I have little time as it is.

CEFFY. WE READ IT TOGETHER. READ A CHAPTER. DISCUSS.

BAM.

...YES, QUID, YES.

I WILL BE YOUR READING LOVER BUDDY

YES, CEFFY. WE WILL MAKE SWEET, SWEET LOVE HAVE MAGICAL PONY ADVENTURES IN READING TOGETHER.

LIES

[rarity]But the hat is ugly.[/rarity]

Ugly is the new black.

>​Open deviantArt
>​First random result of home page is crude fluffy pony gore

:I

RUN AWAY, QUID. RUN AWAY!

I did, my friend, I did. I am safe.

(Image)

SHE'S A WITCH!

Well, friendship is witchcraft, or so they say.

Also, new headcanon to submit:
Celestia's orgasms cause solar flares.

That's hot.

Ceffy's new hat.

Ceffy's got AJ on the brain.

I would be surprised if he didn't.

ALL THE SCRUNCH

SCRUNCH FACE ERRY DAY

That's a good idea for me as well. I have little time as it is.

CEFFY. WE READ IT TOGETHER. READ A CHAPTER. DISCUSS.

BAM.

Do like Mark Reads Stuff and blog about it.

Hm...interesting. It's up to Ceffy.

Hah! Gaaayyy!

Everypony do as she says!

"DID I *yay*ing STUTTER?! MOVE!"

[Soxastan]

Best Rare is?

I need the names of all of these artists. I know some of them, but not all of them.

[Ameriganastan]

Just friends

Damn shame something that cute is part of a crappy Joseco blog.

[Commune of Luna]

Best Rare is?

All of them?

But really, top row: 2; row 2: 6; row 3: 3, 4, 6 would be my picks.

[Ceffyltir]

Ceffy's new hat.

Ceffy's got AJ on the brain.

What else is new.

le meme

Ha! Yes.

Everypony do as she says!

The only robber I'd actually give my money to.

YES, CEFFY. WE WILL MAKE SWEET, SWEET LOVE HAVE MAGICAL PONY ADVENTURES IN READING TOGETHER.

SOUNDS GOOD TO ME

[rarity]But the hat is ugly.[/rarity]

Ugly is the new black.

RUN AWAY, QUID. RUN AWAY!

I did, my friend, I did. I am safe.

Ceffy's got AJ on the brain.

I would be surprised if he didn't.

This guy gets it.

Do like Mark Reads Stuff and blog about it.

Hm...interesting. It's up to Ceffy.

Do I have to show my face?

[Xiscapia]

Urgh. I typed up this big response to you, hatters, and when I posted it the forum somehow only posted what I quoted and not anything I wrote in response. Suffice to say that I agree with you where you agree with me and disagree with you where you disagree with me. Mostly. Yeah.

[Ceffyltir]

I hate to make things even worse for you, Xis, but I think you typed that first big post for nothing. Wilgrove rarely responds to things like that.

Also, me right now.

[Xiscapia]

I hate to make things even worse for you, Xis, but I think you typed that first big post for nothing. Wilgrove rarely responds to things like that.

Also, me right now.

That's okay, I got some good conversation out of it from Xomic and hatters anyway.

[Lazssia]

Muh hart dun sploded.

[Ceffyltir]

New flag. Fits me well, I think.

I hate to make things even worse for you, Xis, but I think you typed that first big post for nothing. Wilgrove rarely responds to things like that.

Also, me right now.

That's okay, I got some good conversation out of it from Xomic and hatters anyway.

Alright then. I'd respond to it now, but... ugh. I should really get to work on my papers...

[Xiscapia]

New flag. Fits me well, I think.

That's okay, I got some good conversation out of it from Xomic and hatters anyway.

Alright then. I'd respond to it now, but... ugh. I should really get to work on my papers...

You should. I'll probably be going offline soon anyway.

[Wisconsin9]

Love the flag, Ceffy.

[Saurisisia]

New flag. Fits me well, I think.

That's okay, I got some good conversation out of it from Xomic and hatters anyway.

Alright then. I'd respond to it now, but... ugh. I should really get to work on my papers...

Quite nice.

[Ceffyltir]

Alright then. I'd respond to it now, but... ugh. I should really get to work on my papers...

You should. I'll probably be going offline soon anyway.

Mkay. Sorry.

Love the flag, Ceffy.

Thanks!

[Wilgrove]

Sorry it's taken me awhile to get back to you on this, but work comes first.

Alright, let's rap.

1. Cadence and Shining Armor

Big Brother Best Friend Forever, who hasn't been mentioned, seen, written to or so much as referenced in the last two seasons. Out of nowhere. Ditto for Cadence. What's more is that these two characters are basically plot devices themselves. They don't make sense in the context of the show. The crux of Shining's story is founded on a relationship that was never established, because we've never heard of either of these characters before.

Well, honestly I've thought about this and I have to ask, which episode would we be introduced to either Shining Armor or Cadance? I mean they both lived in Canterlot, and in Season 1 it wasn't really a place they visited a whole lot. The only time Canterlot came into play was in the Season 1 opener and the Season 1 finale. So why didn't Shining Armor show up in either one? Royal Guards duties. I'd imagine being the Captain of the Royal Guards (The leader, the top dog) is quite a full time job, probably requiring 12-13 hours work days. Cadance is a little bit more forgivable since not even Twilight Sparkle realized that Shining Armor was marrying Princess Cadance. Where Princess Cadance has been for the two seasons, I honestly cannot answer that because the only thing that make sense to me is that she's been in stasis.

Cadence has no reason to be an alicorn except for the same reason that they made Twilight one -to sell toys. There was never any question about why Celestia and Luna ruled Equestria because, duh, they're alicorn and they have power over day and night. They occupy this neat little yin-yang space between royalty and divinity. It just works well. The introduction of Cadence destroys that. Now you have to wonder -why are Luna and Celestia the alicorns in charge?

I'll be honest, with the recent events involving Princess Twilight Sparkle, I think the raising of the moon and sun isn't really a mark of royalty, it's just their special talent. I mean the moon and sun rose before the introduction of the Royal Sisters in Equestria (Hearth Warming Eve episode). As for why the Alicorns are royalty, the show has yet to answer that in a direct way. However, given the season 3 finale, we can take a pretty educated guess. Twilight Sparkle became an Alicorn because she completed a spell that not even Starswirl the Bearded could complete. So Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, Princess Cadance all have done something extraordinary enough to be worthy of the title Alicorns. It is because of this feat that they are probably seen as the wisest and most knowledgeable ponies, thus they're bestowed the title of Royalty and given a country or city state to rule. (My head canon is that Crystal Empire is a city state while Equestria is a country).

Why isn't Cadence the one ruling? Why does it seem like she ages normally? Is Cadence some kind of lesser alicorn, or is she just a great deal younger, or what? Cadence being an alicorn is a glaringly obvious mistake because it doesn't add anything to her character and it clashes with the established mythos of the alicorns that we already have.

On the age thing, one of my friends in North Carolina Bronies have actually gave a very good explanation for this. There is nothing canon that says the Alicorns are immortal, they just live for a really really long time. Living for a really really long time =/= immorality. So when they are young, they age at a normal rate. However, as they get older, the aging process slows down to the point that the Alircorns age at a snail's pace. Which is how Princess Celestia can be seen as not aging a day from the flashback in Family Appreciation Day to the current time in the show.

Now Cadance is a bit interesting. It's been established in the Season 3 opener that she is the de-facto ruler of the Crystal Empire, and the Crystal ponies even acknowledge her as such. Now this gets a little messy when you realize that the Crystal Ponies have been in stasis for a 1,000 years. Which means that Cadance should be at the same aging process as Celestia and Luna. Honestly my head-canon is that Cadance tried to escape Sombra with the Crystal Heart (the thing that was keeping The Crystal Empire safe) but Sombra stopped her, took the heart and she went into stasis herself. When Celestia and Luna arrived to banish Sombra to the ices of the North, they found Cadance and kept her in storage until she thawed out.

As an aside, what is Cadence doing babysitting Twilight anyway? Isn't she visiting royalty? It's not because Twilight is Celestia's best student -this happened before Twilight got her cutie mark. Doesn't Cadence have other things to do, you know, princess-y things? In reality, from a story perspective, it's a convenient way to make Twilight okay with her Big Brother Best Friend Forever getting married, without sacrificing any toy potential.

I'll be honest, I think that entire scene should've had Twilight's cutie mark and the fact it wasn't there is an animation error. (Like they haven't had animation error with cutie marks before). Why do I put this scene after the events in The Cutie Mark Chronicles? Mainly because in that scene, it is obvious that Twilight is moving into Canterlot's Castle. The room is the same room that Rarity bunked in, in Sweet & Elite, which puts Twilight IN the Castle, after the events in The Cutie mark Chronicles.

\As for why Cadance is Twilight's babysitter, it's been a long tradition in the human world that members of Royalty do a public service. For the Prince's of UK, they entered into the military service. Since Equestria is not a militarized country (no evidence of a standing army aside from The Royal Guard), it stands to reason that Royalty takes on another form of public service to the country. Since I have placed this flashback AFTER Twilight got her cutie mark, it could also be seen as Celestia's way of grooming Twilight for her future role AS a Princess. It's not too far fetch to believe that Celestia does have the ability to be so far sighted that she could mold events to unfold decades from the origin point. So Cadance being Twilight's babysitter is either a public service that's a part of being Royalty, or it's Celestia's way of grooming Twilight.

And why does Twilight instantly vilify Cadence when she figures out that she's acting strangely? If they were such good friends, wouldn't she want to at least try to talk to her instead of complaining or pronouncing her evil? Or, hell, why doesn't she talk to one of the Princesses?

I can actually answer this with a quote from the episode.

Queen Chrysalis: You were saying? You do realize the reception's been cancelled, don't you? Go! Feed! [laughing] It's funny, really. Twilight here was suspicious of my behavior all along. Too bad the rest of you were too caught up in your wedding planning to realize those suspicions were correct. [laughing]

Also, she did try to talk to her friends, to Shining Armor, and she even tried to exposed her during the rehearsal, so honestly Twilight did try to do everything she could to stop Queen Chrysalis.

2. Queen Chrysalis is a friggin' moron

Well that I won't disagree with.

So when Chrysalis dramatically reveals herself, Princess Luna is nowhere to be seen and Princess Celestia conveniently steps out for a moment. Right. Anyway, Chrysalis seems kind of surprised when she actually manages to defeat Celestia. If she wasn't fully confident that it would work, why would she do that?

As for why Princess Luna wasn't there, it's been established in the episode that Princess Luna is nocturnal, and even though they are ponies that can live for a really really long time, they probably still require sleep. The day is Princess Celestia's realm and the night is Princess Luna's realm. I'm assuming that they respect each others realm of rule and would not want to overstep their boundaries.

As for why Chrysalis tried to take down Celestia even if she was unsure it would work? Honestly that moment struck me as a "Last stand" kind of deal. She didn't expect to win, but dammit if she isn't going to go down fighting!

Was that her Plan B? If so, what, exactly, was Plan A? What was she there to do? Was she planning to be Cadence forever? Then what's with the giant changeling army already attacking the shield as the wedding commences? And given how mean Chrysalis has been to everyone up until now, and leaving Cadence and Twilight alive directly beneath the city, it doesn't seem like she cares that much about keeping a low profile.

Plan A:

Queen Chrysalis: [laughing] Right you are, Princess. And as queen of the changelings, it is up to me to find food for my subjects. Equestria has more love than any place I've ever encountered. My fellow changelings will be able to devour so much of it that we will gain more power than we have ever dreamed of!

They were apparently a race of parasitic insect/pony hybrid that fed on love, and as they fed on love, they gain more and more powers, as we've seen when Chrysalis defeated Celestia.

Queen Chrysalis: Ah! Shining Armor's love for you is even stronger than I thought! Consuming it has made me even more powerful than Celestia!

But open combat seems to contradict everything we're told about the changelings. They're a secretive folk who eat your love when you're not looking. Wouldn't it make more sense for them to just sneak in and make-pretend? Why gather a massive, highly visible army to batter down the shield? In fact, why is there a shield there at all? It's never explained what the threat towards the city explicitly was. We have to assume that Chrysalis was the one who made the threat -but Chrysalis is already inside the shield. She would have had to threaten the city, while inside the city, all by herself. Was that done deliberately? To what end? Why is she alone? She has an army that can look like anyone she wants.

As for why she took Cadance's profile. It's kinda obvious. Her changling army sent a note to the Royal Sisters about a possible threat, which puts the entire city on lockdown and distracted from the fact that Chrysalis is already in Canterlot, it's a move of deception. Look at the right hand so you don't realize what the left one is doing. Taking Cadance's place is important because that gives her access to Shining Armor. Her plan was to take down Shining Armor, thus severely wreaking the Royal Guards, thus making Equestria that much easier to conquer.

Which...is actually a brilliant battle plan. I'd have to assume that Chyrsalis's plan was to take out the entire ruling class of Equestria by taking away one member at a time and substituting them with a changling until it was too late to stop them. However, she never counted on the fact that Cadance and Twilight Sparkle would break free of the caves underneath the city.

So we're to understand that Chrysalis, all on her own, sneaked into Canterlot to take down a shield that never would have been a problem if she hadn't, you know, made the threat in the first place? You can't say that she didn't have the power to take it down once she got Shining Armor in her hooves; she could make him do anything she wanted. I'm sure she could command him to take down the shield. Unless, of course, the shield was up when she got there. In which case, what was the point of the threat? And why didn't her army sneak in the same way she did? It's not like having a big influx of people right before a royal wedding would look suspicious, it would be expected.

Honestly, sending in a small group of changling to erode the power structure from the inside out is a better move than what you're suggesting. Think about how much it takes to organize an Army of thousands of people. Now, try to do that while telling everyone in the army that they are under cover, the job becomes much more difficult doesn't it? So it's a better move for the Queen to sneak in, give the Royal Guard a false threat so that they're distracted enough for The Queen to take Cadance place, and then The Queen is in position to weaken the power structure of Equestria enough to open the door for her Changling army.

So once Chrysalis deals with Celestia she just kind of lets the Mane 6 run out of there. Doesn't even try to stop them. What, does she have pressing matters in the throne room? Was she not finished with her gloating monologues? C'mon.

She was starting to become over-confident, which is a staple in episodes like this.

3. Where the hell is Luna?

What, did they think we wouldn't notice? Why isn't she there? There is NO explanation for this whatsoever. And it's not really justifiable in-story either. What, is she supposed to be asleep or something? What a pile of bullshit. Celestia can be awake during the night, but Luna can't be awake during the day? And it seems to me that she would rush to defend Canterlot just like everyone else. Did the animators just decide they didn't want to deal with her big blue butt during the battle scenes? Seriously, what the fuck?

I already explained this.

As for why Princess Luna wasn't there, it's been established in the episode that Princess Luna is nocturnal, and even though they are ponies that can live for a really really long time, they probably still require sleep. The day is Princess Celestia's realm and the night is Princess Luna's realm. I'm assuming that they respect each others realm of rule and would not want to overstep their boundaries.

As for why this was never covered in the episode itself. Honestly I thought it was.

Princess Luna: Rest, my sister. As always, I will guard the night.

I mean yes, they don't explicitly show what Luna was doing during the Changling invasion, but I assume that she either respect her sister's rule and not wanting to overstep the boundries both of them have set up, or, she was fighting the changling in another part of Canterlot with her bat ponies and they didn't show it because it honestly did not pertain to the overall plot of the episode, which is that Love can Conquer anything, or something about that. The story was about Cadance, Shining Armor and Twilight Sparkle. They were the focus, and to shove in a Luna scene would've been convoluted TBH.

4. The battle scene

Okay, so the Mane 6 runs off to get the EoH. They fight a bunch of changelings, beat the crap out of them, and open the doors...only to find more changelings. Wait, so were the changelings just waiting for them? Do they know about the EoH? If so, what did they do with them? If not, why were they there? Was it an ambush? Why didn't they just burst out and overwhelm the Mane 6 during the battle?

It is a popular battle tactic to have ambushes. Send in one wave to wear out the enemy, and then surprise them with another wave. They're so tired out that they can't repel the second wave of attack.

And then the Mane 6 ends up getting taken back to the the throne room anyway, rendering the entire scene pointless. Twilight goes around letting Cadence and Shining Armor free while Chrysalis just...stands there and watches. Again. Even as Twilight frees Cadence, who knocks Shining out of his stupor, thus freeing the one who can stop her. Wonderful.

Like I said, Chrysalis gets over-confident, which is a staple in TV episodes like this. If you've ever watched shows like TNMT, He-Man, etc. in the 80s and 90s, this was common.

Cadence proclaims that her love will give Shining Armor strength, at which Chrysalis utters this gem:

"What a lovely but absolutely ridiculous sentiment!"

Are you fucking kidding me?

To be fair, I agree with Chrysalis, but I see where you're coming from. It's love that gave Chrysalis her the strength to defeat Celestia, and it is love that her race of bug/pony hybrid feed on. So with her over-confidence, she thought that it wouldn't work the same way it did for her and her subject of changlings.

So your entire race gains strength from the power of love, which you JUST used to vanquish Celestia, and when someone goes to use the exact same thing against you it's a RIDICULOUS SENTIMENT?! AND IT'S THE SAME FUCKING PERSON THAT GAVE SHINING THE SOURCE OF THE POWER YOU JUST FUCKING WIELDED AS A WEAPON TO DEFEAT THE GODDESS-EMPRESS?! How could you be so FUCKING stupid?

Over confidence my man, she was over confidence, which was her down fall.

And then there's the moral.

The moral is that love is good? Uh, hate to break it to y'all, but literally everyone knows that. Everyone likes love and to be loved. As they say, even Hitler was kind to his dogs. But, see, here's the thing: I can't shoot great streaming jets of love out of my forehead. So I'm completely at a loss to see how it was love that saved the day. If this was supposed to be an allegory it's hard to see.

I always thought the moral of the episode was the following:

Princess Celestia: This is your victory as much as theirs. You persisted in the face of doubt, and your actions led to your being able to bring the real Princess Cadance back to us. Learning to trust your instincts is a valuable lesson to learn.

For Twilight, it was to always trust in yourself, even in the face of adversity.

For Shining Armor and Cadance...I don't think it was about them honestly. I mean Twilight Sparkle is the main character of the show, and such she's the one that gets the super duper lesson.

You see, we're told at the start of part two that love is a tangible thing, similar to electricity that can be stolen and used against people like a weapon. This doesn't make any literal sense in the real world. But it does make metaphorical sense, if Chrysalis is an allegory for a shady person who curries the affections of decent people for self-serving reasons. Which is fine. But according to this episode, the power of love will save you from these people. If that's so, when Chrysalis squared off against Celestia, and Chrysalis was running off the power of love, what was Celestia using? Double A batteries? What is THAT scene supposed to be a metaphor for? That love can defeat the Goddess-Empress of ponykind? All the scene proves is that Celestia ISN'T god. Huzzah.

In the words of Dr. Freud, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Now as for love being a source of power, Cadance special talent is spreading love, which is actually the PERFECT subject for The Queen to take over, since it's love that her race require. It's obvious that Celestia has a lot of love for her subject, for her country, for her sister, for Twilight, etc. Celestia has a fuck-ton of love. So The Queen using all of this love to power up and defeat the queen is not that insane. Think of it as one person draining another person's power and then using that power against them.

Now the scene where Cadance and Shining Armor defeated The Queen and The Changling was actually very nicely done. Cadance's special talent is spreading love, and as we've seen in the beginning, Shining Armor can build up one Hell of a shield. A shield big and powerful enough to cover an entire city. So combining the two, you get Cadance spreading love to her husband, which gives him enough power to create a shield that repeals the Changling and The Queen. I thought that scene was brilliantly done myself.

And let's not forget. If Cadence's power of love was able to save the day, it's only because 1) Chrysalis STANDS THERE AND LETS IT HAPPEN, and

Over-confidence strikes again!

2), Cadence was released from prison in the first place. By Twilight. Who was put there by Chrysalis. Why? Because she mistrusted Cadence from the beginning. Love didn't save the day -Twilight's paranoia did! Without that Cadence would be starving beneath Canterlot and everyone else would be prisoners or slaves to the changelings as they do whatever it is they do. I don't even want to get into the kind of disconnect it is to have creatures that feed on love terrorizing the populace they're trying to prey upon.

Well honestly in a way, love did save the day. It was the love that Twilight had for her old foal-sitter that made her realized that there was something wrong with Cadance. I mean if you love something, then you're that more likely to remember the good times y'all have together, and to remember each other more fondly. I mean the love that exist between Cadance and Twilight Sparkle did save the day. As for the changling army terrorizing Canterlot, well The Queen did give them the signal to have a free for all feeding.

But there's your moral. "Kids, if you suspect that someone you love has fallen prey to an emotional leech, then never stop doubting them! You'll be proven right in the end!"

Haha, that made me laugh. Or maybe the moral of the story is that love can conquer things. It was the love that Twilight Sparkle had for her foal sitter that caused her to realized that something was wrong. It was the love that Cadance had for Shining Armor that allowed them both to repeal The Queen and her army of changling.

Seriously. Even Celestia says so to Twilight. "This is your victory as much as theirs. You persisted in the face of doubt, and your actions led to your being able to bring the real Princess Cadence back to us. Learning to trust your instincts is a valuable lesson to learn."

Well...that is a good lesson.

So that's my rant on that. They're serious flaws that undermine the premise and the characters of the two-parter. The sad thing is that this could have been such a good finale, but they fucked it up. It wouldn't have taken much, you know, establishing the Shining-Cadence plot thread early, not making Cadence an alicorn, making Chrysalis a bit smarter and acting like a shapeshifter would, including Luna, getting a better moral. These are little fixes that would have been easy and alone don't add up to much, but when you put them all together it makes the finale look like a pile of shit.

Eh, well that's your opinion and I respect it, I just don't share it.

[Quidomne]

I suppose my announcement was too subtle.

I HAVE ANTHRO DEMOSCOOTA-BUTT
TG ON REQUEST

Ugly is the new black.

Hm...interesting. It's up to Ceffy.

Do I have to show my face?

Hell no! You think I'd do something like that? I'm more paranoid than you about that stuff.

No, no faces. We could even use ponysonas if you want.

Also, me right now.

Adorable.

Also nice flag. Mr. Ceffy and Dr. Hyde, huh?

Muh hart dun sploded.

Also adorable.

[Wisconsin9]

I suppose my announcement was too subtle.

I HAVE ANTHRO DEMOSCOOTA-BUTT
TG ON REQUEST

Demoloo is sexiest 'loo. Consider this a request.