Tuesday 27 June 2017

Season 7A – the UK of Equestria rankings

As for the last few seasons, over on UK of Equestria we've recently asked people to rank season 7's episodes up to the hiatus. We chose to make the cutoff episode 11, to avoid potential problems relating to Australian spoilers. I did wonder whether anyone would bother given all the scheduling confusion, but we had 12 lists submitted, enough to get an idea.

I'll pick out a few details at the end of the post, but first here's what the UK of E folks came up with – my own rankings are in brackets:

★★★★★
1. "A Royal Problem" (1)

★★★★
2. "All Bottled Up" (4)
3. "Parental Glideance" (2)
4. "Rock Solid Friendship" (3)

★★★
5. "Celestial Advice" (5)

★★
6. "Hard to Say Anything" (9)
7. "A Flurry of Emotions" (7)
8. "Forever Filly" (10)
9. "Honest Apple" (6)


10. "Not Asking for Trouble" (11)
11. "Fluttershy Leans In" (8)

Number of times each episode placed first
9: "A Royal Problem"
2: "Parental Glideance"
1: "All Bottled Up"

Number of times each episode placed last
6: "Not Asking for Trouble"
3: "Fluttershy Leans In"
1: "A Flurry of Emotions"
1: "Forever Filly"
1: "Honest Apple"

Most controversial (highest standard deviation)
1. "Forever Filly"
2. "Hard to Say Anything"
3. "Not Asking for Trouble"

Least controversial
1. "Fluttershy Leans In"
2. "A Royal Problem"
3. "All Bottled Up"

It wasn't remotely close at the top of the list: "A Royal Problem" was the easiest winner since we started doing these rankings during S4, with a massive lead over the rest of the field. As well as those nine top spots, the episode garnered two seconds and a single fifth place. "All Bottled Up" had only one no. 1 ranking, but everyone placed it in their top five.

At the bottom, the highest "Fluttershy Leans In" was placed was eighth (yes, yes, I was indeed one of those...) but "Not Asking for Trouble" only avoided the wooden spoon because of a solitary fourth place. Those two trailed the rest by a considerable distance. "Forever Filly", the most divisive episode by some margin, was placed as high as second and as low as last.

6 comments:

  1. Thanks for the analysis. Everything seems fairly predicatable in terms of placing. My biggest disappointment is that 'A Flurry of Emotions' and 'Forever Filly' aren't getting more love.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can't help you with "Forever Filly" as I still don't like it much, but I think "A Flurry of Emotions" wasn't particularly disliked -- it simply suffered from the fact that there were lots of other good episodes to choose from.

      Delete
  2. Aw, Forever Filly ;c, the most underrated episode.

    Three ep in the bottom deserved their place, they are episodes that i will try to erase in my memories.

    I hope there will be more 5-stars episodes.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think we all hope for more five-star episodes! ;)

      Delete
  3. It's just as well I can't vote for this (being a yank and all): Not Asking for Trouble would have been my top choice, and A Royal Problem my bottom!

    I'd say that you Brits are hopelessly backwards, but then, the fandom at large seems to agree with you, so...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Actually, UK of E does have a few non-British members; at least one voted in this poll. And as it happens, the gaps were sufficiently large that your votes wouldn't have changed either episode's place! :P

      Delete