Friday 20 July 2018

Special mini-review: "Rollercoaster of Friendship"

Applejack looks left out of shot as Rainbow Dash shushes Megan Williams
Megan is now G4 canon! (In EqG, at least.)
Apologies for the lack of a full-length review for "Rollercoaster of Friendship", but with FiM apparently returning today it was either a mini-review now or a much longer delay. Anyway, Nick Confalone returned for a special that, though entertaining enough for the most part, fell a bit short of his earlier "Forgotten Friendship". It wasn't a disaster by any means, and most of the girls had at least the occasional good line or scene, but it didn't feel as enjoyable or important as the earlier special had.

There was certainly plenty for the RariJack shippers to enjoy, and AJ's reaction to Rarity getting an (apparently) plum job when she was rejected made good viewing. Mind you, much of the rest seemed a little by-the-numbers. Vignette made a decent and suitably unlikeable villain, despite her inevitable near-instant reformation at the end, though the "white room" reveal was just plain silly. The song ("Photo Booth") was not one of EqG's best, being rather generic and forgettable. The special itself was better than that, but even its best scenes lacked the emotional power of Sunset's return to Equestria in "FF".

Oh, and the ponying up at the end seemed a little pointless, but apparently this is Hasbro-mandated for financial reasons. A bit like Rainbow Power, I suppose. I went back and forth between a top-end two-star rating and a bare three a number of times while I was thinking about this review. In the end, it just about scrapes into the higher bracket, partly down to an amusing Rainbow/Fluttershy subplot involving a rather scary rollercoaster – and partly due to that little Megan Williams cameo!

2 comments:

  1. Y'know, if there's anything (besides the Rarijack) that I liked about this one, it's that white room reveal. Like, if nothing else, it kept things from being Juniper Montage all over again.

    It begs the question of why that room was there, but I'd like to think it was part of the whole "magic in the cell phone" thing. Maybe the magic also infused a pre-existing building; maybe it constructed an entirely new one and nobody noticed.

    Or maybe Equestrian magic is the real villain, and it's starting to run out of ideas. :B

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  2. When i realized this ep was written by Nick Confalone, i was shocked because of how dull it is. RariJack shipping is too forced for me and this ep doesnt have enough rollercoaster. Nick's last EQG special is superb, maybe because this ep isnt about Trixie or Sunset.
    Maybe I just expected a lot from my favorite writers...

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