Episode review: S8E18 (or 14, or whatever) : "Yakity-Sax"

Back in "Magic Duel" you could play ten instruments at once...

The release schedule for the next few episodes of Friendship is Magic is a complete mess, and since that period also coincides with a holiday week for me, I'm likely to be a bit behind with episode reviews once again. However, this time there's an early release. Equestria Daily calls this episode 18, while the MLP Wiki calls it episode 14. Whatever, it was written by the Fox Brothers, with whose episodes I have a fairly mixed relationship. After the break, a few thoughts...

This was a really frustrating episode, because it came so close to being a lovely throwback to the old days. It was largely set in Ponyville, the Mane Six-plus-Spike (only, sans Starlight) were the focus and the conflict was domestic and fairly low-stakes. While I like the show we have today, there was an undeniable nostalgic kick in feeling like I'd travelled five or six seasons back in time to a simpler era of Pony.

Yes, you had to be fairly forgiving to accept Pinkie's one-track-mindedness over the yovidaphone, but I suppose she was probably less complex in the early days as well. (I really am looking forward to re-watching S1 and S2 one day.) It was a little bit silly, as many of the early-series conflicts were, and it was a self-contained episode – I'm fairly sure the yovidaphone will feature only peripherally if at all in later eps.

Either Twi has a "teleport books" spell or Spike has been worked to the bone

I've seen it said by one or two people that the part of the episode where Pinkamena (another S1 callback!) is unmoved by the Mane Five's jollity and attempts to cheer her up could be an allegory for depression, and the way so many people misunderstand that as something that a cheery smile can fix. I honestly doubt that, as those seem waters too deep for this show, especially in an episode like this.

Maud's cameo was excellent, making use of her unique style of speech for comedic effect. Mind you, the Mane Five were Idiot Balled a bit there, as they surely know Maud well enough by now to understand that they needed to ask direct, unambiguous questions. Still, I can let this one go as a way of advancing the plot – on which note, the pacing of this episode did seem pretty good, right from Fluttershy's opening scene.

The yaks (except Yona) are still not my favourite characters, so I wasn't hugely enthused by the prospect of a trip to Yakyakistan in the final act. Pinkamena – whose colour gradually drained even during the episode – was in a pretty bad way by then, having failed to gain happiness from the yaks' fine playing of what I can't help thinking of the bagpipes. The Mane Six changed tack, and that did work.

On the plus side, Madame Le Flour didn't make an appearance

Which was the problem. We'd seen earlier in the episode that Pinkie's terrible yovidaphone playing wasn't just a minor inconvenience, but had caused significant and continuing upset to a large number of Ponyville's inhabitants – even in the middle of the night. As such, "If you like doing something, just carry on!" felt a very unsatisfactory moral. For one thing, it puts the Mane Six's desires on a pedestal above everyone else's.

So, how would I have changed this? What I was hoping for was a moral involving compromise and give-and-take, with Pinkie understanding that she was being rather selfish but some arrangement being found to let her continue practising. There's actually such a thing in show canon already: the "Bubble of Silence" spell used by Twilight to talk to Moondancer in "Amending Fences".

Oddly enough, "Yakity-Sax" wasn't the first episode written by the Fox Brothers to have the problem of a fun story brought down by a poor ending. Back in S6, "P.P.O.V" did something similar, when an entertaining episode was made frustrating by the ludicrous "bunyip" ending. So I suppose I should have expected it. Even so, this still felt like a missed opportunity for a nostalgia trip. We didn't even get the S1 parody of the Benny Hill music!

"It's Twilight Sparkle's balloon!" – more old-time Pony stuff

Best quote: Rarity: "Apple-solutely!"

Yays

• A soothing bath of old-series atmosphere and callbacks
• Nice to see a plain ol' Mane Six episode
• Generally quite well paced
• Pinkie leaving for Yakyakistan was an unexpected twist

Neighs

• A deeply unsatisfactory moral
• Pinkie's gratingly one-track mindset
• Pinkamena and Rainbow making cupcakes? No thank you!

★★ (albeit a high one)