It took me four months to get through S3. To get through the twice-as-long S4 took me seven months, a little less than twice the time. Progress! First of all, let's see where this season ranks in terms of its mean star rating. (You can see how I rated each individual episode after the page break.) Four seasons of Friendship is Magic so far, and guess what? S4 comes out on top! Not by all that much, but it does. The scores on the doors are:
1. Season 4: 3.42
2= Season 1: 3.38
2= Season 2: 3.38
4. Season 3: 2.92
First, here's how I rated S4's 26 episodes:
★★★★★
Pinkie Pride
Filli Vanilli
Testing Testing 1, 2, 3
Twilight's Kingdom, part 2
★★★★
Princess Twilight Sparkle, part 1
Flight to the Finish
Rarity Takes Manehattan
Pinkie Apple Pie
Maud Pie
For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils
Twilight's Kingdom, part 1
★★★
Princess Twilight Sparkle, part 2
Castle Mane-ia
Power Ponies
Bats!
Simple Ways
Twilight Time
It Ain't Easy Being Breezies
Leap of Faith
Trade Ya!
Inspiration Manifestation
Equestria Games
★★
Daring Don't
Rainbow Falls
Three's a Crowd
Somepony to Watch Over Me
★
none
Season 4 had ten episodes which scored four or more scores. Only S2 has matched that, and that season had five two-star eps to S4's four. Although the difference is not large, this does tend to support the fairly common feeling that S4 is the most consistent of them all. It'll be interesting to see how S5 does in this regard, but my hunch is that it'll bounce around more, despite the existence of some real classics.
This was the first season of Alicorn Twilight, and thankfully the arguments and infighting of the S3 era were already largely on their way out – along with those fans who just could not make their peace with Princess Twi. At this point, with Twilight still living in her good old treehouse in the very heart of Ponyville, things felt as though they were returning to something a bit more comfortable. There was however one significant piece of fandom unpleasantness, which I'll get to.
Although there had been very occasional early releases before (most notably the "Smile Song"), S4 was the first time that leaks really became something almost to be expected. It still wasn't that bad, certainly not compared with how it became later on – but a couple of eps did leak, most notably "Pinkie Pride". As such, avoiding visual spoilers on social media or art websites started to become increasingly tricky. You had to either hide yourself from EqD etc or take the risk.
Amy Keating Rogers made a welcome return to the writers' ranks, and she provided the one S4 episode that is (almost) universally acclaimed as a classic: "Pinkie Pride". Given that she was also responsible for "Filli Vanilli" and "Testing Testing 1, 2, 3" and that all three of those episodes got five-star ratings from me, she is the easiest of shoo-ins for my writer of the season. For all M. A. Larson is popular, I'd probably choose AKR to write Pony for my life.
She was, however, the target of by far the most unedifying event of S4. The one thing many people, including me, disliked about "Filli Vanilli" was how Pinkie Pie was portrayed. Pinkie's characterisation was really up and down throughout the season, but it was a real surprise when a writer of AKR's calibre seemed to have missed the mark. Even so, the fact that a few fans took it upon themselves to send what was apparently really quite nasty hate mail was appalling.
We had a few new writers this season, most significantly Josh Haber with his Scooby-Doo-esque "Castle Mane-ia". At the time, of course, we thought Haber would be just another writer... elsewhere, Natasha Levinger made an impressive FiM debut with "Pinkie Apple Pie", as did Ed Valentine with "Flight to the Finish", while Noelle Benvenuti gave us the fun "Maud Pie". The other debutant was Scott Sonneborn, whose first episode was the substandard "Somepony to Watch Over Me" but who improved considerably with "Trade Ya!"
As was the case after Season 3, there will now be a break from FiM rewatches. My next full rewatch post will be on the Rainbow Rocks film, which has always been my favourite of the Equestria Girls franchise and contains my own vote for its best song. I may cover the many musical shorts that were released both before and after the movie itself, but if so they will be bundled together into one or two posts and won't get a star rating, just a brief discussion.
After that, of course, we will enter the Starlight Glimmer era. Not that we realised back at the start of S5 that she would prove so influential to the last few seasons of the show. I suppose we were all still talking about Twilight's castle and didn't think that the season's villain might actually end up being a semi-core cast member herself. Still, "The Cutie Map" itself is an episode I am greatly looking forward to revisiting.
"this does tend to support the fairly common feeling that S4 is the most consistent of them all."
ReplyDeleteAgreed, though myself I treat it as a very nice season that I don't think tops the first two, but does earn a place alongside them. You can probably deduce my general opinion by the fact I tend to call this one "the mild season".
"It'll be interesting to see how S5 does in this regard, but my hunch is that it'll bounce around more, despite the existence of some real classics."
My hunch also. Even ignoring my feelings for that finale, Season Five definitely had some rough patches. I think a large part of that is because it's a transition season on multiple levels, with a lot more canon-shaking stuff happening in it.
"This was the first season of Alicorn Twilight, and thankfully the arguments and infighting of the S3 era were already largely on their way out – along with those fans who just could not make their peace with Princess Twi. At this point, with Twilight still living in her good old treehouse in the very heart of Ponyville, things felt as though they were returning to something a bit more comfortable."
Yes, I'll give credit to Season Four for this too. Season Three left me very unhappy with where the series was going, but Season Four felt so much like a return to form (and if I'm nasty, like "damage control" for the fallout of Season Three) that I'm glad I stuck it out back then.
Haven't got much to add about the leaks (avoided them and binged the season a few weeks/month after it was over, if I remember right), favourite writers (I tend not to think about it, really), the fan hate dumbness (so what's new?), new writers (gets more interesting in the next season), Rainbow Rocks (YES the best thing to come out of EqG, though we're in for some treats down the road), and the so-called reformed-Starlight era (let's just say I really strongly disagree with this decision and leave it at that).
But yeah, "The Cutie Map" is going to be really interesting on a revisit. It's a kind of horror well-suited for MLP: a moral horror. Arguably the best two-parter of the series, as well. Looking forward to it!
Hey, we agree on quite a bit this time! :D As far as S5 goes, I'm fairly certain I'll give out my first one-star rating. You can probably guess which episode, too!
DeleteError, Logan, Error: Maud Pie is missing from your list! I believe it's supposed to be a 4-star. Your average rating is correct, you just omitted it from the list by mistake.
ReplyDeleteIn advance for this, I compiled the same list, using your ranking system. Which, to be clear, is not the same as mine. I also elected to rank the episodes, rather then just listing them in release order within each category.
MEAN STAR RATING: 3.19
Fantastic (★★★★★)
1. Pinkie Pride
2. Filli Vanilli
3. Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3
Great (★★★★)
4. Pinkie Apple Pie
5. For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils
6. Rarity Takes Manehattan
Really Good (★★★★)
7. Flight to the Finish
8. Twilight’s Kingdom - Part 2
9. Twilight’s Kingdom - Part 1
10. Trade Ya!
11. It Ain’t Easy Being Breezies
12. Leap of Faith
Good (★★★)
13. Simple Ways
14. Rainbow Falls
15. Bats!
16. Twilight Time
17. Maud Pie
Decent (★★)
18. Equestria Games
19. Inspiration Manifestation
20. Castle Mane-ia
21. Power Ponies
Okay (★★)
22. Princess Twilight Sparkle - Part 1
23. Three’s A Crowd
24. Somepony to Watch Over Me
25. Princess Twilight Sparkle - Part 2
Weak (★★ or ★)
No episodes here!
Bad (★)
Daring Don’t
Terrible (★)
No episodes here!
Abysmal (No ★)
No episodes here!
And as a bonus, my Writer Averages:
Amy Keating Rogers (3 episodes): 5.00
Natasha Levinger (2 episodes): 4.00
Ed Valentine (1.5 episodes): 3.33
Dave Polsky (5 episodes): 3.00
Josh Haber (3 episodes): 3.00
Noelle Benvenuti (1 episode): 3.00
Scott Sonneborn (2 episodes): 3.00
Merriwether Williams (1 episode): 3.00
Meghan McCarthy (5.33 episodes): 2.75
Corey Powell (1.5 episodes): 2.67
Charlotte Fullerton/Betsy McGowen (0.67 episodes): 2.00
My mean rating is a bit below yours, but not that much - basically 6 stars' worth of difference across all 26 episodes. Having not done this for the other seasons, I can't say how it would fare (my old reviews from a year ago are outdated and unreliable, I've changed on many of them), but below Seasons 1 & 2 and above 3 is a given.
Like many, I found on this rewatch that Season 4 mostly got the show back on track after a rough Season 3. Other then Season 2 and 1 (which are close enough in quality that it's shaving it), this is the one time in FiM where one season was unequivocally better then the preceding one. That counts for a lot! It is the consistent season - only one episode I think is Bad or worse, but not many true standouts either. Many episodes are merely Decent or Good, and that, more then anything else, leaves it as the consistent season - beyond a shadow of a doubt, I'm sure this season would have the smallest statistical deviation from its mean.
And hey, look at that! We both have Amy Keating Rogers' three episodes on top! She tended to be really solid in Seasons 1 & 2, but with some slips through the cracks. In contrast, she delivers almost nothing but knockout hits in these last two.
Unlike many, I don't find Pinkie that problematic in "Filli Vanilli", and indeed the oftentimes rampant criticism towards her this season is overdone. She does have a little of that "great when she's the lead, a bit more likely to be shaky as a supporting player" thing going on. But not nearly that much. We've debated this elsewhere, so I won't dwell on this.
As for others writers: hard to comment on many with so few episodes, but a few trends do present themselves.
A few newcomers abound, some with great results (Natasha Levinger), others doing okay for a first try. Like Impossible Numbers, I'll save the longer talk about writers for next time.
Dave Polsky produces two of his best episodes that absolutely fulfils his mission statement to write more emotionally probing stories this season ("Rarity Takes Manehattan" and "For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils"), but the rest of his output is the same inconsistent results its always been.
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[continued from above]
DeleteAs for Haber, nothing to add - the evidence here suggests he can write okay as long as there's someone else in charge. Most interesting is how "Leap of Faith" has none of his usual writing tics.
Meghan McCarthy scores quite low, but all she wrote this season were two-parters (with tons of arc and corporate pressure), and co-authored a few others (the Production Changes reveal that these were problematic scripts she personally overhauled late in the game, enough for a writing credit). It would certainly support that a Story Editor should not write too many episodes (though, ironically, all of Larson's personally written episodes next season during his 10-episodes tiny as Story Editor turned out great, while the ones he didn't… mostly didn't).
I'd say Spike got the rough treatment this season - his three lead episodes all landed in Decent, and as noted in Production Changes, many a time his subplot or running gag was cut for time in an episode (granted, some were lame and unfunny, but some were pretty neat). And even when he was around, episodes struggled to give him satisfying stuff to do. In Season 1, when Twilight was still settling in, he often had an important role being the more outspoken one on her behalf, and was rarely just "not included with the group for no reason", only in "Sonic Rainboom", this started to unravel in Season 2 as Twilight got more comfy, and probably reaches its lowest point here, where writers strain to give him satisfying stuff either as a lead or supporting player. We're still a long ways off Season 6 where he gets more respect in-universe and out-of-it.
Before this gets away from me too much, lets scale it back. Alicorn Twilight… my allegiance will always lie with Unicorn Twilight. By this point in the show, her sassiness and verbal bite had already been scaled back dramatically (Meghan McCarthy can do many things Lauren Faust could - this and making toyetic inclusions natural isn't among her skillset), and the end result is that, when Twilight isn't the lead character, she's rather bland. And even as a lead, the results are mixed - "Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3" taps into much of her old charm, but otherwise, it's only when she's under immense, tangible pressure in the two-parters that she's actually interesting. And that tends to bring other problems, as those episodes attest to.
And that's all ignoring how much I still don't really like her Alicorn design - the pony Flash model was perfected to the nth degree, and the small alterations to make her different but feel the same as she one did don't really satisfy either way. She's far less cute, while not changed enough to justify it.
Have I made my peace with the above? Of course, many times over. And simply having her old treehouse, and mostly carrying on with her life as she once did, things still do feel mostly the same. The arc stuff done with her is, generally, really satisfying. Compared to what's in store later, Twilight comes out of this one okay.
That applies to Season 4 as a whole, honestly. It feels like it's trying to remain as the show was while gradually incorporating changes, and it's honestly reasonable successful at this. If that means it takes the transition elements slowly, hey, not complaining here! The Production Changes documents point to a very smooth writing process, with very few episodes needing dramatic overhauls, and almost all changes made along the way being sensible. Compared to the production troubles for Season 5, it's a godsend. Fitting that the most consistent season in output quality was the most consistent to produce.
Too late to make a long story short! But Season 4 came out really solid, and while there's a lot to like or love about Season 5, so much changes there that this one truly is the end of an era. I'm gonna miss it. But it'll always be there when needed, sure.
"Maud Pie" error fixed; thanks for the heads-up. :)
Deletethis is the one time in FiM where one season was unequivocally better then the preceding one
I wonder whether I'll agree. I remember liking S7 quite a bit more than S6 and S9 a bit more than S8, but even the latter pair were a while ago now.
"Rarity Takes Manehattan" and "For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils"
I do remember that, speaking to other fans at his talk for BUCK 2014, "RTM" was considered his best episode up to that point by a clear majority. My memory is vague, but my impression is that "FWtSBT" took a bit longer to be fully appreciated by many fans.
[Twilight's] sassiness and verbal bite had already been scaled back dramatically
Yes, this had been noticed at the time. When Twilight says, "No-one likes sarcasm, Spike" in "Castle Mane-ia" there were some mildly unflattering comments on EqD etc to the effect that Twi's own sarcasm had been toned down a lot since the early days.