I'm pleased to see you enjoyed it. If you choose to adress it blow by blow, I'll look forward to it, but it's up to you.Cloudane
Nice read. I'd address it blow by blow but I'd need a few weeks so just going to say it's read and digested!
I saw it, and I will probably be able to adress this episode better when I review it, but long story short it didn't seem like a grown up issue to me, in fact, it seemed like a very standard children's show storyline about how while we're all the same where it matters, we shouldn't hide what makes us individual. It's something that is pretty standard for children to be made aware of, it's not really a grown up issue - it's an every age issue.Anyone caught last week's episode? It takes a very interesting stance on equality. Or rather more importantly, enforced equality in a highly Orwellian village. It's very deep stuff and I'm not really sure how I feel about it - it's great that it's addressing such grown-up issues and challenging something that we tend to just automatically assume is good (equality is good, right? Well put it this way, from now on I'm qualifying it with "of rights and opportunities") without properly thinking about it - it forces us to think.
I've seen a lot of talk about this, and I can safely say that the episode has absolutely nothing to do with communism. From what I've heard, communism was nothing like what happened in this episode, and wasn't about forced equality. The whole thing was discussed on The My Little Pony Arena, and it ended up being established that the episode has nothing to do with communism at all. No offense.But I also don't want it to turn into purely a Brony show or to push politics too hard (it also takes a big swipe at communism)
Ultimately though, I agree about not wanting it to become purely a brony show. I keep meaning to write a full article on this, but basically it's been constantly brought to my attention on MLP Arena that the writers are trying too hard to put brony stuff in the show. Now, I'm not completely against them tipping their hats to their older fans as long as it's subtle and/or makes sense with what they are doing in the storyline. After all, Season 2 contained brony shout-outs, but they were indeed subtle, and when they weren't they made some level of sense with the episode. In season 4, while I admit I am less familar with what bronies are making memes out of (I was completely lost with the fedora references at BUCK), it seems like season 4 tried to hard in many places, and one of those cases maybe the brony shout outs; in "Pinkie Apple Pie", there was a clear "Twilightlicious" reference, which probably wouldn't have been too bad if it wasn't so forced into the scene, but sadly it seemed really forced in there like they really wanted us to see it, like we wouldn't have noticed it otherwise.
Another thing I've noticed is that they seem to be trying too hard in giving us things to make memes out of in season 4. Season 1 and 2 had things that had memes made out of them too, but the differences is they didn't try to become memes - they were just things that people found they liked enough to keep using.
There's a lot more on this, but I'm already off topic. Ultimately, one of the reasons bronies fell in love with MLP: FIM is because it was already a well written children's show - it was obviously for kids, but it had storylines, and developed its characters enough for us to take them seriously - it felt like we'd actually watched the show as kids ourselves, and had grown up with it. It didn't have to try to appeal to us, it already did when it was basically the previous MLP shows smushed together with its own flaire. Hopefully season 5 will be closer to season 1 and 2.
Pretty much that. Though I will say that a show can be deep, and still be for kids, but I know what you mean (when I was a kid, I tended to look deep into the storylines of things), but ultimately I agree that it should remember who the show is really for, but also take note of season 1 and season 2 (which in turn took note of the previous generations) and continue to make a kid's show with good writing, and help the bronies realize that they are guests in this shows audience, not the audience themselves.I admired it best in early seasons when it was purely a kids show that just happened to be of a good enough quality to have a huge adult gathering on the sidelines, and realising how easy it is to kind of "forget" the basics of friendship and how to best treat each other in order to be the best friends we can. If it's going to "grow with its audience" and become all dark and grown-up and tackle deep stuff, then it takes away what originally attracted me to it - the upbeat, simple little slice-of-life joy that makes you laugh, smile and possibly shed a tear. In turning into like a Star Trek TNG with ponies it'd still be great (I adored TNG), just not the same thing, and I worry about them forgetting who it was originally meant for. The last thing I want to do is effectively "steal" something from little girls, who may not be all that interested in watching some deep political and sociological stuff even if it does have cute ponies in it. I'm conflicted, as I thought it was a superb episode for ME, I just worry about that.
I agree with this, and it's a very good point. I have actually decided that if I have children, I'm going to let them decide what they like, regardless of what gender it's aimed for. I also agree that it's okay if you do want to follow a gender role then it's also okay.A common view that I've held myself is that things like gender roles are bad and.. well they are if someone is pressured into following it, which society tends to blindly do (I cringed in the toy aisle when I heard a boy say "I want this!" then get told "no you don't, that's for girls"). But if someone wants to follow a role - such as shock horror a girl wanting to play with pink ponies, great! The point is if a boy wants to, that should be fine too. And it's how we bring that about without turning the world into that dystopian enforced-equality nightmare.
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