Free and Open Debates on the Nature of Ponykind

And once again we have proof that the writers just don't care anymore.

Sean Mirrsen wrote:And once again we have proof that the writers just don't care anymore.

Really? Just because of some anatomical impossibilites? If you want to be that nitpicky, you might as well decry every single episode because the way they move their forelegs rarely corresponds with any probable bone and joint structure.

TBH thought it kinda creative. So long as they don't turn into hands for writing or something ridiculous like that.

They've held stuff under their wings before. See: the bell in winter wrap up.


Also as for anatomical impossibilities, ahem, wings at all? Wings are limbs, and wings on the back are pretty ridiculous on any mammal. You can't just have some bones protruding from the shoulder blades like that.

Kaijyuu wrote:TBH thought it kinda creative. So long as they don't turn into hands for writing or something ridiculous like that.

They've held stuff under their wings before. See: the bell in winter wrap up.


Also as for anatomical impossibilities, ahem, wings at all? Wings are limbs, and wings on the back are pretty ridiculous on any mammal. You can't just have some bones protruding from the shoulder blades like that.

This^

The wings on the back have always baffled me. How are the wing joints not jamming themselves into the pony's ribage?

The pegasi likely have what effectively amounts to four shoulders, two mammalian shoulders for the forelegs and two pseudo-avian shoulders for the wings.

Slag wrote:The pegasi likely have what effectively amounts to four shoulders, two mammalian shoulders for the forelegs and two pseudo-avian shoulders for the wings.

This. And yeah, getting upset about issues with [x] because they happened in the second season is a tad silly when similar things happened in the first season. Not a great episode, but not nearly as bad as Lesson Zero.

Yeah, a lot of the complaints I've been hearing with season 2 were still in season 1. I've been chuckling to myself for a while

I might be garroted for this but aside from the characterisation problems Lesson Zero was pretty funny episode, I mean I watched it three times in a row and all. Half of that was because of the all the !!wtf!! but I still enjoyed it.

And it did gave us these:

I figured out why I don't like Lesson Zero a while ago, along with how to fix it.



It was a funny episode. That's fine and dandy. The jokes worked. What didn't work was keeping suspension of disbelief. I literally stopped caring halfway through, as I was no longer watching a show, but some dancing lights with noise coming out of my speakers.

Problem: Twilight's behavior just wasn't justified. Sure, she's been OCD in the past, but about more serious things and to a lesser degree. Whole episode was an out of character moment, and it jolted me back to reality, hard.
To fix: Incorporate the moral. You know, what the episode is ostensibly about? Have each pony brush her off as she visits them, rather than later at the picnic. Her initial OCD was in character; being frustrated with friends would believably magnify it into the resulting breakdown.

There are handwaveable things, and non-handwaveable things. Feather-fingers are such an old and cheap way of humanizing avians that I've long thrown it into the non-handwaveable pile. There are a multitude of reasons why they should not physically work under any sane circumstances, and quite a few reasons why they should not work even when magic is taken into account here. Prehensile tails are one thing - they are at least handwaveable as a sort of innate magic, as the tails themselves are anything but rigid. Wings having bendy grasping feathers, though? That throws just about all sense of internal consistency and common sense out the window.

Season 1, as well as I can remember it (I watched it through twice in the span of four days, back when I found the show... I had fifteen metric craptons of free time on the dacha, and oodles of internet access. I still rewatch it from time to time.), had at least a sense of internal consistency. It did a pretty good job of establishing things that were and were not supposed to happen in the universe, in many ways it established the whole setting, which managed to continue making sense throughout the whole 28-episode season (and yes, I see Return of Harmony as the finale of the first season, not pilot of the second, at the very least because it still uses the S1 opening). Come season 2. We are treated to increasingly bizarre occurrences that seem to exist on the whim of the current writer and disappear without a trace, leaving behind an incredibly confuzzled universe, and an incredibly annoyed me.

Spoiler:

It's like early comic book Superman and his world-famous powers like super-ventriloquism, super-landscaping and super-weaving. It took a momentous Cosmic Retcon to finally put the DC-verse into a semblance of a consistent state (and reboots are still happening here and there), and if the current trend in FiM episodes continues, it'll take nothing short of that to fix it as well. I still have a very faint hope they'll manage to make something epic for the season finale that'll somehow alleviate all of this, but quite frankly, I don't see it happening at this rate. Princess Cadence, a new alicorn out of nowhere, when she shouldn't have been one by the continuity creator's design? Yeah, I don't think we'll get much out of it. Or at least I won't.

And in general, I agree. Even Lesson Zero, which wasn't very high on my "liked" list, and even the latest two episodes that I think are the beginning of the end for FiM as it used to be, are rather funny. Nay, they are quite hilarious in their own way, the jokes and gags and meme-worthy quips and expressions were all very good. But I do not watch Friendship is Magic just to laugh. I have way better, and way deeper things for that. Laughter is but one of the elements, after all. Generosity and Loyalty I'd say are still there too, and even though shaken by recent events, Honesty and Kindness still hold. But Magic, the most important one, is fading. Right now FiM is beginning to feel like a run-of-the-mill cartoon. Not one for just kids, thankfully, it's not quite that far gone, but something is going wrong with it nevertheless, and I am far from sure it can still recover.

...

[/pessimist]

They need more psuedo-DnD-esque episodes like the Season 1 Opener and the one with the Diamond Dogs.

Anyway, you put up a good point, I guess. The show isn't quite as good as Season 1. But it's not like its completely gone to shit. Sure, the stories aren't as good, the emotions a little less real, but they're still higher quality than your average show. They know that some of the important elements are missing, and they're trying to throw in a couple things to fill in while they try to get their act back together, like references and jokes. They've been slowly getting better, and even if this particular episode was a step in the wrong direction, sometimes you have to make a few mistakes before you get it right.

Zangi wrote:They need more psuedo-DnD-esque episodes like the Season 1 Opener and the one with the Diamond Dogs.

And Dragonshy, and Stare Master, and Swarm of the Century, and even Bridle Gossip, to some extent. In a way, Winter Wrap-Up qualifies too, and even the otherwise not-too-brilliant Over a Barrel. All of those are episodes with some sort of internal adventure arc. Less milling around contemplating their collective navels, more going out and doing something interesting. To my memory of episodes of this kind in Season 2 we've had... The Last Roundup, in a way, Heart's Warming Eve and (sort of) Read it and Weep by proxy (as in, the adventure does not actually happen, it's just described), and maaaaaybe Secret of my Excess. One sort-of-adventure, one disaster aversion, one theater play, and one shout-out book. My judgement on the season in this particular regard is still open, because we still have It's About Time, Dragon Quest, and Hurricane Fluttershy as possible mini-adventure arcs, so we'll see how that goes. It'll take some doing to screw up a Twilight episode about time travel, or an episode named Dragon Quest, but we've already seen that these people are quite capable of outstanding feats when we least expect it.

Anyway, don't let me and my pessimism get to you. I'm always like this, openly expect the worst, secretly hope for the best. Just keep a happy front up and take the bad things in stride, let nothing get you down.

This is Sean Mirrsen, reminding you to turn your frown upside down!

*audience laughs*

Yeah, and while you're at it - flip your buttcrack side-ways!

Was the wing finger thing really that bad? It didn't seem much fingery to me.
Mayby I'll have to watch it again, but it seemed that it was preetty far from any precision fingering.

Gaah, I just cant find the damn words to describe what I think. Incredibly frustrating.

Precision fingering? Sounds fun.

Slag wrote:Precision fingering? Sounds fun.

A few more good ideas like that, and you'll actually be able to make a proper sequel to the The Spellbook.

Sean Mirrsen wrote:

Slag wrote:Precision fingering? Sounds fun.

A few more good ideas like that, and you'll actually be able to make a proper sequel to the The Spellbook.

Precision fingering with wings? I'll add that to the list...

BTW, I just had the typo "wingering" and I think that's a good word. Or at least it would be if there was ever any time or place when it would be appropriate.

Oh god no please. This is what happens when you don't understand what the langue youre using. Why dind't I think of all possible meanings before posting.


Fail english forever^^

Long-range tactical precision fingering? Something like the finger-longer, but GPS-guided and rocket-propelled. And, if you really feel like it, heat-seeking.

And I shall likewise add "wingering" to my vocabulary. Right alongside the "wingboner", waiting for a chance to be used in casual conversation.

Sean Mirrsen wrote:Long-range tactical precision fingering? Something like the finger-longer, but GPS-guided and rocket-propelled. And, if you really feel like it, heat-seeking.

And I shall likewise add "wingering" to my vocabulary. Right alongside the "wingboner", waiting for a chance to be used in casual conversation.

Heat-Seeking precision fingering.

Why I hate and love the internet.

I wonder how a wing would actually feel. I don't think it would really be much of a pleasant experience, honestly...    

Slag wrote:I wonder how a wing would actually feel. I don't think it would really be much of a pleasant experience, honestly...    

Well, you could always try... I mean, why wonder?

And speaking purely hypothetically, it probably depends on how well you react to tickling.

Hm, tickling. If wingering amounts to very specifically aimed tickling, it is technically nonoffensive and, in context of ponies as depicted on the show, kids-friendly.

...

Can somebody tell me where to buy a "Mind Control Over The Phone 101" handbook? I want to call a few canadians.

Most people tend to react very poorly when you try to tickle them down there. The only people who probably wouldn't are children, and well... yeah.

OTOH, tickling is not too distant from other motions.



Anyhow: Remember that season 2 was written in a fairly short span of time. I've said it before: give the team time to get used to writing without Lauren Faust or certain others actively involved in everything; season 2 has a couple fairly different sets of fingerprints on it, and I hope that the team gets the message from the part of the community that isn't only in it for the memes.

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