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Season vs. Season 2 (Episode 4) XylonLionheart!l7.O6DCdPw Sat, Apr 18th, 2015 15:28 No. 36794894

Now that I've watched this season's episode twice to form a better opinion, I feel confident enough to move on to the comparison. So, today we get to look at this set of episodes:

Season 1: Applebuck Season
Season 2: Luna Eclipsed
Season 3: One Bad Apple
Season 4: Daring Don't
Season 5: Bloom and Gloom

Let's see. I think this time I'm going to go with this:

Luna Eclipsed > Applebuck Season > Daring Don't > Bloom and Gloom > One Bad Apple

Is anybody surprised at my #1 choice? Luna is one of my favorite characters, and this might be her best showing. This episode is what made her better than any of the other princesses. It made her much more relatable than Cadence or Celestia. I would love to see another episode that humanizes her, or better still an episode that does that for Celestia! Come on, Hasbro! Five seasons and no Celestia episode?

Applebuck Season is the moment for me that the show really started to step things up. While I wouldn't give it a gold-star, this was the episode that showed the shows true potential, especially when it came to comedy. You could kind of draw a connection between the premiere with generation 1 and The Ticket Master with generation 2, but this is really where I feel the show earned its own identity. Plus I think this still might be Applejack's best episode.

Daring Don't is an odd animal. The premise can absolutely break the episode for some people (you know, making Daring Do real). What's funny is that my biggest issues with the episode lie outside of that. (Pointing out that you are standing around and not helping does not excuse the not having them do so int he first place.) Even then, the episode is loads of fun and show Polsky's penchant for humor. There are definite flaws, but I still enjoyed the ride.

Looking at the list, it was only now I realized that Babs has not been in an episode proper since Season 3. How crazy is that? This episode wasn't bad, I don't think, and I know a lot of people really enjoyed it. For some reason, however, I really could not get into it. During my second watch, I noticed that I had a lot of nitpicks over the course of the story which I found rather predictable and hard to watch, especially in the second act. None of the problems are that big, but I just had so many small ones that this episode to me would rank average to below average on my own scale.

One Bad Apple still earns the lowest marks, however, because it does have a big problem, and that problem is bungling the message of bullying. It's a similar problem I have with the moral of A Dog and Pony Show? (Got kidnapped? Annoy your captors. That will make things work out for you!) The episode also fails at showing any regret from Babs. She's just... too good at bullying, and we don't get any sense of depth until after her past is revealed. The lack of needed sympathy just compounded my issue with the episode. This might not actually be in my bottom ten episodes since I don't actually hate it like some others, but if it isn't, its probably rather close.

And so, here's how my personal standings look.

EP 1&2: S2 > S5 > S4 > S1 >S3
EP 3: S2 > S5 > S4 > S3 > S1
EP 4: S2 > S1 > S4 > S5 > S3

Season 2 is still dominating with its super-strong start. Things should become more competitive soon, however. Season 1 finally earns a silver medal, season 4 stays squarely in the center, season 5 barely misses hitting the bottom for the first time, and Season 3 still struggles to earn any praise. (It's time will come soon, however.)

Next time, season 2 has to face much stronger competition. Will it finally lose its #1 spot? We shall see!

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