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Apprehensive about season two of MLP:FiM

124

Comments

  • You can change. You can.
    Oh, and Q was always a terrible character.

    I love how you have no arguments whatsoever. Cool stuff. I approve. ^_^d
  • Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the Shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder’s eye on the last Day.
    I liked Q.

    Even if Encounter at Farpoint was kind of stupid.
  • You can change. You can.
    (It was sarcasm)

    I haven't seen Star Trek and I don't really care for it for now. I like scifi, but right now I'm more interested in surreal procedurals with dancing midgets who talk backwards.
  • I think I'm happy I'm not a high enough fan to be a brony. The worry about how the next season is gonna go would be killing me. 
  • Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the Shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder’s eye on the last Day.
    I dunno, I'm enough of a fan to call myself a brony, and I'm not too worried.  Most of it strikes me as overly cynical and reading too much into little things.

    I haven't seen anything that would lead me to believe it'll be significantly worse than season 1 yet.
  • That's true. 
  • Give us fire! Give us ruin! Give us our glory!
    ^^Indeed, this all sounds like jumping the gun to me.
  • You can change. You can.
    The problem with second seasons for shows succesful during the first season is that everyone seems to expect the worse and in a way, the show gets worse as they try to find themselves in between all of the success.

    Like, for example, community was awesome, but as the show went along the second season, it seemed to focus more on the pop cultural aspect, instead of the character development that had made it so uniqute between sitcoms. However, after the mid season break the show managed to find a middle ground between developing characters and silly romps like "For a few paintballs more"
  • I believe it was a random comment on youtube that made me realize the significance of the word "Brony"

    But needless to say, I am not one.
  • no longer cuddly, but still Edmond
    Keep in mind that so far all I've really said is "I hate Discord" and "I hope there are no more villains" (though I should amend that a bit--if there are more villains, they need to be along the same lines as Trixie, Gilda or the Diamond Dogs. Those kinds of characters make sense in the context of MLP's fictional universe. Eldritch gods really don't). I even said in my blog post that "the silver lining is that this is only two episodes" and "as far as I'm concerned, season two hasn't really started."

    Besides, Discord was a lot more fun to watch than Nightmare Moon. He actually did stuff and had an actual personality.


    To be truthful, I didn't think Discord was that fun. He came off a little like he was trying too hard.

    I should admit though, I don't really care for "trickster god" characters. I feel like a good villain has to be strong, but within the context of the fictional setting. If I may use a nebulous term, they have to have an air of "credibility." Like Jason "a van is coming at me, I better jump out of the way" Vorhees of Friday the 13th Part III versus the "I was inside a camper when it went offroad, overturned and burst into flames but I climbed out unscathed and held my sword aloft like I was channeling the effing power of Grayskull" Jason Vorhees of Part VI. The former, because he jumped out of the way (implying that the van could have worked) is more credible and, oddly, more scary because of such. The latter is just so over-the-top that its hard to take him seriously no matter how many kills he racks up.

    I didn't really like the Nightmare Moon story arc (or at least not the second half of it--the first half was fine) but I'm sold on Nightmare Moon herself for several reasons: We have a rough idea where she comes from, we know what she's doing, and why she's doing it. Even though she's a goddess, she comes off as vulnerable--notice her aghast reaction the first time she thinks the "spark" has been ignited. I also get some mileage out of her and Twilight's almost-a-joust, because a part of me wonders if Twilight couldn't have simply impaled her. The very fact that this is left up in the air lends her some further credence (we don't really know how gods work in this world--for all we know it could be the Eastern interpretation, where a god can be killed just like any man could). Finally, I really like Nightmare Moon's design. I think I said this before, but that blue helmet, that sleek black body, that mane and tail made up of essence of night sky--no look you could choose has the presence or makes quite the statement that makes!

    My problem with "Trickster Gods" is that they're a cop-out. They're basically the writer saying that the character doesn't have to make sense or be credible--in fact, they're saying the very fact that he doesn't is a strength, a mental sleight of hand that I've seen third-graders and fanfic writers try to use to defend bad drawings and awful fanfics, casting their lack of any talent as "a unique personal style." There is no better way to develop a bullshit filter than to hang around kids (or parents).

    Anyway, getting back to the point, as far as we know (and I know I might be being presumptuous) Discord has no motive outside of just... he's there and he likes causing chaos. He has no history outside of he was in charge before Luna and Celestia dethroned him. Basically, we don't know what he's about. He's not so much a character as he is a walking plot device with a(n IMO bad) sense of humor. As for his design, well there's only one way a god of chaos who likes chaos and represents chaos can look, and that's like *ahem* a piled-on mishmash of everything but the kitchen sink (and I'm honestly surprised they didn't include one just to be safe). He's bland. He's creative diarrhea. He's not even on the level of Q--Q, at least, had a purpose and a clear ideology behind him even if he had a sense of humor about it. On top of that, to fully buy him you have to buy some of the questionable premises that go with him, like that he somehow existed before Luna and Celestia (you know, the people who created the day and night) and that he's more powerful than Nightmare Moon even though Nightmare Moon escaped on her own and Discord didn't. If I were writing this story, I would've made Discord a servant of Nightmare Moon who showed up late for whatever reason, rather than trying to make him the next higher tier.

    And if I may make a low blow, having a God of Chaos character is redundant in the show that gave us Pinkie Pie.

    Anyway, what I thought was going to be a two or three line response wound up becoming a dissertation on what makes a good villain. I better go play some more shmups before I end up writing a thesis on Cutie Marks. Ta!
  • OOOooooOoOoOOoo, I'm a ghoOooOooOOOost!
    Just watched the first episode. Discord's a good deal less powerful than I was expecting from what everyone was saying. That's a good thing.

    As for the whole "showing up without context" thing, I think it's just a matter of the order in which events happened. In the first season, we got basically a full exposition episode before the villain showed up, while here, the villain showed up, then we got about a minute of exposition.

    Can't really pass final judgment without seeing the next one.
  • Discord got an explanation, though what really strikes me as Odd is the teachers explanation of the statue.

    :3

    Or did no one else realize that Ms. School teacher called Discord a "Species"?
  • no longer cuddly, but still Edmond
    INUH, I think you misunderstand what I mean by "context."  "Context" means considering the kind of stories and subject matter that the series usually deals with.  Being rushed has nothing to do with it.
  • edited 2011-09-20 13:21:52

    I just now noticed this while going over the thread again:

    [Batman: TAS] jumped the shark when it became The New Batman Adventures.
    [Justice League] was itself a step down from the rest of the DCAU
    [Megas XLR] was never good.

    Moe, are you certain you're not me under an alternate account?

  • OOOooooOoOoOOoo, I'm a ghoOooOooOOOost!
    ^^Ah. Well, that's a fair point, but he's definitely one of the sillier trickster god types I've seen.
  • edited 2011-09-20 14:34:08
    ~♥YES♥~! I *AM* a ~♥cupcake♥~! ^_^
    I am really hope Discord gets a appearances in future episodes. He is already up there as one of my all time favorite villains.



    This may or may not have to do with the fact that Q is also one of my favorite bad guys.
  • no longer cuddly, but still Edmond
    Moe, are you certain you're not me under an alternate account?


    I... could have developed a split personality after all the times I got high.

    Or did no one else realize that Ms. School teacher called Discord a "Species"?


    I noticed, but I didn't think much of it.
  • ... You didn't think too much about something that might be plot significant since it was mentioned in the first place?

    ...

    That's not a really smart thing to do lol.
  • no longer cuddly, but still Edmond
    That gives me an idea for a hilarious plot twist: Twilight Sparkle (cribbing from Fluttershy's book) decides to solve the Discord problem by telling his mother! *Dies laughing* if that happens, the whole story arc will be totally redeemed.
  • You can change. You can.
    It'd be incredibly predicatable, specially as that's probably one of the oldest cartoon tricks out there, but whatever.
  • >predictable

    >Children's Show
  • You can change. You can.
    > Animaniacs
    > Pinky And The Brain

    you were saying?
  • >Implying those two weren't predictable.

    Yes, I was.

    Hey, do you think the Brain will conquer the world today?

    If you answered yes, then you obviously don't watch the show.
  • edited 2011-09-21 07:47:41
    You can change. You can.
    That's the premise. It's kinda like saying that because Gibbs going to solve a case makes NCIS predictable.

    also blah blah trappings of fiction 
  • no longer cuddly, but still Edmond
    Dude, Animaniacs and its spinoffs were almost as formulaic as an episode of Scooby Doo. The entire series pretty much ran on running gags after all.

    If you think they were "unpredictable" then I've got a Dr. Seuss book with a twist ending you probably won't see coming.
  • You can change. You can.
    To a certain extent, that much is true, but I think the jokes and the use of the gags were inpredictable. At least to five year old!me, anyway
  • >A five year old you.

    Found the problem.
  • no longer cuddly, but still Edmond
    If more people revisited the shows they liked when they were younger, there'd probably be less people raving about cartoons that weren't all that good.

    Me, I always watch a show again before declaring it excelled in anything.
  • You can change. You can.
    Eh, I liked it and I thought it was fun and wacky and unpredictable. I don't think it was as perfect as people make it out to be. animaniacs, anyway. I loved Pinky and the Brain, though.

    And I'd say that even a formulaic work can be unpredictable, if you're smart enough to understand that X is a variable. ;)
  • That sounds like a horrible joke. MLP usually has a predictable outline, but the execution is always something nice to look at. If they do that, I'll probably be quite disappointed.
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