My Little Pony - Friendship Is Magic: Episode 113 - Fall Weather Friends

Rating:

If our favorite ponies were actually real, then maybe Fall Weather Friends would have been interesting.  But they’re not, so that makes the episode contrived, which it feels like from head-shaking start to disastrous finish.  Having not learned anything from the terrible Rarity vs. Applejack funfest that was Look Before You Sleep, we have Rainbow Dash vs. Applejack instead, which goes just as poorly.  This now makes two out of the five other main ponies that Applejack can’t be friends with.  As the most athletic ponies among the six, Rainbow Dash and Applejack square off in a dodecapentathlon to determine who is the best.  When Dash wins easily, they decide to run a race instead.  That’s about it for plot.  Theoretically, there’s some comment that’s being made about sports, but it isn't close to accurate.  Amy Keating Rog­ers was one of the better writers on the show, so the episode isn't entirely painful.  There was no saving this premise though, and Rogers decided to fill the episode with bad puns, a few clichés, and some references to the old Roadrunner cartoons in an apparent attempt to salvage things.  None of it worked.  That means we’re left with the worst episode in a shockingly weak four episode stretch.

Rainbow Dash and Applejack’s horseshoe game is as much about exchanging bad puns as it is trying to win, but Applejack’s victory gives the two ponies the idea to try a much larger contest featuring more events.  They choose twenty such games that fall into track & field, rodeo, fitness, or a carnival (whatever that bell-ringing game is called).  It’s close early, as Ap­plejack of course fares better at the rodeo events, but Rainbow Dash pulls away to win by ten.  With two more acts to go, the competition can’t end here, so Applejack challenges Rainbow Dash in the “annual” Running Of The Leaves race, which is apparently a marathon through the countryside around Ponyville (and another mindnumbingly stupid attempt to explain seasons in Equestria with no logical justification).  This race is conveniently being run the next day, and Applejack insists on entering it since Rainbow Dash used her wings to win a number of the events.  She has a good point (although it’s hard to argue Dash shouldn't be allowed to use something she was naturally born with), and since Dash never says no to any challenge, the race is on.

The marathon is open to any pony who wants to enter, so Applejack and Rain­bow Dash are far from the only contestants.  However, they both should’ve quit immediately once they saw Twilight Sparkle joining as well.  The only reason Chekov’s Pony could have for entering a race for the first time in her life is (at the very least) that she is going to beat the two most prominent ponies in the race.  Try to act surprised at the end.  Dash and Applejack are naturally the best in the field and lead the race most of the way.  They’re so good that even when both get tripped up and stand around talking to Twilight for a few moments (her constant dead last-ness should be frightening), they overtake the field within seconds.

Of course, Applejack and Rainbow Dash start trying to sabotage each other, although these are mostly minor inconveniences given how fast they are.  Both of them do end up cheating to catch up to the pack (Rainbow Dash uses a branch to propel herself, and Applejack catches a ride from Pin­kie Pie’s hot air balloon), and no doubt they should be disqualified since this is all done in plain sight.  But we’ll pretend this doesn't happen, and the two ponies roll to the finish in a dead heat.  Instead of a photo finish, Pinkie Pie announces they finished in last.  For some reason, she was covering the back of the pack instead of the winners.  Guess that was just Pinkie being Pinkie again!  Certainly not because Rogers was trying to trick the audience into thinking that Dash and Applejack were still fighting for the crown when every other time they got behind they easily jumped in front of everyone else.  Then Celestia shows up to put in an appearance at the race, and she can only pretend to know what Applejack and Rain­bow Dash are talking about at the end.

Presumably the message of the show was something about how “cheaters never prosper”, but sports over the past couple of decades have shown this isn't true at all.  Everyone knows Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens used performance enhancing drugs (Bonds has always “admitted” it (poor little Barry was too stupid to know what he was taking) for all the naysayers out there), but not only have they denied it in public, they lied to the federal government about it too.  Despite lengthy trials, both were acquitted.  Good luck winning your federal case.  Bonds is the current single season and career home run leader, which only happened after he beat fellow users Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa.  Current Yankee Alex Rodriguez has admitted to using before and is finally facing a lengthy suspension because of it, but he still has a championship ring and is challenging the career home run record himself.  And it’s certainly not just in baseball.  Lance Armstrong won seven straight Tour de Frances, although his unfortunate decision to return for one last try ended up earning him a lifetime ban.  Had he not done so, the titles would still be his.  Steroid use in American football has been documented since the early 1990s.  No doubt there are many more who haven’t got the publicity of these figures.  To borrow my own clichés (in the spirit of the ep­isode), if you’re not cheating, you’re not trying.  In that light, it’s almost hard to fault Rainbow Dash and Applejack for their stupid antics, since that’s what they know of professional sports.  Of course, what they did wasn't like their real life counterparts as much as it was their cartoon counterparts.  Having a big lead and needlessly slowing down to sabotage your opponent only happens in animation (the trope-namer is Dick Dastardly), and always has predictable results.

Perhaps the message was about how trying is all that matters or it’s “just a game”, but that isn't really accurate either.  In an era where just about every professional athlete is a millionaire, the best players are the ones who can’t stand losing (Michael Jordan being the prime example).  They hate it so much that there isn't any amount of money that will make them feel better about it.  Historically speaking, most players’ performance goes down once they get their big paycheck.  As soon as money is taken out of the equation, most athletes don’t seem to care about giving their best effort.  Looking over major league baseball rosters is stunning at the disparity between who is getting paid the most money and who is having the better year statistically.  But the few who are getting paid the big money and perform at top levels are the true stars in every sport.  And those are the ones who hate losing.  So even though Rainbow Dash may look like a sore loser, it will be that fire to propel her to the top of her game.  You may not like to hear it, but “sore losers” are often the best players in any sport (Tiger Woods).

The old tortoise vs. the hare story we have with Twilight is quite a bit of bull­shit, especially since it takes years of training to compete in marathons.  Of course, horse racing is famous for horses who come from the back of the pack to win, but not only do these horses run at fast speeds just to be where they are in the race, but they also train for years to do it.  It’s a nice joke for Twilight to join the race on a whim and trot all the way through it, but there’s no way “studying” about a race is enough preparation for her to finish anywhere but dead last.  Harsh as Rainbow Dash’s jokes were, she was right to make them.

I may have complained about substance in Call Of The Cutie, but that episode looks like War And Peace compared to what is shown in Fall Weather Friends.  Sports are already meaningless by themselves, but the fake sports here manage to be more boring and more pointless.  Everything shown about sports in the episode is misrepresented, and all the bad jokes and puns just make a difficult experience even worse.  We already saw Applejack fighting with another mane six member in an earlier episode, so this unwanted facet isn't even original either.  Taking all of this into consideration, nothing much is left to recommend about Fall Weather Friends.  In the simplest terms, it’s boring, unfunny, contrived, and pointless.  The episode may not be entirely forgettable unfortunately, but you’ll wish you could erase the memory of anything you do take away.