Re: S4 premiere Ep1-2

by Guest Sun Nov 24, 2013 8:26 am

CamoBadger wrote:That...was painful.
I enjoyed the flashbacks, I really did.
But the story to it and 90% of what happened... it hurts.
Spoiler:
Unfortunately, I'm still on this fucking ride because I'm curious about the possible continuous story. Goddamnit.

~~I'm surprised you didn't mention any of the NMM stuff thought you'd like that.~~ You did. Damn my brain derped. Too early.

by Formis_Fluttergod Sun Nov 24, 2013 8:44 am

CamoBadger wrote:That...was painful.
I enjoyed the flashbacks, I really did.
But the story to it and 90% of what happened... it hurts.
Spoiler:
Unfortunately, I'm still on this fucking ride because I'm curious about the possible continuous story. Goddamnit.

Good, goood, stay with us. Spike

The the slip-up with the Summer Sun Celebration is weird, with that you're right.
The rest, Swicked already addressed the Cutie Mark thing and why only Celestia with Luna got abducted, no point in repeating. Though I might add that if the vines were to abduct all alicorns, they would've tried to abduct Cadence as well, even though she was very far from Everfree and not in the same place as the others.
We also still don't know anything specific about the Sisters' past, there might be something that makes them different, distinguishes them from Cadence an Twilight, dunno. We'll see, or not. Applebloom

OneMoreDaySK wrote:
In regards to the ending and related to FO:E:

I'd say the locks need to be unlocked at the same time (I'd do it that way at least, it's safer.), so Lil'pip would have to pick them all at once. Spike

by Guest Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:03 am

Formis_Fluttergod wrote:I'd say the locks need to be unlocked at the same time (I'd do it that way at least, it's safer.), so Lil'pip would have to pick them all at once.

That'll be uncomfortable for everyone but the unicorns. XD

Shy

"Our cheeks are touching."

Rainbow Dash

by Formis_Fluttergod Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:11 am

Last wrote:
Formis_Fluttergod wrote:I'd say the locks need to be unlocked at the same time (I'd do it that way at least, it's safer.), so Lil'pip would have to pick them all at once.
That'll be uncomfortable for everyone but the unicorns. XD

"Our cheeks are touching."

Well I meant it more along the lines of "Lil'pip would have a hard time unlocking it alone.", but you gave me an entertaining mental image. Big mac

by Harmony Ltd. Sun Nov 24, 2013 10:21 am

There is something to be said about the simple joy of watching an episode of My Little Pony on your phone just outside the gates of a military base on a sunny day.

Anyway, just watched the episode. Quite good I must say. No negative comment to make at this point, as I enjoyed the ride.

by OneMoreDaySK Sun Nov 24, 2013 10:38 am

Huh, is the box made of any sort of metal or gems, y'think?
Blackjack: *Nom! Nom! Nom!*

by Orm Sun Nov 24, 2013 12:14 pm

Formis_Fluttergod wrote:

We also still don't know anything specific about the Sisters' past, there might be something that makes them different, distinguishes them from Cadence an Twilight, dunno. We'll see, or not.

Might have something to do with the fact that Twilight and Cadence were made into Alicorns, while Celestia and Luna were born Alicorns.

Aside from this, I do hope this season turns out better than the previous one.
I didn't find the episode to be too rushed (especially compared to another episode).
And I'll be happy if they do go with a continuous plot throughout a good chunk of the season.

Oh, and they got rid of their Deus Ex Machina.
I'm happy about that too.

by Formis_Fluttergod Sun Nov 24, 2013 1:16 pm

Orm wrote:Might have something to do with the fact that Twilight and Cadence were made into Alicorns, while Celestia and Luna were born Alicorns.

That's just it, we do NOT know whether they were born as alicorns, we just assume it (as many other things in the series).
We don't know anything about the Royal Sisters before the events of finding the Elements and then sealing Discord with them, and even after that we don't know what they'd been up to between that and NMM being sealed in the Moon, aside from them defeating Sombra, that is.
We don't know where they came from, when they were born and to whom (if anyone). We just know that they hadn't been always in Equestria, regardless of whether they were already alive at the time of its founding.

I know people feel like those two kinda lost their uniqueness thanks to other alicorns starting to appear, but even despite that we still know next to nothing about their personal history, whereas we do know almost everything about Twilight and enough about Cadence.
And of course there's still many unanswered question about alicorns in general.

Aside from this, I do hope this season turns out better than the previous one.
I didn't find the episode to be too rushed (especially compared to another episode).
And I'll be happy if they do go with a continuous plot throughout a good chunk of the season.

Oh, and they got rid of their Deus Ex Machina.
I'm happy about that too.

Compared to MMC the pacing in these episodes was almost perfect. Now imagine what would've happened if they made it into one episode. Spike

On the other hand, there's always the other extreme of Naruto's bored-to-death pacing, or lack thereof to be precise, not sure which is worse.

by Stringtheory Sun Nov 24, 2013 1:26 pm

Formis_Fluttergod wrote:Compared to MMC the pacing in these episodes was almost perfect. Now imagine what would've happened if they made it into one episode.
On the other hand, there's always the other extreme of Naruto's bored-to-death pacing, or lack thereof to be precise, not sure which is worse.

Personally I prefer rushed to drawn out, less time wasted that way. If the show's rushed you just feel unsatisfied while if it's too long it just becomes tedious (I'm looking at you Dragon Ball Z...)

by Guest Sun Nov 24, 2013 1:50 pm

I think the problem with both those animes or one of the major ones at least is they treat their audience like idiots.

Naruto has a constant stream of "remember this thing that happened? It's semi relevant right now" flashbacks and DBZ started every episode with "Last time on dragon ball Z" both of those things for the most part being pointless time wasters.

Yeah, I think I prefer rushed too. If you're forced to have one or the other mainly because rushed doesn't waste your time. Otherwise I prefer neither.

by Stringtheory Sun Nov 24, 2013 2:08 pm

Last wrote: DBZ started every episode with "Last time on dragon ball Z" both of those things for the most part being pointless time wasters.

I tried watching DBZ once, I couldn't get past the first ten minutes. Recently my sister, my father, and I tried watching it. (I was watching DBZ abridged and they wanted to know what I was laughing at so much so I showed them, then they wanted to see what the original was like) We still didn't get past the first ten minutes. To quote my sister: "It feels like we've been watching for half an hour"

by Guest Sun Nov 24, 2013 2:18 pm

It's less bad when you're a kid. It's still bad just harder to tell. I think cutting out a lot of the bullshit DBZ had is part of the reason why the abridged series is so popular.

by Formis_Fluttergod Sun Nov 24, 2013 4:16 pm

Last wrote:I think the problem with both those animes or one of the major ones at least is they treat their audience like idiots.

Naruto has a constant stream of "remember this thing that happened? It's semi relevant right now" flashbacks and DBZ started every episode with "Last time on dragon ball Z" both of those things for the most part being pointless time wasters.

Indeed, any normal show would just let the characters mention it, at most showed a quick glimpse of a flashback to remind people. Naruto-like animes go all the way with flashbacks of a flashback that was previously a flashback in an episode entirely composed of flashbacks. Especially during the parts that are supposed to be the most fast-paced, a.k.a. the fight scenes.
If they'd cut that sh*t out, the fights would actually be exciting to watch since their animation isn't bad on the rare occasions when they make more than 5 continuous seconds of it.
If the fights were more like in the Avatar for example, now that would be cool to watch, and there would be barely half the episodes.

Anyway, I think I derailed the thread a bit, let's get back on topic. Spike

EDIT: Also, I haven't seen much of the vines yet, but the Twilight Scepter and the white alicorn potion have definitely become popular. Twilight crazy

by Formis_Fluttergod Sun Nov 24, 2013 5:03 pm

swicked wrote:One of the biggest problems is they are based on manga, which burn through plot and dialogue far slower than anime does.
The filler's mostly so that they don't have to go the way of the original full metal alchemist and start making stuff up as they go after using up the original storyline that's so far been released.
...of course, then you have shows like Bleach, that manage this through having entire seasons worth of filler, often based around everyone but the series' actual main character, to allow the manga to get ahead again.

Don't want to spam the thread with moar manga stuff so I'm gonna at least spoiler it.

Spoiler:

by Formis_Fluttergod Sun Nov 24, 2013 5:40 pm

swicked wrote:
Formis_Fluttergod wrote:The manga is maybe going through the content slower but it's also produced much faster than a fully animated episode.
Not really.
The average manga has only one or two artists.
Anime has multiple teams.

...unless you just mean manhours, in which case, yes.

I mean, voice acting is a factor, too, but there's still a lot more money and resources thrown behind anime than there is manga.

I just meant manhours. Of course that when there's substantial difference in the amount of people working on each then even anime can be produced faster than manga. They're just trying to produce it too fast, and without any pauses between seasons they're bound to catch up with the source material. That results in the need for redundant fillers which cost additional money which could've been used on a production of better story-centered episodes, or terribly sluggish pacing, or both in Naruto's case.

Simply put, their production management is the one thing creating most of the problems.

by StoneSlinger88 Sun Nov 24, 2013 8:10 pm

Formis_Fluttergod wrote:
swicked wrote:
Formis_Fluttergod wrote:The manga is maybe going through the content slower but it's also produced much faster than a fully animated episode.
Not really.
The average manga has only one or two artists.
Anime has multiple teams.

...unless you just mean manhours, in which case, yes.

I mean, voice acting is a factor, too, but there's still a lot more money and resources thrown behind anime than there is manga.
I just meant manhours. Of course that when there's substantial difference in the amount of people working on each then even anime can be produced faster than manga. They're just trying to produce it too fast, and without any pauses between seasons they're bound to catch up with the source material. That results in the need for redundant fillers which cost additional money which could've been used on a production of better story-centered episodes, or terribly sluggish pacing, or both in Naruto's case.

Simply put, their production management is the one thing creating most of the problems.

Like not waiting until the manga is done to make the anime. I like Naruto; I just don't like a full third of the episodes are outright filler.

by Derpmind Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:00 pm

StoneSlinger88 wrote: I like Naruto; I just don't like a full third of the episodes are outright filler.

Do you mean 1/3 of the episodes being filler, 1/3 of each episode being filler, or both? Trollestia

by StoneSlinger88 Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:07 pm

Derpmind wrote:
StoneSlinger88 wrote: I like Naruto; I just don't like a full third of the episodes are outright filler.
Do you mean 1/3 of the episodes being filler, 1/3 of each episode being filler, or both?

Both. After every commercial break there's a good 30 seconds of going over the 30 seconds before the commercial break.

by Moodyman90 Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:12 pm

For a while Bleach was 15 minute of recap of what's happened over the past 20 episodes, the last five minutes of the previous episode, and 2 minutes of new shit at the end. Repeat forever.

by Katarn Mon Nov 25, 2013 7:32 am

what really was happening inside vine's:

by Formis_Fluttergod Mon Nov 25, 2013 2:50 pm

StoneSlinger88 wrote:
Derpmind wrote:
StoneSlinger88 wrote: I like Naruto; I just don't like a full third of the episodes are outright filler.
Do you mean 1/3 of the episodes being filler, 1/3 of each episode being filler, or both?
Both. After every commercial break there's a good 30 seconds of going over the 30 seconds before the commercial break.

Plus the remaining screen time where something new actually happens is incredibly slowly paced. Spike

by cb5 Mon Nov 25, 2013 6:01 pm

Ahahaha, someone figured out where derpy is in the season 4 opener. Short version is that they got away with putting her back in the show by changing her mane to orangish yellow. That's kind of funny that it actually fooled people. Like how dumb is hasbro's censors to have not noticed?

by Formis_Fluttergod Mon Nov 25, 2013 6:47 pm

They were trying to censor her again? Derpy Hooves

by cb5 Mon Nov 25, 2013 6:53 pm

Formis_Fluttergod wrote:They were trying to censor her again?

Well they sure as hell figured out how to get past the censors. Just add a drop of orange to her mane and call her a completely different pony and presto. If you want to know where she was in the episode is was during the summer sun celebration when the sun was being lifted in the group of onlookers right in front of the stage.

It's funny cause it actually fooled people.

by Formis_Fluttergod Mon Nov 25, 2013 7:16 pm

cb5 wrote:
Formis_Fluttergod wrote:They were trying to censor her again?
Well they sure as hell figured out how to get past the censors. Just add a drop of orange to her mane and call her a completely different pony and presto. If you want to know where she was in the episode is was during the summer sun celebration when the sun was being lifted in the group of onlookers right in front of the stage.

It's funny cause it actually fooled people.

What I meant was that she was in various episodes of season 3 just fine, maybe better hidden than she used to be, but still. I don't see why they should try to censor her again now.

by jacky2734 Tue Nov 26, 2013 5:04 am

Formis_Fluttergod wrote:
StoneSlinger88 wrote:
Derpmind wrote:
StoneSlinger88 wrote: I like Naruto; I just don't like a full third of the episodes are outright filler.
Do you mean 1/3 of the episodes being filler, 1/3 of each episode being filler, or both?
Both. After every commercial break there's a good 30 seconds of going over the 30 seconds before the commercial break.
Plus the remaining screen time where something new actually happens is incredibly slowly paced.

Naruto isn't that bad once you figure out that all you really need to do is watch the final fight of any given arc in order to understand what's going on.
At least Naruto waits until a Main Story Arc is finished before switching over to some unrelated filler arc unlike Bleach which likes to stick several random filler arcs INTO THE MIDDLE OF THE MAJOR FIGHTS! Seriously what was there, three/four large filler arcs in the Wako Mundo and Fake Karakura Town fights alone?

by Formis_Fluttergod Tue Nov 26, 2013 8:17 am

jacky2734 wrote:
Formis_Fluttergod wrote:Plus the remaining screen time where something new actually happens is incredibly slowly paced.
Naruto isn't that bad once you figure out that all you really need to do is watch the final fight of any given arc in order to understand what's going on.
At least Naruto waits until a Main Story Arc is finished before switching over to some unrelated filler arc unlike Bleach which likes to stick several random filler arcs INTO THE MIDDLE OF THE MAJOR FIGHTS! Seriously what was there, three/four large filler arcs in the Wako Mundo and Fake Karakura Town fights alone?

Perhaps, but when I'm gonna skip 90% of the content I don't really need to watch it in the first place, might as well just read the Naruto wiki for anything that interests me. Spike

Anyway, I started watching it again from the beginning a few days ago, because I got interested in the english version. While I have to skip about 1/4 of each episode (previous episode material + lengthy flashbacks) there's been some really fast-paced (for Naruto's standards) fights during the first two seasons, more than I remember, where did those go in Shippuden? Derpy Hooves

by Scienza Tue Nov 26, 2013 11:41 am

Finally saw the episode.

The Celestia/NMM scenes were just fantastic. The animation has gotten so unbelievably good.

by Meleagridis Tue Nov 26, 2013 6:30 pm

Righto.

Team has learned to properly pace given two short episodes. That's a plus, and a lesson that will remain invaluable for any actiony episodes. Which might well happen more often. They might just jam all six (it was six, right?) jewel-box keys into the finale but they might spread it through the season, have an overarching multi-macguffin mission. If that's the case, there's a good chance it might end up a little closer to Lauren's adventuring vision.

Or they'll squish it into the last episodes and we'll have another MMC. Phbbbt.

While the bump in prettifying everything up is nice, it looks like they took the juice from characterization to make it happen. "Here's the exposition." "That makes me feel surprised." "I have been saved." "Hooray, I'm overjoyed."

On the note of characterization, I've got something to say. I'm sure a lot of people will agree with half of it, if not the rest. Pinkie Pie is really getting on my nerves, despite originally really liking her. Early on she was... different. She wasn't more self-aware, but she seemed more like a real person trying to be funny. Hit or miss, give something the briefest once-over and pop it out while its hot, hope it sticks. And every so often she'd go too far and actually be sheepish or vaguely remorseful about it. A quick, "Oops, that joke sucked. Sorry." does a lot. Now everything is exclusively LOL RANDOM territory that bugs me to no end. My wishlist for the season? Old Pinkie. And an episode about how to be a clown without annoying the people around you. I bet everybody knows someone who could benefit from that lesson.

And lastly, Discord. I didn't mind him in this episode. Funny every now and again, always a plus. It's only when you take this along with the 'reformation' episode that I cringe a little tiny bit. But meh. Promising for the rest of the season, though. Discord can make anything more interesting. I wonder if we'll get any other villain reappearances...

Oh, right, the memory-orb juice! That... that's gonna break some headcannons. But oh well. I'm glad to finally be getting some of this stuff from the show.

by Scienza Tue Nov 26, 2013 8:14 pm

Meleagridis wrote:

On the note of characterization, I've got something to say. I'm sure a lot of people will agree with half of it, if not the rest. Pinkie Pie is really getting on my nerves, despite originally really liking her. Early on she was... different. She wasn't more self-aware, but she seemed more like a real person trying to be funny. Hit or miss, give something the briefest once-over and pop it out while its hot, hope it sticks. And every so often she'd go too far and actually be sheepish or vaguely remorseful about it. A quick, "Oops, that joke sucked. Sorry." does a lot. Now everything is exclusively LOL RANDOM territory that bugs me to no end. My wishlist for the season? Old Pinkie. And an episode about how to be a clown without annoying the people around you. I bet everybody knows someone who could benefit from that lesson.

She's still better than Flutters...

I am so getting crucified over this.

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