Season 9 Discussion Thread [NO SPOILERS, DF airings only]

@Mildgyth  
I wonder what your whole list looks like now…

@Wiimeiser
 
All seasons?

@Mildgyth  
Yes, all seasons.

@Wiimeiser
 
There you go:
 
Season 1
 
Friendship Is Magic/Mare In The Moon:9.0  
The Ticket Master:9.2  
Applebuck Season:9.0  
Griffon the Brush-Off:9.0  
Boast Busters:8.3  
Dragonshy:8.6  
Look Before You Sleep:7.8  
Bridle Gossip:9.0  
Swarm of the Century:8.0  
Winter Wrap Up:8.7  
Call of the Cutie:9.4  
Fall Weather Friends:9.3  
Suited for Success:9.5  
Feeling Pinkie Keen:9.4  
Sonic Rainboom:9.6  
Stare Master:9.0  
The Show Stoppers:8.8  
A Dog and Pony Show:9.5  
Green Isn’t Your Color:9.3  
Over a Barrel:8.4  
A Bird in the Hoof:8.6  
The Cutie Mark Chronicles:9.0  
Owl’s Well That Ends Well:8.4  
Party of One:9.4  
The Best Night Ever:8.5
 
Season 2
 
The Return of Harmony:9.2  
Lesson Zero:9.3  
Luna Eclipsed:9.0  
Sisterhooves Social:9.1  
The Cutie Pox:9.0  
May The Best Pet Win:8.8  
The Mysterious Mare-Do-Well:8.1  
Sweet and Elite:8.8  
Secret of My Excess:8.2  
Hearth’s Warming Eve:9.0  
Family Appreciation Day:8.6  
Baby Cakes:8.6  
The Last Roundup:8.4  
The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000:8.6  
Read It and Weep:8.7  
Hearts and Hooves Day:9.0  
A Friend in Deed:9.2  
Putting Your Hoof Down:6.0  
It’s About Time:9.5  
Dragon Quest:8.6  
Hurricane Fluttershy:9.2  
Ponyville Confidential:8.2  
MMMystery on the Friendship Express:9.2  
A Canterlot Wedding:9.0
 
Season 3
 
The Crystal Empire:9.3  
Too Many Pinkie Pies:9.3  
One Bad Apple:7.5  
Magic Duel:8.6  
Sleepless in Ponyville:9.1  
Wonderbolts Academy:9.1  
Apple Family Reunion:8.2  
Spike At Your Service:7.0  
Keep Calm and Flutter On:7.8  
Games Ponies Play:8.7  
Just for Sidekicks:8.0  
Magical Mystery Cure:8.0
 
Season 4
 
Princess Twilight Sparkle:9.4  
Castle Mane-ia:9.6  
Daring Don’t:8.6  
Flight to the Finish:8.8  
Power Ponies:8.9  
Bats!:8.4  
Rarity Takes Manehattan:9.0  
Pinkie Apple Pie:9.6  
Rainbow Falls:8.3  
Three’s A Crowd:9.3  
Pinkie Pride:9.5  
Simple Ways:8.2  
Filli Vanilli:9.0  
Twilight Time:9.2  
It Ain’t Easy Being Breezies:9.0  
Somepony To Watch Over Me: ∅  
Maud Pie: ?  
For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils: ?  
Leap of Faith: ∅  
Testing Testing 1-2-3:9.5  
Trade Ya: ?  
Inspiration Manifestation: ∅  
Equestria Games: ∅  
Twilight’s Kingdom: ∅
 
Season 5
 
The Cutie Map: ∅  
Castle Sweet Castle: 9.0  
Bloom & Gloom: 8.0  
Tanks for the Memories: 7.5  
Appleloosa’s Most Wanted: 7.2  
Make New Friends But Keep Discord: 8.3  
The Lost Treasure of Griffonstone: 8.5  
Slice of Life: 9.6  
Princess Spike: 4.5  
Party Pooped: 9.0  
Amending Fences: 9.0  
Do Princesses Dream of Magic Sheep: 9.6  
Canterlot Boutique: 8.0  
Rarity Investigates: 9.0  
Made In Manehattan: 8.2  
Brotherhooves Social: 9.5  
Crusaders of the Lost Mark: 9.0  
The One Where Pinkie Pie Knows: 8.0  
Hearthbreakers:9.2  
Scare-Master:7.8  
What About Discord?:8.4  
The Hooffields and McColts:4.0  
The Mane Attraction: 8.1  
The Cutie Remark: 9.3
 
Season 6
 
The Crystalling - 8.0  
The Gift of Maud Pie - 9.0  
On Your Marks - 6.7  
Gauntlet of Fire - 8.1  
No Second Prances - 8.5  
Newbie Dash - 9.0  
A Hearth’s Warming Tale - 8.3  
The Saddle Row Review - 9.6  
Applejack’s Day Off - 7.8  
Flutter Brutter - 8.5  
Spice Up Your Life - 7.5  
Stranger Than Fan Fiction - 8.0  
The Cart Before The Ponies - 8.2  
28 Pranks Later - 8.4  
The Times Are-a-Changeling - 8.1  
Dungeons and Discords - 8.3  
Buckball Season - 8.0  
The Fault in Our Cutie Marks - 7.8  
Viva Las Pegasus - 7.5  
Every Little Thing She Does - 8.5  
PPOV - 9.5  
Where The Apple Lies - 9.2  
Top Bolt - 8.5  
To Where And Back Again - 8.8
 
Season 7
 
Celestial Advice:9.1  
All Bottled Up:8.9  
A Flurry of Emotions:9.5  
Rock Solid Friendship:9.5  
Fluttershy Leans In:8.4  
Forever Filly:9.2  
Parental Glideance:9.6  
Hard To Say Anything:8.7  
Honest Apple:8.6  
A Royal Problem:9.6  
Not Asking for Trouble:9.2  
Discordant Harmony:9.5  
The Perfect Pear:9.2  
Fame and Misfortune:8.2  
Triple Threat:9.3  
Campfire Tales:8.6  
To Change a Changeling:9.2  
Daring Done:9.2  
It Isn’t The Mane Thing About You:9.3  
A Health of Information:9.0  
Marks and Recreation:9.0  
Once Upon a Zeppelin:9.1  
Secrets and Pies:9.5  
Uncommon Bond:9.5  
Shadow Play:9.4
 
Season 8
 
School Daze:8.5  
The Maud Couple:9.5  
Fake It ’Til You Make It: 9.0  
Grannies Gone Wild:8.7  
Surf and/or Turf:8.0  
Horse Play:9.4  
The Parent Map:9.4  
Non-Compete Clause:8.8  
The Break Up Breakdown:9.4  
Molt Down:9.2  
Marks for Effort:9.0  
The Mean Six:8.0  
A Matter of Principals:8.5  
The Hearth’s Warming Club:9.5  
Friendship University:8.8  
The End in Friend:9.0  
Yakity-Sax:9.0  
On The Road to Friendship:9.1  
The Washouts:9.4  
Rockhoof and a Hard Place:9.2  
What Lies Beneath:9.3  
Sounds of Silence:9.5  
Father Knows Beast:8.5  
School Raze:9.3
 
Season 9
 
The Beginning Of The End:8.7  
Uprooted:9.1  
Twilight’s Seven:9.2  
The Point of No Return:9.4  
Common Ground:9.2  
She’s All Yak:9.0  
Frenemies: 9.3  
Sweet and Smoky:8.1  
Going to Seed:7.0  
Student Counsel:9.4  
The Last Crusade:9.3  
Between Dark and Dawn:9.0  
The Last Laugh:9.5  
2, 4, 6, Greaaat:8.7  
A Trivial Pursuit: 7.5  
The Summer Sun Setback: ∅  
She Talks To Angel: 9.0  
Dragon Dropped: 9.3  
A Horse Shoe-In:9.4  
Daring Doubt: 8.7  
Growing Up Is Hard To Do:8.9  
The Big Mac Question: 9.5  
The Ending of The End: 8.1  
The Last Problem: 9.6
 
About the question marks in the Season 4, these are episodes i watched but i never graded.

@rdibp  

 
Nevertheless, Discord had revealed important information about Grogar, who is called “the father of the monsters” and was a notorious villain who had ruled over what became Equestria in recent times. There is a strong possibility that Discord could have imitated Grogar because he was created by him, and thus put with intimate knowledge of him and his magical signature that we know is real by observing the bell.
 
“Grogar Forgery” as I call it, was the biggest disappointment of the entire Season 9 and one of the most controversial events of the entire G4 that had led to strong feelings among fans and viewers. It was a great shock, more experienced writers would have steered away, yet they did not do so with Grogar and Discord. We were expecting a grand battle between the good and the bad, where Twilight and her friends had to fight what was considered the biggest villain in G1 at that time.
 
Instead, Discord messed up, disappointed many who liked his character development and personality, his arrogance, indifference as when Sombra terrorized Equestria and destroyed the Harmony tree, and short-sightedness threw him into the abyss of disaster. The Mane 6 and her allies and friends had to clean up. And when the three villains are punished, Discord once again had to disappoint his fans because he went back on his word about not petrifying ponies as seen with Cozy Glow.
 
The final episodes of just 22 minutes are too short to see if Discord is being punished, he had committed criminal acts after all and allowed the three villains to be punished, which could be a criminal offense under the law of most human states. Because it was Discord who released them, encouraged them to commit offenses, and gave them the bell. It is punishable and the basis for acquittal in our world. Why did younger viewers see this?
 
Even in the Middle Ages, human beings were not tolerant of the kind of organizing the crimes of others. Here the writers had erred, they completely forgot that we have laws that would have made Discord an accomplice in the crime and that his actions are morally unacceptable. Although Discord risked his life as he helped out the rest of the Mane 6 and was forgiven by Twilight who chose to release him - many would not be disappointed if he had been left in the dungeon - it is a moral requirement that he be punished .
 
For the sake of viewers.

@Dustcan  

 
He’s a pimp and a playa!

@Background Pony #DA2F  
The Grogar that we knew just wasn’t all that interesting. He was just someguy who shows up coincidently after the princesses announces their retirement and is just all talk and no show. All the episodes with Grogar focuses more on the villains more so than him, so it doesn’t feel like the finale focusing on them came out of nowhere.
 
I can understand the disappointment of expecting Grogar to have a trick up his sleeve for the finale, but what we got was still good.

@rdibp  

 
Exactly this.
 
Grogar would have been such a flat villain sue [though extremely oblivious and narrow-sighted] had he been played straight. The focus was always on the Triad which is a much better name for them than the ‘Mean 3’, i mean c’mon

@Dustcan  
Oof, my feels :<

@Background Pony #DA2F  

 
Why? The actual purpose of punishment is to redeem someone or to get them to not repeat the same behavior. The things that happened in the finale were a bigger punishment to him and more effective in that goal than anything the others could do to punish him.
 
Punishment just for the sake of making others feel better or just to make the punisher feel better isn’t punishment, it’s revenge or possibly just sadism. Either way it’s short sighted and petty.

@RaineV1  
Or torture.

How much more powerful was Discord than Sombra?

@Background Pony #8E76
 
Celestia and Luna could defeat Sombra themselves, with just their combined power, no Elements (we know for certain it’s not the Elements, because they tried to stomp Cozy Glow the same way)… and Discord is far above them. In addition, Celestia was still standing in S5, in the wake of him.
 
So there’s no realistic way to go “Discord isn’t much more powerful than Sombra.”
 
 
@MrXemnas1992
 
Grogar was intentionally being portrayed as less interesting as the other three villains, period. There’s no way to deny that he wasn’t being set up as being compelling.
 
 
@Background Pony #DA2F
 

 
I still believe it’s bizarre that people ever thought that had anything to do with actual morals on Discord’s part.
 
Stone = less chaos, less fun  
Death = less chaos, less fun  
Him being turned to stone = Discord is frustrated personally, selfishly
 
Legion of Doom = Discord doesn’t give the slightest fuck about fun, having them being chaotic, so stone it is, plus it’s been 7 seasons.
 
That’s how I see his thought process, regarding that.

@AC97  
oh agreed. 100%

Come to think about it, Grogar wasn’t really that interesting or fleshed out as an antagonist other than just “being the leader of the Legion”

@ILoveMyoozik
 
Exactly.
 
Grogar had the special position of being the antagonist with literally nothing about him being personal, as “advertised” before the twist, in sharp contrast to the other three. It would’ve been “they’re in my way,” not “they’ve defeated me before and I want revenge, and to take over.”
 
Even Celestia and Luna were born long after his defeat, which is something no villain that’s appeared in the entire series can say, I think.
 
The only beings he was shown being kinda cruel with were… the other villains.
 
Not innocent beings.

@AC97  
Him being from that time made him kinda interesting
 
It’s not like the show expanded on The Trio’s grudge in a meaningful way anyway

>>2174642t (deleted)
 
So much better

So, question. In the last episode, Fluttershy says Discord is going to an “O and O convention”. Does that mean anything in particular, or is it just supposed to be a mystery as to what those stand for?

@Fwelin  
Ogres & Oubliettes

Ah, thanks.

@Fwelin
 
Ogres & Oubliettes convention.
 
It’s basically the Equestrian equivalent of Dungeons & Dragons, seen in Dungeons & Discords, and The Break Up Breakdown.

While at it, this relates to the Shining Armor & Cadance blandness discussion from a little ago:  
Know what would have been cool? An episode of Shining Armor joining Discord et al for an O&O session. In the comics he was a nerd in his younger years, having this in an episode would have given him more of a character

@ILoveMyoozik  
Maybe not character wise. But as a threat combined with his power level, he would’ve provided a much more exciting climax. Instead we just got 3 villains we’ve already defeated (twice on one occasion) and a lower stakes battle as a result of Discord’s stupidity.