Episode Talk: S6E6, No Second Prances

Trixie's back!  And you know what that means: time to talk about Carrot Top!

...What?  Oh, you think there's a better story to be had out of this episode?  Well, you don't even know!  Carrot Top's a huge Trixie fan, but she's never truly gotten to enjoy a Trixie show.  The first time Trixie came to town, well...

...Let's just say, it turns out that the girls shouldn't have tried those funny-looking mushrooms Sparkler found growing in the Everfree.   Several hours after the show, Derpy would find Carrot still standing there, staring with that same unblinking intensity at the long-empty stage.  Carrot Top would eventually return home without the vaguest recollection of the content of the show she'd just seen, accompanied by a churning sense of disappointment.

Also, Rarity being a rhymes-with-witch to Carrot Top's visiting cousin, the inexplicably-named Carrot Bottom, really put a damper on the day.  

And of course, the second time, it wasn't so much a "show" as a "hostile takeover."

But now!  Now it's time for a new Trixie episode!  Was it any good?  Does Carrot finally get to see the ultimate act in stage magic, preferably while not in the grip of a powerful hallucinogen?  A few thoughts of mine, below.

-Let's start off with the overall: I didn't really enjoy this episode.  Mostly, I think, because it was a 22-minute reminder of what I didn't like about how S5 ended.  "Hey, you know how everyone just abruptly forgave the pony who tried to enslave ponykind and destroy the world on two separate occasions?" the episode says.  "Well, here's a pony who never did anything worse than be a little stuck-up and have unfortunate taste in jewelry.  Oh, and she apologized to Twilight two years earlier.  Guess which one's more trustworthy in Twilight's eyes?"

I mean, I didn't feel like Trixie needed to be best buddies with the main six at any point, but... well, I didn't feel like Glimmer needed to, either.  This episode just kept needling that, "if this is how they treat Trixie--fair enough, by itself--then why's Glimmer getting a free pass?  Not just from Twilight, but from everypony?"

"Where in this town can I find a friend?" murmurs Glimmer, trotting right past Carrot Top.  To be fair, though, Carrot Top was distracted by the producer credit, so maybe that wasn't the exact moment to go up and say hello.

-I also wasn't a fan of a lot of the facial expressions.  Too much off-model "wackiness" for my tastes, and too many times when a "funny" expression was held just a little too long, as if the animators (or producer, or whoever's in charge of that) were afraid we wouldn't see it.  Frankly, the expressions reminded me of some of the timing/visual gag issues with the fan-made Double Rainboom.

 I listened to the audio here half a dozen times, and it turns out there's no dialogue whatsoever that matches whatever Rose and Carrot are saying to each other.  Given the expressions and excitement level, my best guess is that Celestia just got into town, and they're discussing which of her charioteers is cuter.

-That said, there was plenty I did like in this episode.  The Derpy level was about where I want it: a little more in-front than I'd like as a general thing, but fine for one episode, and with nothing distracting from the main plot.  And even though I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it, I like the now-explict idea that the economy of Equestria only works as long as the more powerful wizards are careful not to do any of the mudponies' jobs with a stray thought.  Earth ponies: canonically useless!

-What was up with Celestia, though?  She's got the put-upon glare of someone who just spent the last three weeks negotiating a new trade agreement with the yaks.  Actually, maybe that's exactly what she was doing... still, this was a level of hostility toward her former student that I found awfully jarring.

This time, Carrot Top made sure to get there early.  She got a seat front and center for the show, which ended up being a bad idea--turns out that manticores spray worse than Gallagher, and Trixie's performance doesn't come with plastic sheeting for the front rows.  Still, it was a night to remember.

-I have to correct all the "Trixie lost her only friend, so she decided to commit suicide" talk, however--especially since I've seen that a lot, not all of it joking.  Look, she was planning to try the Moonshot Manticore Mouthdive (which sounds like it would be a killer shot for some MLP-themed bar to come up with) before Glimmer even showed up, so obviously she had a plan to survive.  My best guess is that maybe the bullet-shaped helmet wasn't to make her more aerodynamic coming out of the canon, but to help her slide straight down the manticore's gullet before it could start chewing.  And from there?  Well, plan A would be to teleport into the box, but if she'd never managed that before, I'm guessing plan B involved her coat being liberally soaked in ipecac before the show.  Look, it's not pretty, but it's better than being eaten, right?