So, last night I pre-ordered Adventures In The Crystal Empire and today I pre-ordered Season One, plus I got an email saying my glow in the dark Zecora is on it’s way after being backordered. Today has been a very good day for ponies.
Thanks for that link, I just ordered it myself. My official excuse is that I need to use up my Amazon gift card before the California sales tax takes effect.
Sorry I can’t hear you over the sound of raw awesomeness coming from my 2 trading card 30 pack boxes :D. Wow they are up to $140 now and there is only one left - that is crazy. I could have probably made a bit of money had I not opened and cataloged them all in my album already. Any idea what Crystal Empire is gonna be? Is it just gonna be a few episodes like Friendship Express, or is there gonna be original content in there?
We (my daughter and I) are just now catching up on this. While I have to say the animation seemed to change somewhat in S2 (more stylized somehow? more extreme?), S2 also has some awesome episodes. Certainly as a Pinkie Pie fan “Baby Cakes” gets my vote. 
There’s a MLP Comic Series starting soon, in case folks weren’t aware.
When is the Season 3 Premiere?
Sometime in November
Last I checked, no official air date yet, but confirmed S3 starts in November.
Such a long wait!
There’s speculation that because this is going to be only a 13-episode season, that perhaps we’ll get 2 short seasons a year instead of one long one. I’d be ok with that, but who knows what the real deal is.
What, no bump? We just watched the Crystal Empire episodes and were happy to see it start up again, but were just slightly meh by the end.
Evil appears (a pony with fangs!). Princess Celestia delegates the saving of ponykind to Twilight Sparkle, who comes through and passes a test in the end. This is very very familiar.
The animation does get sharper every season.
Twilight is the protagonist of the show, so she should have a role in big plots like this. However, she wasn’t the one who defeated the villain. Spike and Cadence played a big role, but it was ultimately the Crystal Ponies who saved the day. A lot of people are complaining that the villain didn’t have enough lines, but I thought the other plot points took more precedence. One of the reasons the opening of season 2 is my least favorite among all the two-parters is that there was too much of Discord. The writers seemed to just revel in him being goofy and dickish and devoted way too much time to him, so the ending was incredibly rushed. I love John de Lancie, but if you only have 40 minutes to tell a story, make sure you don’t focus on one aspect too much.
I couldn’t really disagree more. Well, I do agree about the resolution being rushed. But other than that, I think of the Season 2 opener as pretty much the high water mark of the show’s “high adventure” episodes, and much of that had to do with Discord and how personal he was as a threat - especially to the Mane 6. Having Discord’s scheme revolve around disrupting their individual strengths was a great way to work the show’s core themes of interdependence into a “good guy vs bad guy” scenario, and kept the focus of the episode on the show’s greatest attribute, which is its emphasis on character development.
[spoiler]“The Crystal Empire,” in contrast, spent a lot of time making Twilight look like a self-absorbed idiot and gave a bare minimum of attention to the rest of the cast, each of whom basically gets one or two opportunities to remind us who they are (Rainbow Dash is a brash daredevil! Fluttershy is shy! Rarity is obsessed with pretty things!!). And much of this was due to the plot, which eschewed theme and character in favor of worldbuilding. Not that that’s a bad thing, necessarily, but in this case, that amounted mostly to long stretches of exposition about the history of the Crystal Ponies and the occasional wordless growl from the erstwhile villain, from whom we’re given zero sense of motivation or purpose. The previous villains on the show at least managed that - Luna was jealous of her sister, Trixie was an attention-seeking blowhard, the Flim Flam Brothers were scam artists, etc. King Sombra gets bupkis.
At least the Crystal Pony designs looked cool, though. And hey, Luna got some lines! And they’re definitely setting up some sort of “Chosen One” arc for Twilight Sparkle, which, hmmm… I’ll withhold judgment until I see more of where they’re going with that.[/spoiler]
But yeah. Overall, I was not impressed by this season opener. But then, I didn’t really like the “Canterlot wedding” two-parter at the end of Season 2, either. I may just not much care for the post-Lauren Faust high adventure stories. Here’s hoping they get back to the “day in the life of” stories soon. I’d take a “Sweet and Elite” over a “Crystal Empire” any day of the week.
I really didn’t like this episode at all. 2 of our scant 13 were blown on this snooze-fest. 
I don’t know exactly why I didn’t like it, and perhaps I’ll change my mind, but so far it was my least favorite episode.
Totally not giving up on it. The commercials for next week’s episode had me nearly crying, and the list of episode titles and synopses sound promising.
Next week’s promo?
Pinkie Pie turning around and showing her G3 (?) face = me dying laughing
There, that’ll put the rumors to rest
Huh. That was almost disturbing. We’re those doppelponies sentient? Still, I love any episode with Pinkie Pie.
I really loved it. We were laughing so hard I kept having to pause it so we wouldn’t miss too much. I was very disappointed in the premier, so it was extra good for me that I liked this one.
Maser, yeah, let’s not look too deeply into the fact that all the Pinkies had the same genetci, cognitive and emotioanl makeup and potential as the original one. And then Twilight had them endure (what is to Pinkie) psychological torture. Those who couldn’t take it had their existence summarily ended until Twilight’s horn glowed red from the heat of her laser.
Also, the best way to tell who’s telling the truth is to have them endure unpleasant, stressful experiences until they can’t take it anymore. Those who tell the truth will stick to it, just like waterboarding.
I am glad I’m not the only one who thought that “unexisting” sentient beings was a little out there. I don’t think the new season has hit its stride yet, but I am very pleased with the fact that there are new episodes after such a long wait non the less.
Yeah, I loved the wackiness and sight-gags of the episode, but the ending was a bit graphic and disturbing for a children’s show.
Still, it is a return to form for the show, the premiere wasn’t that good.
The episode where Applejack saves Spike’s life, so now he owes her blah blah blah, was lifted from almost every sitcom of the 1950s and 60s. Otherwise though, I’ve liked this new season.