Unpopular opinion time

tbf the show isn’t ultimately about fights but i do get were your coming from. All them creative abilities and it just ended up shooting lasers. On that note, Rainbow dash should have gotten to use her sonic rainboom to really hurt a major villain, her abilities were underused

@Background Pony #A60B
Yeah, there were more creative matches early on. (Look at Magic Duel.) But I guess like in real life, it’s the basics which work most reliably…

As for Twilight VS Tirek, I don’t hate it, but I’d like to trade half of it’s “action budget” for a proper Rainbow Power scene in which every pony gets to do something.

@Latecomer
Thinking about it, don’t the kids play JRPGs? There’s a wide array of combat spells to use than “the basic beam”.

@Background Pony #A60B
Pretty much.
This make virtually all the fights only as enjoyable as the narrative results can allow it since none of them hold up good enough by themselves.
Ironically enough the pretty low stakes Magic Duel between Twilight and Trixie was better since it was actually creative in the spellcasting use and is even notable neither Twilight nor Trixie require to think or make heavy efforts to make “complex” spells even with the alicorn amulet involved, making it look like they just simply hold back their own potential.

Plus the over reliance of lasers also mean suddenly the characters are in distress in ways that often feel rather easy to break away. Spells that in slice of life are as handy as they come suddenly dissapears when an actual danger appears (and no, arguing “is too dangerous to use” doesn’t cut it because in said slice of life episodes they used spells without much issue).

@Latecomer
Problem is, there have been lots and lots of times when said basics actually fail often. The ray is strong but cannot actually beat so they instead try to apply more pressure, or they think the laser is enough but then a sucker punch for not bothering checking if it was actually enough.

If the basics actually start failing or stop being useful, then that’s when maybe using lasers over and over is not the best course of action.

They missed an opportunity for Twilight to tackle the problem of tiger parents that pushed their children too hard in their magic studies.
There is no reason they couldn’t have had another prodigy mare who was overworked and pressured by her parents to strive for the best through stringent study regimes at the detriment of the wellbeing of said mare.

@Background Pony #4C59
Yeah… it would be nice to see characters use their brains more. You’d think Twilight would be good at that, but I guess fighting isn’t her forte.

@Latecomer
To be fair, that narrows it very little since again, is not just her. All the fights in MLP always felt formulating to an extend its more of intermediate just to get the narrative result rather than anything particularly interesting on itself.

Speaking of which.

They seemed to have avoided Far Eastern themes at nearly every turn of the show.
Don’t give me that Mistmane insert that made no freaking sense. And Kirins are anything but culturally eastern.

All the while they had Indian ponies in one episode. Native American(Bison), Nordic(Rock Hoof), Cajun(Meadowbrooke), Egyptian(Sonambula), Arabic, Roman(Flash Magnus), Yak(possibly Himalayan), Zebra(African), Russian accented Ponies, and even some Latin American.

@Background Pony #4C59
It perhaps didn’t help that the last season saw an increase in “actionisation”.

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
“They didn’t use anything like this, except for when they did cause it didn’t count.”

@Latecomer
Indeed.
On one hand I’m glad is not a show that just tries to pointlessly try to pamper battle obsessed nimrods, but once they were gonna have a battle just be creative or do something actually epic that doesn’t rely on tried-and-tested methods that even long time ago stopped being effective.

@Background Pony #4C59
Yeah but. They could have devoted more towards exploration of Equestria and beyond. Over 70% of the setting in their world have never been visited nor addressed. Probably even more,as we’ve only ever had one side of the globe shown. They’ve never showed us anything on the other side.
Instead they’ve spent too much time in Ponyville. Regurgitating the same tired lEsSonS with ye same overdeveloped characters. I wished there’s had been an overarching story arc for each season with some slice of life moments.
Part of the problem the show has was the fact they didn’t really expand much beyond the Mane 6 and the same old stuff they do in the same old setting that amount to practically nothing in the grand scheme of things. For the vast majority of episodes in most seasons.
And could they have at least given us a basic structure on Equestrian societal bureaucracy beyond just their mess of a Tetrarchy they had?
A lot of their lore also felt like complete Asspulls for the sake of convenience to serve a situation. They’re always pretty vague in how things worked in the series. There’s like no system whatsoever. They have never explained to us exactly the working behind what they call “magic”. It’s almost like they had a system and formula in mind behind their working, but they never elaborated on it.

In shorter words.

The series lacks a solid well explained and structured set of lore and how things work in their world. And much of the stuff that came felt like complete Asspulls throughout the series.

There were times I felt like Bronies are just deluding themselves to pretend they’re enjoying the show everytime an episode dropped.
The show became rather stale after season 4. By then it felt like it was just looping in circles.

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
Maybe some Bronies, but I myself definitely genuinely enjoyed the proceedings.

Also, hard disagree on the show getting stale after s4

@Jonny Manz
They’re just salty there weren’t more of the same attributes as anime.

Another reason why Glim Glam is best pony

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
I do genuinely enjoy them. This is no delusion, only heart.

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
Who exactly? But yeah, I assume that kind of thing was considered too sensitive.

It doesn’t even have to be like an anime. There are a ton of western kid cartoons in the 80s and 90s that had more intricate themes, sometime heavier themes.

Also another thing that western cartoons and anime alike tend to have that FiM seemed to consistently lacked.

Organized villainy. Almost all the villains, save for the Changlings, Maneiac, Ahzuilotoh(I botched up the spelling). Had any form of organization, rank and file.
Does Equestria even have a standing defence force/military? What are the ranks and file among the Royal Guards?

@Mr.Myoozik
Starlight Glimmer was probably the only one that thought outside the box when it came to magic use.

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
Indeed she was

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
Decent at tactics…but lousy at strategy considering how many backfires she suffered…plus she got beaten for not making sure Chrysalis was beaten.

@Background Pony #4C59
Always aim for the head

My argument that this show really lacks any clear structure to it’s lore stands. Most of the stuff just seem like an asspull.
And I also find it funny how every nation that surrounded Equestria are just glorified city states.
There’s also some evidence of other Equine states in existence. Such as Maretonia, Saddle Arabia, and wherever Zecora’s homeland is.
We never saw those places nor did the maps ever included them.

These other places all just felt like just an extension to Equestria, nothing ore nothing less.
I was hoping there’s be a rival Equestria like power at least.

Also, Crystal Empire is NOT an empire.

@TheQuietMan
I don’t like that movie.

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
Honestly I wouldn’t have changed a thing assuming the characters are still moped around tho.

@ЅℰℒᎯℙℋℐℰℒ
Zecora has a homeland.