Man, Faustism was crazy back in the day, lol.

Given that the term “alicorn” was only introduced in season 3, and that we only found out what it fundamentally met uh…never, I’m not sure how the writers could retcon something that was never really established to begin with. It would be like complaining that in Mass Effect 3, the writers made a nod to Femshep’s VA’s accent with a comment that Femshep’s parents were originally from Vancouver, and how that messes up the lore of the character…even though Femshep’s parents are already very vague to begin with.

@Erroneous
No, it didn’t. Season 2 had a lot of terrible episodes.

@Ebalosus
The writers deliberately went out of their way to retcon the way alicorns worked in later seasons.

Even now?

Uh, Luna might as well have not existed for the first season beyond the opener given how little she figured in to the narrative. Also, the show never really “demystified alicorns,” since there never was a mystery with them to begin with.

Despite all the seasons and their strengths and weaknesses the one thing I dislike the most is the demystification of Alicorns. In the first two seasons Luna and Celestia towered like figures with cosmic power, akin to the Gods or Heroes of Old of Equestria.
 
Now they’re not, they don’t have that, they don’t carry the feeling of being characters that are beyond reach and carry a millennia of experience. And I miss that

@Gecko  
Despite how MMC may’ve turned out for you, I never found the “toy advertisement” forced (at least, not terribly so). Mostly because FiM has a very episodic structure where a single Episode or Two parter has its own plot and introducing new toys to sell this way hardly comes off as obligatory for me.

Have we finally found the pony equivalent of Pokemon genwunners?

LAUREN FAUST HAS NEVER DONE ANYTHING BAD AND IS PERFECT IN EVERY WAY

CANON DUR HUR DERP DE DERP DURRRRR

Oh great. One of those fans.

@Takashi.0  
We are and we do. This may get deleted yet, but the way I see it is someone expressing an opinion by more than “Worst pony, lulz!” and doing some shitty edit.
 
By the way, it seems like you’re calling us out via comment more for everyone else to see and less for us to notice, and that ain’t cool.  
You know we’re in IRC.  
You know we read reports.  
Catching a comment directed at us isn’t a reliable method of communication.

Also, mods? We were told that you’d be putting more effort into deleting “artwork” made/uploaded for the sole purpose of trolling.
 
So why is this still here?

*a bannable offense

@Erroneous
 
If there’s one thing that should be a bannable offends on EVERY pony website, it’s putting words in Lauren’s mouth.
 
Go back to /mlp/ and never come back, you blasphemous manwhore.

@Background Pony  
I damn sure know Hasbro got their hands in a lot of things, I’m just saying that they seemingly used to give the writers and the staff way more creative freedom back in the day, aside from the “guideline” they gave them. I don’t work at DHX, though…Also, I think Raritys wings for example actually worked quite well as a minor plot-device. And I don’t mind a little “advertising” as long as it doesn’t seem forced. I don’t know how this will work out yet, but IMO Hasbros decisions were all in all pretty horrible lately.

Protip:
 
Nobody gives a shit.

@Erroneous  
Fun fact: Erroneous is most likely full of shit and putting words in Lauren’s mouth.
 
Even if Lauren did say it “hurt to watch” post-Discord eps, that probably doesn’t mean what you think it means.

@Erroneous  
I will need evidence with that, sir, or I will have to confiscate your bullshit.

Fun fact, Faust can’t watch anything past the Discord episodes, because “it hurts to watch”
 
Clearly she saw Lesson Zero and ran for the hills when she saw her creative vision being raped by people she trusted. Its a shame though, because the season got good after that.

@Gecko  
Hasbro may be “taking control”, or maybe they always had control.
 
Do you really believe that Rarity getting butterfly wings in “Sonic Rainboom” wasn’t done to promote the Glitter-wings toy? Remember, Lauren said outright that Twilight’s balloon and the Friendship Express train are constantly inserted to remind girls that toy exists.
 
The only part of your point I’ll agree on is the likelihood that Jayson, as the replacement, might not have as much sway with Hasbro execs as Lauren did, and thus less ability to question them without getting in trouble. That happens in television.
 
Alicorn-Twilight is one of those things that would have happened even with Lauren on staff. Really, the only thing I can see being significantly different with Lauren on staff, aside from certain stories being handled slightly better, is that she probably would have been able to keep Derpygate from happening (either by holding Jayson back from doing the shoutout in the first place, or by being a better negotiator when Hasbro went on the warpath).

@Background Pony  
Agreed. People seem to forget that creators like George Lucas and Gene Roddenberry started to run their series into the ground (The Star Wars Prequels and Star Trek TMP/Early TNG anyone?).
 
Not sure that is exactly the case here, but If Faust ran the show for more seasons, eventually it still would have lost steam. All shows do eventually.

ITT: OP with a headcanon that’s beyond saving. Let us mourn this doomed soul.

@Background Pony  
So you follow it just to be contrarian?
 
That aside, she actually was involved in any meaningful way on season 1, with season 2 just keeping her around for consulting purposes.
 
In any case, I personally was more annoyed by Shining Armor and sincerely wish they hadn’t been so blatant in regards to bringing him just for a toy line.
 
Cadance… Cadance was exactly what I expected, and the more interesting bits were all because of Chrysalis rather than her, so…
 
Not saying I agree with the guy above, just that people seem to be too forgetful.

Wow. Just… wow.
 
So because Lauren and Rob left, that renders everything that happened after invalid. Okay. OP is probably the same type of asshole who refuses to acknowledge any Trek series that Gene Roddenberry didn’t personally approve.
 
I still fail to see what problems everyone has with Season 3. To me, it has about the same proportion of “good” and “bad” episodes as Season 2, which Lauren was involved in.
 
Whiners like OP bitched and moaned when Cadence was introduced. The episode we got wasn’t perfect, but she turned out to be a character that we wanted to know more about (that’s my opinion anyway). She could have been far less in the hands of inferior writers.
 
I’m not happy about Alicorn-Twilight, but the more I see haters bitch and moan, the more I welcome our new Alicorn overlords.