(Song Used: Blow Me Away - Breaking Benjamin)

We’re one quarter into the 100 now (And 1/3rd into the entire series. 21 Parts, this is the 7th one). In this grouping is our first appearance from a two-parter and mostly Season 1 Episodes

While Speedy Cider is ranked lower, I actually kinda liked that episode more then this one despite it bring ranked higher, While I surely won’t be perfect whatsoever given this is a personal list I do try to have some degree of objectivity. But yeah, M.A. Larson may be my favorite writer in the show. But I’m not big on his first episode despite it having some fun moments to it such as Twilight’s first little freakout that would explode come early in Season 2 or the really hilarious scene where it looks like Pinkie’s about to save Rarity but instead picks up an instrument and leaves. I think my main issue really is just Pinkie not being able communicate what she’s doing. I know that’s kinda the point but when the ending had something where the Main 6 apologize to her about not listened when Pinkie never really communicated herself. Kinda hard to really take that slight hyprocisy.

 Regardless however, it’s a fun episode for sure and given this was from my favorite writer from the show it’s not like I consider this episode a huge mistake from him. You know you’re going to see M.A. Larson episodes spread across the entire list all the way to near the end.

This is the episode that introduces the competitive rivalry between Rainbow and Applejack. For some this also may have started the ship between them like Look Before You Sleep did for RariJack (Though in both cases that’s weird basis for shipping considering both argue or try to cheat against each other in games). One weird thing about the episode is that it’s only two episodes after Winter Wrap-Up. That’s right the start of Fall begins only two episodes after the end of Fall. While other Seasons have had similar issues with sudden Winter episodes happen only to bring it back to a normal Spring or Summer for the next one. This is the first time it happened so you can say it began the whole weirdness. It makes it hard to determine if the episodes really came one after another. Doesn’t help that the early Seasons weren’t as big on continuity as Seasons 4 and 5 were for the most part. Back when Season 1 was finished people even attempted a complicated timeline that was based entirely on headcanon with not much supporting evidence. I don’t know if they still exist somewhere but it’s certainly something that this episode was probably a direct cause of it being made. 

On the episode itself it’s another one of the just ok ones from the first Season. There are a few moments where it gets into the predictable territory, such as RD and AJ laughing at Twilight only for them to lose and Twilight wins and/or gets a high-placement. Which while I appreciate they didn’t make it the former, the latter could still be seen as following the same trope. However I do have to give credit where it’s due, the episode still manages to have some good moments here and there. Pinkie being the Loopy announcer, Rainbow Dash’s derp face not too long after altering the sign to fool Applejack, etc. It’s also a good showing voice talent wise because remember both characters are voiced by Ashleigh Ball, which means a lot of this episode turns out to be Ashleigh talking to herself. Which can actually be hard to tell since it’s rare that you hear Rainbow’s raspy voice in Applejack’s country nor vice versa. You know you have a good voice actor when they can pull that off.

While this technically isn’t Apple Bloom’s debut. As not only did Apple Bloom first appear in the pilot episode, and later played a big role in Bridle Gossip this is the first official CMC episode pretty much. An explanation is given for the Cutie Marks, and it started a quest for three little fillies that would eventually get there’s just a little less then 5 years ago for us in real life. So no doubt this was an important episode. It is however also the debut of some ponies that often are on people’s most disliked ponies list. You have Twist who annoyed people with her voice enough for people to not even mind that she barely appeared much after getting hers. As well as Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, now the latter got shades of some good in her shown earlier in the episode. But Diamond’s would come perhaps a little quickly and in the same episode the CMC eventually got their Cutie Mark to boot. I don’t think everyone has really fully forgiven Diamond despite the reveal that her Mom’s far worse then she is. Cause you run to a similar problem as with Babs Seed in One Bad Apple: Bad things being done unto you might make you feel you want to do bad things, but it’s an entirely different line of thinking when they actually go ahead and do so. And we’ve been subjected to Diamond treating the CMC like trash ever since this Episode aired and it will take a little more time then just the one week where we see her motive for all of it. 

Back to this episode though, plenty of unforgettable moments such as the Cupcakes song (Not the fanfic, grimdark lovers), the official introduction of Sweetie and Scootaloo (Yes I know they make cameos in the pilot but you get the idea), and more. There was a time where people weren’t sure of these three, but considering the moment they got their Cutie Marks is an instant beloved episode in Season 5 you have to figure that things definitely changed since then

Ah well look where we are now, the one that started it all. It’s also our first two-parter on the list, which probably also unfortunately means it’s the weakest two-parter in the list. But I just want to say something, although I have it as the weakest two-parter. This is actually more of a compliment of how things go on later. You have to put this in consideration, for most fans that got in the show in later 2010 or 2011 this was the first episode(/s) they watched cause people’s instinct is to start with the first episode. People going into this episode with no facts known beforehand that were even curious was expecting it to be utter horrible crap that at that point MLP was known for. But as it turns out, it actually surprised a lot of people to the point where they said they enjoyed it. Spreading like a wildfire in 4Chan no less, where normally this kind of thing 4Chan utterly despises from the get go. Granted there were still people from the site that fought against it given the internet wars the show caused over there. But coming into this show thinking you’ll find something on the level of G3 or just “eh” were shocked to find it have some interesting writing and characters. It’s a huge testament to this episode that it managed to make a very cynical part of the internet fight for control of how many threads and/or users posting content from it. 

With how much of an impact it had with starting the popularity, you would think it’d be higher on the list since I do like to value impact. But that’s because the show actually just has that many amazingly done episodes that the beginning of it all is not only #72 out of a total 112 spots that it’s the weakest two-parter we’ve had yet. Because despite how it still drew in people to the show, if you looked at it under the same critical analysis eye that some do these days on the Pilot you’d find many logical problems with it. Cause by the the time the other two-parters start coming the bar has been raised a lot. Some of those issues include Twilight’s turning to Friendship might be seen as a little fast given her attitude earlier in the episode. Sound familiar? Yep! Even the show at it’s start has had some quick turnarounds, while Twilight’s turn isn’t a total 180 like the villains you see getting redeemed quickly you could still see as Twilight trusting in the others a little too fast. Another one is Nightmare Moon is pretty ineffective as a villain. Complain all you want about Sombra who feels more like a natural force rather then a character at least he felt like a threat. Nightmare Moon’s attempts to stop the Mane 6 only ended up blowing up in her face and conveniently showed their respective elements to Twilight until finally Twilight realized they themselves were the Elements of Harmony. Granted every episode under a critical eye could fall apart under the seams. As I’m sure even when we get to some of my Top favorite episodes there’s probably a review somewhere that nitpicks them to death to the point where they look like they belong in the Bottom 12 instead of how high it actually is. But it’s often forgotten that the Pilot isn’t so different, maybe some do realize that and say that the show was never as good as they thought when they go back. It can be the fault of expectation bias, we were expecting the worst thing ever heading into watching the Pilot instead we actually got a pretty decent story and introduction to characters that we’ve come to know and love. The love for the show can start to raise certain expectations sometimes people expecting the show to go a direction but if there’s anytime it falls below or the show to them seems to go out of the way to prevent whatever they wanted happen they start thinking that the show went downhill which from at least my point of view really has not been the case whatsoever.

 Now if any of you still think pretty highly enough about this episode that you’re appalled I put it this low, I do apologize but I don’t mean any harm. The pilot did everything it could of possibly done right in terms of how the internet reacted to it. I would not be making this list today if it were not for that first glimpse of Twilight reading the story of the Mare in the Moon. I assure you that it’s a testament to this show that the episode that hooked me like many others is this low in the list.

This episode’s kinda in a weird place. If there’s one thing Merriwether Williams did right in her Season 2 episodes is getting the cruelty correct. And this is one episode where that is actually kinda justified because this is the Main 6 re-enacting a play where to put it bluntly the ponies were racist to each of the other kinds. It creates pretty huge worldbuilding as it reveals that Equestria was once far from the paradise that it seems currently in the show (Well it’s never 100% paradise what with the monsters, dragons, and such but you get the idea). It took the efforts of three ponies who weren’t quite as mean to the others to unite against the Windigoes and unite ponykind to make Equestria. Also judging from the fact that it’s mentioned the Unicorns raised the Sun and Moon. This is as far back as before Celestia and Luna were even born. Definitely intriguing to say the least. We don’t even know how far back that could possibly be since we don’t know nor will we probably really know Celestia or Luna’s ages.

That said, not a lot has really came from this episode yet as there’s hardly anything that’s followed up on it. Meaning despite it having huge implications for the worldbuilding of Equestria in the past, it hasn’t really set in for anything future-wise. It’s really only impacted fanfiction authors at this point, though the stuff in the past and funny moments we got from the acting the Ponies did still made it fun and interesting. So I think this is a pretty good spot to put it. If anything follows up on it in the future there’s potential for this episode to get higher in the rank. But for now I feel this is a solid spot for it as of right now.