I’m your BIGGEST fan!
Today we witness yet another excellent departure for the series, one that explores areas of Equestria we weren’t aware of, as well as expanding on previously introduced characters in a way that I more than welcome. Right after the first sentence you can tell that this is yet another episode that succeeded in entertaining me to no end.
Firstly, we have Rainbow Dash being completely adorable as the massive “Daring do book” fangirl. I’ve always said that this is my favorite version of her, one that is capable of being super dorky yet maintain an image. It’s interesting, cute, and best of all, character strengthening. All of this with the fantastic Aztec mythology references, and a fast yet oddly paced episode, provided for an entertaining thrill ride.
The introduction of Daring-Do as the “lone-ranger” esq character was an interesting choice that I liked. Her entire character was memorable, and a somewhat realistic portrayal of what I imagined Daring Do to be like. However, Dash following her around was a little odd at first, but it ended up picking up pace with the introduction of Ahuizotle, the seemingly ongoing villain in the Daring Do books.
This, with the perfect blend of action and adventure provided for an exhilarating second act. Having Daring Do quite literally kick butt was exhilarating, and we got to see a lot of that. The gang, whom was there to save Daring Do, was mostly under-utilized, but for an understandable reason. This episode was extremely fast paced, almost begging for screen time. I could have seen this being spread out into a two-parter and still succeeding with flying colors.
Rainbow dash, although not truly developing within this episode, still manages to be an extremely likable character. Instead of being arrogant to the point of “face pain”, she instead was convincing herself of her own “awesomeness” just so she could face her hero. This was a heartwarming and interesting take on her character that I welcome with open arms.
I was happy to see this storyline being told, mostly due to the fact that I was a huge fan of the “Daring Do Book’s” introductory episode as well, “Read it and Weep”. Once again, this series proves that it is still not on a decline, rather on an incline still, showing that it can pull out fresh ideas and interesting episodes almost every single episode it puts out.
In the end, it was a worthy installment of this show. It was visually appealing, hilarious, and best of all, extremely entertaining. Hopefully this show keeps it’s pace, because so far it’s shaping up to be a wild ride!
P.S- What’s up with Dash creating some of the most nightmare-fuel faces I’ve ever seen?!
Grade: A-
awkwardreviews 
This episode was awesome, but it has some problems…
For me, the biggest is the fact that we’re just supposed to accept that Daring Do, Auhizotaland and all the rest are real.
I mean, I really expected RD to wake up at the end, and realise she dreamed all of this. It feels like RD was ‘transported’ into Daring Do adventure, but not in the same world (just for the second part that is)
There is also the fact that the episode tries to tell too many things, in 20 minutes, like in ‘Keep Calm and Flutter On’, and that creates the feeling that the episode is rushed, you know ?
Seriously, there is a lot going on in this episode : we get from Rainbow Dash waiting for the new Daring Do book, to Rainbow Dash saving the world with her hero, and we have some characters conflict between the two (with the fact that we discover that Daring Do is real)
But I still really liked it. In fact I’d say I’d buy Daring Don’t on Bluray.
I liked this episode, I was chuckling the whole way through, especially at those faces RD was pulling.
Some people have complained about them making Daring Do a real character, but I look at it this way: If you have to find some mystical artifacts and have no idea where to start looking after you’ve exhausted all the books available to you, who are you going to turn to? The pony who deals in finding lost mystical artifacts of course.
I’m probably wrong about that, but it would be cool if this played into the season long arch later on. But if not it was a great, funny episode anyway so it’s not like it’s time wasted. Not that watching MLP is ever a waste of time.
Great comments! Keep em’ up, i love reading them!
I liked the episode, but Rainbow Dash seemed so out of character to me. Here’s what I think: Rainbow has never been one to runaway from a situation like she almost did when Daring got captured. Dash felt so defeated that she wanted to go home and quit. That’s not like her. (At least, it wasn’t.) She normally would be very loyal and stick with it. Had this been like a season 2 episode, I think she would’ve said like, “No way! Daring needs our help no matter what she thinks! We gotta save her!” But now that’s she disconnnected from the Elements of Harmony maybe some of that loyalty is gone. I’m not saying Dash is totally not loyal anymore, I’m saying that maybe the element made it stronger and without it now, she’s weaker. I won’t be sure until I see more of the mane six.
I did still enjoy the episode though. ^.^ The action, Twilight’s pep talk, Twi and Dash going back and forth like lots of fans do, Pinkie being…Pinkie; it was all enjoyable.
I already commented on your YTBC (YouTube Blind Commetary) about this episode, but there’s a perfectly good plot I wished a few weeks ago that could have be made in any form (show, fanfic, fan video, blog).
For the purposes of this story: The reveal that the Author IS Daring-Do NEVER happened and the author really DID just created Daring-Do as an author avatar. (I personally don’t mind; it just moved what I had in mind from “could become canon” to “never going to be canon”) It was a few weeks ago when I thought this up:
Just so you know, it would be a Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash focused episode. and this is the sequel episode I wished they could have made.
First Act: It starts with the premise that despite the author A. K. Yearling (remember, at the time, I thought the author was just an ordinary author…okay, I won’t bring this up again.) having previously retired from writing Daring-Do, she has gotten a new author to write more books for the eager fan base. Let’s just call the new author, Mare E. Weathers. (you can figure out where I’m going with this, but I’ll continue.) When the new book from Weathers came out, Twilight and Rainbow agree to read their own copies over the weekend and meet up to talk about it.
The reaction: Rainbow would react, “Ohmigosh! (x5) Daring Do was sooo awesome [insert awesome moment you can think of here] and it was very exciting!”
Twilight, on the other hoof, would say, “I have owned all the Daring Do books Yearling have written, ranging from good to perfect, but this new author wrote…the worst thing I have ever read! This new author used so many bad writing tropes in this book, and I’m shocked that Yearling herself supported and officially approved of it!”
Second Act: Next thing you know, Twi and Dash got into a spat about whether the book was good or bad. In the process, Twilight introduced many literary terms and tropes to Dash and–with great disappointment–said the book doesn’t meet her standards. Dash admitted that she has always seen the Daring-Do books as just stories of adventure and escapism, not meant to have any deeper meaning to them. (After all, she got into reading because Daring had a broken wing in the first story; which Dashie identified with, being in the hospital for a few days.) Sure enough, they broke it off and stopped talking to each other.
Soon, after taking some advice from their friend, (AppleJack, most likely). Twilight and Rainbow re-read the new book (as well as the original author’s saga, in Dash’s case). This time, having calmed down from the anger of reading a poorly-written book, Twilight had to admit there were a few moments in this new book that she actually enjoyed. Now, she knows why Rainbow still loves the book in spite of the bad writing. Likewise, going back over the original author’s saga, Dash re-read them with more thought and discover so much fridge brilliance and thought-provoking scenes between the lines that actually made her love of the original series even better. And so having re-read the new book, Dash now understood why Twilight got so upset with the new book.
Third Act: Both ponies discovered that in some way, they were both wrong. In Dash’s case, it ties back to the end of Read it and Weep when Twilight said, “Rainbow Dash, just because you’re athletic doesn’t mean you’re not smart.” Reading the books with a more thoughtful mind enriched the saga for Dashie. In Twily’s case, she still stands by her opinion that the new book is the weakest Daring-Do book she has ever read. But is it the worst thing ever? Of course not! There are far worse things than a poorly written story, such as a broken friendship over conflicting opinions about the new book. Twilight had to admit she found her first Guilty Pleasure in Mare E. Weathers’ first book.
Of course, they made up with each other and wrote the letter to Princess Celestia together. In addition to what I already mentioned above, the letter’s main point would be along the lines of:
Dear Princess Celestia,
Rainbow Dash and I nearly lost each other as friends over our opinion of a book. We both learned that even when you have an entirely different opinion about something than your friend, it doesn’t mean you can’t still be friends. Everypony can share, not force their opinions with each other. And with that, they just might learn something new about the other. Maybe even make their friendship even stronger.
Your faithful Student, Twilight Sparkle
And right before the episode ends, we find out a few books later that Mare E. Weathers finally wrote a book that does meet Twilight’s standards.
To elaborate, I have seen Twilight as the kind of person, uh pony who would critically analyze a book and Rainbow as an excitable fangirl. So, you can see how the above reactions would be possible. As you might have realized, I imagined the new author as the Equestrian version of real-world MLP writer Merriweather Williams, with the new D.D book being like the Mysterious Mare Do-Well and the book written a few installments later as Wonderbolts Academy. On a meta level, this story would reflect the group of Bronies who analyze what they see and the group of Bronies who get very excited every time an new episode is released.
Now that’s a story I wished could have been a real episode of the show. I tried to at least search online for a story similar to this, but among the first results for keyword search: “Twilight Sparkle Rainbow Dash Daring-Do” are shipping stories that ship TwiDash together over their common love for Daring-Do. If you ever come across one, I would very happy to read it.
See you next review.
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