The neat thing about A Horse Shoe-In is that, Starlight as headmare, with Trixie and Sunburst alongside her… That’s kind of how things should have gone. These are characters with nothing in particular to do (aside from Sunburst, but they lampshaded that), and it really points out what a stupid idea it was for Twilight to open the school in the first place and stick her friends there as teachers. Give the secondary and tertiary characters a purpose instead!
This week, a reminder that we can’t have a Daring Do episode without putting her name in the title.
Someone spoiled the ending twist for this episode to me last week. It was really hard to enjoy watching because of that. But it’s also a good place to start discussion. See, this episode provides its own comparison and contrast.
The core of this story is Fluttershy working her epic kindness abilities on a group of ne’er-do-wells to turn their hearts toward good. Redemption was maybe not something I ever wanted for Caballeron, but it fits with the show’s themes. From Starlight to Discord, My Little Pony villains get redeemed, it’s what we do.
Ahuizotl on the other hand is supposed to be misunderstood. And not only is redemption for him not something I, personally, wanted, it’s a bad idea. Or at least, it was mishandled to an extreme degree here.
The difference is, while Caballeron wants you to think he’s an okay guy, it’s entirely because he wants to use you. This is what happens to Fluttershy and is ultimately short-cut by the influence of the Truth Tablet. Caballeron, and to a greater degree his henchponies, is swayed to the side of good by acts of kindness the like he’s never seen before. He might go back to his thieving ways in time, who knows, but for now, he’s changed enough to team up with Daring Do against a common enemy…
Who should never have been common in the first place.
I mean, Ahuizotl does nothing to earn a redemption in the first place. His whole arc is “If you had just listened, you would have seen he’s not a monster.” Except it completely ignores literally everything he’s ever done? Like, how is bringing “one thousand years of blistering, scorching heat” to the Tenochtitlan Basin supposed to protect the jungle? I ask you.
This is not a redemption story: this is a retcon. And it’s a real shame, because A) this was actually a fun Daring Do adventure when I was able to ignore the spoilers, and B) there could have been a really important real-world lesson here. I thought for sure the setup with Caballeron’s anti-Daring Do book was going to be, “though a story may have two sides, that doesn’t make them equally valid”. Like, teach the kids how to evaluate sources, c’mon, the schools aren’t doing it.
All in all, this is a very disappointing sendoff for Daring, and it all comes down to a veteran writer mysteriously disregarding canon for some reason. The only good thing I can say is that I wasn’t as angry by the end as I expected to have been, coming into this knowing what I knew.
(And no, I’m not at all salty that I just released a Daring Do adventure that also uses the name Tonatiuh.)
Student Counsel
Sparkle’s Seven
A Horse Shoe-In
She Talks to Angel
The Last Laugh
The Last Crusade
Common Ground
The Beginning of the End
Sweet and Smoky
The Summer Sun Setback
Going to Seed
Frenemies
Rainbow Roadtrip
Dragon Dropped
The Point of No Return
Daring Doubt
A Trivial Pursuit
Uprooted
2, 4, 6, Greaaat
She’s All Yak
Between Dark and Dawn
The End of the Rainbow
Rainbow Roadtrip
Living in Color
The Last Laugh
Better Way to Be Bad
Fit Right In
Lotta Little Things
Present Perfect 