Chad Rocco, proving to us that some bronies have logic in the brain.
 
I’m surprised he hasn’t opened his mouth and insulted Rainbow Rocks.

What?
 
Er… it does beat Pound Puppies… three times, if you’d actually looked at the chart.

@Beau Skunky  
Yeah, it seems like they don’t know what they really want.

@Fanloser  
Indeed, when asked when they first wrote “Magic Duel,” they said the script for it was submitted back in January 2011.  
That was back when Season 1 wasn’t even halfway finished airing, before the brony fanbase became widespread, and before Trixie became “popular.” So it’s kinda ironic to hate it for that reason…  
(In fact, honestly, I thought it was better then the first S1 Trixie episode.)
 
They even stated they originally planned for it to be a Season 2 episode, but it got bumped back.
 
The episode also had Zecora have an expanded role in it, but nobody complains about her appearances, or episodes like that “pandering to Zecora-fans,” and such… (Besides, the ending to “Boast Busters” even hinted Trixie would come back. So it’s not like her return was that “out of the blue.” Pun intended.)
 
I also find it funny those same people who always complain about things like “pandering” also complain about things like the lack of Derpy this season, and such. You can’t please them EITHER way…

@biznizz  
Actually, I think that was the only example he gave. And he completely ignores the fact that the script, or at least the idea for it, was made back in the beginning of 2011.

@rogerSnow  
I did say that the animation and most of the voices were really good. The script and story just really needed to go through a few more drafts.
 
The shoutouts and the references were some what distracting, but my pointing them out was to express how Chad liked DR, but thought an episode like Magical Duel was in his own words “pandering” because Trixie came back for example.

but i like lps. screw cr

@biznizz  

@biznizz  
You sound far more reasonable than CR.

@Beau Skunky  
It wasn’t just the fact that the Powerpuff Girls were shoved in there. I mean, it did solidify it as “fully animated fanfiction”, but I wouldn’t have minded it so much if they just had done it well.
 
I’m a 90’s kid, and grew up watching that show. I actually really liked the movie, even if Craig and Lauren thought it was too dark (which… yeah? It contrasts with the series to show how much the Girls have made a difference. That and I like the occasional forray a property makes into darker territory when done well).
 
So what actually truly got my goat wasn’t how Dash was shown as a selfish jerkass who drinks an untested potion, the sheer amount of “REFERENCES!!” & pandering, or that it took Pinkie’s 4th wall bending too far (the deus ex machina)… it was that they didn’t even get the PPG to act in character.
 
I realize this kinda makes me sound like CR, but… If my recollection of the show is right, I’ve never so much as seen the Girls beat down a surrendering enemy (Mr. Mime/Rainbow The Clown aside…) and act like possessive brats about a clearly sentient being who expresses displeasure at their actions.
 
I hope this doesn’t make me sound like “Spitfire is acting like a jackass for being “rude” to Dash!!” like a certain ex-brony. I just saw it as the topping to a sloppily written Pony episode, where the fanfic meetup happens and the Girls (to me, at least) aren’t even characterized properly.

@Beau Skunky  
He’s either that or a budding attention-whore.

@LtcProductions  
Yeesh, Mr. White sounds like a “nice guy”… Alot of “critics” seem to become A-holes, I hate to say it. Is there some kinda “jerkyness” disease that effects critics?

@Beau Skunky  
The critic you’re thinking of is Armond White, who was in the news this week for heckling Steve McQueen at the NYFCC Gala.

@biznizz  
Kinda surprising given all the hatred half the fanbase had for “Double Rainboom.” (Especially on this site.) I don’t hate it, but even I can admit, it was kinda flawed, and felt more like a fan-parody, and a bit of a forced-crossover, rather then a legit episode. (Like they claimed it was going to be, which is partially why it got some flack.)
 
It was still amusing though, had some funny parts, and some homages to Lauren & Craig’s past works. (Probably why CR liked it.)  
Though a few gags admitted were a bit overboard, like the trollface cameo… That felt very out of place. Admittedly, the “Derpy eye gag” has been done before to many times in fan-works. (And even once in the first issue of official comic.) Though, I’ll cut them some slack, sense it took them a year to make that. (Before the comic came out.) So maybe that gag wasn’t as common at the time.
 
Though, yeah as you point out, in regards to how nit-picky he is with official canon episodes, (like the “pandering,” and “OOC” complaints…) it’s amazing he’d actually like something like “Double Rainboom.” (Amazed he didn’t bash it at all…)  
I’m honestly starting to wonder if CR just wants to be a “contrarian,” and just disagree with people on everything. (Like that one critic who bashed “Toy Story 3,” yet liked a bunch of other critically-hated movies… Forgot his name.)
 
I actually enjoyed “Mare Do-Well,” and “Spike at your Service” personally, regardless of their flaws.

@biznizz  
Oh god, he really said that?
 
@Beau Skunky  
I found that headcanons can be a dangerous thing.

@biznizz  
maybe he said it knowing his opinion would undermine it?

@biznizz  
And yes, I know that there is a big difference between a show with professional, established writers & animators compared to a fan episode made by an animation student & volunteers… but come on.
 
How is it that nearly all the flaws in the show be present in a fan episode… and Chad LIKES said fan episode? Because he’s either clueless, a hypocrite, or said it to confound people intentionally given his “War against Bronies” and/or most likely never seen it.

@Beau Skunky  
@Fanloser  
I still find the most incredulous thing that CR has said, amongst all of the shit he’s spewed, was that he enjoyed ‘Double Rainbow’ [sic] (i.e. the fanimated episode Double Rainboom) and felt it was the best place to leave off (the fandom).
 
And Magical Duel was “pandering”? Wonderbolts Acadamy had a “well established” character acting OOC? How many episodes had “deus ex machinas”?
 
Don’t get me wrong; the fan episode had some good animation, if definitely not “show accurate” as it claimed, and the voices IIRC weren’t too bad, but the story & “moral” itself was quite awful. Personally, I’d say Mare Do Well & Spike At Your Service were better written in comparison. But… you see what I’m saying, right?

@Fanloser  
Andy Price said >>451952 some fans actually gave him, and Katie Cook guff over the MLP comics for “ruining” peoples’ fanfiction…
 
Some fans get to attached to their personal headcanons, and care more about them then the actual canon. Besides, they can still have their fanfiction, and “headcanons,” and just consider them an “alternate universe/canon,” or something if their fanfics are that important… Though, they shouldn’t let those things taint their opinions of the show to much.

@Beau Skunky  
Or are just plain selfish and/or stupid. Like the people wanting their fanfics to episodes.

@Fanloser  
Yeah, I really don’t understand all the self-entitled fans, or fans that think “they can do better.”
 
Ironically, some ideas I saw some fans had to “improve” the series, would actually end up angering most other fans…  
(Like one wanted them to aim it at adults, and put “political commentary” in the show, and thinks that would “improve” the series… Boy, that would anger so many fans…)

@Beau Skunky  
Not likely, seeing as how those people only think about themselves and how things work for them only.

@Beau Skunky  
I meant, “it’s not like she was forced off the show.”

@Lock247  
Who knows?
 
I like Lauren Faust’s past works to, (Especially the shows her husband made, and she helped out with like “Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends”) but I don’t understand the so-called fans who seem to only/mainly like the show for her, or act like she’s the only person who makes it, or makes it “good.” It’s like they ignore everyone else who makes the show. (I must add, I liked Sibsy’s works to on DA, before finding out she worked on MLP:FiM.)  
…Even CR’s kinda like that. Like when he remarked that “All” of Meghan McCarthy’s written episodes are “toy commercials.” (Just because she wrote the “Canterlot Wedding,” and “Crystal Empire” 2-parters, but the “toy-advertising” still felt subtle in those… Besides where are all the “Changeling” or King Sombra toys? Little girls like villains to.)  
Yet, he (and others who make that claim) forget all the other episodes she wrote. (Including the beloved/comical “Emo Pinkie Pie,” and “Twilight goes nuts” episodes. Where’s the toy tie-ins for those?)
 
It’s like some don’t have any respect for anyone else who makes the show, nor the companies that produce it. (Because you know, any company that makes money is “evil.”)
 
The only episodes Lauren Faust wrote 100% were the first 2-parter “Friendship is Magic/Mare in the Moon.” Honestly, those were the first episodes, I saw, and while good, they didn’t really “hook” me, or make me a brony/fan yet. I didn’t start to get into the show until I saw the third episode “Ticket Master.” (Which Lauren also co-wrote with Amy Keaton Rogers.)
 
Also, she left by her own choice, it’s not like she wasn’t “forced” off the show, or anything…  
I see some paranoid/insane fans insisting that Hasbro “payed her off” to quit, so they could take it over, and intentionally “ruin it” according to them…  
Also, the president is a fraud, and he lives on the moon! :P ^{(Ren & Stimpy reference.)}
 
Sometimes I wonder if these people would be griping less if they didn’t know Lauren left the show, or if Twilight never got wings, and such…

I honestly don’t think he liked the show to begin with and was just interested because his almighty Lauren Faust was involved with it.