Talk:To Where and Back Again - Part 1/@comment-29310952-20161001191622/@comment-29310952-20161003061758

Rather than just be an idiot and only say that Cutie Re-Mark was horrible, please allow me to take the time to explain to those who liked it why others hated it. I'll admit, I can't speak for everyone on a lot of this, but I'll at least try to cover some problems with it.

1: The main theme is time travel. I can see why it's so liked, but at the same time, I can't find it in myself to actually like it as a theme. To me, it feels like an incredibly overdone gimmick that's far too easy to add into a story when you have nothing better to write. The formula for it is done countless times throughout all kinds of different games, shows, and stories of all calibers, and each time it's done, it's virtually the exact same thing; main character time travels once and never does it again, bad guy times travels and ruins history, good guy goes back to stop them and fails, making history worse, but then gets it right the next time or two. In essence, the main character doesn't do anything at the end, seeing as how they undid everything.

The way I choose to percieve time travel mainly involves the use of Multiverse Theory, in which time travel is simply traveling to a different dimension and altering the events of that timeline and that one alone, your own original timeline being completely unaffected altogether. I understand that there are different theories regarding the hypothetical, but at the same time, it feels like it's far too easy to believe in the Butterfly Effect altogether.

2: Starlight Glimmer's random over-powered abilities. Honestly, I don't think it's fair at all for a simple unicorn to be able to stand against an alicorn. We've seen that alicorns are super powerful based on the other princesses, but really, this whole moment in which Twilight can't automatically win a magic fight in a split-second is just unfair to her. To me at least, this season focuses more on crapping on Twilight by nerfing her abilities like crazy, making her act very passive-aggressively about how she doesn't get to go on trips with the others to the very few places that are actually new. Sure, they explain that Starlight had higher-than-average magic levels in season six, just that she lacked the training for it, but that's an entire season too late to try and explain why she's so overpowered here. Twilight even exists as the embodiment of the element of magic, so it makes even less sense that she isn't able to beat someone else in a magic fight, made even worse by how she as an alicorn can't beat a unicorn.

3: Too much fanservice. In all honesty, this one just plain leaves a bad taste in my mouth. More time was spent throughout the finale on fanservice for lots of characters people probably liked, but really, that's just the entire problem. Virtually no time was actually spent on the more important things here, such as Stopping Starlight Glimmer, and even finding out why she was doing all of this in the first place, which reminds me....

4: Starlight Glimmer is a unstable, borderline-sociopath. Due to the above problem, zero time was put in to try and make a good backstory for Starlight Glimmer, instead, giving us a simple moment in her past that accomplished NOTHING. It flat-out can't possibly explain how it is that her refusing to be happy for a friend once can turn her into a fascist monster in the years to come. All it tells people is that she's absolutely unstable and shouldn't be allowed to walk free since she could very well just relapse into this same madness and chaos. If you need any more evidence, let's look at how she didn't care at all about the future of Equestria lying in ruin due to her actions, she's convinced that as long as she gets her revenge, she couldn't possibly care less about whatever side effects it has.

5: The unacceptably bad writing for a rushed ending. Starlight Glimmer is randomly forgiven for her crimes against nature itself, which makes zero sense whatsoever, and borders on massive amounts of character breaking, all to rush a badly designed ending with a character that ultimately makes for a horrible Mary Sue. Randomly incredibly powers, seeks to cause chaos, and is accepted into the main cast. Correct me if I'm wrong, but is this not the checklist for Mary Sues?

I can understand a few points here, mainly that Twilight would have to fight against someone using means other than magic, and I agree that it works out so much better, but the idea falls flat on its face on account of the fact that the power gap between Twilight and Starlight should be so much more massive than it actually is. It shouldn't even be a contest based just on two factors on Twilight's half; being an alicorn, meaning that she has access to very powerful magic to begin with, and representing the element of harmony via incarnation. She shouldn't lose a fight when it comes to magic, or at least, shouldn't lose a fight against a unicorn. The other major point here is to give Twilight a student in the arcane arts, which is also really good as a concept, but since it involves a character like Starlight Glimmer, it just plain leaves a bad taste in my mouth, almost being the same as a bad fanfic.

Easily the biggest issue though is the time constraints being used against them in such a way. So much time was wasted on fanservice via alternate universes, it left the team with no time to actually write good events happening, which is what meant that we could only see one moment of Starlight's past, the likes of which didn't explain how it was even remotely possible for Starlight to walk down the path that she was. The only thing that managed to make it even worse though was the fact that she was so easily forgiven, in spite of her crimes being FAR worse than even Tirek's. Tirek was a rampaging bull demon intent on sucking Equestria's magic dry and leaving the denizens for dead, and was ultimately stripped of his power and imprisoned in what is effectively hell in Equestria for the rest of his life. Starlight Glimmer conspired to destroy all of Equestria through theft of cutie marks, leaving her foes unable to o what they need to do to stop her while having her reign over them. She essentially has committed a worse version of Tirek's crimes, and gets off scott-free, because she's essentially a lunatic.

Rarity, Applejack, and Rainbow Dash also don't make things any better for forgiving her so easily. Really, considering the crimes that she's committed, especially to them on a personal level, it's incredibly hard to believe that they'd ever forgive her at all. Rainbow seems more like the type to attack her on sight and not bother questioning what she was doing, Applejack doesn't seem like the type to forgive those who wrong her, and Rarity definitely isn't the type to forgive someone who wrongs her or her friends. All of them would realistically hold a massive grudge against her, but these three in particular feel like the most likely to hold a grudge, and really, you can't blame them. In the end though, their personalities are gutted to accept a horribly written trainwreck into their circle of friends, and it ultimately comes back to bite them in Every Little Thing She Does.

I understand fully well that people have their own opinions, and I'm not simply trying to argue by saying your opinions are wrong, I just can't personally see anything good about Cutie Re-Mark at all. From the lazy writing, to the horrible characterization, all the way to the incredibly forced character being added, this finale altogether just feels like a horrible trainwreck. Considering the same writer from that is going to be writing this finale as well, it's pretty safe to assume that To Where and Back Again is going to end up being another trainwreck.