Read It and Weep

Read It and Weep is the sixteenth episode of the second season of My Little Pony Friendship is Magic, and the forty-second episode overall. Rainbow Dash discovers the joy of reading when she is laid up in the hospital, but she hides it from her friends due to her former penchant of mocking it as an "egghead" pursuit.

Summary
The episode begins with Rarity, Pinkie Pie, later joined by Twilight Sparkle, watching Rainbow Dash soaring and performing tricks off-screen. The three of them watch in admiration, with Pinkie Pie going as far to twist her neck around twice to keep track of Rainbow Dash's flight. However, Rainbow Dash loses control and crashes into the ground leaving the trio worried.

In the following scene, Rainbow Dash wakes up in the hospital in a daze, with her close friends around to see her. The first thing she hears "Is she going to be okay?", "Oh, I'm so worried", and "Is her face going to stay like that?" from AppleJack, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie, respectively. When the doctor tells her that she will be in the hospital for a few days minimum, she responds negatively saying that it might as well be a few months or years. However, her friends offer her help and motivation, saying that the chow may be "hoof-licking good" and that the hospital gowns "match the curtains". A nurse pushing a shelf of books walks by the room from which Twilight borrows then gives to Rainbow Dash. The book is titled Daring-Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone, recommending her to read it. However, Rainbow Dash hastily rejects to read it, saying that reading is for "eggheads", and calls Twilight an egghead in the process. Her friends chuckle at her view of reading, saying that everyone enjoys reading from time to time. Once visiting hours are over, her friends leave. Twilight tells Rainbow Dash that Daring Do is a lot like her since she is "adventurous, fierce and undeniably, unquestionably unstoppable".

After her friends leave so Rainbow Dash can get her rest, Rainbow Dash is shown bouncing a ball off the wall, eating her food, turning a lamp on and off repeatedly, and telling jokes to her roommate to pass the time. However, none of these work out for her, so she reluctantly decides to read the book. The musical cue that plays when she looks at the book and starts reading is very similar to the one that plays in a similar scene in the film The Neverending Story.

As she starts reading the book, the episode cuts to a widescreen portrayal of the story. Daring-Do, a brown-coated, grey-maned pony with the same style as Rainbow Dash herself, is first seen surrounded by a variety of wild cats, ranging from a large tiger to a small kitty cat. Daring-Do makes a run from the wild cats, using a vine to swing across a ravine. She then comes to the entrance of a vault. She is immediately drawn in by the story, and quickly sees how fun reading actually is. By admitting it, however, she comes to the shocking realization that she had become an "egghead" herself, but she proceeds to continue the story.

Rainbow Dash's reading session is interrupted with Fluttershy and Twilight enter with a board game to play. Rainbow Dash quickly pretends to lose in order to get them to leave so she can return back to her book. When she "loses", she packs the game away messily into the box and Twilight and Fluttershy leave quickly. When they leave, she whips her book out of her blanket and begins to read again.

Daring-Do comes to a tile trap, which is triggered by weight on any tile other than a tile with a rat on it, which Daring-Do works out by noticing that every other tile has a carving of a predator on it. After she jumps across the rat tiles, she comes to the Sapphire Stone, which she examines closely, but quickly grabs and puts in her hat. Unfortunately, the Sapphire Stone was trapped, and this trap triggers the floor to fall away, revealing a pit of lava. Daring-Do manages to jump through a hole in the ceiling with the aid of the collapsing pillars, being blasted away by steam in the process. She then crash-lands in the jungle, and is met by Ahuitzotl, a large creature also after the Sapphire Stone.

Suddenly, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Rarity enter her hospital room and ask how she's feeling. A nurse arrives with Rainbow Dash's food, and when her friends say she can eat while they're there, she begins to eat her food messily and rudely, which eventually prompts her friends to leave the room. She once again continues her reading.

Ahuitzotl captures Daring-Do with the help of the wild cats, whom he calls with a quick whistle. Ahuizotl puts Daring-Do into a room with closing walls with spikes, quicksand, snakes and spiders. As Daring-Do is getting consumed by the quicksand, the doctor and nurses come to tell Rainbow Dash that she is to be discharged from the hospital.

Rather hastily, they put Rainbow Dash in a wheelchair and wheel her outside. She despairs that she will no longer be able to find out what happens to Daring-Do, since the book is in the hospital. Rainbow Dash tries to get back into the hospital, because she doesn't feel that she could get Twilight's copy after calling her an "egghead". Rainbow Dash re-enters the hospital, complaining that her wing is hurting. The doctor doesn't fall for the ruse, so Rainbow Dash decides to enter the hospital at night to retrieve the book.

Unfortunately, a new patient is occupying her bed, but she finds the book underneath. She crawls under to continue reading the book, but wakes up the patient, who accuses her of stealing his slippers. She gets caught by hospital staff, who chase her out of the hospital and through Ponyville. They run to Twilight's library, where she is met with a lot of confusion from hospital staff and her friends. She explains that she was an "egghead", which none of her friends really understand. They tell her she didn't need to start making a ruckus, or as Pinkie puts it, a fracas, just to get a book.

Twilight lets Rainbow Dash borrow her copy of the book, as well as more for her to read. Twilight explains that reading is something everypony can enjoy if they give it a try, and the lesson Rainbow Dash learned is to not reject something until she tries it.

The episode then cuts back to the Daring-Do story. Becoming overcome by the quicksand, Daring-Do ricochets her hat off of her hoof, hitting the lever and resetting the trap. She then escapes the dungeon, and reclaims the Sapphire Statue from Ahuizotl.

The episode ends with Rainbow Dash finishing the book in her bedroom, and taking the next book in the series, Daring-Do and the Griffon's Goblet to read.

Quotes

 * Twilight Sparkle: Hey Rarity, hey Pinkie Pie. What are you looking at?
 * Pinkie Pie: Rainbow Dash! Isn't she the most daring devil? I mean, devilish darer? I mean-
 * Rarity: She's dazzling!
 * Pinkie Pie: Ooh yeah that's a good word. She's dazzling!
 * Pinkie Pie, Rarity and Twilight Sparkle: [gasp]
 * Twilight Sparkle: Oh no, oh no, oh no!
 * Pinkie Pie: Ayiyiyiyi!
 * [crunch]
 * Pinkie Pie, Rarity and Twilight Sparkle: Ohh.
 * Pinkie Pie: So much for dazzling.


 * Rainbow Dash: You guys have gotta get me out of here, I'm gonna climb the walls!
 * Pinkie Pie: Ooh, just like a spider! [to the doctor] Did the crash somehow give her super-duper spider powers?


 * Pinkie Pie: Yeah! I love reading, and my head isn't even close to the shape of an egg! It's more the shape of an apple, or maybe an orange, but a big orange, more like a grapefruit really...


 * Rainbow Dash: ...to get to the other side! Get it? Nevermind...


 * Rainbow Dash: I hate to admit it to myself, and would really hate to admit it to my friends, but... I love this story! I, I- I love reading! I'm an egghead.


 * Ahuizotl [with Pinkie Pie's voice]: Hello, Rainbow Dash!


 * Daring-Do: You won't get away with this, Ahuizotl!
 * Ahuizotl: But I already have.


 * Doctor: [chuckles] I think I know what the trouble is. A severe case of lazy-itis.


 * Patient #1: Someone's trying to steal my slippers!
 * Rainbow Dash: I'm not trying to steal your slippers, I'm trying to steal this book!


 * Pinkie Pie: Hey, nopony invited me!


 * Patient #2: [barking]
 * Doctor: Hey, get back to the hospital!


 * Applejack: There's no reason to go around causin' a ruckus-
 * Pinkie Pie: Fracas!
 * Applejack: ...causin' a fracas just because you like to read.


 * Twilight Sparkle: Rainbow Dash, just because you're athletic doesn't mean you aren't smart!
 * Spike: Yeah, just look at me! [kisses]

Gallery

 * Read It and Weep image gallery

Trivia

 * As Rainbow Dash is about to crash Pinkie Pie shouts " Ayiyiyiyi!" A catchphrase often uttered by Alpha 5 on  Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.
 * The board game Rainbow Dash plays with Fluttershy and Twilight bears a close resemblance to Battleship, a board game that happens to be published by Milton Bradley, a subsidiary of Hasbro Inc..
 * The Daring-Do series is a reference to the Indiana Jones franchise.
 * The titles of the two Daring-Do books mentioned in the episode are references to the title of two of the Harry Potter books: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.
 * The scene where Rainbow Dash is throwing the ball against the hospital wall is a reference to The Great Escape.
 * While the title of the book is Daring-Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone, Twilight calls it Quest for the Sapphire Statue after Rainbow Dash admits to reading it.
 * Applejack says the chow is "hoof-licking good", which is similar to KFC's catchphrase "finger-licking good".
 * Of the many Daring-Do books seen, there are three different covers; the cover for Quest for the Sapphire Statue, the cover for the Griffon's Goblet, and a plainer cover featuring only Daring-Do. The other books all have variations, mirrored or otherwise, of the Sapphire Statue cover. Despite having different illustrations, the three different covers all bear the title scroll for Sapphire Statue.
 * The sunlight shining into the temple chamber before reaching the pedestal is a reference to the city and the beam of light scene from Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark.