Magical Mystery Cure

Season 3 was the shortest season of 'My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic', with only thirteen episodes, and the tone was sometimes darker. It was an inconsistent season, with the best episodes being outstanding ("Sleepless in Ponyville" was my favourite) and the weakest being lacklustre with good moments ("Spike at Your Service"), but with enough decent and more episodes to consider it a solid enough one.

"Magical Mystery Cure" is one of 'My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic's' most controversial season finales. Have seen a lot of love for it, from those that loved the character writing, interaction, music, visuals and emotional impact. But also a good deal of complaints, from those that found it too rushed, too over-plotted, too heavily reliant on the music (this is not for anybody that dislikes musicals, love them myself actually) and of course the whole Twilight Sparkle Alicorn controversy. For me, there are certainly better season finales of the show than "Magical Mystery Cure" and despite having such potential to it is not one of the best episodes of the show. As far as Season 3 goes, it's in the better/high middle end while not being fully realised. For me, it was a good episode with so much to love, but it should have been amazing and just wasn't.

Do have to agree with those, and it seems to be the general consensus, that felt that "Magical Mystery Cure" felt rather rushed, especially in the middle act and the climax also could have done with a couple of minutes longer.

This would have been prevented if the episode was a two parter, which was most likely the original intention. With so much story content, it did feel like two episodes worth of content in one.

However, "Magical Mystery Cure" is one of the best looking Season 3 episodes along with "Sleepless in Ponyville" and "Too Many Pinkie Pies", one of the most imaginative looking too (again along with those two). There is a lot of atmosphere in the colours, everything looks smooth and the backgrounds are ambitious yet very richly detailed without trying to do too much. The music is a big star here, there are seven songs overall and they all work in having emotion, upbeat energy, adding to characters and not distracting from the story or momentum. For me the standout song was "(I've Got to) Find a Way", which tugs at the heart-strings and inspires. The writing has humorous stretches but also a lot of touching ones, and some clever continuity nods. Twilight's "but what should I do now? Is there a book about being a princess that I should read" is one of the most poignant quotes of the season.

Didn't ever find the story dull at least and it really connected to it emotionally, admittedly more so than most Season 3 episodes. Which was why it did disappoint me somewhat that the episode wasn't even better than it was. The whole thing with the Cutie Marks was creatively handled, the switching of duties between characters being an inspired move (i.e. Fluttershy trying to do Pinkie Pie's job). Actually didn't have anywhere near as big a problem with the Alicorn controversy that rattled many, yes it did need more time to be fully explored (and doing the episode in two parts would have definitely solved this). But re-watching the whole season recently, it did strike me that there was some foreshadowing early on, though not in your face, so the plot point wasn't as come out of nowhere feeling in the way it did when first watching the episode. It did well setting things up for what was to come. Absolutely loved Twilight's character development, some find her too unapologetic here but to me she resonated with me and felt real and not a stereotype or anything. The voice acting is very good indeed, with the performance of the episode belonging to Rebecca Shoichet's singing for Twilight. Forgot to mention that the singing is pretty darn good here, Shoichet's rendition of "(I've Got to) Find a Way" is powerhouse level.

Summarising, good season finale with exceptional qualities but if it was in two parts, slowed down and had a little less going on this could have been amazing and one of the best of the entire show. 7/10

I have enjoyed this show since the beginning and this episode I thought was a passable way to end the 3rd season. The songs were all great and I was impressed on how much they had here. I will say one disappointing thing was the pacing of it and the sad scenes could've been expanded more and the larger amount of songs seemed to be the cause of this. The episode began at a fast pace but once it got going it wasn't half bad. I was questioning the fact about Twilight's transformation into an Alicorn princess but once I saw her, I began to accept it. Who knows, this might be a good change. Overall it was a great episode non the less and I really look forward to season 4. Wonder what they will do next with Alicorn Twilight but we'll see when we get there! Go Bronies!!