Yeah, I haven’t exactly been timely regarding this.  I blame Ushio & Tora being a Friday release.

Anyway, this was probably the biggest episode of the season so far.  Probably the one episode I rewatched the most amount of times.  And wouldn’t you know it, it’s a Diamond Tiara episode.

We begin the episode with the Cutie Mark Crusaders in the clubhouse, and it takes only a few seconds before a song breaks out.

That’s right.  We get a song during the cold open.

Pipsqueak shows up and asks the CMC to be his campaign managers in the upcoming student pony president election.  He’s running on a platform of repairing the playground that’s been damaged from all the recent monster attacks.  However, the biggest hurdle in his way is resident bully and CMC antagonist Diamond Tiara, whose mother is head of the school board.

Still, it’s nothing a lengthy, catchy song can’t fix.  That’s right; this is a musical episode.  Based Ingram, thank you.

Diamond Tiara runs on a platform of blackmail, bribery, and egocentricity.  In other words, she’s Donald Trump.

Alas, Diamond Tiara doesn’t suggest building a wall around Tartarus and making the monsters pay for it, so she loses badly.  Like, really badly.  Like, she’s the only person who voted for her badly.  Yes, even Silver Spoon didn’t vote for her.

Concerned for Diamond Tiara, the CMC kinda stalk her back home, where they witness DT’s mother, Spoiled Rich, berating her for not winning.  Seems Spoiled Rich is obsessed with social standing and pushes DT to be a winner in all things for its sake.

DT goes on to sing her first solo song, “The Pony I Want to Be,” which is surprisingly amazing.  Dat singing voice.  Those visuals.  Based Ingram.  BASED INGRAM.

The CMC feel sorry for her and try to befriend her the next day.  When Pipsqueak shows up at the clubhouse to ask the CMC what to do about the fact that the school board doesn’t have the budget to fix the playground, Diamond Tiara figures she can use the situation to prove Pipsqueak is an ineffectual president and get herself back into office.  This results in yet another amazing song about choosing to do the right thing.

In the end, Diamond Tiara chooses to do the right thing, stands up to her mother, and gets her father to donate the money to fix the playground.  Then she works with her classmates to fix the playground, making friends with them in the process (and patching things up with Silver Spoon, which is kind of a missed opportunity in itself; that could’ve been its own episode).

I should point out that, physically, that fence makes no sense.

So yeah, after 5 years, a major antagonist of the CMC turns good in a redemption song.  That is mindblowing in itself.  The CMC congratulate themselves on a job well done and decide that instead of focusing so much on getting their cutie marks, they should help others find their cutie marks and learn more about what their cutie marks mean.

Once they agree to this, the unthinkable happens.

And so we close out in a beautiful musical number that’s worthy of a series finale, and we’re not even done with the freaking season.

That’s just… dayum.

It’s been a month and it’s still hard for me to get over this episode.  So amazing.

This is the face Diamond Tiara makes for a few frames while she’s in the CMC clubhouse.  Derpibooru tags it as “arin hanson face.”  I have no fucking clue who Arin Hanson is.  Google tells me it’s Egoraptor.  I recognize Egoraptor as an animator.  I have no fucking clue why it isn’t then called “Egoraptor Face” instead.  Whatever.  This meme doesn’t really have much flexibility, but it is pretty amusing.

Yeah, not a lot of meme-worthy stuff in this episode.  But the songs.  THE SONGS.

Imdrunkontea really captures some of that cutie mark pride with the CMC and their sisters (and “sister” in the case of RD/Scootaloo).

Runner-up goes to the mighty Lumineko.  There was one little filly that had “creepy super strength.”  Like, ability to lift the schoolhouse strength.  Lumineko runs with it and makes the best reference possible.

For the first, and perhaps only time ever, this week’s Best Pony is Diamond Tiara.  Hell hath frozen over.

I’ve still got a few episodes to catch up on, and that strangely includes BOTH a Halloween-themed episode AND a Christmas-themed episode.  And the Christmas-themed one actually aired first.