Yay it's time for some of Kreekakon's after-episode tl;dr goodness! Will contain some SPOILERS so read with care.
This episode is called the "Wonderbolts Academy", and is the seventh episode of season three.
Now first off I just want to point out that this episode was written by Merriwether Williams, who in my opinion can be considered the "least good writer" who works on MLP episodes among the writing crew. Get what I mean?
This episode displays several of Merriwether William's writing flaws which include cheesy scenarios, and pacing issues. An example would be Pinkie's more-than-usual amount of ranting in this episode to the point that it started getting annoying rather than funny. Another one is when the Mane 6 suddenly come out of the clouds, and suddenly need to be rescued INSTANTLY. Such negative aspects aren't THAT bad in this episode, but noticeable enough for me to point out.
Now the thing I want to talk about most in this episode are the characters themselves, namely Lightning Dust, and Spitfire.
Lightning Dust will take a bit of time, so I'll start off with Spitfire. You can tell quite noticeably in this episode that the voice actor is different. That's okay for me, but what may present some controversy for me at least is that her mannerisms, and personality seem completely altered from before. It's almost a complete character switch.
I understand that some of this might be because she is basically a drill sergeant in this episode, and has to push her students. However even if this is the case she doesn't drop the act at all even when she's off-duty in her office when Rainbow goes looking for her. She doesn't even seem to remember who Rainbow is or what she's done! Then again a lot of other ponies seem to let the Mane 6's endeavors completely slip their minds.
I think it would have been awesome if this was the case: Spitfire only acts tough, and demanding while pretending not to know Rainbow Dash for sake of training. Later when Rainbow goes visit her in her office she acts softer, and more encouraging while doing a quick reassurance that she was only dissuading her in training for sake of training, and she very much remembers who she is. That would've been awesome if they did that, and wouldn't require rewriting of the plot of the episode at all.
I do like that she acknowledged Rainbow's view on what it is to truly be a good flyer, and not be reckless. If she didn't, and just let Rainbow leave without saying a word, I would've flipped my table.
...
Now onto Lightning Dust. I really REALLY liked the concept of her character, and what it represented. Anyone who pays close enough attention will notice that she's actually a reflection of Rainbow's own character except seemingly more extreme in the right circumstances.
One may say that she shares similar traits to Gilda, but I liked Lighting Dust better as such a representation of "Evil Rainbow Dash", because of how vague Lighting Dust's standing is at the early parts of the episode. She will seem like a friendly rival who will "seem" like a semi-positive/benevolent supporting character, but you just can't know for sure at this point in the episode. Only later will you see her veer off into a darker direction. I feel this deterioration of her character might've been done better though, mostly owing to pacing issues here. The change from friendly-rival to ruthless victor seemed a bit too jarring, and sudden in my opinion. The idea is okay, but the pacing could've had some work done.
After her eventual "corruption", this is where I start to really like the "idea" of her character even more (Again pacing was an issue here). You can really see aspects of Rainbow's personality inside her actions, and lines except that they are amplified to a douche-bag level. It just shows how Rainbow could've been if she had leaned slightly more to the extreme as well as showing that in reality Rainbow is still morally aware enough not to go down that path. It works great for both of the characters.
Such a character relationship reminds me of one I saw in the anime series Yu-Gi-Oh 5D's (Really great show considering it's one about card games). If you don't care about that show or the comparison I'm about to do, just skip the spoiler box:
Neither Jack Atlus, or Rainbow Dash had explicitly stated outright that they see the negative qualities of themselves inside their "evil-selves", but you can tell from some of the ways that they disagree with what their counterparts are doing is that they probably do see it. And that's awesome.
That covers nearly everything I want to say about the episode. One last thing: I don't know if it's just me, but Rainbow Dash's "Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!" at the end seemed REALLY forced to me. It was a fandom shout-out for sure, but if just seemed really forced, and unnecessary.
Verdict*: An episode with some very interesting, and amazing ideas for characters, and overall plot which was offset by cheesy scenarios, and pacing issues.
7/10**
*Not really since most of the above was more about talking than reviewing, but I figured I'd chuck out a score anyways
**Slight guide for my rating mentality: 5 - Mysterious Mare-Do-Well ; 10 - A Canterlot Wedding. I've yet to run into a MLP episode I want to rate below a 5, and I'd be very cross if I ever ran into one!
EDIT: Oh my sweet god, that turned out way longer than I thought.
Someone had better read it! I spent an hour typing all of this!
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