Mlp Canterlot Boutique Review

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Canterlot Boutique has the kind of premise that I have been waiting for, for a long time. Rarity has always had greater ambitions for her career in fashion and the question has always been up in the air as to how she might achieve those goals when she is stuck at ponyville.

Well worry not dear readers because we have a story premise that just oozes potential. Rarity is setting up a second branch in Canterlot with a new business partner, at long last we will get a kids show that will unapologetically take a look at entrepreneurs beyond the simple lemonade stand. We will finally have a chance for a kids show to look not only at casual relationships but at business ones as well (which is rather important given how much our lives will generally be spent in the company of fellow employees).

Ooh... wait... sorry.. it seems that all that is being thrown out of the window. Apparently there’s not enough space in the script, because it’s all being taken up by Rarity’s ego.

Narrative dissonance... The times when the narrative of a story is dissonant with something else... In the case of Canterlot Boutique I find the focus on creativity to generally be incongruous with the setting it is taking part in. The fundamental issue at the core of this episode is a fundamental mismanagement of supply. By opening a branch (in the wealthy capital)  with distinct products, Rarity is clearly setting herself up for a huge increase in demand for distinct products. Whilst I can understand how she might feel overwhelmed when she tries to meet this sudden jump (and change) in demand.. the issue isn’t a creative one, it’s a business one.



Perhaps we should look at the “rules of Rarity”, to take another look at this:

“The rules of Rarity, guaranteed quality

This I can assure

For each and every dress

I vow to give finesse

With time, love, and couture”

Fair enough. These rules make enough sense. Good quality products done to specification. Pretty feasible. Makes sense.

“My favorite moment's when a pony sees it

That special gown that she just adores

That pony's now in style

My hard work's all worthwhile

Oh, yes, it makes my heart

My heart just soar”

Oh dear.. I think it’s fair to say that this is what Rarity enjoys in her profession, rather than these being rules of her business.

On that note though. If you are setting up a branch in another city. You won’t see when you give the dress to someone. You won’t see them being in style. You won’t get that feeling that it’s all worthwhile.

Basically, the reasons you are in this business are not congruent with the business decisions you have made.

“The rules of Rarity, just a parody

No dress here's unique

The panels all the same

Each colored windowpane

I fashion only makes me want to shriek!

Erm no. The actual rules are actually pretty good. The problem is that you are doing this for the wrong reasons and you have a huge issue with supply.

No dress is going to be unique because that’s the way you are doing this. If you wanted every dress to be unique then you shouldn’t have adopted this business model.




So yeah... the business model might be fundamentally mismanaged and this certainly doesn’t help Rarity... but the focus is mostly on Rarity’s motivations behind being a dress maker. So let’s talk about that.

As we saw above, Rarity is foolishly doing this venture. She relishes the personal touch but she is starting a very impersonal new franchise. The conflict of the episode is that Rarity is not happy with her own business decisions. Where things start to tear, is the way Rarity and the episode seem to look at this issue.

If Rarity has fundamentally misjudged her venture or her own character. Then it should clearly be her who should be doing the growing. However.. The episode seems to try to frame Sassy Saddles as the ‘bad guy’ or cause of Rarity’s discomfort and it frames her who needs to do the growing.

The problem with this is that Sassy Saddles is actually doing her job pretty well and her only ‘flaw’ is selling only one of the dresses. It feels like the episode and Rarity are just projecting their problems onto a mostly innocent co-worker.

This creates what really irks me about this episode. Rarity is a projecting, egocentric jerk. She has put herself into a corner where she’s not happy. So therefore it must be the fault of those around her. It must be ‘them’ who change. 'I’m upset, so therefore the whole world must move around me.'

It through this lense that Rarity really starts to look like a bit of a brat. In the song, Rarity sees her rules as polluted when her business partner, who is there to market her dresses, markets one of her dresses. When she’s had enough, she just pulls the whole venture down, without much consideration or discussion with Sassy Saddles. Wanting to stop for personal reasons is fine.. but you really should show some respect to your business partner who has put so much work into this venture.

Or to make an analogy. When Rarity found that giving her toys for someone else to use, was not so fun as using them herself. She decided to take all the toys and to leave the playground. But what makes this distasteful, Is how Rarity rationalizes this.  The toys weren’t good anymore, the other kid was using them wrong, I am a great person and you are holding me back.

Not being happy with a situation, isn’t the problem. It’s how you handle it that matters. Rarity and the episode obsesses about her creativity, about her ‘rules’, how she feels, me me me me me. Whist at the same time being very callous and cruel to Sassy Saddles who, to most intents and purposes, did nothing wrong.


It’s a great shame too, because this story could have almost been about both Sassy Saddles and Rarity trying to work together to start the branch. Sassy Saddles in the original episode is given hardly any breathing room, she just does boutique stuff for act 1-2 and has a tacked on redemption for act 3. As with the Luna episode prior, the show almost goes out of it’s way to make our two lead characters not interact on any meaningful level. It just does the same hollow story structure, of having a status quo for two thirds of the story, before everything gets wrapped up in the end. It’s such a great shame because there’s so much room to explore so much with this premise.. Sassy Saddles and Rarity could’ve had creative differences, they could’ve tried to work together, find a solution where both of them are happy... in there is a great interpersonal story just waiting to be told.. instead.. the member of the master race was unhappy.. it was the plebs fault.. and the pleb must learn from their wrong doing and accept the church of friendship...


But beyond the main ‘arc’ (where Sassy Saddles did nothing, but had to ‘learn’, to placate Rarity’s issues). What else was there?

Well.. generally speaking the episode felt like a bit of a mess in terms of pacing. As mentioned before. It suffers from the same ‘2 acts faffing, last act resolving’ story structure. Sequences, particularly at the beginning, feel almost completely superfluous. There’s no real need to have all of the Main 6 come along to the boutique, or to show us the stuff before that...

The song was.. alright. Not a particularly memorable melody line and it’s mostly sing-talking  but at least the lyrics seem to have more care put into them than most of the songs as of late (it’s no way near as bad as stuff like  “Here's a parasol to hide you from the heat” which the VA had to gabble out really fast), a simple pitter patter, talking song...


So.. conclusions...

I think that this episode went about the theme of creativity the wrong way. It emanates a sense self of entitlement and self righteousness that I felt rather put off by. Being creative is great and everything.. but earning a living is arguably more important... Being a good person to others and handling your own issues is also rather important. If you’re a creative person, you have to balance all of these things.. and it’s tragic for the episode to have a premise that raises all of these points, only for the writing to mostly focus on only one of them.

Overall the episode has the same writing issues that are plaguing this show. A lackluster 3 act structure, putting everything off to the end, stupid gags and the pony master race.

Oh.. Sassy Saddles. You had both the moral and legal high ground and you threw it all away... When Rarity tried to ‘go out of business’ you should’ve sued her arse for hundreds of thousands of bits. Because not only were they not going out of business.. she has put a lot of work into this venture and she has done nothing wrong to really warrant this response.

© 2015 - 2024 byter75
Comments23
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As much as I hate the episode, there's something about the way you word it that seems odd.

For one thing, you say that Rarity was showing no consideration. ...How? While we're on the subject of no consideration, what about the fact that Sassy Saddles put her name on everything, constantly referring to the place as her boutique? What about the irrational business decisions? (Taking a hundred orders for a dress on the grand opening day? Advertising a dress while naming it (without any hoof in making it I might add)? Despite the fact that Rarity says that she would like to choose the name herself?) Rarity practically put together the whole business herself (Made the necessary connections, earned all the money for the property, made EACH AND EVERY DRESS to sell, etc.).

Rarity wasn't upset because she was being held back; she was upset because her passion was turned into a factory, something that she did not want to be a part of. What Rarity wanted was to make sure every pony got something worthwhile, something that she enjoyed making for others. Sassy was more concerned with not "be[ing] part of another failed boutique". If she needed that job so much, why did it have to be Rarity's passion to project onto? And that's another thing: How was Rarity projecting any more than Sassy Saddles? Sassy was just using Rarity's business to make herself feel successful. Sassy didn't care for creativity like Rarity did (however lackluster Rarity's "creativity" is). While Rarity, on the other hoof, meant to put all her hard work, passion, and skill into the dresses and making sure the customers liked them. Sassy couldn't realize that she was sacrificing Rarity's principles for success.

Sassy is lucky that Rarity is (somehow) the element of generosity, or else she would be without a job.