In all honesty: whatever is wrong with Applejack.
(Also, whatever is right with her)
What I’m about to tell is, actually, obvious, but for some reason it was never mentioned in any Applejack analysis I’ve ever seen: Applejack ain’t honest.
For whatever reason, the creators of the show have decided, that honesty is an important part of the magic of friendship and gave that trait to Applejack. And then… they failed to establish it.
You remember the second part of the pilot episode: a big part of it was spent to five scenes establishing elements of harmony as traits of Mane Six. BronyCurious (I believe) stated in his analysis of the episode that it just wasn’t enough time to do it properly. In general, I can only agree with him, but going into details we can see that not each of those five scenes suffered from time limit equally.
In my opinion Fluttershy’s kindness and Rainbow Dash’s loyalty were revealed decently. Maybe, they could be revealed even better with more screentime, but they were already good enough.
Pinkie’s laughter and Rarity’s generosity weren’t revealed as fortunate as those mentioned above. But in these cases writers still managed to make a turn with help of healthy self-irony, though. I mean Twily’s reaction when Pinkie (for the first but not last time) broke into song: “Tell me, she’s not!” - “Yes, she i-is!” Or Dashie’s final statement in sea serpent scene: moustache would grow back!
BTW, great scene though: ridiculous on one hoof and hilarious on other. It’s a useful tactic: if you are landed in an awkward situation, be the first who laughs. That way others will laugh with you, not at you. That’s exactly what writers did there.
But the attempt to reveal Applejack’s honesty was a complete fail. When Applejack started to talk about “honest truth” many viewers said: “What?! What does honest truth have to do with anything happening in this scene?!” But this was expected. We all know that honesty is valued as such only then, when revealing the truth has consequences you better avoid. So, to show honesty, we need those consequences. This means we need another conflict. Ergo, we need whole another subplot, which has to be developed throughout several scenes. And there lack of screentime strikes!
Not being established properly, the element of honesty never appears further in the show. No, really: Applejack isn’t particularly honest. She lies occasionally, as we all do, and for the usual reasons. What’s really bad is that she sometimes lies to herself. That is the farthest thing from honesty you can ever have. Sad but true. Furthermore, as soon as in the first season we have several episodes built upon Mane Six being in their elements. We have Rarity being generous in “Suited for success”, we have Fluttershy being kind in “Bird in the hoof”, we have Pinkie Pie being full of laughter in “Griffon the brush off”. We even have an episode, where those elements came into collision: “Green isn’t your colour”.
But we have not a single episode - not in the first season, nor in the whole entire show - where Applejack's honesty would be the driving force of the story. In the contrary, we have two episodes where the main conflict is generated by Applejack’s lying: to her friends in “Last roundup” and to herself in “Applejack season”.
Well, it’s perfectly understandable: honesty has been number one priority in children’s didactics for the last nine thousand years. After all, parents and teachers don’t want children to lie to THEM. But it means there’re already too many stories out there that teach children value of honesty. Also, let’s admit it: honesty isn’t most valuable virtue in a real adult life. At some point we all have to learn when and how it is appropriate to lie. So once again, it’s perfectly understandable if the creators of the show don’t really want to address this issue.
What I can’t understand then is why in Celestia’s name they’ve chosen the trait they have no interest in exploiting further whatsoever?!
Thank Celestia Applejack has another trait we love her for. It’s her reliability. She is very supportive and always tries to be reliable to her friends. Right from start, in the beginning of “FiM, Pt.2” she says: “She ain’t no spy! But she sure knows what’s going on, don’t you, Twilight?” With that one sentence she admits Twilight importance, reveals it to others, asks Twilight to trust them and offers her support. Later on she refuses to leave Twilight alone in Everfree Forest. In “Ticket Master” all five try to bribe Twilight for the extra ticket but only Applejack tries to give Twilight what she actually needs at the moment: food. And in the end she is the first who apologises. In “Dragonshy”, when Twilight decides to stick to the plan and bring Fluttershy along, Applejack takes care of the matter without questions. And later on Applejack saves Twilight in avalanche. Not to mention “Applejack season”. This list can go on and on, but there is one another example of Applejack’s supportiveness I’d like to mention. I will do it another tome, though, when I’ll talk about “Boast Busters”.
The final question is: why creators of the show didn’t make reliability Applejack’s element of harmony? It would fit perfectly, wouldn’t it?
What I’m about to tell is, actually, obvious, but for some reason it was never mentioned in any Applejack analysis I’ve ever seen: Applejack ain’t honest.
For whatever reason, the creators of the show have decided, that honesty is an important part of the magic of friendship and gave that trait to Applejack. And then… they failed to establish it.
You remember the second part of the pilot episode: a big part of it was spent to five scenes establishing elements of harmony as traits of Mane Six. BronyCurious (I believe) stated in his analysis of the episode that it just wasn’t enough time to do it properly. In general, I can only agree with him, but going into details we can see that not each of those five scenes suffered from time limit equally.
In my opinion Fluttershy’s kindness and Rainbow Dash’s loyalty were revealed decently. Maybe, they could be revealed even better with more screentime, but they were already good enough.
Pinkie’s laughter and Rarity’s generosity weren’t revealed as fortunate as those mentioned above. But in these cases writers still managed to make a turn with help of healthy self-irony, though. I mean Twily’s reaction when Pinkie (for the first but not last time) broke into song: “Tell me, she’s not!” - “Yes, she i-is!” Or Dashie’s final statement in sea serpent scene: moustache would grow back!
BTW, great scene though: ridiculous on one hoof and hilarious on other. It’s a useful tactic: if you are landed in an awkward situation, be the first who laughs. That way others will laugh with you, not at you. That’s exactly what writers did there.
But the attempt to reveal Applejack’s honesty was a complete fail. When Applejack started to talk about “honest truth” many viewers said: “What?! What does honest truth have to do with anything happening in this scene?!” But this was expected. We all know that honesty is valued as such only then, when revealing the truth has consequences you better avoid. So, to show honesty, we need those consequences. This means we need another conflict. Ergo, we need whole another subplot, which has to be developed throughout several scenes. And there lack of screentime strikes!
Not being established properly, the element of honesty never appears further in the show. No, really: Applejack isn’t particularly honest. She lies occasionally, as we all do, and for the usual reasons. What’s really bad is that she sometimes lies to herself. That is the farthest thing from honesty you can ever have. Sad but true. Furthermore, as soon as in the first season we have several episodes built upon Mane Six being in their elements. We have Rarity being generous in “Suited for success”, we have Fluttershy being kind in “Bird in the hoof”, we have Pinkie Pie being full of laughter in “Griffon the brush off”. We even have an episode, where those elements came into collision: “Green isn’t your colour”.
But we have not a single episode - not in the first season, nor in the whole entire show - where Applejack's honesty would be the driving force of the story. In the contrary, we have two episodes where the main conflict is generated by Applejack’s lying: to her friends in “Last roundup” and to herself in “Applejack season”.
Well, it’s perfectly understandable: honesty has been number one priority in children’s didactics for the last nine thousand years. After all, parents and teachers don’t want children to lie to THEM. But it means there’re already too many stories out there that teach children value of honesty. Also, let’s admit it: honesty isn’t most valuable virtue in a real adult life. At some point we all have to learn when and how it is appropriate to lie. So once again, it’s perfectly understandable if the creators of the show don’t really want to address this issue.
What I can’t understand then is why in Celestia’s name they’ve chosen the trait they have no interest in exploiting further whatsoever?!
Thank Celestia Applejack has another trait we love her for. It’s her reliability. She is very supportive and always tries to be reliable to her friends. Right from start, in the beginning of “FiM, Pt.2” she says: “She ain’t no spy! But she sure knows what’s going on, don’t you, Twilight?” With that one sentence she admits Twilight importance, reveals it to others, asks Twilight to trust them and offers her support. Later on she refuses to leave Twilight alone in Everfree Forest. In “Ticket Master” all five try to bribe Twilight for the extra ticket but only Applejack tries to give Twilight what she actually needs at the moment: food. And in the end she is the first who apologises. In “Dragonshy”, when Twilight decides to stick to the plan and bring Fluttershy along, Applejack takes care of the matter without questions. And later on Applejack saves Twilight in avalanche. Not to mention “Applejack season”. This list can go on and on, but there is one another example of Applejack’s supportiveness I’d like to mention. I will do it another tome, though, when I’ll talk about “Boast Busters”.
The final question is: why creators of the show didn’t make reliability Applejack’s element of harmony? It would fit perfectly, wouldn’t it?