Well, tbh, it's an ambivalence. The story was done for the most part fine. On Spike's end, it feels very organic and realistic of a young kid to grow out of a crush like that. On Rarity's end, she's in character enough, she's been way worse in her pettiness and her selfish side. In fact I got a bit of a kick out of her being suddenly so possessive on Spike. Albeit with a moderate weirdness of a relationship that was previously defined in terms of of an unrequited love on one end and one of at worst a child she took advantage of and a best one she humored and found could be a help at times. Still, Rarity's fondness for him seems very equal, as if he wasn't a child. It feels slightly off to me. As for Sparity? Was it a good closure? Organically as a child losing a crush without much fan fare feels pretty realistic but the problem comes from a plot standpoint. It isn't so much closure as much as something that they just swept under the rug. Yet where was Sparity to go? It rarely came up as more than a gag and even in Spike and Rarity episodes outside of Secret of My Excess it was just there without changing its status much. Yes, Rarity and Spike's friendship evolved, but not the crush. Now where is one to go with it? In my personal opinion, Sparity would make hard to happen without being kinda creepy. Arguably from a storytelling perspective real life 100% is the most boring way to end a plot thread (but still has some value with lessons). My thoughts on the best way to end it would be to have it fully tackled with Spike being the one learning the lesson that he couldn't be with her and it changing fully to a healthy friendship. Though I must say I'm not sure I'm willing to call it a bad ending having Spike just simply grow out of it isn't offensively bad and makes sense with real world logic. Yet I have found myself yet another angle of attack with the fact that Spike itself acknowledging it/the episode being about Spike realizing that he doesn't have a thing for Rarity would be a far cooler plot point!
One other thing I forgot to mention in my wall of text is how well I think Gabby fits here. IDK what to say but Gabby befriending Spike isn't something that would come to mind yet felt so natural to me. Heck, Gabby felt more realized as a character then most the Student 6. Yet the reason for this could just as be that we've know her a little longer and that student 6 have much more hinted at and needing for exploration then a simple minor regular. There was a lot of elements I liked in this episode TBH.
How do I rate this? I actually enjoyed it most of the time. I think though from a storytelling closure perspective it failed. I also think the POV should be on Spike not Rarity for both storytelling and the purposes of a stronger more powerful lesson. Problem is I never was invested in Sparity. Yet it is still as something they ran with that I think you can make a case they could still have acknowledged better then this.
My rating is:
Mindless pony episode:7.3/10
As a resolution to Sparity: 5.9/10
