When Rarity shows them their new dresses, it’s neat that the dresses are kept in shadow, with only the boots and a hem shown directly. It makes their reveal at the fashion show that much funnier. As Spike bursts in and explains that he mentioned Rarity’s fashion show to Hoighty Toighty, I was wondering, was he doing that as a favour to Rarity due to his crush on her? Said crush was established in the pilot, but I don’t really see any direct reference to it in this episode, so I’m not sure if that was why. Perhaps he was just passionate about sharing what his friends were doing. When Rarity hears about it, she could have asked the others to wear the original dresses, just for the show – but I suppose that would have involved putting down their dresses, and revealing that she wasn’t really happy with them.

Hoighty Toighty, as he arrives at the fashion show, is interesting. A part of Canterlot high society, a fashion business bigwig, but also an Earth pony. Either the class structure is less stratified along unicorn/pegasus/earth pony lines than we often think (although the show regularly supports that type of stratification), or he’s somewhat of a rags-to-riches story, a bit like what Rarity aspires to. As the show begins, Spike gets to play his favourite role and be the announcer, and I have to grin as he just goes a bit overboard. It’s a show being held by a small fashion parlour in a small town – even if it’s near to Canterlot, it’s not really going to be anything like as prestigious as Spike’s making out, and there’s only 5 outfits being shown off. I’m not very familiar with fashion shows, but surely just 5 isn’t very much? So it’s hardly going to be the day of all days when the “perfect pony gown” finally arrives. And as we see the garish dresses finally revealed, they’re absolutely fantastically made – that is, in order to demonstrate by juxtaposition just how good Rarity’s original dresses were by comparison. I wouldn’t know what sort of clothes are fashionable vs unfashionable (except for a vague awareness that damaging jeans is still seemingly all the rage despite going on like that for what must be more than a decade at this point), so this episode does a good job of making it clear and obvious even for viewers that don’t know a thing about fashionability. However, I will say, Pinkie’s dress didn’t come out looking too bad. All things considered, I think it’s the best looking one of the bunch. Twilight’s “oh dear” moment is absolutely perfect. I love the idea that Twilight can get so wrapped up in technical details, and then suddenly have a rush of clarity and social awareness. Spike’s obliviousness and the crowd’s reactions are hard to sit through, I’m glad it fades away before too long.

Rarity’s dramatic shutting herself away is hilarious and some more great characterisation, I love it. I also love the concern all five of them show – this episode isn’t just a great Rarity character episode, we get a lot of great interactions between all of the Mane 6, and get a better sense of how they work as a friend group outside of adventures. Just one thing puzzles me – how do they get the dress out of Rarity’s room? Twilight could probably magic it away, but wouldn’t Rarity notice? Ah well, it doesn’t matter too much. Poor Opal is clearly terrified, though it is a funny way to get Rarity to come out.