LE deleted parts

What did I expect from this episode? An actual fucking 40-60 minute special.
Let's also look at the title "Luna Eclipsed" I expected an eclipse with an effect. Perhaps the eclipse raises up Luna's powers in unexpected ways, Luna exaggerates with her powers and completely modifies ponyville and the townsponies.
Anyone reading this ever watched Tutenstein? The egyptian pharaoh show with the little zombie pharaoh stuck in modern times and he tries to make it more like his home by turning everything into pyramids and sand.
Instead Luna Eclipsed gives me a huge load of nothing and on top of that nothing they add this obnoxious self-parodic comedy which I can't laugh at. But it seems like bronies enjoy having the comedy cover up for the lack of story, plot, characters, overall substance.

I have a few... ideas which a Halloween episode could use.
Perhaps the castle from G1 Midnight Castle ressurects together with Tirek. (Maybe the mane6 change into their G1 counterpaths, rather than meeting them)
Luna is stuck as Nightmare Moon and has to defeat her doppelganger posing as Luna.
Perhaps just a relaxing slice-of-life sandbox episode like an anime Beach episode, but it's Halloween themed. (Or 10 minutes of SoL with 10 minutes of adventure).
Maybe Twilight gets trapped in time as a ghost and Luna & co have to save her, whilst learning about the traditions and history of Halloween for each culture. (the EI rating originally demanded MLP to be educational, hence later in season 2 they got rid of the EI along with the ending's moral lessons)
An average cliche episode would be Luna scarying the mane6, they would have day-dream sequences imagining that Luna is still evil and tries to turn Ponyville into a zombie town. It was all a surprise party at a haunted mansion. Don't judge the cover of the book negatively. The end.


An actual good story which doesn't have to rely on just specific Halloween elements. Perhaps in this episode they learn about Canterlot's history, egyptian gods, evil mane6.
Or remove Luna and make the mane6 tell spooky stories to each other. There's plenty of ideas which can't be told in just 1 episode.
If I ever make my own cartoon... then I'll devote a part of the budget entirely to 13 episodes of Hallow's Eve.

What I really wanted to see was a very well executed freeform episode. Luna or Twilight could give Pinkie Pie pegasus wings to compete with Rainbow Dash for candy. Fluttershy could have her personality modified. Twilight could act more bitchy and fun, the ponies could overall be more charming and at their top game. They could switch personalities all around in here. Rainbow Dash could join the Shadowbolts for a brief time. Pinkamena could return.
All sorts of ideas which can fit in the world design just by using Luna's magic.

Originally it never crossed my mind to put Luna in a Halloween episode, because I don't relate the night necessarily to Halloween, I don't relate spooky and nightmare elements to Halloween. I also don't relate Luna to the night, she could appear in daytime all she wants. For me it should be a festive party where you have fun. It shouldn't be specifically be about remembering the dead and how many horror cliches you can cram in.
Otherwise we can consider every episode of shows like Billy and Mandy, Courage the Cowardly Dog, Addam's Family, a halloween special cartoon in itself.

A Luna/Halloween combo could have made for a good episode, but season 2 takes the simplest concepts like Lesson Zero and turns them into a mish mash of everything but the kitchen sink. It's like burning orange juice, you have to be anti-talent to screw it up that badly.
Anyway nevermind about the Halloween episode. Luna was suppose to be a recurring character through the whole season. Instead Zecora gets more appearances and roles than Luna.
Luna got treated as a guest character, a one-shot one-trick horse.

I imagined Luna's first episode as a slice of life introductory episode where she races with Rainbow Dash, bakes and jokes with Pinkie, talks pretentiously with Rarity, basically a capable all-encompassing personality. This is a very realistic and average episode typical of MLP's character-driven focused episodes. I didn't ask for much. I wanted Luna to be like that lovable cute mary sue who always changes the dynamic of the episode and automatically improves ten fold the dynamic of the mane6 and the way they deal with monsters and problems.