My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic - Episode Twenty Five

As season one draws to a close, the final two episodes both focus on parties.  The last episode is set at the Grand Galloping Gala (finally!) and here, Pinkie Pie finds she may have overdone it with the parties.

Party of One
Twilight Sparkle's studies are interrupted by the arrival of Pinkie Pie, who is delivering a singing telegram-style invitation to a party for her pet alligator Gummy's birthday.  She does the same for each of her friends, but with different costumes, leaving her pretty darn exhausted when all is said and done.  The actual party is a rousing success, though not without a few snags: Applejack and Rainbow Dash each find a "surprise" while bobbing for apples, Rarity gets grossed out by Gummy-flavored punch (me too), and Fluttershy and Twilight Sparkle fall victim to Pinkie Pie's crazy dance moves.  Still, everyone has a good time and praises Pinkie's party techniques.  As the party draws to a close, Twilight Sparkle tells Pinkie Pie they should do this again soon...
The next day, Twilight is woken by a knock at the door.  It seems that Pinkie Pie took her comment to mean "have another party today", and has a "Gummy's after-birthday" party planned for that afternoon.  Twilight begs off, saying she needs to hit the books, and Pinkie understands, though she recommends reading the books rather than hitting them.  Applejack similarly turns her down, claiming she has a lot of apple-picking to do, and while Pinkie Pie is slightly less understanding, she still lets the farmpony off the hook.  Rarity, to get out of going, dunks her head in the trash Spike just took out for her, just to give her "I have to wash my hair" excuse some credence.  And Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy come up with an elaborate excuse about housesitting for a bear named Harry who likes to go to the beach to collect shells and play volleyball.

Back at Sugar Cube Corner, Pinkie Pie thinks over her friends' various excuses, but before she can dwell on them too much, she spots Twilight Sparkle sneaking around.  Seeing her friend enter the shop, Pinkie Pie sends down a tin can to eavesdrop, and overhears Twilight making a covert pick up from Mrs. Cake, specifically mentioning not to tell Pinkie Pie.  As Twilight sneaks out and around town, Pinkie Pie follows after her, Gummy in tow.  She dons groucho glasses as a disguise, but soon feels the need to up her game.
Meanwhile, Twilight Sparkle reaches her destination and passes the box off to Rarity.  They mention not wanting Pinkie Pie to "ruin everything," and then part ways.  Rarity bundles the box into her tail and slinks away, all seen by Pinkie, now disguised as a bale of hay (with groucho glasses).  Rarity in turn meets up with Fluttershy, unaware of Haybob Piepants observing the whole thing.  She overhears them talking about how they had to make excuses to miss her party, and how what they're doing will be so much better, as long as Pinkie doesn't find out.  Fluttershy takes the box and heads in Haybob's direction.  Pinkie tries to get out of the way, but bumps into Fluttershy, freaking her out, and the pegasus takes off.

As Pinkie Pie, still dressed as Haybob, gets bummed out about her friends dissing her party, Rainbow Dash passes by, not fooled for an instant, though she forgets she's supposed to be avoiding Pinkie Pie momentarily, and takes off herself once she realizes it.  Pinkie Pie follows, and uses the same get-there-first powers she used back in Griffon the Brush-Off to trail Rainbow Dash no matter where she goes, demanding to know what's going on.  Finally Rainbow Dash makes a break for Applejack's barn, managing to get in just before Pinkie Pie, leaving Applejack to deal with the now-irate pony.
Applejack does her best to keep Pinkie Pie from coming into the barn, claiming that there's renovations going on, even though the "construction noises" are obviously just being made by the other ponies.  Eventually Applejack just slams the door on Pinkie's head to keep her from looking.  Pinkie Pie doesn't buy it for a second, but she finally leaves, and the others breathe a sigh of relief.

Not one to give up, Pinkie Pie knows that there's still someone who can tell her what everyone is up to and why they won't tell her: Spike.  She invites him to Sugar Cube Corner and offers him a big plate of jewels.  But before she hands it over, she pulls out a spotlight and has Gummy clamp Spike's tail.  "All you have to do is talk," she tells him, and so Spike starts talking about the weather.  So Pinkie Pie clarifies: talk about the other ponies.  And Spike does, describing each member of the mane cast.  So Pinkie has to clarify again: CONFESS!  Spike cracks under the pressure and confesses to spilling juice on one of Twilight's books.  And using up all the hot water.  And talking to himself in the mirror.
None of this is what Pinkie Pie's looking for, and she loses her cool, freaking Spike out.  He tells her to just tell him what she wants to hear, so she does: "Tell me that my friends are all lying to me and avoiding me because they don't like my parties and they don't want to be my friends anymore!"  And he does.  At first, Pinkie Pie feels vindicated, but as the meaning of those words sink in, her hairstyle suddenly deflates, leaving her absolutely crestfallen.  Spike, no clue what he's just done, simply chows down on the promised gems.
Never one to give up the chance to party, Pinkie Pie simply makes some new friends, literally in this case.  Rather than inviting some of the many background ponies, Pinkie Pie instead put together a gathering of objects for her guests: Mr. Turnips, Rocky, Mme. Leflour, and Sir Lintsalot.  She treats them as if they were animate guests, speaking for them and getting them punch and cake, though doing so gives her a terrible twitch.  As the party goes on, she begins to slip deeper and deeper in the world she's created, until it seems that the "guests" are speaking on their own, disparaging her old friends and convincing her to never talk to them ever again.

Which is when Rainbow Dash shows up, inviting Pinkie Pie down to Sweet Apple Acres.  But with Pinkie Pie still riled up, she not only refuses, she starts talking for her guests, weirding Dash out.  But Dash persists, hoping that getting Pinkie Pie out of the room will bring her back to her senses.  Instead, Pinkie Pie positions her new "friends" to oppose Rainbow Dash, and Rainbow Dash even starts talking back when Rocky calls her a chump.  Seeing that even she's started to succumb, Rainbow Dash stops asking and starts telling Pinkie Pie to come, but Pinkie Pie is having none of it, even sitting on Dash's head at one point.  After that, Dash's patience is completely used up, and she just drags Pinkie all the way to Sweet Apple Acres.
As the barn door swings open, Pinkie Pie coldly regards her former friends as they yell out "Surprise!"  They're the ones surprised when Pinkie just glares at them in response.  It seems that in her now-twisted psyche, her friends have decided to throw her a farewell party to officially kick her out of the mane cast.  She confronts them about how they've been lying to her and avoiding her all day, but no one is particularly sympathetic, since surprise parties have to have an element of subterfuge in order work, and she, party maven that she is, should know that already.  Rarity explains that they'd been planning the party for too long to put it off for another, and Twilight points out the cake she picked up earlier that says "Happy Birthday Pinkie Pie" on it.
Surveying the evidence (gifts, banners, the cake), Pinkie Pie finally realizes that her friends threw her a surprise birthday party, and her hairstyle poofs out again in happiness.  She wonders how she could have doubted their friendship so easily, but the others forgive her.  With everything as it should be, the party starts in earnest, and Twilight Sparkle drafts her letter to the princess.  This time around, the lesson is "always expect the best from your friends, not the worst."  As the ponies conga, Pinkie suggests they incorporate Gummy's after-birthday party into her party, so he won't feel left out.  Not a problem, everyone agrees.

One thing that really bugged me about this episode, once it became clear that Pinkie Pie's friends were throwing her a surprise party, and weren't just "partied out," is why didn't they think to have someone distract her.  Even if they all needed to help set up the party, they could have had the Cakes set her up with some "deliveries" or something.  I mean, even the G3 ponies knew enough to have Pinkie Pie distracted while setting up a birthday surprise.  But then, of course, we wouldn't have seen the Spike interrogation scene or Pinkie Pie's descent into madness, both of which make this episode worth watching.
It also kind of bugs me that, unlike in the last episode, no one apologizes for the miscommunication.  Even if it was a means to an end, the other ponies did make Pinkie Pie feel pretty rotten.  And how did she forget her own birthday?  As into parties as she is, it should have been at the top of her list.   And is it just me, or is Gummy kind of creepy?  While I like the continuity of seeing him again, I really didn't need to see him as much as I did here.

Misc. Screenshots
Dash draws a watch
Sir Lintsalot
There's that twitch again
Spike dancing with Rarity?