Hello Derpibooru, my old friend~  
I’ve come to draw for you again~
 
Welcome back to my Season 8 Homework Assignments. This week’s comic is based on Sounds of Silence. Well, we’ve got another map episode, following a Mane 6 pairing for the first time since Season 6! …It’s a pairing we’ve already seen, and right at the end of the season, meaning the other 4 are being shortchanged here, but whatever, I’ll still take it. Best Tree’s probably trying to focus more on results and less on patterns these days, which I can respect I suppose. …It’s so funny how much more I can connect to and understand the decisions made by the map and Best Tree just because of the last episode. (and yes, I intend to continue calling the Tree of Harmony “Best Tree”. Because it is.)
 
We get to add yet another species onto the pile of sapient races in MLP, which is always nice. (inb4 Kirin student at School of Friendship) In particular, I’ve always found characters that don’t talk to be really cool, communicating mostly through expressions and gestures and still being understood and acknowledged by the groups they are a part of; it’s really unique to see and allows for some creative storytelling when done correctly… and yeah, that wasn’t the route this episode was going at all, but it would’ve been neat if it was. The episode’s still… fine, for what it is, and of course the song was great.
 
When I found out that the episode would involve Fluttershy travelling to a society of mutes, this was the first thing that popped into my head. In case you’re not sure what’s going on, back in season 1, when Fluttershy was babysitting the Cutie Mark Crusaders, she challenged them to a quiet game as a thinly veiled excuse to shut them up, and claimed that she was the world champion at it. Like pretty much every random line of dialogue from season 1, the fandom at the time took it very seriously, and did stuff like draw Fluttershy with trophies and write fanfics where Fluttershy goes to an entire tournament for being quiet, it was great. So I figured she might try to defend her title here. Don’t be surprised if she doesn’t talk in my comics for a while, for reasons I mentioned in both this and the previous paragraph.
 
Hope you all have your voices heard, regardless of whether an actual voice is used or not! Looking forward to the next episode!
 
Applejack, Fluttershy, and My Little Pony belong to Hasbro and DHX.