Amusingly, my mother watched the episode (a fan of the series) and abhorred this one. Her main statement being “he looks like he came from 70’s knock off cartoon.”

@Scpx  
It’s a regular dragon appearing in the series.

Yeah, they only happened in season 1 with Red and red no2 aka “green”.  
@Starswirl  
Correction: that’s a classic medieval dragon

@cheezedoodle  
@Derpy Whooves  
Thank you both.

@Background Pony #C95F  
That is an actual dragon.

@Derpy Whooves  
Okay?  
That dragon disguise was meant to look ridiculous and fake, now we‘re at the point were actual dragons look like that.

@Derpy Whooves  
Well in the off-chance you come back, i don’t think it’s about being drawn right as much as it is about being designed impressively.

@PonyPon  
Where things like making sure that fantasy characters are drawn “right” for a cartoon is concerned, there really is only one lesson.
 

 
It’s pretty universal. For me, it works for lots of stuff like this.
 
I’d love to chat about it more, but someone else desperately needs my attention about something that seems super important to them, so I must focus on that for a bit. Might be a while.

@Derpy Whooves  
Wasn’t Crackle a deliberately silly looking dragon we haven’t seen anything comparable to, used for a momentary gag?
 
What lesson was supposed to be learned?

@PonyPon  
Yet the lesson wasn’t learned.

@Derpy Whooves  
That’s already been posted.
 
@cheezedoodle  
One of those ones that remind me of a HTTYD design.

Hey, guys … what’s going on in this thread?
 

Would like a word:
 

@Starswirl  
Not to mention chubbier characters can be a bit more difficult to animate compared to slimmer ones at times.

@Background Pony #3541  
They’re Flash Animation. You save on work by reusing the same model. That’s why many background ponies are clones of each other. Any unusual design requires additional work. It’s literally the opposite of what you said, I’m afraid.

The season 1 wyrms were likely to difficult to animate being more intricate designs, teeth and slender body. Fat basic dragons with simple designs are much more cost efficient.

@Chuy Ryu  
Yup. There is nothing good that will come of the episode.

@mjangelvortex  
Yeah, it’s about 5 hours away and the tags “spoiler:s08e24” and “Father Knows Beast” haven’t been connected yet.

@Dogman15  
That’s today’s episode? I didn’t even know that. I thought we were getting a different one today.

@mjangelvortex  
Well, we’re going to find out in just a few hours.

@Background Pony #A422  
I don’t care about the ages of the dragons. The point I (and Starswirl) are trying to make is these types of dragons aren’t a new occurance.
 
I honestly think Garble’s design is both goofy and ugly and is a poor example of a badass looking dragon. I never really got a serious or sleek vibe like I did with Ember and Smolder because I think his head and snout shape look really off.
 
This new character is implied to be his father. He may very well not be his dad.

@Background Pony #A422  
I’m not trying to convince ponies to like it. I’m merely pointing out that “goofy” dragon designs aren’t new, nor would it be strange for Spike’s relative to have one.

It does seem really weird that his father’s design isn’t hugh, which leaves me to beleive this isn’t his realy father