My husband and I sailed for our honeymoon on the EC Fantasy in September, and we chose to skip Pirate Night when we dined at Palo. This was one of the best decisions we made the entire cruise. Not only was Pirate Night crowded, but I was extremely dissatisfied with the menu choices as well. Our reservations were from 7:30 to 9:30 and it allowed us to skip the crowds, enjoy a fantastic dinner, and still leave us ample time to make our way up to see the fireworks.
As far as which individual restaurant to skip, my husband and I were both very disappointed in Animator's Palette. I grew up sailing on the Magic and love the original black and white décor, so it was already a hurdle for me to like any aspect of the new design to start. We ended up eating at AP twice on our sailing, and both times the menu was underwhelming (aside from one arugula salad which was to die for), and there were no "wow" factors whatsoever. As someone who is used to watching the original AP's entire room change from black and white to color, as well as the CM's change costumes to match, seeing the lack of oomph in the new restaurant was a bit of a letdown.
Personally we both loved Enchanted Garden (it was our favorite of the cruise), and Royal Palace was enjoyable as well.