Night Sky

Interesting. I had heard that Zephyr Heights was either a collapsed Cloudsdale, or was located near to where Canterlot used to be. The Pegasi do seem to be the best off of the three Pony species in Gen 5. The Pegasi Royal Guards seem to have a more or less direct lineage back to the EUP Guards.

Never say never... they haven't stopped making Star Trek and Star Wars yet. I don't think anyone who has ocassion to actually read this post will see the end of MLP in their lifetime. And so long as all the voices are still with us, never say never.

I feel Argyle was too interesting and knowledgable character to kill off after just one sequence. Yeah, the decision to kill him off may have made some vague point about coming of age and loss. But what if there had been some adolescent friction between an aging Argyle and Sunny? What if her idealism had buckled slightly, or his has, as they both aged? There are ways they could have kept him alive and still touched upon the theme of life's inevitiabilities. Gen 5 desparately needed a knowledgable, wise mentor, and it didn't have one. Argyle, Dragon Lord Spike and Opaline Arcana are the only fully adult personalities in the whole of Generation 5. Most of the adult Earth Ponies are childish and xenophobic. The Pegasi of Zephyr Heights have their snouts buried in their cellphones. The unicorns are either stoned, depressed, or stoned because they are depressed. Queen Haven and Alphabittle are kind of underwhelming as leaders. Argyle was a character Gen 5 could ill-afford to squander.

I would be quite happy to sit through the film again in the theater, ideally I could make a BRONY OUTING of it, and attend with a group of Ponies. A DVD release would be MUCH APPRECIATED. Releasing on Netflix alone was wrong, snubbing a DVD release was just another of several key decisions which shot Gen 5 in the hoof. But, perhaps a re-release of the ANG movie in theaters could stir interest in a fourthcoming Gen 6!

I sincerely and strongly suggest to anyone perusing this thread: After you've watched the ANG Movie, for Celestia's Sake, watch Make Your Mark first. Watch Tell Your Tale if you want to be confused, disoriented and put oddly ill at ease in a manner you won't quite be able to explain or justify. Just my opinion, but I consider this question important enough to chime in on. Here endeth the suggestion.

My thought on the 3 Crystals is that, basically, they were Twilight Sparkle's creation. Somehow or other. How she might have crafted them is in some thin sense connected to how long she had ruled before Opaline's machinations forced her hand. I know the IDW Gen 5 comic books have touched upon how Twilight Sparkle cast the Ward that protected Equestria. If she had reigned for a long time before Opaline came, then her magic must have been terrifyingly powerful by the time of the crisis, maybe beyond anything we saw or would expect to see. Perhaps the 3 Crystals are the merely physical vessels, maybe Twilight Sparkle went to the granite countertop maker to have them cut into the shapes we see. Maybe they are all flawless precious stones from the Crystal Empire, or Skyrim.

It's certainly an interesting question. Argyle had clearly dedicated much of his life to studying the history of Equestria, and passing the most important takeaways to Sunny. I am tantalized by the enigma of how much he had come to know, and how he had managed to come by that knowledge. It may have served to make some kind of vague statement about growing up and loss, but if you ask me, the decision to kill him off after the first sequence of the film was a shortshighted mistake. A wise, older character full of knowledge and wisdom, as well as a few powerful trinkets, was something Gen 5 desparately needed, and didn't have. My disappointment in Queen Haven and AlphaBittle's unsatisfactory performance as leaders and mentors is compounded beacuse I believe there are indicators that they are not as ignorant of Equestria's history as they act like they are. I can't prove it, but I believe that. Whereas, Argyle clearly perceived that a great deal might one day hinge on what seeds he was able plant in Sunny's mind and character, and he took the responsibility very seriously. His responsibility to his daughter and to Equestria. Besides Dragon Lord Spike and Opaline Arcana, he may well have been the only other true adult in all of Gen 5. If Argyle had lived, and if Gen 5 had taken itself and the Lore a bit more seriously than it did, perhaps an entire episode or arc could have dealt with how Argyle came to possess a memento of Grogar. Of course, as everypony can clearly see, the map behind Argyle in Snoopy Fan's screenshot is centered on the heartland of the old Canterlot Kingdom, stick 'ems Mention Pinkie Pie and Rarity and show their cutie marks. I would love to ask Argyle what specifically he was researching...which of Pinkie and/or Rarity's exploits was he tracing? Next to the map on the left is a portrait of Star Swirl the Bearded, so Argyle's knowledge of Equestia's history was vast and deep. Really, there are several thousand questions I would have liked to ask Argyle, and Gen 5 denied him the chance to answer any of them.

Make Your Mark clearly indicates that Opaline Arcana was a contemporary of Princesses Celestia and Luna, and was even spurned by them as a filly. Opaline was very, very ancient by the time of Make Your Mark. She survived without her magic throughout all the years Twilight Sparkle's spell was in effect. I don't believe that continent sized wards dampening the manifestation of magic would by itself be enough to deprive an Alicorn of her immortality. So where did they all go? It's probably meant to be mysterious, so these are just theories, my opinions; - It may be something like the Elves in Tolkien's Middle Earth, either taking the ship back to Valinor or going to the Halls of Mandos. - Maybe after a certain duration of time, an Alicorn is compelled by instinct, magic or firm conviction to a tradition to which we're not privy, to go find a cave. There she might meditate endlessly on the sun, or the moon...or Love. - Or Luna "returned" to THE Moon, or Celestia became one with the Sun. - Maybe like the cottage of Tom Bongmaker, they are hiding in plain sight but are either unable or not disposed to interfere anymore for some reason the rest of us could never understand. If there is no mystery, there is no magic. However, in the hologram she created, Twilight Sparkle did mention that she would be with "you". I believe that Alicorns are at least somewhat prescient. Twilight Sparkle may well have had some idea of who would be watching, thousands of years later. Consider the God Emperor Leto II's message to the Bene Gesserit in Heretics of Dune. He had the message written on the wall of a hidden storehouse, thousands of years before it would be rediscovered. Twilight's message is very similar. Remember that when Twilight Sparkle became an Alicorn, Princess Celestia took her off into a bizarre astral realm of cosmic flat screen TV's. Maybe they go there. It's up to the imagination. You decide where they went, but for Celestia's Sake, don't make it a boring fate.

Not really. And, until I got about halfway through Mark Your Mark and watched more than ten episodes of Tell Your Tale, I was something of an apologist for Gen 5. Now? I'm kind of weirded out. What are the takeaways? I did watch the movie before starting either series, FIM is a tough act to follow, but I wasn't going into the movie hoping it would fail. I thought things were getting off to a good start. I especially liked the fact that Gen 5 DID try to link itself to Gen 4. But if I hadn't seen Gen 4 first, I probably would not have rushed into the shows on the basis of the film. Maybe, it's hard to say. I don't think the film would have made a BRONY out of me. Whereas, say what you will about it, and even though I'd seen some episodes before I watched it, the Gen 4 film did have a big role in making me into a brony.

This is all very close to home for me too. I see it in Princess Luna, and feel it there too. But it strikes home for me the most in unreformed Starlight Glimmer, who several ponies have already mentioned in this thread. I was never as successful as Princess Luna, either before or after she went wrong. Starlight suffered from a very similar wound of envy, sense of rejection, lack of purpose and a feeling that the world had past her by. Unreformed Starlight was a might-have-been who was really a never-was, who used a great deal of talent and ability to carve out a small personal hell for herself and a small group. I am not saying I've done everything Starlight Glimmer had done. But watching her unreformed self is very uncomfortable for me. But that's the genius of MLP generally and FIM in particular. Twilight Sparkle went to work on Starlight, and Discord and Trixie...how would it all have ended if she hadn't? There are very few franchises which offer much in the way of redemption, and maybe none as much as FIM.

For me it's a toss up between two candidates. 1.) Tirac / Tirek, because he has been an enemy of ponies since the beginning of Gen 1, and he was already very powerful back then. He has the power, the magical abilities, the greed, the callousness, and a lucid if not imaginative intellect to keep him focused. Thank goodness Tirac/Tirek didn't have his kick A55 war chariot during his battle with Twilight Sparkle, that infernans en vehiculo is Temperate. Who knows how that battle might have gone if he'd been airborne. 2.) The Tantabus. I am reminded of the id monster from Forbidden Planet. Remember, an Alicorn Princess is almost a demi-goddess, there was a lot of power behind Princess Luna's thought form, a lot of natural magic gone wrong. If the Tantabus had totally and completely broken free of Princess Luna, Equestria would have been cooked. The entire would be like a series of bad hallucinations onboard the Event Horizon, 24/7. I get the creeps just thinking about it.

My favorite non-Mane 6 character is back. She's always at her best. I can never get enough of Maud Pie. Beneath her hilariously flat deadpan exterior, there is a caring, pragmatic and streetwise pony who never fails to do the right thing, albeit in a low key manner. This episode reminds me very much of the bulk of Season 5. A mellow, chill, slice of life story that leaves you feeling relaxed and amused by the end. Also, dare I say, somewhat hopeful that there is happiness to be found in life. I love FIM's effectively perfect balance of an epic story nine years in the making, with charming and enheartening glimpses of everyday life.