By the Light of the Moon · 10:35pm Jun 30th, 2019
If you are not yet totally bowled over by the awesome magical powers of Equestrian princesses, then take a look at this:
How do they do that? Putting the sun and moon in the sky at the same time is straightforward. You just arrange it so the orbit of the Earth around the sun, and the moon around the Earth line up in such a way. But how did they engineer that lunar phase? A crescent moon with the sun just to one side! Such relative positions would normally produce a new moon, invisible in the daytime sky as the far side is illuminated by the sun behind. Strangely in this picture the crescent faces the sun when it should be the other way round. It’s also an odd shape, but we’ll put that detail to one side for now.
What is lighting up the moon for Celestia and Luna to admire? Perhaps there is a huge mirror on the other side of the Earth which is reflecting the light from the sun back onto the moon, positioned at such an angle to illuminate only a fraction of its face. Which means ponies on the other side of the Earth will be able to admire a reflection of the view in the planetary-sized looking glass. And those at a point halfway round the globe will see two suns and moons in the sky, which must be confusing but perhaps they are used to it.
Things get even more interesting when we look at this shot.
There is a star or two in the dark part of the moon's disk. As if somepony had cut out part of the solid body allowing the distant stars to shine through. We can only assume that these stars must actually be smaller objects in front of the moon. Observational evidence that there are artificial satellites in Equestria!
The same thing can be seen even more clearly over Hope Hollow, allow in this case we should perhaps consider the possibility that it is a painted sign.
And this magic is all driven by a pocket-sized amulet containing spring-loaded gems stones.
Reminds me of the old scifi story where the first astronaut to orbit the moon didnt realise it was a simulation run.
This is more like the colony ship on H'ven Sent?
Obviously, it’s because the moon’s a hologram designed to hide the lizard-people’s home base.
5082173 Maybe someday Spike will bring Twilight along to his old family home.
I laughed so much when this part of the episode showed, because I wrote a short story once where *Twilight* created a machine to raise and lower the sun and moon, and both Celestia and Luna tried their best not to show how much it upset them to be subordinated to a machine... until Luna quietly chucked a rock into the gears so she and her sister could do their old jobs again.
My theory has always been:
That the sun and moon are atmospheric phenomena in Equestria. The planet itself is wandering through intergalactic space, all alone and millions of light years from any star, and Celestia and Luna control these balls of ionized gas that move through the upper atmosphere.
I've got a lotta theories.
Mike
5082154
How did they miss a detail like that?
5082173
Wondering how much they had to pay Luna to keep quiet after she returned from her exile.
5082310
Like the one in Horse Play? Did Luna really need to interfere? She could have just waited for the inevitable mechanical failure.
5082320
The sun and moon as quasi-stable plasma excitations in the ionosphere. That is an interesting theory, but must be tricky to sustain. Would be really be easier for a princess than just keeping a big rock in orbit?
5083000
Well, I'd assume since all the Equestrian government is in on it (except Prince Blueblood) it was hardly a secret. Most likely, Luna just went there to have her bionic upgrades worked on, and maybe a little R&R.
Or she could have been on a secret mission to save the Reptilians.
5083000
Oh no. The whole point of teh short story is, he thought it was Real, because he was unconcious during the launch stress, and they didnt switch the camera off on the dolly, as it moved behind the set.
Perhaps, their world is in a giant planetarium.
What follows is just mine headcanon, so it is meaningless:
Q what G1 MLP. The show inspired him to created a pocket Universe with 1 world and an illusory sky, like a planetarium. He entered this Universe as Discord. MLP:FiM is just something Q does to amuse himself.