Thoughts on canon and the finale

I will be doing a full run-down on the actual episode at some point (and reserve my little "When did this show become shonen?" question for then), but I thought I'd make a few notes about some things which came up in the episode which are somewhat interesting from a canonical standpoint.

First off, Twilight got a new house. That poor library never knew what hit it. And those books! So many books lost. Where will they go to find random plot device books now?

Oh, right.

Still, that does make Twilight a bit less "earthly" in some ways, though on the other hand, her living in the town library as a princess always was just a little bit silly. To be fair, it is not as if Luna and Celestia have castles to hand out, though, and apparently they always seem to be fixer-upper deals. Still, I was surprised that it was not the castle in the Everfree Forest she ended up with, and frankly, her new castle is... really kind of ugly.

I understand that this is design for six year old girls, but this looks like it was designed by a six year old girl. Then again, given Twilight's incredible fashion sense, perhaps it merely reflects the aesthetic sensibilities of its owner. It does look like a castle that a purple unicorn wizard might live in.

From a characterization point of view, it is clear that Discord did not (and still does not) understand friendship, but he has indeed been corrupted by it at this point and definitely feels something for some ponies (Fluttershy and Twilight in particular by the looks of things). Discord still has a very him-centric view of friendship, which is why he never saw the betrayal from Tirek coming. The fact that he actually felt guilt about it, felt bad when all friendship was taken away from him, and then was surprised when Twilight helped him out, for no reason other than the goodness of her heart, really indicates he doesn't understand what it means to be good.

However, Discord was really the only character who GOT a whole lot of characterization in the episode; it really felt like it developed him more than it developed Twilight, who had the conflict of feeling extraneous in the beginning (when clearly she is the Princess of Blowing Bad Guys Up - a very important job), and who... decided her job was to spread friendship all over Equestria in the end, but really it didn't feel like those two parts tied together all that much. Her decision is important, in theory (so I'm sure we'll get some road trip episodes in season 5... though frankly, I'm not looking forward to the cast herd syndrome so many of those episodes had this season) but I didn't really see it as really being all that logically connected to the rest of the episode. It was just kind of... there, at the end.

The finale also (maybe) answered a question about how much power some folks have - it put the magic of literally every other pony in Equestria, plus Discord, into one being, and had it face off with the magic of just the four alicorn princesses - Twilight, Celestia, Cadance, and Luna. And... it was about equal. If anything, the princesses had the edge. So, the four pony princesses may well be more powerful than everyone else in Equestria, plus Discord, put together. It gives us some idea of just how big the power gap there is - apparently, the pony princesses possess truly vast amounts of power compared to ordinary folk. Or at least, some of them do. Though who knows if even that is consistent between them - we saw a lot of sun and moon based power incontinence, but we didn't see any signs of Twilight not being able to handle the power of love. Clearly that is not going to become a fanfic now. I'm not really sure I'm entirely happy with that, as I liked the idea that while the princesses are awesome (as they are), Shining Armor and Rainbow Dash could both do pretty impressive things as well. Then again, they probably didn't put that much thought into it.

Interestingly, Tirek also underwent another growth spurt after he drained Twilight's friends, which may well indicate that, between them, they have a considerable amount of magical power - though, to be fair, we've had more than a hint of that with Rainbow Dash, at least, and perhaps Pinkie Pie.

One oddity, and potential error - in the flashback, they showed Tirek's old buddy interacting with a pony who looked rather like Starswirl the Bearded (though he was missing a few dozen bells), and implied he was a contemporary of them... despite the fact that the Hearth's Warming Eve play indicates their absence at the time period when he was a "young wizard" (though perhaps he is only being called young relative to thousand year old princesses; the pony in question looked quite old). A bit of a continuity snarl there - the princesses didn't show up at all in the Hearth's Warming Eve play, and weren't even mentioned, and indeed the whole story wouldn't have even worked with them present to bind the races together. Of course, it may well not have been Starswirl - after all, Starswirl never learned the magic of friendship, so perhaps this was one of his apprentices or descendants or simply someone else who dressed similarly because that's how all the cool unicorn wizards dress, right?

Twilight sure thinks so.

The episode also contained a clear violation of rule 22 on Twilight's part, but clearly she did not feel it applied to her. They always do.

Rule 22: No matter how tempted I am with the prospect of unlimited power, I will not consume any energy field bigger than my head.

But I desperate times call for desperate measures, I suppose.

What did you think? Anything else which came up in the episode that you felt was important to the canon in some way that I missed?

EDIT 1: One other thing I missed: the episode confirms that Celestia does, in fact, sleep, which I strongly suspected but which had never been demonstrated in an episode previously as far as I can recall.

Comments

[Fernesh]

I think the thing that was the most important in the canon was Twilight's new castle, and those... Thrones ? I'm already hearing the new season 5 MLP opening theme.
I don't know what they are going to do with these, I don't even know if they'll will use it later, but it felt odd. Are they going to have some sorts of regular convention ? About what ?

And also, Tirek's brother is still around right ? I'm pretty sure some stuff is going to come out of him, from the fandom or the show itself.
And before this episode, I've always thought that Discord was kind of invulnerable. That his god-like powers can make him do litterally anything he wants, like Chesire Cat. But apparently it's not the case.

Oh, and with dat ending, maybe some possible DisLestia for season 5 ? (one can hope)