My thoughts on the S5 finale

Warning: Spoilers ahead!

Pros:

- The animation was top-notch.

- Twilight's role as a guest lecturer at Celestia's School of Magic really suited her (side note: does Celestia also sponsor a School of Meteorology and a School of Botany? She seems a tad biased against the other pony tribes).

- The AU's were fun to see. I would watch a whole spinoff series about the war with the Crystal Empire. And the Flim Flam brother's takeover was the only scene that gave me a belly laugh. I also liked how Twilight explored the alternate timelines until she got to Tirek and went, “nope.”

- Related to the above, Dash, Pinkie, and Maud were truly badass in the war. Also, I liked Zecora's alternate look and the bit of expansion on zebra magic.

Cons:

- The Cloudsdale scenes got repetitive. I was sort of hoping that Starlight Glimmer would go farther back and try to prevent Twi from being born, or vice versa.

- For “the smart one,” Twi was slow on the uptake for most of this episode.

- The writer made Starlight overpowered. I get that Josh Haber felt like he had to make her a credible threat, but come on. Maybe it's just me, but I liked Starlight better as an average unicorn who relied on her cunning and manipulation more than her magic. But no, apparently she can go toe to toe with an alicorn who was supposedly a prodigy even when she was still a unicorn. And she can use her telekinesis to make herself fly around like a pegasus, something I don't remember seeing Twi do.

- Starlight's sad backstory and motivations were really weak. It was almost as underwhelming as Dr. Doofenshmirtz's “I lost my choo choo train” from Phineas and Ferb: Across the 2nd Dimension. She seemed petty and juvenile, like she's a grown-ass mare who never moved beyond a six year-old mentality. Is this someone any reasonable person would want to be friends with? Yeah I know, “little kid show,” but we've seen a lot more maturity in other episodes. Just look at the beloved “Amending Fences” as an example.

- Just based on the ED and Youtube comments, I seem to be in the minority on this, but I'm really not sold on Starlight suddenly becoming BFFs with the Mane 6 and Spike. Starlight hasn't had a chance to bond with anyone else besides Twi, and I'm sure the others would have trouble trusting her after she imprisoned them and stole their cutie marks. I know that Season 6 has been confirmed, and I'm leery of where the show is going with this development. Is Starlight going to move to Ponyville? How would an overpowered, formerly villainous unicorn fit with (or mess with) the group dynamic? Is she going to get her own throne, Celestia forbid?

I was on board with the episode up until the last 7 minutes. I enjoyed it overall, but it wasn't as good as the S4 finale, and I have a lot of reservations about the way it ended, and where the show is going from here. I'll keep watching, but I'm nowhere near as optimistic as I was a week ago. I can definitely see this finale and subsequent season being a Base Breaker the way “Magical Mystery Cure” was.

Granted, I felt the same way after “Magical Mystery Cure,” but then they made it work in the long run, IMO. But I'm still trying to come to terms with the Cutie Map. Adding a new main protagonist seems like too much, too fast. Plus, it may take away from the precious screentime of the M6, Spike, the CMC, and hell, even Luna and Celestia (I'm more of a Luna fan but even I want to see Tia get a focus episode).

I read a couple of comments on the episode thread that speculated that this is the writers' compromise between the bronies who want Sunset Shimmer to return to Equestria and join the M6, and the bronies who want Equestria Girls to be a separate continuity. I don't know for sure if this is their intention, but it makes a lot of sense to me. The writers might be trying to have it both ways by creating a unicorn who is very similar to Sunset, reforming her, and having her join the M6. But there are a few problems with this move. One is that Starlight can't be a clone of Sunset – that's a cop-out at best. Another is that fans didn't start to love Sunset until Rainbow Rocks, and Starlight is still like Sunset from the first movie. She's going to have to work to earn her place among the M6 and Spike. Third, even though I loved Sunset in Rainbow Rocks and Friendship Games, I hated the way they rushed her redemption, and I didn't like it any better when they did the same with Starlight. Fourth, Sunset didn't actually succeed in carrying out the most evil part of her plan, so it made more sense that the other girls would be willing to forgive her.

It's a bit sad that out of all the rushed reformations in this series, Gilda's is the only one I really believe.