Monday XII: The Cutie Remark · 6:11pm Nov 30th, 2015
So we're finally here, the epic two-part finale to season 5!
**SPOILERS**
If you've seen the episode and are interested in my words then read after the break, otherwise just move along or come back later.
We start off with Twilight Sparkle giving a speech on cutiemarks to a class of magic students. She talks about how she met her friends, and how their cutiemarks have affected their lives (that's important for later). During this speech Twilight notices something we've been noticing all throughout the season, what looks like Starlight Glimmer plotting her revenge from in the audience.
Of course when she looks again she's quickly gone and Twilight dismisses it as an illusion. That is, until they get home, where they find Starlight Glimmer waiting for them at the map with quite possibly the most smug expression ever.
Yeah, she's definately not up to anything.
Starlight reveals her scheme. She's gotten hold of Starswirl's timetravel spell, remember, the one Twilight used to travel back in time a week to warn her about the furture? The one she had to break into the Starswirl wing of the Canterlot archives? Yeah, they really need to improve their security.
So Starlight has stolen the scroll and made some slight modifications to it. She's figured out that she can combine Starswirl's spell with the map's connection to all of Equestria to travel to any place, and time within Equestria. Holy horseapples, Batmare That is awesome.
And now what does she decide to do with this awesome power?
Go back in time to get revenge on Twilight Sparkle and stop the mane six from getting their cutiemarks.
Well... That's slightly dissapointing. Litterally all of time and space at the tips of her hooves, near infinite potential, and she chooses that. I guess we'll see where they're going with this.
So Starlight Glimmer opens the portal and heads through, leaving the scroll behind, because plot device.
Spike picks up the scroll, and somehow triggers it causing them both to be sucked through the portal after Starlight. They arrive in Cloudsdale, on the day that Rainbow Dash set off her first sonic rainboom whereby they discover what I already mentioned a few paragraphs ago. They fail to stop Starlight's plan, the sonic rainboom does not go off, and the Mane six all do not discover their cutiemarks.
Starswirl's spell does it's thing and brings Twilight back to the present, where the only thing that remains is the map (and some chairs that got caught in the magical-time-prevention-bubble-thing).
The episode then repeats like this for a few times, with the momentary break for a short Pedotwi moment.
Rainbow Mash: ... I need an adult. [1]
Twilight fails to stop Starlight Glimmer again, and each time the future they return to becomes worse.
Twilight admits that Starlight is too strong for her to beat and that they could continue fighting forever (because ponies totally don't need to eat or drink or anything), and in the end the only way she is able to stop her is to convince Starlight to stop, by showing her the wasteland that the future has become.
Starlight is not immediately convinced but with some more talking to, and a short trip to see her own past, Twilight eventually convinces her to give up her revenge scheme and to retry friendship. They return to the present to find everything back to normal and the scroll is lost through it's own portal, presumably to lay the foundations for a sequal.
Despite this episode not being quite what I expected, there certainly weren't as many retcons (read none) as I was hoping for, it was still interesting to see all the different alternate realities, one for every villain they had ever defeated.
The first one, with a war against Sobra, particularly gave me a bit of a fallout vibe [2] [3].
The Crysalis, and Nightmare Moon realities were also very interesting. I would very much like to see some side series, or perhaps a future season that expends on one of these worlds.
In my opinion it was a good episode, not nearly the best of the season, The Mane Attraction still has that spot, but it's still a nice sign off on Starlight's arc.
Bonus Material:
Spike doing what he does best: supporting character and/or comic relief.
Starlight Glimmer may be the bad guy but she can be so adorable at times.
[1] I call her Rainbow Mash, yes.
[2] Pre nuclear apocolypes
[3] Disclaimer: I have never played fallout, or read Fallout: Equestria. My impressions are based on what I've seen second hoof.
