My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic - Season 6 Episodes 1-2: "The Crystalling" (SPOILERS) · 4:00pm Mar 26th, 2016
Season six has arrived!
Just so we're all on the same page:
We can all agree that between 9 to 11 months have passed since the episode "The One Where Pinkie Pie Knows", right? We're not going to have any debates on how long has passed between season five and season six, right?
*puff* *pant* *wheeze*
Okay! 
So let's address the elephant in the room: Flurry Heart is funny-looking. There. Done.
In the cold open, Starlight Glimmer learns just what a horrible punishment being Twilight Sparkle's pupil is going to be. Oh, and she's been shoehorned into the photograph in the opening titles, too.
Like Sunset Shimmer before her, Starlight Glimmer has been dorkified. I still don't like her.
OH GOD SPIKE WILL YOU JUST NOT. Seriously, we KNOW you're a big hero in the Crystal Empire. You don't need to keep spraying it around like cat pee!
So the "Crystalling" is basically using the feel-good fuzzies of New Baby! to make the Crystal Heart stronger. Here I thought it'd be, y'know, turning Flurry Heart into a crystal pony.
By an amazing coincidence, Sunburst has moved to the Crystal Empire. Starlight is apprehensive about trying to reacquaint herself with him after all she's done.
Shining Armor is a MESS, like any new dad. 
Spike is already learning how to torment the new pony on the block. I approve of this.
Starlight uses Spike's ego as a stalling tactic. She's still a manipulative, conniving jerk.
Aaaaaand there's Flurry Heart! Awww, she's so adorable. And so destructive!
OH MY GOD SPIKE THAT IS THE OPPOSITE OF HELPFUL!
Sunburst is more squirrelly than a tree in a public park.
Poor Shining Armor is freaking out. I think I'll get at least one OOCSST out of his new daddy freakouts.
Foalsitting a super-strong alicorn is hilariously disastrous.
OH CRAP.
Well...so much for the Crystal Heart. 
The ending music for part one is a bit...silly for what just happened.
So with the Crystal Heart shattered, the arctic weather of the north has nothing to stop it from flash-freezing the Crystal Empire, and everypony is in danger.
Meanwhile, Starlight and Sunburst are being awkward, and Starlight fails her first ever friendship lesson. Color me surprised.
...Pinkie Pie, get those white and gold crayons away from m--AAAAAHHHHHH!
Celestia and Luna try to fight the weather while the rest of the gang tries to figure out what to do about the Crystal Heart. Meanwhile, Flurry Heart has learned to teleport.
Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash trying to send everypony home to keep them safe does...not quite go as planned. Meanwhile, trying to research the Crystal Heart is also going badly because Flurry Heart is a flying disaster area.
Naturally, the important book they need that has the only remedy for their problem gets zapped by a stray Flurry blast. Who did NOT see that coming?
So Starlight goes to bring Sunburst back to the palace to help with the important save-the-Crystal-Empire spell. Now we're going to learn the truth about him.
Starlight reveals her dark past to Sunburst, and Sunburst reveals that he pretty much cracked and washed out at Celestia's school. Then we find out that Sunburst DID have something that will help with the impending doom. Yay for contrivance!
So it turns out that the Crystalling is what's needed to reconstitute the Crystal Heart, along with some spells for various things to, y'know...kinda quiet things down. So while Twilight, Luna, Celestia, and Starlight hold the shattered Heart together, everyone else re-enacts the opening scene of The Lion King, and that fixes everything.
NIGHT LIGHT AND VELVET GOT VOICED!
Season 6 is off to a good start, I think...I just hope we don't get too many Starlight Glimmer episodes. Still don't like her!
To me any way, it felt not as tense as past season premiers. It wasn't perfect, but it wasn't that bad.
Uh, actually, unless Cadence knew at the moment of conception, it's probably been a bit less time than that. Still multiple months, yes, but not the full gestation period.
And yeah, could not believe that the parents actually got to speak. Only took six seasons.
So... baby ponies being uncontrollably strong is normal?
It was an okay premier. Nothing like season 5. Then again, the season 5 premier was hard to top.
For the length of time, remember, this IS Equestria. We don't know how long the pregnancy period for them lasts. And since that's kind of squicky to think about, we'll never truly find out.
To be fair, they've done that all the time with the two parters, ever since the show started.
I was also shocked that Twilight's parents finally spoke.
Honestly, I'm pretty sure that we'll be getting quite a few episodes with Starlight. Heck, they pretty much confirmed that she'll be joining the mane cast with the first few minutes.
Or, well, actually christening the kid before the assembled crowd.
What a heartbreaking turn of events.
You could say it was a little...
(•_•)
( •_•)>⌐■-■
(⌐■_■)
Discordant.
YYYYEEEEEEEEAAAAAAHHHH!
3827948
Remember Pound and Pumpkin?
I thought it was entertaining. Not the best season premiere but that bar is high. Starlight still needs some work but at least I wasn't glaring at her and saying I hate her through the opener. I actually found Flurry Heart adorable, hope she appears more. Celestia and Luna said not even they had knowledge of a baby alicorn, so does that mean they weren't born alicorns either, and that the books and comics are different continuities? Also, TWILIGHT'S PARENTS SPOKE! FINALLY!
It's about time we heard Twilight and Shining's parents speak. Neat how Spike had that vase. There's some new shipping fuel for the inferno of ships in this fandom.
3827936 Yeah, it was a bit of a softer intro, and that's okay by me.
I felt that it was decent, but didn't stack up with the other season premieres and finales...
I knew Twilight had lessons planned, but I never expected such a wide variety; we didn't even get to the B's.
3828195 Yep. I am tired of the series introducing villains that threaten to destroy everything only for them to be defeated and mentioned again when the writers want to pat themselves on the back.
Hopefully this means a more relaxed season compared to last years.
A good start to the season, but a little too crowded. It seems like they tried to do a little too much here, they wanted to reintroduce Sunburst, work on making a redeemed Starlight more likeable, introduce us to Flurry Heart, and include all of the mane six and Spike. If there was ever a two parter that should've gotten a third part, I'd say this one probably most deserves it.
Twilight's mom (twilight velvet, twilight twinkle, whatever her name is) was in the credits as Mrs. Sparkle and her dad was Mr. Sparkle. Their fandom names are now invalid.... MY LIFE IS A LIE!
All I want is Sunset Shimmer to come back just once, and hopefully Starlight can kick rocks soon.
There was also this interesting tidbit:
Also, MythrilMoth, this is off-topic, but here's some more information about the new Voltron, with an attached video.
Avoided the entire thing because of Starlight, lets hope she gets dropped pretty soon so I can get back to watching Pony.
3827947 So like 2-3 months along during "The one where Pinkie Knows?" So around 6-8 months between seasons.
Wait a minute, what was Starlight doing for 6 months that she hasn't had a single friendship lesson yet, or even learned the layout of the palace?
3828677 She's in the opening sequence, inner circle for the memorial photograph. I think they've ascended her to Ponyville regular. We'll probably see more of her than the CMC.
3828677 Guess you won't be watching season six at all then. Sucks to be you!
3828717 Because the season finale clearly and obviously happened the day after Twilight found out she was going to be an aunt. Also, equine gestation is 11 months, so the "9 to 11 months" in my post was accounting for 1-2 months' lead time for Cadance learning she was pregnant.
3828765 Which suggests that Starlight is still getting lost in the castle more than eight months after first setting foot in the place? That's not a friendship castle, that's Gormaghast!
3828793 it's also possible that magical ponies have a different gestation period than real life horses. Or that Starlight stayed in her village or somewhere else for a while before moving to the castle or both. She hasn't learned any friendship lessons so it does make sense
3828293 Well, in the CCG, which shares about the same canon holding as the comics, maybe a bit higher imo, they're listed as Twilight Velvet and Night Light, so there's that at least. And the CCG has had some decent foreshadowing across the sets, IIRC they had the "Flim Flam curative tonic" named in a flavour text before Season 4 even started.
Maybe in another Flurry Heart episode, we may have them fully named. Mind you, it took 6 seasons for them to be bloody voiced, even after three major events in the lives of their children that they were at...
3828866 Was i misinformed? Last i checked the comics aren't canon, they just aren't supposed to conflict with existing canon but maybe i was wrong. And hopefully they'll be named soon since these seasons seem to be background pony episodes and we'll know for sure. Hopefully they'll get better names than Muffins did
3828793
No, it suggests that time passed between "The One Where Pinkie Pie Knows" and "The Cutie Re-Mark". Possibly several months.
3828717 Twilight froze her in crystal while she slept and tossed her in the cellar for several months. Twilight gets her revenge, Starlight is never the wiser, everyone is happy.
3828717
Interesting question, isn't it? Maybe someone should write a story answering it.
NO! NO....NO STARLIGHT IS EVIL
DON'T MAKE ME LIKE HER
DON'T
STOP
3828068
Yes, of course I do, I just wasn't aware that that was the norm. That was a Pinkie Pie episode, after all.
It seems to me that freaking out runs in the Sparkle family, since we saw how easily Twilight can freak out over the smallest issue in "Lesson Zero". Now, Shining Armor is freaking out over not having gotten everything ready for the Crystalling ceremony, as well as being exhausted from having to handle a superpowered alicorn foal.
3828903 you facehoof and yet it's the timeline you proposed he's using. Also there's nothing to suggest starlight spent the whole time after the season 5 finale at the castle. She could easily have spent time at the village or somewhere else, though I can only think of the village
3829068
Excuse me, but at no point did I say that much time passed between the season finale and this season premiere. I said that much time passed between the episode "The One Where Pinkie Pie Knows" and this season premiere. At no point did I imply that the events of that episode and the season finale happened anywhere close to each other, or make ANY inferences about how long Starlight's been donking around the castle. And even with what I did say, I was pointing out how much time must have passed between Cadance announcing her pregnancy and the birth of Flurry Heart. Nothing more, nothing less.
3829095
Was that sarcasm? If so then I apologize and disregard the rest of this response. If not then you contradicted yourself by later saying
By the first statement timeline the season 6 premier would have been around 7 to 9 months after the season 5 finale and Starlight has still not learned the castle layout after around 8 months, which you facehoofed at him stating that
3829118
Incredibly, yes. The sarcasm was so heavy and thick no kind of emoticon was needed whatsoever. Or so one would have assumed.
3829306 I've seen people actually type exactly like that to put emphasis on a point. Text does not always convey emotion perfectly and, unlike tone of voice, there is no shift in tone so my apologies for being unsure whether or not it was sarcasm
You know what this episode felt like? An oc centred fanfiction. It' mostly focused around Starlight, god help us if that becomes a trend, but this character is so unlikable because of what we already know about her that I doubt there's anything they can do to make people care. Sunburst wasn't a bad character, but he really didn't need to be in this episode. Twilight studied magic all her life, so why couldn't she be the one to figure out how to restore the crystal heart, why did it have to be Megan's brand new character? Why did Starlight even need to reconcile with this tool? He never did anything wrong, he just went to a different school and they lost touch.
The baby served little other than to create a problem, and sure we got to see Shining had some brief panic attacks, but that was dropped pretty quickly once the heart was destroyed.
Everyone else was just kinda... there. They barely contributed much to the story.
Also, two full grown alicorns can't hold off the storm, the crystal heart can hold off the storm, but the crystal heart gets destroyed by one alicorn baby screaming? I'm no mathematician, but I'm pretty sure that equals bullshit.
3828717
No I'm pretty sure the majority of the gestation period is between Pinkie knows and the season 5 end. Odds are likely Hearthbreakers is after that episode meaning that 3 seasonal changes have happened before Cutie Re-Mark.
3829825 It could be. We're definitely back to the "year per season" paradigm after the S5 finale. And it would explain help explain why Starlight was acting like she only just became Twilight's student.
3828765 Episode 3's promo doesn't seem to feature her at all so it won't be that long a wait.
If you hate Starlight now, just wait until they make her an alicorn.
A) yes, yes, we ALL can agree that 9 to 11 months have passed because pregnancy blah blah blah
B) Did you see that MYSTERIOUS AND ALARMING BLACK SPOT HEADING TOWARDS THE CRYSTAL EMPIRE???? 'Cuz it's kinda freaking me out a bit
3827948 I can accept alicorn babehs being like that as, you know, they're alicorns. However, Baby Cakes was an abomination that never should've existed.
3828068 *hisses in disgust*
3828491 Since I refuse to believe that they weren't born alicorns ( it brings up way too many questions that I and one or two other people brought up on DeviantArt talked about), I'm going to view that as Equestria - the founders of it, to be more specific - was founded AFTER the births of Celestia and Luna. Either that, or they just mean it hasn't happened in a 1000+ years