Apr
20th
2019
Points of Canon: S9x04 - Twilight’s Seven · 7:06pm Apr 20th, 2019
Business as usual.
- Chronology markers: Sombra’s antics from The Beginning of the End are referred to. School is in session, though, which makes it impossible for this to occur before Uprooted, which happened during the summer break. So far, we’re on a straight chronological track, but other episodes might still slide back or forward between these.
- Twilight’s signing papers consists primarily of her hoofprint. Which cannot be an effective signature, unlike fingerprints, due to it being, effectively, a very large fingernail. Fingernails grow, and so do hooves, they have to be trimmed. We have, however, previously seen hoofprints valued as autographs, in Parental Glideance and elsewhere, so I would expect this is what Twilight is doing – autographing letters, rather than signing documents.
“Twilight! Look at this scroll I just got!”
- Shining’s scroll is signed with his cutie mark and what looks like a proper signature.
- Throughout the episode, Spike receives such scrolls from Shining Armor multiple times, indicating that either Shining learned to send them himself or has stable access to the means of sending them. We know that Cadance can send them these days from The Beginning of the End, but since Cadance is not involved in this episode at all, it probably isn’t her. Could be Celestia herself, though.
“When Shining Armor and I were small, we competed over everything.”
- Compare to the line “we never had a single fight” in A Canterlot Wedding.
- Notice that when flying a kite, Shining uses his teeth, rather than magic, to hold the string. Why? This is not how, for example, Starlight does it in Rock Solid Friendship.
- Throughout the flashback, Twilight has her cutie mark and routinely has a diapered Spike around. In fact, the sibling relationship between Shining Armor, Twilight and spike forms the entire core of the episode and it never lets up. Compare to Friendship is Magic #40, which is the comic issue that attests that Celestia dumped Spike on Twilight immediately when school started – and I guess that one needs a PoC post soon too.
“To keep it friendly, our parents gave us gold stars every time we did something special.” Generally not a way to keep things friendly, but ok.
- This scene in the flashback is set inside a room that most resembles Shining Armor’s home in A Canterlot Wedding rather than any other dwelling this family was ever seen in. It is definitely not Twilight’s minaret room from Friendship is Magic. Which is actually more than a bit strange, see RTAC #1 for why.
- Notice that Shining Armor elects to give Spike half of his share of the apple rather than split an apple into three equal parts.
“And at the end of each week, we’d add up the stars.”
- So why are the stars in a 3x8 grid?…
- Notice the cutie mark used to represent each sibling, rather than their names.
- Of course, Spike drawing gold stars on the wall is not a random image here.
- “Guess I’ll watch the school?” Students are walking the halls, so school has started.
- Notice that Twilight and Spike arrive to Canterlot flying, rather than by train. Spike can fly pretty far already.
- “Look, I know you’ve always held a grudge because I left home with this.” I wonder which particular event is Shining referring to, here.
- “With the return of Sombra, Princess Luna and I felt it was time to reinforce the castle’s defenses.” I.e. lock the door after the horse has bolted. That said, that’s our chronology reference.
- “So I asked our old Captain of the Guard to handle the job.” Previously, it was left ambiguous whether Shining Armor still held that post, and the events of Twilight’s Kingdom as well as other secondary stories sort of implied he still did. Glad that’s settled.
“The castle is surrounded by shards of Queen Chrysalis’ throne. Thanks to Star Swirl, its anti-magic powers are now tuned to stop anycreature from using a spell to get inside.” This is pretty far-reaching.
- Individual shards retain at least some usefulness for their anti-magic properties, even though they do not appear to impede Shining Armor moving them by magic as a raw material.
- These properties can be tuned by magic – if Star Swirl was involved.
- The particular application Star Swirl puts the darkstone to is warding against teleportation, apparently. Which implies that there are no permanent wards in effect before these are installed, doesn’t it?
- “Giant fans keep anycreature from flying too close to the castle.” That, actually, would be impossible with mere fans, and would probably require magical means. Notice no obvious power source on those fans. Notice also that the anti-pegasus magic from Daring Done is not being employed.
- “Plus, the entrances to the tunnels below the castle have been sealed, so there’s no underground access.” Which implies there was such access before.
- “And even if you could get in – which you can’t – I’ve doubled the ranks of security.” Notice the prominence of mares in the Guard this time. In fact, they’re paired off to nearly every guard stallion. I still maintain that identical colors and build of the Royal Guard were a result of regulations, dictating selection of the troops and coat dye, and the appearance of, first, different colors, and now, mares, implies these regulations being progressively relaxed in favor of other qualifications. I think this episode is a solid argument in favor of this point of view, especially considering Zephyr Breeze and the fact that Rarity dressed in a guard uniform passes for a guard.
- “Ponies protect every hallway and door, which can only be opened with royal guard medals.” This would have to be a magic-based lock, wouldn’t it? This later appears on a different, much more normal looking door.
- “Even if you brought an army, the throne room is the safest spot in Equestria.” Which is effectively an admission that the Sisters need this room to be safe, right?…
“But say you avoid the floor? Still no luck, because I’ve employed nature’s alarm system.”
- Actually, this part is strange, and presumably, only exists for the purposes of this competition, rather than anything else. By the time someone is up in the throne room, it’s too late to raise the alarm.
- Incidentally, this is a reference to Battle of the Allia, but that gives us no clue whether there has ever been a similar historical incident in Equestria or not.
- These are anything but geese. The beak shape is all wrong, and the beak comes with teeth. They look most like flamingos, but the length of the legs is wrong for that. For the rest of this discussion, I’m calling them geeze. So there.
- The equations on Twilight’s blackboards are not sufficiently legible for me to make sense of them, so I’ll leave that to braver researchers. One chart, however, describes ballistic flight, which implies Twilight considered shooting herself out of a cannon at least at some point for this infiltration. One other method considered is apparently an airship disguised as a cloud.
- “Plus a bushel and a peck of impenetrability.” Ponies use or have used bushels in the past.
- “He guessed your whole plan!” To be fair, it is the obvious optimal strategy, and knowing that this is what Twilight is planning to do does not guarantee it will not work.
- “We got questions, and you’re gonna serve us up some answers, juice jockey!” The obvious sealed juice packets with straws sticking out of them actually imply that this is probably not an establishment that habitually serves juice as its primary drink: If it was, they would pour it, and there would be no need for the packets, nor much demand – who wants pasteurized juice when you can have fresh? That said, the location is later on referred to as a “seedy juice joint,” emphasis mine, which implies some sort of euphemism. Now, the Doylist reason for this euphemism is obvious and needs no explanations. What’s the Watsonian?…
- Pinkie’s imagination involves a very rare crescent moon, as well as a micro-planetoid beset by baobabs and a gas giant with a ring.
“Like, I distract the guard ponies with a farewell performance by my alter ego, famous country-western superstar Apple Chord!”
Applejack’s story leaves it deliberately ambiguous whether Apple Chord was a thing in her life or not, but at least the flashback does not show her parents. That said, with the way the flashback includes Minuette and other contemporary ponies, it’s bogus anyway. Notably, Rainbow doesn’t know whether Apple Chord existed or not, and Rarity, who would know, having spent her childhood in Ponyville, does not confirm or deny. The flashback covers a substantial age range for Applejack, which would overlap the events described in Where the Apple Lies and the events of the Sonic Rainboom.
As before, Applejack’s background is actually the murkiest out of the Mane 6.
- “Well, I guess the opposite of what I’m good at is being in small spaces.” Fluttershy later dates her claustrophobia to the events of Castle Mane-ia, which is actually strange: There were other events since in which she ended up in small spaces with no obvious complaint.
“I always wanted to be a super-spy.”
- Super-spies are part of pony fiction, even if they are not part of pony reality – and we generally can’t determine cleanly if Bon-Bon really is one or not, due to her line in Slice of Life being almost certainly bullshit.
- So are lasers. But we knew those are ever since MMMystery on the Friendship Express.
- For that matter, lasers are almost certainly fiction rather than reality, because the behavior Spike’s imagination requires of them is physically impossible even for most movie lasers.
- Mysteriously, Applejack encounters no obstacles when setting up her portable stage right within castle walls – apparently, anonymously. It has already been fairly obvious that the courtyard is normally public space, however, street performances of that scale are typically regulated – and would be, considering that my best estimate for the population of Canterlot is ~500k ponies.
- A shot of the gas burner implies that the Infamous Pink-Purple Balloon – we still aren’t sure who actually owns the bloody thing, I’m just certain it’s not actually Twilight – is a hot air balloon. For which it is at least three times too small. Possibly, some special kind of fuel is being burned?…
- “The Wonderbolts did a fly-by, and the only way past those giant fans and into the castle ducts is here.” Rainbow managed to talk the Wonderbolts into helping, which is itself story material.
- “We’re not actually going into space, right?” Space travel is definitely a subject of pony fiction, but probably not pony reality: The way they imagine it generally wouldn’t work unless the universe was so vastly different that you might as well give physics a vacation. That said, Fluttershy is right to worry about Pinkie going into space, for obvious reasons.
- The method by which Applejack steals a medal off the guard’s armor is complicated and not very reliable, but definitely is not impossible.
“Then how are we meant to shake down ne’er-do-wells for information?!”
- Notice that this implies that the never-do-wells exist in Canterlot as a stable population. I.e. the criminal underground is a thing, right in the capital.
- And Rarity knows where to find them. Just what does she do in her spare time?…
“Zephyr Breeze?!”
- Notice that at Luna’s direct orders a pair of guards is replaced by one. And it’s Zephyr. Somepony should have noticed that there’s no way this would have happened if Luna didn’t explicitly want it to.
- Notice that Luna also knowingly set Zephyr up to fail, not that he didn’t deserve it.
- Notice also that this implies that Zephyr didn’t really learn his lesson from Flutter Brutter, did he? Problems accepting character development must run in the family.
- Notice that at Luna’s direct orders a pair of guards is replaced by one. And it’s Zephyr. Somepony should have noticed that there’s no way this would have happened if Luna didn’t explicitly want it to.
- “I knew you’d come running when you heard I got this job!” Interesting question: How would she have heard? This is important for figuring out how long ago did he get this job.
- “I told the sarge that gold kinda clashes with my aura, but apparently, thy aren’t big on input.” Royal Guard uses the rank of sergeant.
“We’ll have to glide to the throne. No flapping.”
- This stained glass window isn’t made in the original stained glass technique, i.e. it’s a solid piece of glass, painted. A pretty huge solid piece of glass.
- Spike mysteriously loses the piece he just cut out.
- Spike’s claws are sharp and hard enough to cut glass.
- Shining Armor has problems preventing three geeze from moving simultaneously with just his magic, which has bearing on how unicorn telekinesis actually works.
- “I was always excited to be part of Twilight’s and Shining Armor’s rivalry, like I was their little brother! But they never really thought of me that way.” Spike’s line is slightly ambiguous: You can interpret it as “they never really thought of me that way [at all]” and as “they never really thought of me [as part of the sibling rivalry, but some sort of sibling-hood was there]”. Other evidence in the episode suggests the latter, but it could be interpreted either way.
- “Half of them are traps!” Canterlot Castle tunnels have traps and secret passages. Not to mention a sizable population of white lab mice. I blame Star Swirl for those.
- “What are you all doing out here?” This grille is a security hole – notice that Spike has no problems getting through, even if everypony else would, and neither would, say, the CMC. Which should really be considered in the expected threat profile.
- Distracting the guards with a party works. Considering the events of Rarity Investigates, it appears that the optimal way of conquering Equestria would involve a few hundred tons of cake. Someone tell Grogar.
- “I’m strong, Twilight, but not even I can buck through solid rock.” Considering the time Applejack bucked away a boulder that had to weigh on the scale of a thousand tons in Shadow Play, I’m sure she is, so I’m not convinced there was a pressing need to involve Maud. Possibly, there was a need to keep the noise down below the level Twilight can magically suppress?…
- “Next shift. You’re on break.” In most armies, regulations require a third person to supervise the shift change, precisely to prevent this sort of ploy. That this works implies that either the Royal Guard does not have that particular regulation – and maybe they’ll learn that now – or that the guards have relaxed to the point where they ignore it.
- Remember, in A Royal Problem, Luna was putting up fresh lavender in the corridors every night? Well, it’s not lavender now. Did she stop?
- “Who wants a feather massage?” How would one even work?
- “The lever to the secret hallway entrance should be… here.” While Spike is saying that, behind him, one can see a statue of what looks like a hippogriff.
- “Oh, come on!” Actually, considering that the rules were to “steal the crown and get out,” I’m pretty sure meeting Shining Armor in the throne room would change nothing if Twilight could get out with the crown anyway. But unfortunately, that doesn’t occur to Twilight. Looks like she wanted to take the crown without Shining Armor even knowing it was taken, which is a bit too much to want if you ask me.
- “The little brother we’ve always had.” Shining Armor himself acknowledges Spike as a sibling, which he had no opportunity to do previously.
Some analysis
- The incompetence of the Guard itself is pretty legendary in this episode, exceeding even the previously seen excesses. Turns out, relaxing the regulations didn’t do them much good – rather, looks more like the reverse. And I even know whom to blame for this: Flash Magnus is the drill sergeant now, isn’t he?
- Notice that the security measures are mostly geared towards preventing someone sneaking into the castle, rather than simply fighting their way in. Assuming that it’s Shining simply exploiting the situation to play with Twilight, rather than deliberately engineering the whole security procedure to do so, and the geeze are his sole concession to that particular end, what sort of enemy are they actually expecting, and what kind of security measures did Luna have in mind that would involve her and Celestia doing everything themselves?
P.S. Amazing, a Season 9 episode that’s actually good.
What a great episode.
I don't know about that. Horses have a frog in their hoof that is fairly soft, and equestrian ponies seem like their hooves are fairly flat, rather than having a raised ring around the outside like real horses. I could see the middle of that hoof having enough unique skin folds to effectively give a fingerprint.
Yup. We now have canon proof that Spike and Twilight lived together under Night and Velvet's roof, perhaps until Twilight was legally an adult, and that he considers Twilight a big sister more than a mom. This does contradict Issue #40. Perhaps the answer is, at the end of that comic, Twilight realized how much in over her head she was, so she moved back home?
As they point out, it does help explain some of Twilight's weird habits.
At this point I want to say Twilight living situation was something like
A)0-11 live in parents house until accepted into the CSfGU.
B)11-12 live in the dorms until she realizes taking care of an infant on her own is really hard.
C)12-18 live with parents again until she becomes some kind of grad student for Celestia.
D)18-19? Live in mineret with Spike until she is sent to ponyville.
It's possible that Twilight would give him a ride, but he would insist on flying once they are inside the city out of pride.
I think it's just a grudge that he moved out on a week he happened to win the crown and took it with him, rather than give the crown back to their parents.
Not Chrysalis twice or the Storm King, but Sombra is what it took?
What Luna was probably thinking, but would never say, is that if he was any good why didn't he do this before when he actually was the Captain of the Guard?
All of these are true. Also who wants to wager that some time in the final season we will see someone teleport into the throne room anyway because the writers forgot?
Yup. Although don't almost all the mares share the same light green color? Also, when he doubled the guard, to me it looked like the new guards were smaller than the older guard. Teenage cadets?
Deep cut!
Twilight is many things, but not subtly. Neither is her brother, who told every element of his strategy to Twilight ahead of time like an idiot.
Ponies may never have created beer, and the primary alcohol beverage of choice is various types of wine and ciders, i.e. fermented juice. The "seedy" part of the name tells ponies it serves alcohol.
(Or it's a dumb pun about pulp in the orange juice).
I'm not sure either, but I lean towards it was a real thing she did from time to time, because the guards seem to act like they recognize her songs, and as you have pointed out, pick the option that makes for better storytelling right?
She didn't say it, but this is also the first time she was trapped in a small space in a stone castle. That might be more traumatic.
You mean aside from the many forms of magic laser we've seen on the show, right? Laser could be what they use to refer to "magic beam." (Don't ask me how they got the name when Laser is an acronym.)
The guards would probably enforce rules, and she probably told some she was putting on a charity concert for them. Guards are not that professional.
Thank god for Spike, otherwise Pinkie might have actually made it.
Notice how all the ne'er-do-wells are wearing nicely tailored outfits? They have to get them from somewhere.
The fact that he got the job, and was put on castle duty, should settle the question of the average guard's competence once and for all. I think Luna arranged his schedule, but I don't think she had the time to get him into the guards in the first place.
Who I believe we meet at the end of the episode. And she's a mare, so they've been in the guard long enough for one to be promoted to sergeant.
And he's probably the most powerful unicorn stallion we've seen after Starswirl.
Yeah, I want to say he just wasn't part of the rivalry, but that's just because the alternative is kind of sad.
Blame him for the mice, but Celestia is probably to blame of the traps and secret passages, according to the forbidden tome.
But in order to get his hooves on that much cake, Grogar would have to steal like, 40 cakes! And that's terrible, no member of his new legion of doom would commit such a crime!
Bucking away and bucking through are probably different though.
They may have patched things up, but no one actually appreciates Luna's flowers.
And this probably enhances his own popularity back home, he's going to be bragging about his little brother the Brave and Glorious.
Yup. That and it looks like they're growing the size of the army by just sticking anyone who walks by in a uniform.
For the first part, Chrysalis round 3. For the second part, good question.
Yeah, this was a funny and fantastic episode.
5047139
Only that is precisely the part of the hoof that does not appear on the paper.
No it doesn’t: Even in boarding schools, students typically go home over breaks.
I’d be surprised if there were any takers.
Not really, some are purplish blue, some are grey. Though none of them have particularly bright colors.
These are the mares, which are typically smaller.
Interesting option.
Point, I suppose.
Which invariably come out of pony horns, yes. When security devices like these never do.
…So Rarity has a side business in dressing up the criminal element?
Precisely why I’m asking this question.
That said, Shining Armor had to double the guard, which might have involved some abrupt recruiting…
Doing something not-stupid during Sombra invasion could do it pretty quickly.
According to the Legends, it was Luna who designed this castle, though.
Sheesh, just steal a bakery.
I didn't know that! That's really cool. ^^
According to "Mares from SMILE" she is. And agency actually MUCH bigger that Bon-Bon knew.
5047169
While this is the one G.M. Berrow book I will give time of day to, because it’s not quite as terrible as almost all the others, like all of her books, its canonicity is, well, residual.
5047174
Well, comics also have rather dubious canonicity.
"Now, the Doylist reason for this euphemism is obvious and needs no explanations. What’s the Watsonian?…"
Well, they don't say what it's juice of. Maybe come Equestrian plant produces alcoholic juice that's the basis of some particular class of beverage, or perhaps the chemical involved isn't alcohol at all but some other psychoactive substance which may or may not exist on Earth.
"And Rarity knows where to find them. Just what does she do in her spare time?…"
Black market dressmaking materials?
"Which should really be considered in the expected threat profile."
Which, the grille or the CMC? I'm guessing "both". :D
5047146
"According to the Legends, it was Luna who designed this castle, though."
Maybe Celestia did some renovations during her millennium of sole rule?
Obligatory and pedantic comment about "fight" and "competition" being non-synonymous, friendly rivalries, etcetera.
To account for each sibling theoretically getting more than one star per day? Three by eight makes twenty-four, so that comes down to each sibling doing about three or four star-worthy things per day, which given the fairly low bar for stars being awarded seems reasonable enough.
And also begs the question abut why it never occurred to anybody to seal up the various backdoors into the country's main seat of power, backdoors which apparently can and do open with convenient and obvious entrances right in major public streets.
About that...
assets.rbl.ms/10341653/980x.jpg
Eh, flashbacks have always shown contemporary ponies. Call it copy-pasted background fillers, call it ponies filling in gaps in memory with familiar faces.
You'd be shocked at the sort of seedy, unscrupulous lowlifes that meet up right in W.D.C. on a regular basis. I think their biggest hangout is this one joint called "the Senate".
*canned rimshot*
5047139
It also pretty thoroughly nixes the idea of Celestia having been the one to raise Spike.
There seem to be three general female guard models now -- sea blue, gray with a blue mane, purple-grey with a whitish mane. The first two seem to be part of the regular guard, the latter two of the night guard.
I rather liked that one, personally. Zephyr (a) assumes Fluttershy has told Rainbow, as she does with all the developments in his life, because (b) he assumes that whenever his sister and his (obviously reciprocal) crush get together, they naturally talk of little else.
Oh no ... that's what they missed.
Ask the CMC to get involved in coming up with a plan. That would have brought them all the way to 10.
Remember when the Guards were properly disciplined?
How the mighty have fallen.
5047146
I guess that's possibly true, but it seems the sibling supreme competition rewards things between the siblings on a daily basis. It's hard to picture Twilight going home and visiting her parents ever single day from boarding school.
Horns or magical objects, like the EoH. I think a magical device could be enchanted to fire off a low-powered energy beam constantly. The more intriguing question is, how do they have the ability to know when their beam is interrupted?
I don't know if it's a side business as much as Rarity will sell clothing to anyone who asks. And given her love on noir, she's probably pretty good at designing gangster outfits.
Perhaps. He did "double the ranks of security." But Zephyr also bragged that his role is a "castle guard," which to me implies the Royal Guard guards things beyond the palace. Depending on what percentage of the Royal Guard just hang around guarding the palace, we can better guess how low standards how to drop to double those on palace duty. The animation suggests to me that he made castle duty open to mares and not just stallions anymore, but we all know these kind of visuals are tricky.
Yeah, but are we going to believe that mares have been guards for a while and not shown on the show, or that a Royal Guard did something not-stupid during the Sombra invasion?
Which also helps explain why she thinks she's highly qualified to beef up the defenses of the castle herself. She probably just wants to build a bunch of extra rotating bookshelves and sliding staircases.
5047195
Yup. It also kind of lowers the max age of Shining Armor. He was still a teenager when Twilight had already gotten her cutie mark.
Good catch!
5047176
Indeed, but generally, they are a better fit to televised canon and are mostly written with an assumption of an audience that isn’t intellectually deficient.
Which is more than what I can say for most of the chapter books.
5047189
This is actually a theory floated to explain Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000 – the ponies consistently behave like the drink is alcoholic, but it’s squeezed out of the apples right there.
While it would explain things, I personally don’t like it, but that’s just me.
More so the CMC than the grille, really.
Never mind that Cozy Glow is also an appropriate size to squeeze through that grille…
She would have to, at some point – indoor plumbing probably was not a thing in the era, for one, at least if we take the technology development presented for the “colonial era” in From the Shadows into account – but we have no clear indications allowing us to conclude whether she did or not.
5047195
What confuses me most about it is that the individual columns appear to be labeled, while the rows are not. With 8 columns, they can’t be days of the week, and more importantly, the rows appear to be filled horizontally left to right.
Celestia used those to sneak out for drinks.
The beak’s still the wrong shape. They’re geeze, rather than geese, I’m certain.
Pretty sure these aren’t an underground, though, they’re quite open about how ne’er-do-well they are.
5047296
Oh yes. That said, there was barely enough time for everything in one episode as it is.
5047373
How fortunate a summer contains like 90 days.
They don’t. Rather, they burn things, apparently.
In any case, both cases of such lasers seen in the series occur in sequences clearly identifiable as imaginary, so I’m confident they are fiction rather than reality.
As a side note, we have no indication on how long did it take for Twilight to come up with the plan, or how long it took Rarity to prepare everything for the first abortive attempt. Zephyr could have been hired specifically for the purpose of shooting him down later. They never even explained to him what “guarding” is, remember?
Well, we know mares have been in the Guard for at least three months by that point: The first female Guards appear in School Raze.
5047495
"This is actually a theory floated to explain Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000 – the ponies consistently behave like the drink is alcoholic, but it’s squeezed out of the apples right there."
Ah, I think I do now vaguely recall that being floated.
"Never mind that Cozy Glow is also an appropriate size to squeeze through that grille…"
Ahh... yes, good point.
"She would have to, at some point – indoor plumbing probably was not a thing in the era, for one, at least if we take the technology development presented for the “colonial era” in From the Shadows into account – but we have no clear indications allowing us to conclude whether she did or not."
Good point.
5047495
I think that books mostly written for same target auditory as a show while comics targed older auditory.
I think you mean from Daring Done. It was a spell by the sphinx.
5047495
Maybe the eighth column is for the overall week. If they got at least one star for every day that week, they'd get a bonus star. Or two or three bonus stars for two or three stars each day. Alternatively, if there's a hard limit of three possible stars to earn each day, the eighth column could be an extra fourth or fifth star for exceptional occasions where they do something to deserve an extra one.
5047556
Oops. Yes, I do. That said, being “by the sphinx” shouldn’t make it impossible to reverse-engineer…
Possible, but like I said, they seem to be filling it in rows left to right – otherwise, the pattern of missing stars on Shining Armor’s side of the card would be rather statistically unlikely.
5047586
Statistically unlikely things have to happen sometime.
5047495
Sometimes up to 500! But yeah, summer vacation is a thing, Twilight would probably stay at home during that period, that makes sense.
Spike says "So, while Shining Armor went on and on about his improved security measures, Luna and I struck a deal. She put Zephyr in charge of the catacombs and helped keep Celestia out of the castle hallways." It seems unlikely to me that Spike had Luna hire Zephyr for this role but he doesn't mention it here. It would also be pretty cruel of Spike to get Zephyr a job just for the purpose of him screwing up and getting fired, something Fluttershy would not be happy about. The moral of this episode is supposed to be don't treat younger siblings like shit right? (Ok, it's not like the show staff would realize if they were contradicting their own moral).
And I'm sure Zephyr had guarding explained to him, he's just too dumb to remember it.
True.
Have we ever had any kind of indication that the Equestrian week has 7 and not 8 days?
5047629
Yes. Sisterhooves Social:
5047630 Ah. Perhaps the 8th section is a place to tally up totals for each column then.
5047632
Doesn’t work, I’m afraid:
cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/351321807120498689/569565281048068097/cap_stream_001410_01.jpg
This is basically the same ideas as sport: compete in a controlled way, instead of competing in an uncontrolled way, ie a fight.
More seriously, using a material ward like this would not just prevent somepony teleporting in, it would also stop anypony teleporting out. So any royal escape plan that requires them to teleport away from a villain that's taken the throne room is now more restricted than before.
The way ponies (and dragons) imagine them are unrealistic, but that doesn't mean they're unreal. After all, there are plenty of living humans who have no idea how lasers work or what space is actually like.
Yeah, but if the CMC were doing penetration testing, you'd end up with a real disaster.
5048187
Actually, that’s probably what the trapdoor is actually for.
Sure – it’s just that if they were real enough to exist as more than experimental specimens, at least one pony would imagine them correctly. Or Twilight would nitpick Rainbow’s Nightmare Night costume in Scare Master.
Not necessarily. They already have their cutie marks in cutie mark interpretation, right? Send them to scour the castle for a cutie mark for somepony new…
5048304
Oh, she does - internally.
Just realized this, something big and missing: the Princesses appear not to be aware that Tirek and Cozy have escaped from Tartarus. They talk about Sombra's recent attack, and even say they want to be prepared against other potential threats, but they do not bring up Tirek as a threat, which would be really weird unless they don't know if he's escaped.
Kind of fits with the Tartarus we saw at the S8 Finale, which looks like a big oubliette. It also fits with the idea that no one has checked on Cozy Glow since they tossed her in there.
Alright. Had stuff come up and didn't get around to this for awhile. Let's see...
We've gone from Twi and Shining doing everything together to competing with eachother instead, like some twisted abridged-series retelling. The evidence for the soft reboot grows... Although, it could just be that the flashbacks for the BBBFF song and this are like... weeks apart. Or days. or hours. Have you had siblings?
Is giving one sibling bragging rights 'until next time' really a good idea? Then again, parents were probably happy just to trick them into doing constructive things...
Doesn't he have stuff to do as the prince of the crystal empire? Then again, he's prince consort, not prince regnant, so... maybe not?
Twilight comes in with a strong early entry for best face.
Remember when it was played up that they were horses? Stamping their hooves instead of clapping, doing that neck-hug-nuzzle thing instead of hugging?
Chrysalis's throne is a nice continuity nod, but giant fans? Seriously? There has to be a better way to do that... What if Celestia or Luna want to fly around? Or pegasus guards? I suppose I could give the benefit of a doubt if this is an 'emergency measures' system rather than one meant to be always on.
Doubled guards and sealed all the entrances? Okay, this has *got* to be an emergency-measures drill in case of feared changeling invasion or the like, not normal operating procedure.
Do those geese have TEETH?
For a moment I thought she was gonna give some big speech. It's good she can admit the truth to herself. Although... making sure the castle is secure through penetration testing is an entirely legitimate cause... she'd try even without the crown, wouldn't she?
An intriguing second entry for best face.
I think we have a winner!
Oh no. Hasn't anypony ever played
ShadowrunShadowtrot? This does not go well!For a moment I wondered if this fantasy sequence was a spell like the one from the S6(?) opener
Pinkie has interesting ideas about space.
Applejack what? Oh this is episode 200 isn't it.
Rainbow you're the same person you can't be the one to ask her that
I'm not going to question Spike and Fluttershy's capabilities in this sequence, but why would you destroy the lasers instead of just leaving? Now you've let everyone know you're here!
Rainbow Dash always dresses in style.
I like how in this world sneaking outfits just have to include some kind of animal ears. I really want to know the cultural origins of this tradition.
So... the trap just dumped them into a pit that no one is monitoring?!
How can guards be dumb enough to all leave for a surprise party.
Does Rarity assume all female guardsponies smoke three packs a day? Yeesh. As long as some of them do I guess it disguises her voice, though.
So... they defeated all the security measures and reached the crown. Was stopping Shining Armor and the Royal Sisters from sitting there watching it really part of the challenge?
Does Luna comprimising the whole thing really count, either? I mean, if Spike had snuck over there and taken it while Shining was gloating and focused on Twilight, it'd make a good point...
Shining might have taken to flying a kite with his teeth while teaching a young little sister to do it -- he'd have had magic before she did. Also, he could be so much better at kite-flying that he's doing it as a handicap and still winning.
Obviously Twilight Velvet and Night Light worked out that their kids probably won't do more than 24 good things in whatever the contest period is.
Ohhhh noooo they totally did leave Spike out of the chart, poor guy...
Really. He's the one who didn't even talk to her about his wedding...
They're preparing for the next threat!
I did wonder about that, 'using a spell' is pretty vague. As for lacking a previous ward, it could be that the princesses valued being able to teleport in and out over the security risk posed by the small number of ponies who can do long-range teleports (quite possibly 'just Twilight' until Starlight and Starswirl showed up). It could also be that it just wasn't possible without the darkstone.
Yeah, wouldn't that be WAY EASIER? Maybe Shining just likes convoluted plans, and Trollestia probably enjoys them too.
I learned something today. Who says MLP isn't still educational?
Maybe the establishment's entire point is something other than the juice -- a place for discreet meetings, for instance. Then again, if Rarity thinks she can shake down the staff so easily...
I got nothin' Watsonian, but perhaps it's cartoon resolution so the ponies riding it can still be clearly seen when the whole thing is on screen?
Reminding me about this made me wonder why noone spotted a balloon flying over the castle, but not only can there be no pegasus guards in the air but obviously Shining is so confident in the fans that he didn't station anyone on the roof as lookout for ponies trying to sneak in that way. So good on them for exploiting this security hole, I guess.
I thought it was weird that they went from two guards to one, and initially figured it was for the Doylist reason of allowing the whole sequence with Zephyr Breeze. I'm glad there was a believable explanation later.
Pretty sure Zephyr believes he's the center of the universe and thus of course anypony interesting is following his escapades.
This bugged me too, but then it bugged me more that Twilight just walks right up to them when all guard eyes have gotta be on her.
+1 here, though I admit I hadn't had reason to think about it.
Hey, maybe that's the reason they're doing this; they checked Tartarus and noticed the prisoners are missing, but don't want to alarm anypony yet. Even though they should]/i] be alarmed... Princess competence is all over the place, though.
Honestly, I'd have figured that for pretty much all of their history, the Royal Guard has never needed to be about defense of the capitol building. As your RTAC points out, their purpose was probably as an army under the Sisters' control to be led against threats from outside Equestria -- they'd be intercepting and attacking. They certainly wouldn't need to defend the sisters' castle.
The relative peace of the past thousand years, and the forming of the federation of Equestria, has turned them into more of a celebratory post. This also explains the focus on appearance and making everypony look the same. They probably have focused a bit more on defense, even if the idea of an assassin sneaking in and taking out a physical god should be laughable.
But then Shining Armor leaves and is replaced by Flash Magnus, used to the old ways. He sees no point in regulations about looks and probably throws out a bunch of rules that have been developed since -- he doesn't think of the Royal Guard as people who guard the castle, he thinks of them as a standing army ready to go fight a dragon or a monster or whatever.
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Certain comics and chapter books insist he’s in charge of the Crystal Guard, so he does have something to do, but we don’t know how much of his time that occupies.
This is the same face as puddi-i-iing.
It was never particularly consistent.
I suspect this is not meant to be a trap so much as an escape hatch for the occupants of the thrones. The entire castle is the trap instead.
Everyone accepts it, importantly, including Celestia, so evidently it does. The more interesting question would be why does it count, because answers to it imply the expected threat profile.
If so, it’s the most extreme example of cartoon resolution in general.
Flash Magnus cites his job as “drill sergeant,” though, which is not a commanding officer…
That said, he probably has more influence than he realizes, being a legendary ancient hero and all.