"Between Dark and Dawn" Review: Between Beaches and Background Fillies · 1:38am Jun 23rd, 2019

So, the hints for my observation that the attack by King Sombra was just a giant ruse by Celestia and Luna to test Twilight and her friends before they retire that I expected to see in this episode weren't there. But nothing that contradicted my observation either, so I'm still on point with it.
And it's actually not surprising that there wasn't one, after watching the episode, because it weren't Celestia and Luna who announced to go on vacation so that Twilight and her friends get a chance to practice, but Twilight who suggested they should do that.
And seeing how eager Celestia and Luna suddenly were to defend Equestria more proactively again makes me wonder how the future is going to look like once they have retired. They want to retire from their royal duties, but at the same time, they still want to play a part in taking care of Equestria, just not in the throne room.
This is very surprising, so far, it looked like they want to step down completely and spend the rest of their lives with sipping pina coladas in Luna Bay or Fillydelphia's beaches. But now it looks that they still want to be there for Equestria to some extent and when they are needed. Maybe Twilight and her friends won't have as much to do to defend Equestria once Celestia and Luna have retired as they think.
Speaking of which, Twilight seems to have gotten used to the idea of her ruling Equestria as its sole ruler by now. In the Opener, we saw her freaking out over the mere mention of it, but now, she was handling the task of taking care of Celestia's and Luna's duties for one day and one night just fine. She was approaching everything in a calm and composed manner and was even determined and confident enough to suggest stepping in for Celestia and Luna on that day. And she also learned how Celestia and Luna can take care of so many royal duties, by having delegates who assist them and they can assign tasks to. She even spoke it out, "So that's how you rule Equestria!", and had the most determined expression in her face when she said that. That's a very big difference to the panic she felt not too long ago.
Or, was it "not too long" ago? In "Student Counsel", we heard Starlight talking about it how spring break is about to start and in this episode, we heard Applejack referring to the apple trees the giant turtle was eating as their "summer crop". Sounds a lot like another school year is already over again, the third one since Twilight opened her school. Which, if true, would mean that more than ten months have passed already since Sombra's fake assault happened (under the assumption that school years in Equestria are as long as school years on Earth), so Twilight had plenty of time to get used to it then and it just seems shorter to us than it actually is.
And there is more evidence for this, which brings me to my favourite part of the episode..... We've gotten a fantastic appearance of Lemon Crumble in this episode!

That makes up a little for it that she hasn't gotten any spotlight in "Student Counsel". She looks so adorable here biting into that sandwich with purest satisfaction. Lemon Crumble is a very badass and cool filly, but you wouldn't think that of her when you see her there in this moment, with how cute she looks here.^-^
And at her side is Gooseberry, snacking away at strawberries. And a mare we've never seen before opposite of them. The three of them give me a huge vibe that the mare is their adoptive mother and that Lemon Crumble and Gooseberry are therefore adoptive sisters. I want to write about them eventually, this little moment has gotten me even more interested in Lemon Crumble.
And this moment there, combined with Applejack calling the apple trees their "summer crop", brings a pretty solid evidence that the next summer break has already started. Both Lemon Crumble and Gooseberry are students in Twilight's friendship school and that they sit there having a picnic shows not only that they evidently live in Canterlot, but also that they don't attend school right now.
Season 8 has really started a trend with sudden, long timeskips. I hope that's an indicator for it that we will have a timeskip between Generation 4 and Generation 5, because still seeing Equestria in Generation 5 would be the best thing ever!
But either way, I am very happy that we got to see this moment and could learn a little about Lemon Crumble and Gooseberry; that they live in Canterlot and are adoptive sisters. It's a rare treat to get this for background ponies, so it's always a special joy when it happens.
Additionally to Lemon Crumble and Gooseberry, we also got to see Boysenberry, Peach Fuzz and Aquamarine in the forest and learned that they are filly guides, as well! Not to mention that we have seen Sugar Stix and Cotton Puff with their big sisters Tender Brush and Cotton Sky at the beach where Luna relaxed, which also gives further confirmation that it's summer break already, since going to the beach is something a lot of foals do for vacation in the summer.
It's a good episode for background ponies.

What wasn't a special joy, though, was having to see how Celestia treated Luna during their vacation. She did not pay attention to it that Luna was tired and just wanted to relax on that day, instead of doing thrilling and adrenaline-fueled activities. Then accused her of never being happy and then even shouted at her when Luna defended herself. Celestia always had that habit of picking on Luna at times and by now I'm convinced that will never change. Even in the far past when they were still trained by Starswirl, Celestia bullied Luna very often (as seen in "Legends of Magic") and not much has changed since then. Celestia is quite an abusive big sister.
What gives her at least one little point is, however, that she seems to be aware what she caused to Luna in the past. After Luna said that she feels like Celestia wants to rule over Equestria alone again like during the time she was on the moon, Celestia said that she is responsible for Luna.
This was a clear reference to Luna's transformation into Nightmare Moon, since that came right after Luna's statement, so Celestia at least realizes that she was at fault for it that Luna could ultimately become Nightmare Moon because she wasn't there enough for her little sister.
Now if only she would realize that the way she treats Luna could bring Nightmare Moon back again one day..... But judging by past experience and how Celestia always relapses into the same pattern, this seems like it's too much asked for.

A very satisfying episode, overall. Not at all what I expected (and I'm jealous that Celestia and Luna got a sisters episode AND a duet in the show, while Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash still wait to get that), but we've gotten a hint for it how it will be once Twilight rules over Equestria after Celestia and Luna have retired, we've seen a lot of interesting locations all over Equestria (even a couple new ones) and the background pony fanservice was hugely satisfying in this episode. Also, we got to see a beach for the first time ever in the show!
I especially liked the "cavern" Celestia and Luna were exploring. If you looked closely, you could see that it was totally the mouth of a gigantic creature! And the turtle wasn't too small either. It's amazing how we've seen such massive creatures in the show just a few days after I speculated about the existence of monsters the sizes of mountains in my analyzis of the "Rainbow Roadtrip" Special preview screenshots!
And I even got to see my Crusaders for a moment, right after asking for that on the stream, too! With the gods of Equestria having listened to my plea, there is no way how I could be more satisfied (well, except if it would be a full-blown Cutie Mark Crusaders episode and there better be another one this season) with this episode!
Next week is the "Rainbow Roadtrip" Special! The preview screenshots we got for it imply very intriguing and exciting things, I'm looking forward to this a lot!