Twilight's Kingdom, not expecting this!

So I just finished watching Twilights Kingdom and...it was amazing and with the inclusion of Tirek also very surprising.

Going into this I initially believed time travel would be involved, why you ask? well in the episode before this, Spike made mention of the fact that its impossible to go back in time, at which point Twilight put her hoof to her chin as if contemplating whether their really was a way to reverse her role as princess and become a regular unicorn again.
Why did I think this you ask? because the writers had done a very good job of establishing throughout this series that Twilight was obviously not happy with her new-found regal role. Every time there was mention of her royal duties or her princess-hood, you could always see a certain level of sadness cross her face, and they even address this right at the beginning of the episode, which was something I was really pleased to see, almost as much as seeing all four princesses perform some kind of "royal quartet".

But as it is, the reasoning behind my convoluted time travel plot was beautifully destroyed by just how well this episode turned out, to avoid writing an essay 'll just focus on the key points that I felt made this finale really stand out for me:

- As I mentioned before they address the issue of whether Twilight should really be a princess right at the beginning, and by telling her she has a purpose allows us to move on from asking "why" she is a princess to actively pointing out why she "should" be a princess. The writers understood the fan backlash at Twilight becoming a princess and instead of making dullard excuses actually dedicated the finale to addressing this issue on its entirety.

-  This of course could not have been done without Tirek, no one saw him coming and he impressed big time, nothing sets a villain apart more than blowing up a library and then having a dragonball-esq magic duel to boot.

- Discord turning bad actually surprised me, I know he was teetering on the edge of evil but I didn't think he would have such a heavy part in this episode, I thought he would confront Tirek and prove unable to beat him, boy was I wrong, they actually developed his character even further with this episode.

- Again the fight scene really stood out for me, anyone want to say this show is for little girls should that fight out. Good lord I thought the fight would be on par with the episode "Magic Duel", just exaggerated parlour tricks, but no we, get Twilight slammed into mountains, nuclear blasts, gigantic amounts of destruction, all it was missing was a zoomed out shot of the earth with a tiny explosion happening on it a la Dragonball!

- They manage to keep the episode light hearted despite the dire situation, namely when Twilight has just received all the other Princesses powers,  a lot of fun slapstick to be had from that.

Now we every good thing their are some nagging bad points which should be addressed:

- Are you seriously telling me that it didnt cross ANYPONIES mind that perhaps if they want to keep the identity of a fourth princess secret they should probably get rid of the GIANT STAINED GLASS WINDOW DEPICTING THIS "SECRET" PRINCESS!! Maybe Celestia's mind whithers in her old age...

- The ending really stunk to me, what was in the box? oh just a friendship based Deus Ex Machina, I get that the whole point of this show is to emphasize how great friendship is but their must be a point when it becomes just overbearing, couldn't we have had something more inventive than just friendship? Hell they beat Chrysalis with true love and killed Sombra with the combined power of a kingdom, just pulling out more friendship seems like a tired concept when its already been used twice to beat Nightmare Moon and Discord, and just covering yourself in sparkly stickers and putting gold highlights in your hair isnt going to make that fact any less obvious.

- And know Twilight has a castle in Ponyville, and she is now the Princess of friendship, the big question now is is that really necassary? she's been able to preach the magic of friendship since before she was even a princess, so what good is being princess of it? is the spread of friendship going to become some kind of business? are those ponies like Cheese sandwich and Coco now going to become "agents" of friendship in some kind of convoluted friendship takeover of Equestria? In terms of the writers trying to justify Twilight being a princess its acceptable, but for the future I just don't know what this implies.

So overall ABSOLUTELY ADORED THE EPISODE, except for the ending, perhaps Rainbow Rocks will develop Twilights new position further (probably not), or maybe the writers have some ambitious new horizons to aim for. Whatever the case I absolutely loved this season and I look forward to the next...