>>12692
Celestia’s intervention, by contrast, is completely perfect. In particular, I noticed that just prior to Twilight’s friends bursting into the library, Celestia was essentially just forgiving her, but when Twilight’s friends come in and loudly try and convince Celestia not to punish Twilight, Celestia does not correct them but instead asks to hear what they have to say, and after hearing them out, says she’ll forget Twilight’s punishment, “on one condition”, that being for all of them to report their findings to her. Since all six feel that they have made mistakes they need to make up for, Celestia does not try to downplay the mistakes, even though they are somewhat minor, and provides a task for them which both serves as feeling like atonement, and continuing to help further Twilight’s studies. It’s very well thought-out, and impressed me as essentially coming off-the-cuff from Celestia. It’s excellently written, it’s precisely the way a leader should handle such a situation, and in a very short span of time manages to convey how impressively gifted she is with diplomacy. Also, in the end, Spike had to send both a warning letter to Celestia, and a report on friendship to her, and after he’d already gotten claw-cramp from writing and filling out the checklists earlier that day! So I hope his wrist wasn’t too sore in the end!

So all in all, I liked this episode a lot better than I thought I would! My issue (turned out to just be one, in the end) remains, but it’s less egregious than I remembered. I’d say I prefer it just marginally over Return of Harmony Part One, placing it on par with Bridle Gossip at 7.5!