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>  As such, another neat difference between Pony and human society in this sense is that ponies aren’t really faced with necessity as much, and yet they choose to continue to live in a way that brings them in harmony with their countryside and with eachother. 

Feels like with this, one could argue, that, with their magic and control of the whether, ponies achieved relative abundance and stability and have partly resolved/better dealt with it than we humans here, but also... still not completely.
> In this sense, not only does Ponyville represent pony values as contrasted to human ones, but also pony values contrasted to Canterlot!

>  but it would be interesting to think of urban pony life as having degraded from the harmony that kept Equestria together in the past, and so from Celestia’s perspective, all this fun slice-of-life stuff is essential training for her protege to go through

I think there is a lot of support for this! Consider how detached Applejack's family was in Manhattan?  Heck, possiblily some stuff in the Equestria Games that really proves this point if I recall correctly. Considering how Ponyville was seen as exceptional with the harmony in the three races yet, we have seen other towns, like Rainbow Falls, that seemed pretty mixed (though a lot of towns are still Earth Pony. 

> Then we’re introduced to Rainbow Dash’s weather team. Twilight realising she doesn’t have wings takes on a different note on rewatch for sure, but what note that is exactly I don’t yet know how to say. I’m sure it’s also been noted by others before that Pegasi don’t exactly fit the “Earth pony way”.

Unicorn magic is unfair but Pegasi are essential for weather regulation?  

>  the whole social-environmental structure works much better with Celestia as effectively a deity. It also makes the world beyond Equestria much more mysterious and potentially scary, as it’s outside the protection of the world’s only known benevolent deities.

Never been Celestia as a deity (though casual evidence in earlier seasons you certainly can go with that route) but I consider her (and the other Princesses) as something that should be above simply being a really powerful mortal. Even if not a hint of the divine, there is going to be a reverence for her and fear outside of her realm.

> Uncontrolled weather in regions like the Everfree forest and beyond the borders of Equestria would also be an interesting thing to explore at this stage of canon – perhaps it’s much more extreme and violent.

https://www.fimfiction.net/story/182859/its-a-dangerous-business-going-out-your-door
A lot of early adventure fics do have this feel. 

> Then again, it looks a bit as though Spike looks at her horn and realises she’s using magic. Whether he’s noticing a glow or just putting the pieces together though, I don’t know.

He also is an active magic user, albeit, by that definition, so are some pegasi (later in the series I have better examples), if you wanted to go with magical auras existing in canon but only visible to magical users, that might work.

> ’s pretty soon after I first brought it up, but here it is, my first 10/10. I’m not even sure at this point whether I’ll come across another 10/10 as we watch through the show – I hope so, but I’ll be comparing it to this episode as a yardstick from here on.

I think that it is a perfect first 10/10. I very nearly and might rate it as such on rewatch, I tend to be very stingy with anything past 9 but that is how I personally see things.