After the opening is over and Spike is let into the room the Mane Six are preparing in at Carousel Boutique, Spike refers to Canterlot as his and Twilight’s ‘hometown’. I think it would be fair to say, taking off our Season-1-Canon goggles for just a moment, that at some point down the line Spike and Twilight come to see Ponyville as their hometown – I wonder at what point that would be? It’s probably not possible to pinpoint exactly, but it occurred to me as a question. It also, from that, occurred to me that by the end of the show, Twilight has returned to Canterlot, and goes on to rule from there. In the grand scheme of her life, the years in Ponyville would then make up a gap between growing up in Canterlot, and ruling in Canterlot. Anyway, aside over, goggles back on. We cut to Spike as the driver of the carriage in his tuxedo, and he says he wants to show Rarity the crown jewels. Celestia of course wears her crown and her collar (best term I can think of for whatever the gold thing round her neck is), so I think this is suggesting the existence of other, accompanying items. Common ones I know of would be things like an orb, a scepter, and/or a sword. I’d love to know the history of them, I quite like those sort of artifacts – like the Iron Crown of Lombardy, so called because it was said that it contained a nail from the True Cross, and it was won (later to be joined by, I believe, every other nail of the True Cross, in various other artifacts – at least according to legend) by Charlemagne when he came to the aid of the Pope against the King of Lombardy. Later chemical analysis showed the crown didn’t contain any iron, sadly – but the point is, these sort of things always have very cool histories. I’m sure the Elements of Harmony, also, have a fascinating story to tell, even just the crown and necklaces they currently inhabit. 

The song is excellent, and whilst it was going, I was considering all the unique hopes the Six had for the Gala, and how they had been set up in The Ticket Master, an episode that I liked but wasn’t as keen on as others when I looked at it earlier in this thread. However, something I think I didn’t consider at the time was quite how well that episode sets up this one, which is very much a point in it’s favour. On the other hand, I think it also makes a criticism I had surrounding that episode a bit more pertinent too: it might have been better placed just a bit later in the season so that it’s not quite so far removed from the Gala. I think I’d put Boast Busters as episode 3, then Applebuck Season as episode 4, and then put The Ticket Master as episode 5. 

We go through each of the girls starting their nights off not too badly. When Soarin comes along hungry for something, Applejack lists off some of her items and mentions apple fries, so I looked up apple fries out of curiosity. They look really quite good, I might have to make them sometime. I’ve been planning to make apple butter for years now as well, I remember it being one of the first items you’d get on My Lego Network so it’s stuck in my memory from that. Soarin goes for the pie instead, and takes it in it’s tin – so I guess he’s keeping the tin.