Princess Twilight Sparkle - Part 1

Princess Twilight Sparkle - Part 1 is the first episode of the fourth season of My Little Pony Friendship is Magic and the sixty-sixth episode overall, being the first episode to take place after the spin-off film My Little Pony Equestria Girls. It is the first half of a two-part episode.

In this episode, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna mysteriously disappear right before the new Summer Sun Celebration. As Twilight Sparkle attempts to figure out what happened to them, the Everfree Forest invades Ponyville.

Production and development
The script for this episode was locked in August 2012.

On July 20, 2013, an animatic clip of this episode was shown at San Diego Comic-Con International. In the clip, Princess Luna/Nightmare Moon and Princess Twilight Sparkle appear, and Princess Celestia is mentioned. In early November 2013, the Hub Network released a preview of the episode's script on both Twitter and Facebook.

Meghan McCarthy considers the season four premiere to be the second and third parts in a three-part story following Magical Mystery Cure.

The ending shot of the My Little Pony theme song was replaced by a shot of Princess Twilight surrounded by the rest of the Mane Six, Spike, the Cutie Mark Crusaders, Zecora, Snips, Snails, Mr. and Mrs. Cake, Mayor Mare, Big McIntosh, Granny Smith, and Photo Finish with Princesses Celestia and Luna looking at the shot.

There was originally a scene showing how Pinkie Pie dealt with the strange weather patterns. McCarthy stated that there was no room for songs in the Season 4 premiere; "but [there are] soooo many coming up soon." ; she was then asked if Discord singing "Winter Wrap Up" counted as his singing debut, she replied with a "Nope".

Prologue
In Canterlot, Twilight Sparkle practices flying while Spike and her friends Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie and Rarity cheer her on, with Rainbow Dash giving her pointers. However she is still unused to fine wing control, causing her to flap them out of sync, lose control, and crash. She isn't prepared for her performance in the Summer Sun Celebration, which is only two days away. As Applejack helps her up, she calls her "Princess Twilight", which Twilight points out is unnecessary. Rarity questions why she insists on that as she has already given up on wearing her crown all the time, and she should at least embrace her royal title. Twilight concedes that if other ponies want to address her that way it's fine, but it feels wrong for her own friends to do so. Rainbow has her run through her performance's big finish, and Twilight has no problem soaring, but her coordination falls apart after smashing through three clouds, loops out of control, and plows a furrow into the ground.

Royal duties in Canterlot
In the throne room, Twilight's friends admire the new stain glass window commemorating Twilight's ascension and coronation, along with Star Swirl the Bearded's spell book and a purple book with her cutie mark on the cover underneath. Twilight feels downcast that her friends won't be in Canterlot for the official Summer Sun Celebration, as it was the celebration that brought them all together. It doesn't feel right to any of them that they won't be spending their special day with Twilight in Canterlot, but Mayor Mare was desperate for Twilight's friends to help set up the local celebration for Ponyville. Applejack states that while the celebration is what brought them all together, she points to the stain glass window depicting the six defeating Nightmare Moon (from The Return of Harmony Part 1) as proof that they will always be united by the Elements of Harmony. Twilight and Spike see them off at the train station and they Pinkie Promise to write her as much detail as possible so it'll be like she's there with them, while Rarity reminds Twilight that the two have an appointment after the celebration to discuss royal upgrades to her bedroom loft décor in Golden Oak Library. However even as the train pulls away, Twilight tells Spike that she still can't help feeling like she's already missing something.

That evening in their castle guest quarters, Spike goes over a checklist and noting that they are way ahead of schedule, suggests that they have time to make a quick trip to Ponyville, then return to finish off the checklist before the celebration. Twilight decides to stay in Canterlot in case something goes wrong that requires her attention; this being her first royal duty, she doesn't want to let down her old teacher. Princess Celestia enters the room and says that she is actually looking forward to the celebration for the first time. Looking out the window as Princess Luna raises the moon from a tower balcony, she explains that to her subjects, the holiday celebrated her victory over Nightmare Moon, but to her, it was always a painful reminder that she had to banish her beloved sister to the moon. She then brightens up, stating that it now reminds her of Luna's cleansing, return, and the happy reunion with her. Celestia is happy to have Twilight as part of the festivities, but knows it must have been hard to have her friends return home without her. While no longer teacher and student, Celestia reaffirms that she will always be there if Twilight needs her, just as she hopes that Twilight will be there for her. After sharing a nuzzle, Celestia leaves Twilight and Spike to go over the checklist one more time. As she walks down the corridor, a black root breaks through the floor and pursues her off-screen. All that is heard is Celestia's startled gasp and a short cry of alarm.

The next morning, both the sun and the moon are in the sky, splitting the sky into half day and half night. Two royal guards anxiously take Twilight and Spike behind the closed doors of the throne room and inform her that both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna are missing; they've mysterious vanished. As the only princess available, they can only take orders from her. Twilight pulls herself together and instructs the two to continue the search and to immediately let her know of anything they find. Another guard bursts in with news from Ponyville: the Everfree Forest is invading!

Problems in Ponyville
The scene cuts to Fluttershy's cottage, where Fluttershy is comforting a crowd of frightened animals. Fluttershy sees black thorny vines creeping out of the nearby Everfree Forest, and is terrified herself.

At Sweet Apple Acres, Applejack, Apple Bloom, Big McIntosh, and Granny Smith are trying to remove "weeds" without success. Applejack says she has never seen this type of "weed" before. A few spiky dark clouds pass by overhead.

The roots and vines spread to Ponyville's town center, where Rainbow Dash is unsuccessfully trying to bust the spiky dark clouds. A group of clouds scare her off with lightning.

At Carousel Boutique, Rarity does not notice the vines until they emit magic that takes control of her horn and the teapot she is levitating. The teapot pours tea onto a hat and chases Opalescence. Rarity puts out the vines' magic and wonders if Sweetie Belle and her friends are pulling a prank. Sweetie Belle bounces down the stairs on her head, affected by the strange magic as well. The magic takes control of a sheet, which chases the siblings.

Twilight returns to Ponyville
Twilight flies back to Ponyville with Spike on her back as the vine invasion grows worse. She realizes she is flying too fast to land safely at Golden Oak Library, so she teleports herself inside, leaving Spike to hurtle into a window.

Twilight's friends tell her about the Everfree Forest, just as a large root breaks through a window. Twilight explains that Princess Celestia and Princess Luna are missing, and gives her friends their Elements of Harmony necklaces. Applejack tells Twilight that the Elements of Harmony will always keep the friends together. Applejack asks who they may be firing on, and Twilight comes to the conclusion that there's a bit too much chaos going on to just be a coincidence.

The friends stand in a circle and use the Elements of Harmony to summon Discord, who is taking a shower and singing Winter Wrap Up. Discord is not upset in the least, but does remind Twilight that Celestia had told her that she is to give him a heads up before a summoning. Twilight demands that he immediately release Celestia and Luna and halt the Everfree Forest's invasion. Discord denies causing the mayhem and claims to be reformed.

Fluttershy convinces Rarity, Applejack, and Rainbow Dash that they shouldn't turn Discord back to stone because he may be telling the truth. Discord thanks "Shutterfly" while hugging Rainbow Dash. Fluttershy corrects him in regard to the name and the pony. Twilight asks Discord to help them find out who caused the princesses to disappear and the Everfree Forest to grow, but after showing disapproval of the way he was treated, he directs them to Zecora instead.

Flashbacks
Zecora emerges from the forest and explains that the growth of the forest is too much to handle, even for her. Applejack asks her why it is growing so violently, but Zecora does not know why. Nevertheless, she pulls out a purple potion from her belongings and claims that it can help. However, it may only be activated by Alicorn magic. She tells Twilight to turn the potion from purple to white, and after a sip, she may be able to see why the sky is day and night.

Twilight turns the potion white with dark magic. She takes a sip and her eyes turn white. She finds herself in a hall in front of two thrones. As Princess Luna walks out from behind the blue throne, Twilight asks her where they are and why she and Celestia disappeared. Luna says that she is not going to sit "idly by" while the rest of Equestria basks in Celestia's "precious light." She then exclaims that there will be only one princess in Equestria, and that princess will be her.

Luna breaks down the wall behind her and raises the moon in front of the sun, causing an eclipse. The eclipse's shadow envelops her, transforming her into Nightmare Moon, the antagonist of the season one premiere. As she cackles, the shot zooms in on Twilight, who is in disbelief of what she has just seen.

Quotes

 * Rarity: Don't be so modest. It's everypony's dream to someday wear a crown and have their coronation ceremony preserved in stained glass for all to see.
 * Rainbow Dash: I don't know if it's everypony's dream.
 * Pinkie Pie: Most of my dreams are about frosting. [drools]


 * Princess Twilight: I can't help it, Spike. They've only been gone a minute, and I already feel like I'm missing something.
 * Messenger Pony: For the Princess.
 * Spike: "Dear Twilight, You aren't missing anything. Your friend, Pinkie Pie."
 * Pinkie Pie: THAT'S ME!!!


 * Spike: The Celebration isn't until the day after tomorrow. We could still fit in a quick trip to Ponyville and be back in plenty of time to finish off these last few things before the main event!
 * Twilight Sparkle: [sighs] That would be nice, Spike, but what if something else came up while we were gone? What if we were delayed getting back and I wasn't able to finish everything on that list? What if we lost the list on the way to Ponyville and then couldn't remember which things we'd done and which things we hadn't done, and then spent so much time trying to figure out what we hadn't done and what we had done, and we ruined the entire Celebration by not doing the one really important thing that we were supposed to do?!
 * [thud]
 * Spike: Uh... so that's a 'no' then?


 * Twilight Sparkle: Spike, where were we?
 * Spike: About to call it a night?
 * Twilight Sparkle: We should probably go over the checklist one more time.
 * Spike: I knew you were gonna say that...


 * Applejack: Now that I think about it, I've never seen these kinds of weeds at all!


 * Rarity: [humming] Hmm. Something strange about the sky.


 * Spike: Sweet ground! [kissing noises] Sweet, sweet, wonderful ground!
 * Twilight Sparkle: Okay, I get it! I need to work on my flying!


 * Twilight Sparkle: Half day, half night... strange weather patterns... out of control plants. I think I'm starting to get a pretty good idea of who we're up against.


 * Discord: I'm reformed. Don't you remember?
 * Rainbow Dash: Yeah, right! This has got your cloven hoofprints written all over it!
 * Discord: I'll have you know that I only have one cloven hoof.


 * Discord: Ladies, ladies, I'm innocent. Would I lie to you?
 * All but Fluttershy: Yes!
 * Fluttershy: Um...maybe?


 * Discord: The rest of you could learn a lot about friendship from my dear friend Shutterfly here.
 * Fluttershy: Um, it's Fluttershy.
 * Discord: Oh, right, whatever.


 * Princess Luna: There can only be one princess in Equestria! And that princess... will be me!