This is both creepy and sad, it shows that Celestia has lived so long and has become so completely mad that she was willing to bestow the same horrible curse that caused her madness on another, simply so she wouldn’t have to be alone anymore

The gravestones are genuinely the best part.

FOREVER.

Forever

@d715  
Lies and slander. Just because I had some fun with timelines doesn’t mean I’ve become a living embodiment of willful chaos.

@Vree  
Of course he didn’t
 
he became a draconequus

@d715  
“Starswirl never became an alicorn”
 
Phew. It seems Celestia’s dark secret is still safe.

@Millennial Dan  
Considering how the spell was worded, I don’t think it makes sense that reaching that ethereal plain was it’s ultimate effect.
 
You definitely have to suspend your disbelief to enjoy the episode, but for me that wasn’t much harder to do than it is for a typical episode.

@supermanhulkjesus  
Again, that’s all just your own theory, and a sketchy one at that. If so many factors needed to be in place, how could it have been deemed anything but a fluke? And how would Celestia have such intimate knowledge about something that’s “never been done before”, especially if it’s that complicated? Doesn’t make a lick of sense.
 
My opinion (if I were to try to give any explanation at all) is that the Elements of Harmony did not need to be present for the spell. That would stand to reason, since according to new canon, Star Swirl actually predates the Elements. As such, they were simply amplifying whatever was going on, like an electric spark being pulled toward a conductor.
 
So maybe the point of the spell WAS just getting into that weird realm, where magic is boosted and new kinds of spells can be performed. While there, Celestia is able to do her special princessification voodoo.
 
This is all pure conjecture, but like I said before, it’s a problem that’s never going to get any decent logic thrown at it by the show itself.

@Millennial Dan  
Anyone can read the spell and activate it provided they’re an element of harmony, the Elements of Harmony are present, and they have achieved a satisfactory understanding of friendship. That last part is important because the way I see it, it wasn’t so much the spell that made her an alicorn as it was the lessons she learned over the previous sixty four episodes.

@supermanhulkjesus  
Maybe the point of the spell was to change one’s cutie mark to whatever they wanted. Who knows! Not even the writers do, in this case.
 
Of course, it’s never going to make a whole lot of sense, no matter how you explain it. After all, some people have rightly noticed that just like Spike’s comic book, the spell seems to be activated just by reading it. Does that mean that now that it’s complete, anyone can come along and read it and become an alicorn? Couldn’t be. So what does it do? No one can tell for sure.
 
Of all the episodes in the series, MMC is the single most impossible to explain in any satisfactory way.

@Millennial Dan  
Listen to the spell. It’s about achieving ones destiny. What that means is open to interpretation, but I can’t think of a way to interpret it as a spell that teleports you to an ethereal plain and nothing else.

@d715  
That is your theory, and one I consider so shaky and unfounded as to almost be pure wishful thinking. Celestia never said that friendship OR the Elements turned Twilight into an alicorn. She was incredibly vague about the whole thing, but she did say that Twilight had “earned” it somehow or other.
 
Also, as was alluded in a comment below, she denied Sunset’s request to be an alicorn princess. She didn’t say, “That’s impossible, you have to do it to yourself,” she just told her no way, forget it.
 
As for Star Swirl, his lack of friends only prevented him from finishing his spell, and no one even knows what it was supposed to do in the first place.

@Millennial Dan  
Well Cadence was because of the power of Love, like Twilight’s the power of friendship (which is a form of love)
 
and Starswirl never became an alicorn because he didn’t have friends
 
and everything about the show revolts around friendship ie the fucking name.
 
and the EoH are powered by friendship
 
so yes Twilight became an alicorn because of the EOH

@Lathius  
No they didn’t. They just blasted her into that weird ethereal plane or whatever it was. Besides, would that explanation work for Cadence, Luna, or Celestia? Obviously not.

@Background Pony #926C  
>Celestia made Twilight an alicorn  
It’s like y’all never even watched MMC, the elements of harmony made Twilight into an alicorn.

@masterhand01  
Celestia’s the only one with the answers one way or the other, and so far, she just hasn’t spilled the beans. Based on MMC and Sunset’s background comic though, it appears to me that it’s simply a spell that only Celestia knows how to do.

@Background Pony #926C  
That struck me as one of the more likely possibilities.  
But that’s no reason Twilight can’t do it.  
…Unless it’s like, the spell only works on ponies who meet Celestia’s arbitrary criteria.  
…which would make it no longer arbitrary.  
…unless the spell literally only works when Princess Celestia wants it to.

@masterhand01  
He was saying that princess-making is pretty arbitrary in the first place, dependent on a secret set of rules and accomplishments Celestia keeps locked away in her own head, so whaddya expect.

@PonyPon  
Apathy is a valid response I suppose.

@masterhand01  
“Screw that.”
 
Is my more succinct opinion on the subject.

@PonyPon  
I don’t understand what you are attempting to say.

@masterhand01  
“The ridiculously arbitrary process by which they seem to be made.”
 
I propose you remember that phrase if you ever have to ask yourself that again.

Whenever I see these pictures, all I can think is, “what prevents Twilight from making all her friends immortal princesses too?”

Even though I’m a vivid Twilestia shipper I got the feeling this was platonic and Celestia is pretty lonely.