Even against her sister, celestia will fight with all she has to do good. She deserves more credit.

Corruption: The tyrant Celestia image that has overpopulated the fandom.
 
Deception: That version of Celestia who’s name I’ll leave REDACTED.
 
Chaos and Betrayal: Reverse Elements.

Sombra: Everyone shall be my slave!  
Celestia: Care to repeat that?
 
Discord: Isn’t chaos wonderful?  
Celestia: This… can’t… be… happening.
 
Chrysalis: Equestria shall be our eternal feeding ground!  
Celestia: Not while I have a say in it!
 
Nightmare Moon: What will do now Celestia? Are you going to sacrifice your sister for the so called greater good?  
Celestia: I… I don’t know…

Celestia has things rough too.

@Niggoslav_Krawczyk
 
I now have this horrible feeling that I’ve completely misinterpreted whatever point you were trying to make.
 
I honestly must admit I am very confused now, so I just going to wait for clarification before sticking my foot in my mouth.

@Overmind A better reason for Celestia to have gone bonkers on her sister.

@Niggoslav_Krawczyk
 
so she was into making child soldiers?
 
is this supposed to be better?

@Overmind Yea, the eternal night thing doesn’t seem all that threatening…I like to think children of the night got it right. All of NMM’s ‘forces’ were children Luna abducted before she went completely balls-out crazy cat pony.

@Background Pony #A13B
 
Have you run any calculations on this at all?
 
do you have the exact amount of time before she was blasted?
 
if not you are just another luna apologist grasping at any reason to excuse her almost exterminatus and any bad behavior she ever did with the terrible excuse of “she was just misunderstood and wanted to be loved.”
 
that shit won’t fly for Kess BloodySunday nor will it fly here.
 
in the end she still made the choice to do those things and she still has to face the fact that she was responsible for giving in.
 
I’m not saying she can’t be forgiven, In fact I do forgive her and think others should as well.  
But facts are facts.

@Overmind  
Well, are we assuming that this eternal night would have resulted in a frozen wasteland of a planet? Because I think by the time Nightmare was blasted with harmony, our Earth would have already frozen over, and Equestria hadn’t. So I don’t know how inexcusable it was. Nor do we really know how constant night would have impacted the pony psychology.

@Background Pony
 
She never did shun her, it was the love of the ponies that she craved, but How can you say that was justifiable? How can you say enshrouding a planet in eternal Night is a perfectly excusable? Celestia was alone for a thousand years, always having to live with the guilt of banishing the ones she loved.

Betrayal… but who betrayed whom?
 
Without being shunned, Luna never would have fallen. Without Celestia’s pride or greed or complacency, Nightmare Moon would never have existed.

Awesome pic (Go Celestia!)

Discord:AH AH (like Nelson Muntz)

@Trickquestion  
Except for a corrupting evil presence like Sombra
 
Sombra FTW

Kikuko was absolutely dead-on giving her the voice of The Boss.

@HunterSClopson  
And then she accidentally kills her instead of incapacitating her, and dicksword is all “Hohoho I really got you this time, ME turn over a new leaf? Welp, I might as well encase myself in stone now because I don’t think I’ll be able to top this epic a level of troll for another thousand years!

you all will hear the name of Solar Flare… oh you will.

That’s gotta be a hell of a lot of stress to deal with.  
I imagine underneath that strong and impressive front of self-control and stability, it would take just one right hit and the right time for her spirit to come crumbling down in a tower of smoke and loss of control.  
Then… Twilight has to face down her greatest enemy yet: Her own mentor, teacher and mother-figure.

I love how Luna/NMM is just totally giving no fucks.
 
also yeah I think it needs more/stronger villains. Would like to see a villain that Celestia has a justifiable reason for not getting off her duff to confront instead of throwing Twilight at them all “LOL A TEST!”
 
Maybe bring Lavan back. That crazy old magma monster was actively trying to blast the princess ponies to smithereens until they recharged their wands. Make it like his fire magic and Celestia’s sun magic cancel each other out, so her only hope would be physical combat and he’s like 3 times her size, and, uh, made of burning rock. A perfect use of the brand new Heroic Adventurer Twilight with or without the Elements.
 
Also finally Spike can actually do something. He could get Rarity to fashion him a miniature suit of armour like his BeefSpike daydream, so he can sit there and tank the hits WoW hammerdin style. Plus that whole immunity to fire thing too.

It’s true, we’ve seen no pleasant beings that are or were close in power to Celestia or Luna, except Cerberus, who at least seems nice.
 
Thing is, no conflict = no story, even when it’s a show mostly about friendship. At least you can redeem a villain (at least for a while), like Discord.
 
I’ve always been fond of the notion that there are a couple of rulers of the Diamond Dogs who have similar responsibilities for keeping the world running. I picture two brothers, the older and calmer Lord Earthgreen (responsible for bringing the earth fertility and bounty) and the younger and more temperamental Lord Gembright (responsible for seeding it with gems and metals). They oversee a nation of many species of canines, from dogs to foxes. The ones Rarity encountered just happened to be borderland brigands.

I love Chrysalis’ expression here.
 
that is totally a “Do it, filly!” look.

Chrysalis is the coolest because she’s the only villain that doesn’t have a past with Celestia. That almost makes her the one true villain in the show, since the other three were just leftovers.

Makes you wonder what she did to piss off pretty much every other major player on the planet.
 
Offhand, I’d say it was not being a cruel monster. Think of her as a heroine in a world of villains.

“I am old and tired, sick and sad. This world I live in wears the appearance of a pastel-colored utopia like a harlequins mask, underneath it all it is infected with hatred and arrogance. Many of the oldest and most powerful beings I know have succumbed to the sheer animal cruelty of it. It beckons me too, but I will never submit, I will never become a monster. But it is so hard stay pure, when even a Bearer of an Element of Harmony is so easily corrupted. I just don’t care anymore. So let the next self-defeating demon just have its way and burn the world, perhaps a bed of ashes would be more comfortable to sleep on.