The first received a Nielsen household rating of 0.2, and was viewed by over 339,000 viewers, making it the highest-rated episode ever broadcast by the Hub at that point.

The series follows a unicorn named Twilight Sparkle as her mentor Princess Celestia guides her to learn about friendship in Ponyville.

In the first part of the episode, a draconequus named Discord escapes from his stone prison, while Twilight and her five friends discover that the Elements of Harmony have been stolen.

In part two, Twilight is determined to find the Elements of Harmony after her best friends are hypnotically brainwashed by Discord, and all of Equestria begins to fall into disarray.

Later, Twilight Sparkle and the Mane Six find strange phenomena occurring around Ponyville, such as cotton candy clouds dispensing chocolate milk and Applejack's apples growing bigger.

She tells the ponies that the strange phenomena they have noticed is being caused by an old enemy of hers named Discord, the spirit of chaos and disharmony.

Celestia tells of how Discord once ruled Equestria in an eternal state of chaos before she and Luna defeated him by turning him into a stone statue.

He is able to individually test Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Fluttershy against their respected Elements, making them be momentarily hypnotized, lose some of their color, and become an opposite of their Element (Applejack becoming a compulsive liar, Pinkie becoming a cynical grouch, Rarity becoming a greedy hoarder, and Fluttershy becoming a heartless bully).

Inspired by this, she retrieves to the Elements, tracks down her other four friends, and uses a memory spell to remind them of their friendship, cancelling out Discord's magic and returning them to normal.

According to Thiessen, Lauren Faust had conceived of Discord while watching a series of Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes, using Q (portrayed by de Lancie) as a template.

Upon hearing the news, the team altered some elements of the episode to provide more allusion to his previous role, such as the flash of light when Discord would appear or disappear.

Despite her decreased participation, she still has high hopes for the staff members, stating "the gaps I have left are being filled by the same amazing artists, writers, and directors who brought you Season 1.

"[5] He explained, "they saw [the success] of the show early on, which is ... rare because usually a season will be one and aired before a network will renew it because they want to know what the numbers are, but they, I guess, a bit of a risk on their behalf, but I'm glad they did.

In a review of the first part, Carina Belles from We Got This Covered called the series "plain awesome", saying that it is "basically Lord of the Rings, only with ponies".

[9] A review from Republibot of the first part of the episode called the plot "an interesting revisit of the premise of the pilot [Friendship Is Magic]".

[9] Many reviews and critics positively commented on the episode's ending, which featured a parody of the closing scenes to the original Star Wars.

Cyriaque Lamar from i09 wrote positively of the scene, writing, "Honestly, modern My Little Pony fandom is one of those things I'm live-and-let-live about, even though it baffles me entirely [but] this morning's episode of the show did a little homage to A New Hope.

[13] John Farrier from Neatorama wrote, "It's hard for Bronies to get respect from some quarters, but [the closing Star Wars parody] scene alone says much in favor of the show.

"[15] Topless Robot writer Anne Mathews named the Star Wars parody the "Nerdiest Easter Egg" in My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, writing, "This scene is a direct shoutout to the fans and completely cements the creator Lauren Faust's geek cred.