The Mane Five decide to remodel the abandoned Canterlogic factory.
Tropes:
- Bad Is Good and Good Is Bad: Opaline shudders with disgust just before bringing up Unity magic.
- Blatant Lies: Hitch tries to get out of exploring the spooky old factory by claiming Sparky is scared - which he clearly isn't.
- Call-Back:
- Pipp finds one of the "anti-mindreading" helmets CanterLogic used to produce, as well as an old anti-pegasus propaganda poster that was used to advertise the company's product debut show. She wastes no time teasing Hitch about it, embarrassing him.
- Sprout destroying Sunny's lighthouse is brought up (to Sprout's annoyance).
- Pipp sings a bit of her song "All You Need Is Your Beat." The rats later tell Hitch that they left Zephyr Heights because they got bored after hearing it everywhere.
- The Cameo: Phyllis is seen in a portrait hanging in the old factory. She also makes a blink-and-you'll-miss-it appearance at the end of Hitch and Pipp's duet reading a newspaper.
- Consulting Mister Puppet: Misty makes herself a small unicorn puppet, which she names Madame Taffytail, so she'll have someone to vent to. She lampshades that it's weird, but it's not like she can share with anyone else.
- Continuity Nod:
- The word "ghostie" comes up a few times, similar to how Pinkie brought it up in the first ever song of the Gen 4 series.
- As in the Tell Your Tale series, Pipp is a fan of scary places and things.
- Hitch engages in some Balloonacy during his song with Pipp, similar to the poor pony in the pilot film.
- Hitch and Pipp's duet, "With Each Other" has Pipp mention "confidence" and Hitch "kindness". Prior to A New Generation's release, official profiles for the two listed "confidence" as Pipp's most prominent trait, and "kindness" as Hitch's.
- Internal Reveal: Misty learns about the message Twilight enchanted into the Unity crystals and relays it to Opaline.
- It's All About Me: Sprout tags along because he is insistent that the now-defunct factory still belongs to his family, even though he has no intention of doing anything with it. Even after its remodel into "Canterlove Studios", he still claims that the building is owned by him just for the sake of saying so.
- Jerkass Has a Point: Even though the factory is abandoned, Sprout is right that, absent other factors, the property still belongs to his family (or his mother, to be specific) and the Mane Five are more or less taking it without permission or compensation. Since Phyllis never expresses an opinion one way or another, how much of this is Sprout being obnoxious as opposed to actual ownership concern is up for debate.
- Lampshade Hanging: Hitch notes how everypony pretty much forgot about CanterLogic following the events of A New Generation.
- Once Done, Never Forgotten: Sprout is not amused when his actions from the movie are brought up again.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here:
- When it appears Hitch, Pipp and Sprout are being attacked by a "ghost", Sprout is quick to flee.
- Later, after Sprout tries and fails to order the rats to leave, and Hitch and Pipp reject his idea to let them stay, he bails out and leaves them to handle the problem.
- Shout-Out: Hitch says that he's "not afraid of no ghosts" as he explores the abandoned CanterLogic factory, only for a winged rat to scurry behind him and startle him.
- Simple Solution Won't Work: Misty suggests that, instead of trying to steal a rowdy dragon, Opaline could simply drain the Unity crystals directly. Opaline shuts this plan down because attempting to drain their magic without being equal to it would damage their connection to the Prisbeam, potentially cutting off access to the magic altogether. She has to be at full power if she hopes to overcome the unity magic Twilight used to forge them in the first place, so she needs to drain Sparky.
