Headscratchers / Bartok the Magnificent

• So...the film has a happy ending and all, but how are they going to sort out the mess left over from the final showdown? A good chunk of the castle was left in shambles and left the whole town flooded. Ludmilla is dead, and it's implied her body stayed a dragon even in death. And while Baba Yaga shows up and doesn't cause a stir, how is Bartok going to explain to them that she was innocent and that Ludmilla was the perpetrator without any evidence? Sure, there were some witnesses to Ludmilla's transformation (the tortured prisoners, a small crowd of people in the castle, and Bartok, Ivan and co. saw her take the potion), but the former are either dead or too out of the way to seek eyewitness from, and the latter would probably be seen as crazy if they tried to just say "Ludmilla drank a magic potion from the witch and it turned her into a dragon!". Would the populace just take Bartok or Prince Ivan's word for it? And while Baba Yaga theoretically could whip up another potion as evidence, would the townsfolk be willing to give her the benefit of the doubt?
  • First of all, Ivan was rescued, so the main crime Baba Yaga was framed for was resolved. If Ludmilla remains a dragon after her death, her dead body is a clear evidence that there was a rampaging dragon in Moscow. Baba Yaga is a powerful witch living in a magical realm, so it doesn't really matter whether the citizens of Russia believe whether she was guilty or innocent, it's unlikely they would come after her. And considering that they're related, the Tzar might as well take Ivan's word for what happened.
  • A bit of Fridge Brilliance: maybe Bartok went through a Face–Heel Turn and became Rasputin's minion because the townsfolk accused him of unleashing the dragon and causing destruction?
• About the potion, does anyone else wonder what Bartok would've turned into if he had drunk the potion before Ludmilla got hold of it?
• If Bartok is a hero in this movie, and it's established that it takes place before Anastasia, then how did he end up working for Rasputin of all people?
  • Maybe Bartok originally was trying to befriend Rasputin because he thought the latter like Baba Yaga, i.e. a magical person who was assigned a bad reputation he didn't deserve and was acting out because of it. Unfortunately, Rasputin actually was a bad person and ended up making a minion out of him. Bartok does spend some parts of the first film trying to gently steer him away from his revenge, and eventually tells Rasputin he's "on his own" when it gets bad enough. As a tiny bat whose only power seems to be immortality, that'd be the most he can do. On the other hand, Bartok began this film as a con artist and might have also slipped back into some of his amoral habits over the years, leading to him working with someone like Rasputin.
• What was the point of Ludmilla getting someone to dress up as Baba Yaga and drop the iron tooth when kidnapping Prince Ivan? Ivan was the only witness. She could have just kidnapped him normally and still said Baba Yaga did it.
  • Maybe in case the Prince yelled loud enough, someone might check the tower, so she had him think it was Baba Yaga too...or she's aware of the fourth wall and wanted to attempt to fool the audiance, forgetting that her own acting is terrible.
  • Baba Yaga has quite a reputation in Slavic Folklore for being a Wicked Witch who Eats Babies. Given she exists in the movie's universe (heck, the movie itself even with a "The Villain Sucks" Song), Ludmila easily shifted the blame to her by proving evidence of her kidnapping (= the iron tooth, again, Baba Yaga was said to have a mouth full of them) without raising any suspicion on the kidnapper's real identity.