...Okay. Going down the list of hints from your original review:





1. You know the comics aren't canon, right? Legends of Magic doesn't count because DHX and IDW explicitly planned that one out in advance, but anything else is mainly just the headcanons of the comic writers. They're neat ideas, but the show can, and has, contradicted them many, many times. Luna wasn't corrupted by an external force, Starswirl didn't defeat the Sirens by himself nor was music involved, Luna had no experience doing Celestia's job prior to Starlight's intervention, and so on. So while you could deduce that Sombra's voluntarily pretending to be evil again under the radar of the Mane Six and Celestia and the guy who went out of his way to resurrect Sombra from the ground, the Occam's Razor solution is simply that DHX is ignoring the comics again (as well as not alienating anyone who hasn't paid the extra money to read them for important plot points), and the last time anypony saw Sombra was in the season 3 premiere. And in the season 3 premiere, Sombra was very clearly not affected by the Crystal Heart until it was being actively charged by the crystal magic of all the citizens of the empire, which was not the case this time. Obviously this would mean he has no reason to spontaneously become a good guy either.





2. It's possible that Discord was asked by the princesses not to help Twilight. That does seem like something Celestia might do given her past actions. OR, knowing Discord, it's entirely possible that all of his actions were done as a free agent, and Celestia wasn't involved at all. Likely he respected her decision to put Twilight in charge, and figured she'd do a good job in the role, and wanted to make sure she felt the same way about herself. Of course, since this is Discord we're talking about, this would not come without a good helping of trolling, theatrics, and being a jerk under the guise of "teaching lessons". That seems like something Discord would probably do given his past actions. Plus it's not like he's been known to follow authority that closely.





3. See 2.





4. Many materials are known to become less structurally stable internally without significantly changing their external appearance when superheated, especially when you take the magical properties of dragon fire into consideration. More likely, though, since Sombra later revealed that he intended to be defeated at the Crystal Empire, Cadance could break out at any time (thinking Sombra underestimated her alicorn abilities), but was waiting for backup and a distraction before fighting back, lest Sombra retaliate and actually incapacitate her this time. It wouldn't be the first time Cadance saved the empire and Spike took the credit for it.





5. Sombra is capable of very powerful magic, and can shift to an ethereal form at will. He was defeated by the elements over a thousand years ago because he wasn't expecting their power to be so potent, but now that he knew what he was up against (as did Grogar, who may have enhanced his magic to compete against them before he went rogue), he probably just... dodged. He teleported away from the empire before the blast actually reached him, and when he didn't come back, everypony assumed they had won because that's what happened every other time they used the elements. That was Sombra's plan, after all: convince the Mane Six that they defeated him so he could follow them back to where they got the elements came from and destroy the problem at the source. He tells us this in the episode itself; a great plan executed by a villain that learns from his mistakes. He wasn't able to dodge the second time because he was once again caught off-guard; the elements were no longer involved, yet the Mane Six still conjured up a ton of magical energy out of seemingly nothing. ...Or he did dodge, is now desperately thinking of a way to overcome THIS power source, and will surprise us all in the finale. Who knows.





6. See 2.





7. This one doesn't even count as speculation; Discord TOLD US he was faking and that Sombra didn't hurt him at all! Also, see 2.





8. See 7 AND 2. Kind of a jerk move to endanger his best friend's life like that, but Discord's always been known for being particularly reckless. Makes more sense that Celestia having that specific of a contingency plan; she may have a reputation for being a chessmaster, but she's never been that good.





9. Upon closely examining that gif, it actually looks like Sombra's magic is being absorbed by the Mane Six's, and he's desperately trying to pull away before he becomes completely powerless! If that's the case, obviously Sombra would stop attacking them at that point! And even if it's not, I think Sombra's smart enough to know when he's lost, explaining his history of somewhat anticlimactic defeats. If he did indeed dodge this last attack as I suggested in 5, he would want to conserve his power to make a strategic retreat without anypony noticing (and thus nopony looking for him while he hides), rather than exhausting himself fighting a losing battle.





think he is. It's just like the first time when he tried to destroy the elements. If he was actually defeated, the demeanor is likely just a result of panic and uncertainty in the unknown: he's used to being defeated by legendary artifacts; he's NOT used to being defeated by 6 ordinary young mares with zero additional assistance, especially after he thought he had just defeated the lord of chaos incarnate. For all we know, that is a genuine face of panic to Sombra, and it just looks weird to us because we've never seen him panic before. All that aside, though, if you still think Sombra's lines sound rehearsed and like he's reading from a script... intended to be canon. 10. Going back to 5 again, and the idea that he dodged the attack and is currently in hiding, this would also explain why he seems to be acting; he's not actually being defeated, but he wants the heroes tohe is. It's just like the first time when he tried to destroy the elements. If heactually defeated, the demeanor is likely just a result of panic and uncertainty in the unknown: he's used to being defeated by legendary artifacts; he's NOT used to being defeated by 6 ordinary young mares with zero additional assistance,after he thought he had just defeated the lord of chaos incarnate. For all we know, thata genuine face of panic to Sombra, and it just looks weird to us because we've never seen him panic before. All that aside, though, if you still think Sombra's lines sound rehearsed and like he's reading from a script... that's probably because they are. Not everything in the show is necessarilyto be canon.





11. See 2. Of course he's upset at Celestia; he put a lot of effort into something he thought Celestia wanted, and then she changed her mind! His goal was to get Twilight to believe in herself as a ruler, and Celestia reaffirming Twilight's own concerns was pretty much the final nail in that plan's coffin. A rare, genuine effort of friendship from him and it was all wasted.





12. I dunno; they look less "worried" to me and more "empathetic and sorry" at Discord suddenly being very upset about something Celestia just said. And if you'll notice, she went back to being amused by him not too much later.





Your argument is a good one, but it's not completely airtight like you're implying. All of your clues can be contradicted or reinterpreted to mean something completely different, given the right perspective. More than that, though, I think you might be overlooking something crucial about this show's writing team: they're not perfect either. Even if it seems obvious that they'll be doing one thing, they may just do something completely different, maybe to surprise the audience, maybe due to clumsy writing, but it's always a possibility. People thought it was "obvious" that Cozy Glow was gonna be a spy working for Neighsay, and that turned out not to be the case. I remember thinking it was "obvious" that Crusaders of the Lost Mark was gonna be just another CMC episode, and that a bombshell like them getting their cutie marks would never happen so far away from a finale. And sometimes inconsistencies occur because some of the writers don't know the show as well as some bronies do; maybe they only know the cliffnotes of early episodes and don't bother researching the details, or maybe they overlook one minor detail from that one episode because it wasn't really important at the time but some fans still think it means more than it does and burn the writers for it. The point is that due to the size of the team, and how frequently it changes management, it is impossible to know exactly what DHX is gonna do unless you work for DHX yourself.





tl;dr: NEITHER of us know for sure what's gonna happen next. You may be right, but there's a nonzero chance that you're not. We'll have to wait and see.

