I mean sure, seeing ponies reformed in this show gets old after awhile but if this episode has shown us anything, its that the writers are LEARNING from their mistakes!
We were given clear foreshadowing that the villain may be reformed via the friendship map(I personally came to this conclusion before it was mentioned in the episode plus starlight reminded us a few times.) and they made sure that the villain has a backstory, a GOOD ONE!
ANNND, they made sure to show us that the pony choose to join with the shadow but when he wanted to leave had no choice meaning that the shadow played off his despair to get a host! This tells us that while he was hurt by them, he wasn't evil.
So overall, I loved this season finale and a BIG PLUS is we got enough pony lore and history to make Twilight Sparkle herself squeal like I did!XD
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