I don’t care what people say. I loved Reflections and thought it was one of the best stories the comic ever showed.

The thing that this comparison overlooks is that Star Swirl the Bearded is a time traveler that mastered time travel.

@Background Human  
I read that in Prokhor Zakharov’s voice.

Consistency! Not just a big word.

@cheezedoodle  
She definetly had some attachment to her first lover, Flash Sentry himself hits on human Twilight because she reminded him of pony Twilight. Celestia not reacting at all and ever bringing it up that she also used to be like Radiant Hope is just a little hard to ignore.

@Esteban  
Are you implying Celestia Prime should have had feelings for Sombra Prime? Someone she dethroned and destroyed in the past?
 
As I said earlier, it’s more likely that Star Swirl’s backstory has been solidified for the show and it necessitated this minor retcon.

Well Whitley was never a fan of Reflections arc so it isn’t suprising that he retconned that comic. He also didn’t mention Celestia in his Sombra/Radiant Hope arc and only Price made a slight visual reference after his reformation. He pretty much usually prefer to ignore or retcon certain elemtns that he doesn’t like from both comics and tv show.

@Background Pony #788D  
Bronies ignoring some details (like how Celestia had never told anyone the truth about her and Starswirl’s adventures for hundreds of years so lying about it isn’t out of character) in order to produce contradictions IS pretty normal around here.

I know the IDW comics for MLP has this Bizarro world going on but are comics normally this convoluted?

@Dustcan  
Thats hasbro mandating, not really much they could do.  
That said theres children books that do a little on that front as do some of the comics.  
And to be fair, not everything has to be explained up front and before the story starts.  
…well, Alicorns are stupidly uncertain in any aspect since their not a focus of anything in show.  
I doubt we’ll ever have cemented information on anything regarding them till long after the series has ended and someone decided to joke with whats left of the fandom.

@ExistenceNull
 
Twilight’s initial characterization was of a loner who both didn’t have nor care about friendship. Later on we find out she has a brother and babysitter whom she was very close with. We also find out even later that she did in fact have friends ho weren’t family.
 
Cadence being an alicorn. The existence of a third princess should be a big deal, but it’s just dropped on us.
 
The Everfree being dangerous. So dangerous Zecora has her own hut in there and little fillies can stroll in and out of it.
 
Starswirl not understanding friendship. Which is why he was able to befriend Scorpan.
 
Almost anything about the dragons. ‘Ponies know nothing about dragons’, except for their migration patterns, sleeping habits, homeland, ect. Dragons grow huge when greedy. Meaning Equestria is lucky that, say Garble has more restraint than Spike. The dragon scepter calls all dragons in Equestria. By that it means about 12 teenagers and 1 baby and none of the adults we’ve seen. A sleeping dragon can threaten the entire land with smog. So in the 2 or so years the show has gone through only 1 adult dragon has ever felt drowsy.
 
That’s just off the top of my head. You could explain away any of the above with semantics or technicalities, no doubt, but that still means they aren’t exactly self explanatory.
 
@Daring-Do
 
And the franchise is worse off for it. King Zebra is the best thing to come out of this generation.

@cheezedoodle  
Not sure what you’re referring to, but I will say that even in Reflections a lot of the action with Starswirl and the other world took place pre-Luna banishment.
 
All that happened post-Luna banishment was that Celestia started sneaking off to the other world without Starswirl (eventually being caught by him and damaging their friendship).

@Dustcan  
And don’t forget that Celestia’s final years with Starswirl (post-NMM) are a painful memory because of the incident that ruined their friendship. At the end of Reflections she made every pony who knew promise to keep it all secret. So why wouldn’t she make up an alternative “official” story of Starwirl’s disappearance that she can tell to ponies like Sunburst here? With that in mind I fail to see what’s contradictory.

@Background Pony #F70B  
King Zebra is not a real comic.
 
King Zebra is not a real comic.
 
King Zebra is not a real comic.
 
That was a fan spoof. I don’t get why to this very day some bronies are incapable of recognizing a parody when they see one.

@Background Pony #9055  
As far as I’m aware the show’s consistent and if retconed it makes sure to explain it.

I honestly don’t care if the comics aren’t always canon with each other. Especially when the TV show isn’t 100% canon with itself either.

@Itsthinking  
It’s possible the backstory/timeline for Star Swirl has now been established by DHX, necessitating this retcon. Especially if this is supposed to tie in with season 7.

@Itsthinking
 
Yeah because remembering whether Starswirl disappeared before or after NMM happened is such a story breaking detail.
 
If you really want to be a stickler for details then Celestia mentions right there in the upcoming issue that Starswirl went on several increasingly lengthy journeys. There’s your continuity fix; he ‘disappeared’ before NMM, returned after, then disappeared for real sometime after.

@cheezedoodle  
Isn’t the issue here IDW not staying consistent even internally? Is it too much to ask writers know what other comics were written?

Maybe if DHX actually had a show bible, these things wouldn’t happen. I swear there were some more recent references stating that Luna studied with Star Swirl as an adult, but can’t remember when/where it was.

–T. Sparkle, Toward a Unified Theory of (p,q)-Manifolds

@Dustcan  
If shes that easily confused, I’d hate to see how good she is with treaties and trade agreements that haven’t been revised

@Mr. Horrible  
Generally this writer puts less of an emphasis on continuity and more on telling the story he wants. He will ignore even other stories he wrote.

@Mr. Horrible
 
That or the millennium old horse is misremembering a 1000 year old chain of events.
 
Plenty of ways to reconcile a frankly insignificant continuity flub.

Could have been a gradual thing. Like he’d be gone longer and longer each time until one day he never came back at all. Say, he’d been gone for a long time beforehand, and by the time Reflections happened he was back?
 
I dunno. This is kind of a weird goof considering how well the comics usually do at tying their own internal continuity together. OP could stand to be less of a condescending dink about it, though.