Le master ruseman, we bow to you. Keep Calm is now saved as an episode! (Except for the wacky nonsensical beginning) Granted, if we’re shown that Celestia had reason to know the elements had to be returned to the tree one day, that clears up all three parts of Flutter On. Which will also mark the first time since the first season that an episode had complete future continuity, and not just a callback. Rokkin’.  
@Sjogre Actually, it feels kind of lame that they never revisited that, or even had Rainbow have any sort of conflict. Jerky or not, they were BFFs. And it seemed like both of them were in the wrong. Gilda still liked Rainbow’s pranks, but seemed annoyed by her insistence on the chant and her gushing over the Wonderbolts. It seems like Gilda’s interests ‘grew up’ while Rainbow Dash not only had her childish fantasies and cheers still, but Pinkie’s influence was making her more childish, and Gilda saw this and resented it.  
Can’t help but feeling there was a much better lesson/episode to be had there about friends sometimes growing apart but still having a link, just by changing the ending. Maybe we’ll get it in s5 since Pinkie has calmed down a bit after Friend Indeed and TMPP.

I like to think Discord is like the character he is inspired (and voiced) by: Q. He’s a nigh-omnipotent jackass, to be sure, and could very well solve more than half of the series’ plots with a single snap of his fingers, but why? Why should he do everything for the ponies? They need to learn things on their own. Of course, he lost this ideal for a very long time (which is why he was a statue for so long), but friendship is starting to make him remember why he’s here in the first place.

He didn’t do a complete character 180 in a single episode.
 
I am happy with that.

@Zergpony  
keen judge of character and has insight the other characters often lack  
–depending on the writer, that is

I have my own thought.
 
Celestia wanted to reform him to use as “Final measure”. Fail-safe option, when mane 6 is unable to complete task on any curcumistances, or something really bad is going to happen that nobody, even Princesses can prevent.
 
He won’t help them if they can do it by themself. Like what, is he going to be a house maid for them, just to clean up everything? Maybe he would actually do something if ponies acted like complete idiots, like not realising how to fix things. But hey - they succeeded. And doing all job for them… that would be extremly assholish move i would say: “A dragon is sleeping near of Ponyville? Oh, should we talk with him… Or just send Discord to kick his ass? Yeah. let’s send him just to make sure he’ll do some crazy shit to him. We got cupkaces to bake after all, it’s more important!”
 
Loss of Elements of Harmony was unexpected to him. But hey, he didn’t started apocalypsis right after that moment. Yet he has full power to do it - nothing can stop him now. And yet he didn’t destroyed everything.
 
And why he didn’t told them about vines… He knew it was easy to get rid of them. Vines captured Celestia and Luna, but not Mane 6. And even if the mane 6 would fail - he’d acted like deus ex machina just to fix what they failed to fix.

Don’t dis secret agent Spike. He singlehandedly has saved Twilight again and again, is trusted with secrets twilight is NOT trusted with and is basically in instant communication with Celestia. Plus he is a keen judge of character and has insight the other characters often lack.

@BrushieBrushie  
It would be a disservice to him as a character for him to be just “lol kidding!” after “Keep Calm and Flutter On” implied that he might have some actual depth to him.
 
By all means, have Discord get some real friends. But right now, all Fluttershy does is harsh his fun. Character depth doesn’t mean that he’ll come crawling back to the first person that he meets.
 
Having Discord and Fluttershy break off their friendship would be a very different story from what happened with Gilda, with very different causes and fall out.

@Sjogre  
“The thing is, we’ve seen in the show that not everyone can be friends.”
 
If we’ve seen it in the show already then why does it need to happen again? Discord being used for another “Gilda the Brush Off” plot would be really lame.
 
It would be a disservice to him as a character for him to be just “lol kidding!” after “Keep Calm and Flutter On” implied that he might have some actual depth to him.

@BrushieBrushie  
The thing is, we’ve seen in the show that not everyone can be friends.
 
More importantly, the entire point of Fluttershy becoming friends with him was to put the hooks into him. Having him stay friends would kinda sorta totally go against the message of friendship being magical.
 
Friendship isn’t supposed to be a prison.

I dunno, I think that Discord is just being difficult, not evil. Ignoring the meta reasoning that him just deciding to ignore friendship would be subverting the show’s message too hard, he reminds me of me with my friends, we joke around and pretend to be jerks a lot.

Don’t you just love these morally grey characters?

The elements aren’t gone…they can grab them anytime they want. Maybe he could, too…

@Background Pony #73D6  
But villain songs are the best songs!

He’s a Q, Loki and the joker blended with a zoo. Of course he’s not just gonna be a goody good right of the bat. He could have a true heel realization episode later, he does have his own song after all.

@ZORDON  
Does Fluttershy share his desire for that kind of friendship? Even in this show, we’ve seen that not everyone is going to be friends with everyone else.
 
And, not to beat around the bush, but Fluttershy didn’t become his friend because she liked him.

Problem is, what if he was being sincere about friendship? Chaotic creatures like Discord don’t have to lie all the time. Maybe all he wants is frienship, in his twisted way.

@Background Pony #0FA0  
What makes you think that the Crystal Heart is as powerful as the Elements of Harmony? And why would killing a mortal unicorn be as hard as killing something like Discord?

@Background Pony #0FA0  
Discord could just teleport away from the wall ’o death that the crystal heart releases.  
He is pretty powerful, after all.

@Background Pony #0FA0  
… We saw Discord maintain control over the vines in the present. They were also acting on the orders that he gave them when he originally planted them.
 
The fact that Discord lied to Fluttershy, after she defended him from her friends, does not bode well. Either Fluttershy’s claim of retracting her friendship is an empty threat, or Discord will decide that it’s more fun to stop listening to her.

 
“Decent plan. I’ve had better.”

obviously it was discord being discord considering how easily he was cowed by the lemon colored mare after the elements were returned. discord would never be blatant in any good he does. caue unless he gets under someone’s skin, it would not be fun.
 
……also there is another artifact that equistria could use…… though only if discord goes extreme on us. the Crystal heart. though it seems the crystal heart actually kills those it unleashes its power upon. if it would out and snuff out a unicorn, no matter how dark, discord wouldn’t stand a chance.

He was kind of a jerk to Fluttershy.  
I mean she is the only one who actually cares about him, so it destroys the ‘keep calm and flutter on’ completely..  
I would say about 80% chance, Discord will return as a villain.

Discord sent Twilight right back where she needed to be, emphasizing in his own annoying way that her friendship was more important, and with the knowledge that she would be needed in order to defeat the plants. Whether he meant to or not–and it’s clear that he plays n-dimensional chess with the pros, so he probably did–he did the right thing.

prlbem is, he did not immediately go back to his old ways when ti did happen. it seems to me he had no way of controlling the vines anymore. in a sense, they were more powerful than him now as they stole the tree’s power, which would be much stronger than him even weakened. the plants acted indepedantly of him. hell it would have more likely succeeded if he let twilight stay with him instead. she is strong, but alone not strong enough to harm him.
 
also the vines would have been overwhelmed themselves if the tree died. the Everfree would have been unleashed and begin to spread throughout the world.
 
seems to me he was actually helping. though as a being of chaos, he would of course NOT be obvious with it. he would want to cause as much trouble as he could while still assuring that the vines were defeated. he had more to gain if he made sure twilight stayed out, and the tree had fully died. because now the tree itself has given something to twilight and her friends. and if it grows out of a tree that holds the power of the elements, its original source, it is not likely something pleasant for discord.

Erm actually i don’t get why he don’t go loko now.