@Ereiam  
I suppose you’re right… Though I would prefer it to be more Dash-centered, the episode fits with season (and show in general) theme really good.

@Vaidelot  
You’re not wrong, except that if the episode had taken this road, it would have been nothing but a celebration of the “pony hero complex” that Gilda was sneering at. Rainbow Dash being in danger gave Pinkie Pie the opportunity to remind Gilda of what it meant to have a friend to rely on, prompting her to go rescue Rainbow Dash and to make a choice that went against her selfish griffon mindset in the process, which in the end gave her something more valuable than the idol of Boreas: friendship and the means to spread it herself.

@Ereiam  
Well, anyway, Dash plan would work perfect if Pinkie have not spent all their money on snacks or actually helped Rainbow to descend into the gouge instead of unreliable griffin. All that happened later in the episode was more or less damage control. Dash was right… and it’s all that matters (to me at least)!

@Ereiam
 
I’d +1 this too, dude.
 
(Darn it, I need an avatar.)

@Vaidelot  
In this context, Gilda had to make a choice: either try and grab the idol and jeopardize her safety as well as Dash’s and Pinkie’s, or forget about it and save her two friends. A (literal) ‘friend or idol’ decision similar to the one with the Holy Grail at the end of the third and last Indiana Jones movie, as zerowinger66 pointed it out.
 
And then they end up realizing that they didn’t actually need the idol, making it a MacGuffin which purpose was to bring them closer.
 
Also, I find it fitting that, instead of a precious but actually useless idol (did the griffons had any use for it aside from a decorative and maybe ceremonial one? The episode doesn’t seem to imply it), the rediscovered national treasure of Griffonstone would be the griffon scones (about which Twilight was also gushing in her guidebook, if you remember) that Gilda baked with Pinkie’s help and that she’ll have an easier time sharing with her fellow griffons.

@BarryFromMars  
One is not excluding the other. They could have idol and friendship.

@Vaidelot
 
@beast0r
 
… And then when the idol was stolen, there went the kingdom because they thought it was all in a piece of metal. They needed something that can’t be stolen.

Aw it’s too bad Gilda was reformed. I was hoping for her to become Trixie and Starlight’s henchmare in an elements of disharmony line up.

@when she felt her wings unfold
 
Though now that I’ve thought about it a bit, I wouldn’t say RD was completely useless. It’s true her role was to fail in her idea of a solution so that Pinkie’s idea is shown to be better, but without her original friendship with Gilda, Pinkie would probably have had a much rougher time, even with the scone common ground.

@beast0r
 
Actually I’d bet the idol of Boreas, Greek god of the North wind, would be the reason there was constantly a furious wind just in that gorge.
 
I think retrieving the idol later is an excellent plot for fanfic or a griffon-centric MLP adventure play.

@beast0r  
Well, still retrieving the idol could rise Griffins spirit and make them to remember their great past. It would also make them rally together and start rebuilding their kingdom faster. Also their gratitude to RD (and Pinkie) would make them reliable ally to Equestria later. I believe RD’s plan was worthy enough to carry it on. Shame they didn’t…

@Vaidelot  
Getting the idol back would be a temporary fix over jumpstarting the griffons to work together. I’d go so far as to wager the idol itself had no actual power. It was used by the king to get his people to come together.

@when she felt her wings unfold  
How in the nine hells Rainbow was useless in this? She had the right idea and done everything she can to achieve it! If Pinkie wasn’t spent most of their money on the snacks in train or if she actually came with RD and helped her with going down the gouge, Griffin kingdom would be saved much faster and effectively… All she and Gilda do later was to undo the harm inflicted by Pinkie’s own wrong decisions!

@when she felt her wings unfold
 
…there’s depth in this episode that I didn’t bother to plumb on first watch, and it’s pretty cool that you and other people did.

@Anon-a-Miss, @Lawful Girly  
Subverted, I think. The Great Rainbow Hero from outside ends up being completely useless and failing at her task. It falls to Gilda to learn from her own people’s history, make a big moral choice, and save the squishy helpless visitors all before the moral stick is even brought out properly in the second act. She’s unwittingly made the hero in the first act through basically circumstance then rises to it.
 
Later, Pinkie acts as a catalyst on a slightly longer moral journey of Gilda’s from amassing the money to “leave this lousy town” to seemingly wanting to stay, make friends, and maybe improve things. I don’t think the second act is quite as well handled as the first, but I think it still makes it Gilda’s choices that matter just about even if the story’s in the service of the series arc.
 
The episode pretty much directly states that inside they have the capacity to be gracious and great even if chronic poverty (through theft of their resources and mojo, no less) has been kicking their arses for decades or possibly even centuries. I get that it’s the poverty that’s causing them to be awful reverse feedback loops to each other out of individual necessity. If the ep’s setting up the idea that all griffons are irredeemable grasping jerks, then it’s to knock it down.

@Lawful Girly  
Also note: “Typical pony hero complex!”  
And of course, she’s proven wrong.  

@Anon-a-Miss  
Now that you mention it, there are certain connotations with that golden idol, too…  
Oh, wait, remember “Over a Barrel”? Cultural conflict can be solved by compromise and pie!

Now that they know roughly where the idol is, I figure it would make a good public-works project to get a team of griffons with good ropes together to go down there and get it. Call it a civic-spiritedness final exam.

@Lawful Girly  
That’s the one part I didn’t like about this episode. All Griffons are jerks and greedy. No exceptions. Then the mighty ponies come along and save them with their message of friendship.

@Background Pony Number 17  
You don’t think it was implied that they’re poor in part because they’re too busy being jerkwads to each other to cooperate?

@Joshua  
She was disowned by her only friend and only for her behavior.  
As we see all griffons are jerks, so she acted like everyone and this is so unfair for her.  
Gilda wasn’t reformed cuz she wasn’t bad in the first place, she just act like act all in her home.
 
P.S. Gilda for princess of Griffin’s Kingdom

@Background Pony Number 17  
Thank you for making that distinction.

@Joshua  
Not so much reformed as understood.
 
Gilda comes from a very poor country; griffons have to scramble just to make ends meet. They’re a proud, ancient race, though, so can’t be seen as weaklings. They have to look tough, act tough, and even be jerks at times because it’s either be a jerk or starve. To them, compassion is a waste of time and a good way to get ripped off.
 
It’s going to take a long time before Pinkie Pie’s ideas about friendship sink in over there. In the meantime, at least Gilda learned that RD’s friendship mattered to her more than the daily struggle to stay a step ahead of your neighbors.

This scene made me think of Treasure Planet

So……… Gilda has been reformed.
 
 
IT’S RAGNARÖK, I TELL YOU!