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"The Return of Harmony" is the collective name for the first and second episodes of the second season of the American animated television series My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and the 27th and 28th episodes of the series overall. Both episodes were written by M. A. Larson and directed by series director James Wootton. Part one of the episode aired in the United States on September 17, 2011 on The Hub network. Part two aired the following week, on September 24. The episode received a Nielsen household rating of 0.2 and was viewed by over 339,000 viewers, making it the highest-rated episode ever broadcast by The Hub at that point. This is also the last My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic episode to be produced by Studio B Productions. The show follows a studious unicorn pony named Twilight Sparkle as her mentor Princess Celestia guides her to learn about friendship in the town of Ponyville. Twilight becomes close friends with five other ponies: Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Pinkie Pie. In the first part of the episode, an ancient evil known as Discord escapes from his stone prison, and Twilight and her friends discover that the Elements of Harmony have been stolen. They need to retrieve them in order to save Equestria from eternal chaos, but first have to contend with Discord's sinister mind games. In part two, Twilight is determined to find the Elements of Harmony after her friends are hypnotically brainwashed by Discord and all of Equestria begins to fall into disarray.