Cleverclover

Currently don't like her, and overall, it's going to require a ton of changes on her part for my opinion of her to improve. 

For starters, the writers really need to stop hoisting her up on a pedestal while also simultaneously displaying just what a terrible person she is. In fact, I will be stunned if she doesn't continue to abuse others with magic in season 7. She's certainly learned pretty well by now that she can do whatever the hell she wants to anyone she wants without having to expect any greater consequence than a simple slap on the wrist, if even that. 

She needs to stop being so utterly dependent on magic to solve everything, she needs to have some more positive interaction with the mane five and show that she actually wants to be friends with them and vice versa, and she needs to stop making jokes out of her past actions, because it feels like a complete slap in the face that she can consistently joke about something that she most certainly should have been locked up for. 

I think Twilight's Kingdom is massively overrated. It remains my least favorite two-parter and among my least favorite episodes in the show.  

I've seen it probably about 2 or 3 times, and I can't say that I'll ever care to watch it again. 

One of the things I hate about it is how purely incompetent Celestia is. McCarthy has not treated Celestia well since Lesson Zero. Nearly every single additional time she's written Celestia, it's pretty much just for the express purpose of dragging her into the ground while simultaneously making Twilight look better. Where once Celestia was believed to be the equivalent god among the fandom, that perception has been utterly shattered, and McCarthy is entirely to blame. 

In Twilight's Kingdom, McCarthy took things to a whole new level. She painted Celestia as easily the most incompetent ruler I have ever seen, bar none. Celestia's decision-making in this episode is flat-out ridiculous and certainly does not give indication that this character has been ruling a nation for more than a milleniuum. 

For starters, Celestia's first major blunder is sending out a recently-reformed villain to stop a new villain, without any backup plan whatsoever.  Without any good reason whatsoever, she put complete and unwavering faith in Discord to stop Tirek. Because how could that possibly go wrong? It's certainly not as though Discord hasn't proven himself to be entirely trustworthy, you know, by the way he deliberately misled the mane six in Princess Twilight Sparkle and how he deliberately pitted Twilight and Cadence against a giant worm that could have killed them. How could Celestia have ever expected that Discord would betray her and instead help Tirek gain power, effectively rendering her at fault for the fact that Tirek was able to drain magic from just about every single pony in Equestria? I mean, come on, you'd have to be a strategic genius to have seen that one coming! 

And of course, Twilight ends up looking all the better after this massive blunder of Celestia's, because she had offered to stop Tirek herself before Celestia chose Discord, and Lord knows that if Celestia had actually allowed Twilight to do so, Tirek never would have been able to gain power and would have been quickly been sent back to Tartarus. So yes, score one for Twilight, and minus about 10,000 for Celestia. 

But unfortunately, Celestia's poor decision-making doesn't stop there. I truly, truly wish it did, but unfortunately, McCarthy was not at all finished running her into the ground. Because once Celestia realizes "I dun goofed!", her very next step is to deliberately render the three ponies who stand the greatest chance against Tirek utterly powerless, and transfer all of their power to Twilight to keep it safe from him. 

Why....just....why? 

This one just makes no sense. At all. I mean, thinking logically, if you're trying to protect alicorn magic from Tirek, wouldn't transferring it all to a single pony just make it easier for him to get to it, because he would only need to draw from ONE source instead of four? Is there any good reason why Celestia decides to do this instead of taking a stand against Tirek alongside the other three alicorns, which is quite clearly the best chance they had to stop Tirek at that point? And another thing, Celestia makes this decision under the belief that Tirek will not know of the existence of a fourth alicorn, and thus the magic will be safe. But this makes no sense, because Celestia has no reason whatsoever to believe that Discord would not have already told Tirek all about a fourth alicorn, which, of course, he does. And lastly, once their magic is transferred to Twilight, what exactly is she supposed to do then? Celestia doesn't even give Twilight any further measures for keeping it safe--she doesn't advise her to go into hiding or anything. So what the hell makes her think that Tirek isn't going to find her? I'm sorry, but under no logical circumstances does this plan make any sense whatsoever. 

But unfortunately, that's still not the end of Celestia's incompetence. Because she then advises that Twilight not tell her friends about this magic transfer under the impression that doing so will simply get them captured by Tirek and pressed for information about Twilight's whereabouts. And Twilight actually follows this advice, but guess what ends up happening? THE REMANE FIVE GET CAPTURED ANYWAY. 

There just is not so much as A SINGLE THING that Celestia does in this two-parter that makes even a SHRED of sense. She is portrayed as more incompetent than she's ever been, and it's all for the purpose of giving Twilight enough power to face off against Tirek later on.  

As for the fight scene itself, it's certainly epic. And it's certainly darker than anything I would have expected to see in the show. But it's completely and utterly worthless to the plot. Aside from getting Twilight's library home blown up, it really didn't contribute anything to the plot. It was just there to fill some time until Tirek presented Twilight's friends to her and offered them up in exchange for her magic.

And Twilight was definitely stupid to give her magic up, I might add. Because, just like Celestia, she had no backup plan, and it was clear that the best chance Equestria had to not end up under Tirek's control was for her to simply keep on fighting until she killed him. And once Twilight decided to give it up, Tirek had no reason whatsoever not to kill her on the spot, and it still makes absolutely no sense to me as to why he did not do that, other than being too dark for a kids' show, of course. Still, though, the pony who had just dished out a serious beating on him had just been rendered completely powerless, and Tirek had sent the other three princesses to Tartarus for pretty much nothing. It makes no sense for him to suddenly drop his vindictiveness and let Twilight and her friends go instead of just kill them right then and there, or at the very least, sending them to Tartarus as well so that they no longer posed any threat to him whatsoever. 

Overall, the writing in this two-parter is just awful. It's terrible. It's the worst I've seen in any two-parter. I just hate this episode.  

Starlight also exhibited a number of these symptoms in The Cutie Re-Mark, but I think definitively diagnosing Starlight Glimmer with any sort of psychological illness or personality disorder is a fools errand in light of the substantial differences in personality between pre-reformation and post-reformation Starlight Glimmer.

She still has plenty of those symptoms post-reformation, though. 

Absolutely should have been an episode. Completely missed opportunity. 

Here's a post I made on the subject that happens to be one of the most-brohoofed posts I've made: 

The one potential episode that I simply cannot believe no one bothered to make is an episode that would have focused on Spike taking care of Peewee and ultimately sending him back to his family. 

 

The setup was perfect. For the first time in his life, Spike would have been given a responsibility greater than what he has ever known before. Not only does he learn what it means to care for a pet, he learns about just how strong the bonds of family are. But because of this, Twilight eventually recommends to Spike that he return Peewee to his family. At first, Spike blatantly refuses, drawing off of the lesson he learned in Dragon Quest that Peewee does not need to be with other Phoenixes to feel where he belongs. But Twilight informs him that he isn't considering the perspective of Peewee's family, stating that his absence likely devastated them, while also adding that if someone came and took Spike away from her, she would devastated as well. So with that  thought in mind, Spike finally agrees, and the episode ends with him tearfully returning Peewee where he belongs. This would have been a spectacular episode full of awesome development for Spike (which, Lord knows, is something he needs) as well as intense feels. 

 

Why an episode like this was not made when it was already set up so perfectly will always be a mystery to me.    

 

And to make it even worse, what do we get instead of this? A series of pictures at the beginning of Just for Sidekicks which explain Peewee's unceremonious removal from the show, whilst also implying that Spike was a lousy caretaker and was also not the least bit sad or upset about returning him to his family.  

 

I don't really think she got "rewarded" in "Every Little Thing She Does."

Oh, yes she sure as hell did! 

She got to remain friends with five ponies who should want absolutely nothing to do with her anymore. Whose friendship and forgiveness she clearly does not deserve. 

That's one hell of a reward if you ask me. 

Twilight's honestly a pretty lousy mentor. Ever since No Second Prances, it's become clear that she's far more interested in being Starlight's best friend rather than being her mentor. 

As for Starlight, I don't think it makes a difference whether she learns her lesson or not. Even if she continues to allow her lack of empathy for others to show, even if she still exerts her power over others, she's still just going to get rewarded in the end anyway. 

There's nothing that really indicates Sunset Shimmer having any family, or at least any family she cares about. If she does, she clearly had no qualms about leaving them behind for such a long period of time. And if there were people she cared about in Equestria, would she really have been so intent to conquer it? How exactly would she have spared them from whatever horrors she had in mind for the rest of ponykind? 

There are numerous additional reasons Sunburst could have moved to the Crystal Empire. Perhaps he wanted access to the rich history or the massive library. 

and the mirror never got moved to Twilight's castle. It's still in the CE. Twilight, however, DID spontaneously CREATE a mirror out of plot convenient parts, in the basement of her castle. So there are two exits to the portal now- one in CE and one in Ponyville. stupid as it is. 

What? No, she didn't. Where on earth did you get that idea from?  

Um, I'm not the only one who sees and is extremely confused by the word "heroin" in the OP....am I? 

Eh, Sunset and Starlight both have plenty of problems and I don't think either of them are good characters.  

Sunset's problem is that she continues to conveniently pass on her past actions (and by that I mean, the part of her that legitimately wanted to take over Equestria and enslave others) to some "old" persona of herself so that her newer persona doesn't have to deal with it. Does it really work like that? I know that she received a direct hit from the rainbow harmony laser thing, but I do not think that it rid her of every last trace of evil in her body. But it's definitely more convenient for her sake to play the victim card and act as though something or someone was simply making her be evil, and that she's always been a pure and innocent little snowflake at heart. And like others have said, she's losing her flaws pretty quickly and becoming borderline perfect. Friendship Games came out of nowhere to imply that she has intelligence that is nearly on Twilight's level, even though the Sunset Shimmer of the first Equestria Girls was clearly not a bright person (given how she thought an army of mind-controlled teenagers would stand any chance against Celestia), and I can't forget the "By the way, I have awesome guitar skills....because reasons!" thing that Rainbow Rocks shoved out of its ass at the last minute.  

Starlight's problem is that she keeps receiving things that she does not deserve and has not earned. One of these things being Twilight and the mane five's trust. While it took over two and a half seasons after Discord's reformation for the mane six to finally trust him and accept him as a friend, Starlight gets instant forgiveness and completely undue trust pretty much out of the gate. On top of that, for whatever reason, the writers expect us to look past her complete lack of regard for the rights of others and love her to death. It's why she violated the mane five's rights and freedoms on completely unimaginable level, and then just a few episodes later, we were expected to root for her in the season finale. At least when Sunset began gaining some goodwill, she never fell back on it. But Starlight can apparently continue to display what an awful friend and all around awful person she is, and still get rewarded in the end. 

Between the two, however, I think I have the potential to like Starlight more, but that's going to depend on whether she makes a legitimate effort to move past her sociopathic tendencies and be an actual friend to the mane five. Also, I would sincerely like for her to tone her magic usage way down, both in the way she exerts it over others, and in the way she jumps straight to a spell as a solution to everything. 

Toss up between Sombra and Tirek. 

Tirek's problem is that he apparently isn't willing to kill. He really should have killed Twilight and the rest of the mane six after she gave up her magic, but he didn't. Not really sure why, though. It's not like he had anything to lose, and on top of that, Twilight had just handed his ass to him, so he had to be feeling pretty sour towards her. 

Meanwhile, I definitely don't think Sombra would have any problem with killing. 

I think Trixie remains massively narcissistic and will continue to put herself above others whenever she can. Doesn't necessarily make her good or bad, but for the most part, she looks out for number one,. 

She and Starlight honestly deserve each other. 

Oh, man, where do I even begin....? 

The Mysterious Mare Do Well and 28 Pranks Later - "If one of your friends is acting out, the best possible course of action is to follow their example to make them see how they like it, and then self-righteously act as though they're in the wrong and you're not." 

Putting Your Hoof Down - "You can be a massive jerk to your friends, even going as far as to insult their life aspirations, and they'll still want to be friends with you. You certainly don't need to seek them out to apologize. Just wait for them come to you." 

One Bad Apple - "If you're being bullied, the best course of action is to recognize that your oppressor has problems of their own, and also recognize that you're simply a therapeutic release for them. But you'd certainly better not EVER take a stand to defend yourself against them! Oh, no! You're an absolutely awful person if you do that." 

Tanks for the Memories - "Irrational fear entitles you to cause as much deliberate damage to public or private property as you want. And you certainly don't need to worry about suffering any consequences for it later, because no one will care." 

Newbie Dash - "If your peers are persistently taunting you with a nickname you don't care for, just suck it up and get used to it. They totally still respect you. They're just acting like they don't." 

Flutter Brutter - "If you lack confidence in yourself, it is your family's job to bend over backwards to help you succeed. And if your family decides to give up on you due to your lack of effort towards helping yourself, just wait until they start feeling sorry for you again." 

Every Little Thing She Does - "Taking shortcuts is always preferable to doing something right, especially if those shortcuts trample all over the rights and liberties of another person, or even multiple people. Oh, and make sure you apologize only after being told to do so. People will still want to be your friend, no matter how awful a friend you are." 

Yeah, this show has had some pretty lousy morals....

Season 5 is fantastic. Season 6 is meh. 

Umm....yeah, I wouldn't want the comic writers to touch the show with a fifty foot pole. 

Admittedly, many Sunset fans don't exactly seem like "fans" to me. I think "zealots" would honestly be a more appropriate word. People staunchly hold her up as the single greatest thing that has ever come from G4 MLP, and they are almost disturbingly entitled when it comes to her. 

For starters, they hold to the notion that she belongs in FiM, as though there's just a spot in the mane cast waiting for her when she returns. They also hold the notion that she is going to be revealed to be an alicorn when her pony form is shown again, despite there being no evidence whatsoever to support this. Starlight Glimmer has received plenty of hate from Sunset fans who believed her to be "stealing" her mane seventh spot. And there was also plenty of disgust towards Legend of Everfree when the DVD/Blu-ray cover was first revealed: 

As you can see, Twilight is front-and-center here, implying that she, not Sunset, would be the main character of the film. Sunset fans were outraged, because how dare Twilight steal focus away from Sunset? 

To further display the zealotry that revolves around Sunset, I'd like to show something I came across a few months ago:  

https://www.fimfiction.net/story/349155/sunset-shimmer-is-perfect

This is a story titled "Sunset Shimmer is Perfect", that goes on to indeed insist that she's perfect, and then reveals to be an alicorn at the end. And as you can see, this story ended up being quite popular and well-received. 

Can you honestly see this sort of thing going as well for any other character? I just can't see there being a whole lot of love for a story titled "Fluttershy is Perfect" or even "Twilight Sparkle is Perfect." But for Sunset Shimmer, somehow, this is an appropriate assessment. She's apparently a Mary Sue, and there's nothing wrong with that whatsoever. 

Yeah, Sunset fans....they kinda scare me. I wouldn't say all of them are this bad, but I've definitely seen a level of devotion towards her that I haven't seen in the fans of any other character. 

Pinkie, easily. 

The Cupcake song, the Smile song, Pinkie the Party Pony, Pinkie's Lament, Make a Wish, etc...

10. Starlight Glimmer - Still haven't warmed up to her yet, and still don't know if I ever will. I will say that she needs to do A LOT of changing first. 

9. Babs Seed - No, I don't sympathize with her just because she was bullied. Also, her accent is annoying. 

8. Marble Pie - She's cute, but that doesn't make up for the fact that she has no character whatsoever. 

7. Limestone Pie - She's a bitch for pretty much no reason at all. She made the Apples feel unwelcome from the moment they first arrived on her farm. 

6. Snips - Probably has the most annoying voice in the show, and unlike Snails, he's never done anything worthwhile. 

5. Spoiled Rich - You have to wonder why Filthy Rich, a genuinely nice guy, would marry this conceited, egotistical bitch. 

4. Zesty Gourmand - I hate how the only reason she rose to any sort of popularity is because the Canterlot citizenry is hiveminded and collectively stupid. She tells people that dull and bland food is good....and they believe her. 

3. Maud Pie - Don't care what anyone says. She's not some enigma of a character. She's just an overrated bore. 

2. Svengallop - The way he treated Pinkie and the fact that he referred to Applejack as a "dusty farm pony" was enough to make me hate his guts forever. 

1. Zephyr Breeze - I feel genuinely sorry for Fluttershy for having to be related to this asshole. 

Why do people take it for granted that Lyra likes humans when there was no evidence of it in the show?

If I recall correctly, Lyra supposedly being obsessed with humans has something to do with the way she was sitting on a bench in an early episode (which I think is Dragonshy, but not sure). She sits on the bench in the same way a human would, with her hind legs hanging over the side, while Bon Bon, who is seated next to her, is sorta laying on it. 

The fandom apparently construed this to mean that Lyra is well-aware of the existence of humans and strives to be like them. 

Yup, very anxious. 

Anxious that it'll end up worse than season 6, and anxious that it won't be the final season. 

There is one reason and one reason only as to why I would want Twilight to have a love interest, and that's to see how it would affect her dynamic with Spike. 

I can legitimately see Spike having several possible reactions. He could feel intimidated at the fact that he now has to make room for another prominent male presence in Twilight's life. He could play the role of the father, waiting up at night for Twilight to get home and constantly scrutinizing her love interest, fully convinced that he's not good enough for her. He could play the role of the concerned child, wondering if there's still any place for him in Twilight's life. 

I would honestly love to see any of these scenarios. 

I started warming up to Applejack around season 2, after she irritated me throughout the first half of season 1. The episode that really helped her to become my favorite pony was MMMystery on the Friendship Express. 

Applejack ends up being the only one of the mane six who is neither involved in the investigation, nor one of the culprits. However, when watching the episode for the first time, I was really scared that she would be one of the culprits, which would have utterly killed the notion I had that she was the most trustworthy of the mane six. I was relieved when that didn't happen. 

Applejack has since become my favorite pony by a country mile. 

After the finale, I most definitely support a Discord/Trixie episode. 

You truly never tire of making these sorts of threads, do you, TC? 

No, I would not advise anyone to get their hopes up about Sunset being introduced in FiM. There's just too much working against it:

1. There is nothing for her in FiM. 

She simply has no place in the show. She does not know the mane five, she has no home in Ponyville, presumably no family, and ultimately I just don't see what she has to contribute. 

2. She is integral to Equestria Girls. 

Equestria Girls clearly isn't going anywhere anytime soon, and that means neither is she. 

3. The staff are clearly going out of their way to ensure FiM remains separate from EG. 

In the three seasons and 78 episodes that have aired since Equestria Girls became a thing, there has not being so much as one single reference to it with the sole exception of Flash Sentry's two cameos. And Flash's cameos were completely unrelated to EG. 

There's simply no reason to expect that it's going to happen. 

I would.... 

kill her

punish her for the alicorn amulet incident

....say hi. 

Sigh, this clone talk never gets old! Oh wait, yes it does. And it has.

You guys exaggerate the crap out of this stuff.

She's fast? She's prideful? She's athletic?Oh she's a Rainbow Clone.

She's happy? Pinkie clone

She has powerful magic? Twilight clone

Basically, this. 

Seriously, I'm curious as to what actually constitutes a "Twilight clone." 

The only thing that even comes close, I think, is Moondancer simply because her design is simply a palette swap of Twilight's.