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spoiler Is Twilight Sparkle slowly being relegated?


SaburoDaimando

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THis is something I noticed with the Season 6 premier and with today's episode: Twilight isn't used as much as she was use to in the last 5 seasons.  Lemme bring up some examples

 

Season 1: Twilight guides her friends to help defeat Nightmare Moon.  One episode later, she struggles with her friends and the Grand Gallopin Gala tickets.

 

Season 2: Twilight struggles with her friends to defeat Discord.  One episode later, she struggles with herself over a late lesson to the Princess

 

Season 3: Twilight and her friends help protect the Crystal Empire from King Sombra.  One episode later, she is involved in trying to stop the number of Pinkie Pies

 

Season 4: Twilight and her friends sacrifice the Elements of Harmony to save the Tree, thus beginning her quest to acquire the 6 keys of Harmony.  One episode later, they discover a journal to document their quest at the Castle of the Twin Sisters.

 

Season 5: Twilight and her friends struggle against Starlight Glimmer's town of equality.  One episode later, Twilight's friends do what they can to cheer her up.

 

ANd so it seems Season 6 is beginning to buck that trend.

 

Season 6: While Twilight does play a role in this story, her role is minor compared to the recently reformed Starlight Glimmer, who takes center stage as the protagonist of the story.  One episode later, Pinkie Pie and Rarity are in Manehattan with Maud over gifts.

 

Furthermore, we know that the Cutie Mark Crusaders will have center stage on the next episode, and then Spike is up.  Which makes me wonder: Will we be seeing less of Twilight Sparkle this season?  Will she be relegated to supporting character alongside Celestia, Luna, Cadance, Shining Armor and even Discord?  What's your thoughts on this?

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You're right, but the reason is because Twilight's character has just about reached the peak of its growth. She can't really develop any more than she has already, without becoming a Mary Sue. Same for some of the other characters. They're all achieving their goals, and reaching their cap of growth. Any focus on them is becoming very tricky without flanderizing their characters or making them too perfect.

 

This is the reason seasonal rot occurs. As characters hit their respective story ends, the show runs out of material. And then new characters are stuffed in in an attempt to find new threads to pursue.

 

The only characters that really still have room to grow are Fluttershy, whose goals are still unknown to us; Spike, who could use some help; RD, who has one more goal to obtain- and it's coming soon; and Pinkie Pie, whose goals are also unknown to us. AJ never had much room to grow from the start, Twily is in the same position Celestia was S1-3, Rarity now has multiple shops, and the CMC have their Cutie Marks.

 

When character goals start being met for the main cast, the show is starting to run its course.

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You're right, but the reason is because Twilight's character has just about reached the peak of its growth. She can't really develop any more than she has already, without becoming a Mary Sue. Same for some of the other characters. They're all achieving their goals, and reaching their cap of growth. Any focus on them is becoming very tricky without flanderizing their characters or making them too perfect.
 

 

I've never understood this. Do people really think that's it? You achieve a goal and then you just stop growing? That just sounds lazy to me, even if you're writing characters.

 

 Twilight becoming a Princess, or even a Mentor doesn't mean she's out of lessons to learn, Rainbow becoming a Wonderbolts doesn't mean her journey is over. Maybe the show will end soon, and maybe the writer's will end those characters stories, but that doesn't mean that HAS to happen.

 

 If you write good enough characters, there doesn't have to be a growth "Cap" like that, it shouldn't be too unbelievable to think of other directions the characters could take even after reaching their goals, and I think the characters in this show are good enough that's possible.

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You're right, but the reason is because Twilight's character has just about reached the peak of its growth. She can't really develop any more than she has already, without becoming a Mary Sue. Same for some of the other characters. They're all achieving their goals, and reaching their cap of growth. Any focus on them is becoming very tricky without flanderizing their characters or making them too perfect.

 

This is the reason seasonal rot occurs. As characters hit their respective story ends, the show runs out of material. And then new characters are stuffed in in an attempt to find new threads to pursue.

 

The only characters that really still have room to grow are Fluttershy, whose goals are still unknown to us; Spike, who could use some help; RD, who has one more goal to obtain- and it's coming soon; and Pinkie Pie, whose goals are also unknown to us. AJ never had much room to grow from the start, Twily is in the same position Celestia was S1-3, Rarity now has multiple shops, and the CMC have their Cutie Marks.

 

When character goals start being met for the main cast, the show is starting to run its course.

The one solution would be to create all new goals for them to set, or to throw a curveball that changes them more..  Some examples would include the Cutie Mark Crusaders to help out others in mind, Rarity could be more about acquiring a jewel for the perfect dress for a client, Pinkie Pie having to help out a sick Mrs Cake, the day when Granny Smith leaves for the afterlife, Rainbow Dash having to cope with the idea of the Wonderbolts disbanding if Wind Rider and Lightning Dust were to outflank them and leave them as yesterday's trash, Discord showing off more of his status as a papa wolf-like character, and even Celestia wanting to get away from the politics in Canterlot just to have a vacation.

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Im taking this with very little grain of salt .My friend told me there is rumor that Tara Strong is going to leave this show because Twilight Sparkle is going to stagnate. If and If I believe this rumor the reasoning is logical since Twilight is slowly becoming the new Celestia and Starlight becoming the new Twilight Sparkle. I wont believe anything until I see it.

To answer question it seems so and Twilight becoming the new Celestia wouldnt surprise me. Meaning her slowly disappearing into the background and becoming more and more useless as time goes; if it does if season 6 isnt the last season. 

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You're right, but the reason is because Twilight's character has just about reached the peak of its growth. She can't really develop any more than she has already, without becoming a Mary Sue. Same for some of the other characters. They're all achieving their goals, and reaching their cap of growth. Any focus on them is becoming very tricky without flanderizing their characters or making them too perfect.

 

This is the reason seasonal rot occurs. As characters hit their respective story ends, the show runs out of material. And then new characters are stuffed in in an attempt to find new threads to pursue.

 

The only characters that really still have room to grow are Fluttershy, whose goals are still unknown to us; Spike, who could use some help; RD, who has one more goal to obtain- and it's coming soon; and Pinkie Pie, whose goals are also unknown to us. AJ never had much room to grow from the start, Twily is in the same position Celestia was S1-3, Rarity now has multiple shops, and the CMC have their Cutie Marks.

 

When character goals start being met for the main cast, the show is starting to run its course.

 

 

Characters can just get new goals you know, like in Tangled it is said you can always get a new dream. The characters are meant to be 3 demential so they can achieve their goals like real people can and still remain flawed and being able to wish for new dreams. 

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Twilight becoming a supporting character? Are you talking about the exact same pony who pretty much had a whole two-parter all to herself not too long ago? 

 

No. There's absolutely nothing for you to worry about. 

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Oh gosh. First I was seeing, "TWILIGHT'S GOING TO OUTLIVE/OUTCLASS HER FRIENDS AND MAKE THEM BACKGROUND CHARACTERS" back in Season 4. Now I'm seeing, "Twilight's slowly being relegated because she didn't have a major role in the Season 6 premiere and didn't appear in the newest episode."

 

Guys...please. I know I have no right to try and change or silence anyone's opinion, but this constant paranoia needs to stop. Twilight is not being relegated, every season has had more than several episodes either not featuring her or having little to do with her.

 

I also completely disagree with what was said about characters reaching a "growth cap". Real people never just "stop" maturing, nor do well-written fictional characters.

 

Just enjoy the show, geez... :twi:

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It's far too early in the season to judge that. She had a very prominent role in the previous season finale, and we're only two episodes into this one (if the two-parters were counted as one). She's far from a background character and, needless to say, there are many, many more episodes to come.

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She wasn't featured prominently in the premiere because its a Starlight episode: Starlight is basically the FIM version of sunset, and there's going to be a HELL of a lot of shilling of her.

I expect the finale will be a duo episode of twilight and starlight ala twilight and sunset being the stars of FG.

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IT'S BEEN THREE FREAKING EPISODES, WAIT A WHILE LONGER BEFORE CRYING THAT SOME CHARACTER IS BEING RELEGATED TO THE BACKGROUND. Seriously in the lastest episode what role would Twilight have POSSIBLY filled anyway?

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(edited)

@@snowflame, @@SaburoDaimando, @,

 

From a story writing perspective, it's a little different. In real life, a person can have hundreds, thousands of personality traits. But writing a character that complex necessitates most of the focus be on that single character, and to be a more introspective style of writing. In a show that follows multiple characters, making them all deep enough to be interesting, but not some complicated that you can't follow them all, is a delicate balance.

 

Particularly for a light-hearted, large cast, child oriented show as MLP is, you can't give them struggles as subtle as the conflict one might get following a show focused on one character. Even adults would find that much complexity overwhelming with a cast as large as this.

 

In addition, it's important to remember that with a large cast, each one needs to have unique goals and flaws. Sure, you can write a story about, say, Rarity being arrogant with her success and her vision. But that story has been done with RD.

 

The other thing is, there's a limit to what conflicts are believable for a given character. And even further, MAYBE there could be something besides Rarity expanding shops. And MAYBE you could write a sequence of stories about RD going further up in the Wonderbolts. But in an ensemble cast, such furthering of goals is really just grasping at straws. At a certain point, you can't do the subtleties of long-term goals for a given character.

 

And with some characters, what do you see beyond the now? After Twilight has learned to be a good teacher, what's left? At that point, she will effectively be Celestia's successor. Become more than Celestia ever was? That's going to approach Mary Sueness.

 

As for RD and Rarity, what do you see? Rarity is already expanding. If we start seeing her trying to become a multinational corporation, it just takes us way beyond the comfortable scale for MLP. RD going up the ranks- I suppose. But that's such an involved plot, there would need to be a lot more screen time given to her to achieve it.'

 

New goals- I mean. What other goals do you have in mind? People don't have 500 dreams and achieve them all. That makes it less relatable,and less realistic. In real life, you pick a dream or two, and pursue them.

 

I understand that people don't want MLP to end- but it won't. Too much money for it to die. But trust me, as somebody who knows about story writing- a given story needs an end. And some of the best shows ever, do end. They reach a conclusion- because that's what people want from a story. It's dull if it drags on forever. All good things must end.

 

Anyways, that's my piece on the subject of character goals. I feel like the time of the current Mane 6 should end soon, and maybe start a new story with a new cast in the same world. That would probably be best for the health of MLP, and the fandom.

Edited by BalanceBrony
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IT'S BEEN THREE FREAKING EPISODES, WAIT A WHILE LONGER BEFORE CRYING THAT SOME CHARACTER IS BEING RELEGATED TO THE BACKGROUND.

 

Seriously. Twilight's the last character in danger of this, and it's pretty eye-rolling to see people freaking out over it when Rarity went for two consecutive years without a focus episode and still managed to bounce back.

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Seriously. Twilight's the last character in danger of this, and it's pretty eye-rolling to see people freaking out over it when Rarity went for two consecutive years without a focus episode and still managed to bounce back.

but twilight must be in EVERY episode and be the star of them! :P

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She was essentially the main star of the show for 5 seasons, so I could see why they might want to tone her down a bit now. They have done so much with her and what they have done, I am happy about, so if they wish to focus on other characters more, I see no issues with that personally.

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There have been plenty of episodes in other season that have omitted her presence, but her greater role has shown no sign of being diminished yet.  Give it a few more episodes and we'll see if what is happening is a passing of the torch or just another example of a string of episodes that don't require her input.

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She was essentially the main star of the show for 5 seasons, so I could see why they might want to tone her down a bit now. They have done so much with her and what they have done, I am happy about, so if they wish to focus on other characters more, I see no issues with that personally.

This reminds me of S4 and S5 :P

"Twilight's become a princess now! surely they'll tone down her involvement and focus on the others, what else can they do with her?"

"twilight got a castle and a domain as a princess! Surely they'll tone down her involvement and focus on the others! What more can they do with her now?"

 

XD

They can always think of something else to give twilight not matter how far they take her; Specifically, they could have her start taking in multiple pupils and teaching students like how she took on Starlight as a student and make twilight a mini-celestia with a university or whatnot.

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She wasn't featured prominently in the premiere because its a Starlight episode: Starlight is basically the FIM version of sunset, and there's going to be a HELL of a lot of shilling of her.

What do you mean by 'shilling of her'?

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(edited)

This reminds me of S4 and S5 :P

"Twilight's become a princess now! surely they'll tone down her involvement and focus on the others, what else can they do with her?"

"twilight got a castle and a domain as a princess! Surely they'll tone down her involvement and focus on the others! What more can they do with her now?"

 

XD

They can always think of something else to give twilight not matter how far they take her; Specifically, they could have her start taking in multiple pupils and teaching students like how she took on Starlight as a student and make twilight a mini-celestia with a university or whatnot.

 

Well to be fair when it comes to S4 outside of the opener and the finale that really WAS pretty much true, and it frankly badly hurt her character. But yeah it is ridiculous how some of her fans complain about this, she has almost all the Big episodes, and they reversed course on shoving her aside during the SoL episodes in S5, she had three of them like most of the rest of the cast (expect Pinkie who had 4 and Fluttershy who had 2)

Edited by M'gann M'orzz
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What do you mean by 'shilling of her'?

By shilling I mean having two parters and overall the meta plot of the season will probably revolve around her heavily. Like how the Premier was 50% about her and Sunburst and the Day was only saved by Starlight and sunburst coming in to the rescue. Most likely the Finale will have a similar focus with the plot being about Starlight in some manner (much like how Friendship games was at its core about Sunset and twilight and ended with Sunset going super saiyan and saving twilight from herself).

 

 

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Seriously. Twilight's the last character in danger of this, and it's pretty eye-rolling to see people freaking out over it when Rarity went for two consecutive years without a focus episode and still managed to bounce back.

I think its because the writers keep focusing on characters, and then realising that they left one out. They try to fix it by adding three Rarity episodes in a row. (Not that I'm complaining). Twilight is in no danger of being relegated. They just feel like its time to develop some of the characters more before moving in with whatever the hell the Season 7 Finale is.

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