WRITING IS MAGIC

About ten years ago I discovered MY LITTLE PONY FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC. I had watched the original MLP when I was a kid, (yes I’m that old), and may have seen an episode or two of FIM in its first season but didn’t truly discover it, fall in love with it, until I stumbled across an airing of MLP EQUESTRIA GIRLS RAINBOW ROCKS.

In that first watch, of all the characters that grabbed my attention was Trixie and her Powerful and Great “Tricks Up My Sleeve” song.
I really enjoyed the movie and soon was watching the MLP series and seeking out the original EG movie.
Because of Netflix at the time I was able to catch up on all the seasons of MLP from the start. Lauren Faust is absolutely fantastic on the world building on this series and as the seasons went on the world became even larger and the characters became all the more interesting and three dimensional.
Trixie got introduced early on and was rather a one note character, but that would change.
I found all the characters really interesting. I really wish I had gotten a chance to pitch a script to the show.
I have unfortunately fallen into the same rabbit hole that people do on some shows, and that is sometimes finding the background secondary characters more interesting than the leads. Even one of these secondary characters acknowledges this experience when the draconequus Discord realizes that he, Trixie, Startlight Glimmer, and Thorax are being thrust front and center.
So, I have been committed to the series and movies ever since, you might even call me a Brony, but maybe you won’t and I respect that. I don’t know a fraction about the show like other fans do, and haven’t written any fanfic.
I have watched the episodes many times over and still find ones I’ve missed.
Now back to the reason for this blog; the Equestria Girls movies. As stated at the start, I discovered the movies with Rainbow Rocks. Which would also be my introduction to Sunset Shimmer. Because I came in late I didn’t get to know a lot about her but she seemed to a character everyone loves.


SPOILER WARNING!!
Then I found the original EG movie and her origin. She was not a very nice person, and people didn’t like her.
The only complaint I have, and I believe others did, was her redemption at the end of the first movie happened too fast. That said, the growth of her character over the following movies completely made up for it.
It would have been nicer to see it happen over a few more minutes on screen. I feel there must have been a last minute rewrite, but haven’t heard about it.
However, nearly every EG movie from then on is really about Sunset even if the main plot is about others.
In Rainbow Rocks; Sunset knows everyone hates her and so the Sirens mess with her, but in the end “Sunset Shimmer we need you.” Makes her the hero of the show. During the credit sequence we see how other kids now respect her.
Then comes the FRIENDSHIP GAMES. Which introduces us to this Earth’s Twilight Sparkles (Fans call her Sci-Twi). (Yes, Pinkie Pie let the audience know that a version of Twilight existed, and nearly screamed that the girl would make a future appearance.)
There are a few things I want to mention about this movie, but I’ll continue with Sunset. Vice Principal Luna has asked her to figure out why the Equestrian Magic is so active (In the movie we see Sunset study in the library and then write to Princess Twilight, but in a side short she experiments on each of the girls to see what activates the magic. She doesn’t succeed). While at the same time Sci-Twi is searching for the source of the strange energies emanating from Canterlot High, until she is manipulated to use the magic and is transformed in Midnight Sparkle.
Sunset harnessed the Magic of Friendship from the rest of the girls to defeat her.
After watching this sequence, the other day, I don’t think Sunset tapped into the same parts of the Magic as Twilight does in the earlier movies. Her power comes not frame the mane six, but from the Crystal Prep girls who save them. Those girls are nobody’s friend, even each other, but when they see danger that they partially created they act and save the others. They are very similar to where Sunset started out, as bad guys, and it is their selfless acts that kickstart the magic she uses.
It will take them time to really become friends with the Equestria Girls, but the magic soon blossoms.
Now a couple of side notes to this movie: other fans have pointed out that at the same moment Sunset is saving Sci-Twi from being Midnight Sparkle, and redeeming herself, in the pony verse Twilight is doing the same for Starlight Glimmer.
At the end of “Friendship Games” Sci-Twi briefly gets to meet the Twilight from the pony world who mentions how she had survived Starlight Glimmer’s attack.
Here’s how else I want to bring the two stories together. In the second season of MLP episode “It’s About Time” Twilight Sparkle travels back in time to warn her earlier self not to worry about the future, which only results in creating the future she’s from. Which then we assume that time cannot be rewritten.
In the two part “Cutie Re-Mark” Starlight Glimmer has apparent gained hold of the same spell, and has ‘perfected’ the spell to allow her to travel through time and change the future. Twilight of course saves the world, and helps Starlight seek redemption.
As powerful as Starlight is (possibly more so than Twilight), I wonder if the true reason she was able to travel through time and making changes so easily, is because it was happening at the exact same time Sci-Twi of Equestria Girls was Midnight Sparkle and was ripping holes between the two universes. That might weaken the space/time fabric allowing changes in the time line all that easier to do. Just my wild speculations, you don’t have to think on it too hard.
Now a side note about Sci-Twi, we get a glimpse of her at the end of Rainbow Rocks before her true introduction, but what was she doing in that time while she was investigating Canterlot High.
Maybe other fans have written about this, but I just saw something on Sci-Twi’s pin board I had never seen before. In the bottom left of the board is a long shot of the music stage from Rainbow Rocks, three glowing dragons are visible above the stage. Sci-Twi saw them? But what is more shocking is that she also has a close-up photo of a shattered red crystal. A crystal that belonged to one of the Dazzlings. A CLOSE-UP picture. How did she get it? If she got that close, did she not see the other Twilight? If not, where did she get those photos from, someone’s social media account? Did Photo Finish take the photos? Again, just wild speculations, and fun.

Now that Sci-Twi is part of the group, she has made new friends, but she is still having troubles. As “Legend of Everfree” begins, she is experiencing nightmares, PTSD of her experiences as Midnight Sparkle. Though the focus is on where is the magic coming from, and Twilight’s fears, this movie cements Sunset Shimmer as the leader of the team.
After that there is a series of shorter stories all culminating in Sunset briefly returning to Equestria for a new journal and meets Starlight Glimmer. I know it’s mostly about Starlight becoming human and experience the EG world, but I realize something else is important here. Allowing Starlight Glimmer to come back with her is Sunset’s first attempt to make a new friend without the help of the other girls. In a way, this is an important part of her story arc, of her character growth.
I could go into all the shorts that follow, but don’t have time in this blog (I’m already late), but I will say I like “Display of Affection,” in which it is discovered Sunset is the street artist Flanksy. She is so the right character for this.

There are four more movies made: I really like “Rollercoaster of Friendship” because it focuses on the Rarity/Apple Jack’s friendship. There is a one-line joke that shows the old Sunset is still in there “I don’t like to lose.” “Spring Breakdown” is fun as Sunset brings the human Sci-Twilight and Rainbow Dash into Equestria and they have to hide until they get to pony Twilight. It was fun but the ending joke was disappointing, it’s now too easy for people to pass from one world to another and apparently having dozens of duplicates together doesn’t destroy the universe which was the concern at the start of Equestria Girls.
For Sunset, her personal story arc, as she has been growing into her own over all these movies, comes to a conclusion in “Forgotten Friendship”. Here people stop forgetting her; not forgetting that she exists but that she was ever good. They only remember the evil Sunset from long ago. Of all things that are important to her, losing her friends would be the absolute worst and so she will sacrifice herself for them. This story also has her return to Equestia and having to face Princess Celestia. Asking for forgiveness was a hard thing for her to do, and she was scared of what the Princess would do.
What I also love about this movie is we get to see Sunset make a new friend, and surprisingly it’s Trixie. In the mainline Friendship is Magic universe Trixie is the best friend to Starlight Glimmer, so it would make sense that she’d become friends with Sunset in this world.
Of course, it would have been cool to seen a sequence when Starlight Glimmer was in the EG world and have her meet this Trixie. Is there a difference between the two, could she tell? Also, during the “Spring Breakdown” ending, done just for a joke, we now know that both Trixies could have met each other even if very briefly. Now that is scary.
“Trixie is Okay.”
At the end of this long rambling blog about My Little Pony: Equestria Girls, I am left with one last but very important question.
When did Sunset Shimmer learn to play the guitar?