2. Not necessarily; the vast majority of Twilight's shortcomings are personality based and social; stuff like freaking out easily, not being able to read other ponies, etc. I can't imagine that Twilight has completely gotten over her Adorkable qualities.

I love that one of the first things she did was to ask if there was a book about being a princess she should read.

You'll be okay, Apple. It's those damn beginner's doubts creeping in again. You're going to have times when you think everything you do is crap. This is a completely normal part of the creative process.

No one is safe.

Judgmental eyes.

I've just written a nearly thousand word character analysis/commentary of Pinkie Pie. . .

I had actually been planning on doing this for all the Mane Six on another site, but now that I have done this I really feel like I should be ashamed of it, but I'm not, and that feels weird.

So. . .anyone want to have a look?

@ Mio

Is it flattering?

@ Syd

I guess so, but I'm all over the place with it.

edited 24th Feb '13 1:57:58 PM by ApplelightLimited

I updated Flash and Java this morning. Now, refreshing the page takes me back to my most recent post, for some reason. Annoying.

I'd love to read that.

I never claimed that sonic booms were common there. I claimed that they were far less rare than Sonic Rainbooms, seeing as though they, you know, AREN’T legendary and considered impossible.

@JT:

1. It already gives her a different kind of authority over them. I don’t like her friends being treated as minions.

2. She can already fly better than Fluttershy.

3. True.

4. And I never liked her being singled out as the special one, but I could at least accept it. This is on a rather different level though. I do not see how Twilight displays the virtues Celestia mentioned so much better than many other great ponies we’ve met (Go Princess Big Macintosh! ).

5. Fair enough. I’m still concerned and the breathing exercises in Games Ponies Play raised my worries significantly. In fact, even her being able to dance raised my worries. How am I supposed to identify with somepony who’s competent and well-adjusted!?

6. The implication is a meta one. “Yes, Twilight was a unicorn. But now she’s an alicorn! 20% better!”

7. Alicorns > everypony else was there from the beginning, but now it says, “so you shouldn’t be happy being a non-alicorn!” Also, Twilight cast a spell to become an alicorn. Which tribe is the only one that can cast spells again?

@Applelight: Your drawing and writing skills are perfectly fine and will get better.

@Mio: Sure, why not? I'll confess that I have prejudices against Pinkie, so my opinion of her is probably lower than it should be, but let's see.

@Applelight: I don't think it's particularly unflattering. . .

Alright. I'm planing on doing this to the others, so I guess I'll post them here as well.

Pinkie Pie

I don’t think it’s a very big leap to say that of all the members of the Mane Six Pinkie Pie is the most static of the lot. She’s hyper-active, fun loving, random, and an extrovert in the extreme. None of these characteristics go through any change or evolution and her interactions with other characters remain more or less the same.

There are meta reasons as to why this is so, namely that as the shows primary comic relief it is best that her personality remain the same as it always for more variety in jokes. However from an in-universe perspective it’s also very easy to see why she hasn’t really changed much since her first appearance, mainly she has been given very little reason to change. What do I mean by that? Well, when you see the other characters many of them have suffered some pretty severe consequences for their actions and have to, at the very least, acknowledge a particular flaw about themselves and make at least a token effort to correct it (how successful they are is another story). Pinkie Pie on the other hand rarely needs to do this as, for whatever reason, the world seems to work out in such a way that things always seem to work out in her favor.

There are a number obvious examples of this happening throughout the show such as the events of A Friend Indeed, Baby Cakes, or even Best Night Ever. But I’m actually going to look at a different piece, Party of One. This is an iconic Pinkie episode showing a more fragile and co-dependent side of her personality. It’s also where she learns to be more trusting of her friends (something that is oddly contradicted by MM Mystery, but that’s another conversation), but let’s say for a moment that they weren’t really trying to hide anything and just wanted to do something different that day. In that case I doubt Pinkie’s behavior probably would be very endearing to her friends. In fact if she decided to take it as far as she did in Party of One then it is possibly that her fears could have in fact come true, and it would have been her fault. Thankfully for her, her clingy, paranoid behavior turned out to be somewhat justified and her friends were just trying to do something nice for her, and with that the situation returned to normal and the party pony went back to her usual antics.

I will acknowledge that the other members of the Mane Six have had this happen to them in their own episodes (or all in the same episode in Best Night Ever), but I don’t think it has quite effected (or in this case not effected) a character and their worldview quite like Pinkie. In the song “Smile, Smile, Smile” we get a pretty quick summary of how Pinkie views the world and her place in it. She believes that’s her job to make people happy, and seems to feel that her presence always makes things better, and things all ways work out for her in this endeavor, and for the most part she is not wrong. Even in situations where her behavior does make things worse like in A Friend in Deed or Over a Barrel, things work out for the best in such a way that she doesn’t need to change or acknowledge fault in herself.

After looking at all of this it does beg the question, if Pinkie’s behavior has ultimately not resulted in any long term negative consequences and her worldview has been vindicated at multiple turns then there is no need for her to change is there? Well for the most part I will say that is true, if it weren’t for a little incident that happened in Season 3.

Too Many Pinkie Pies stands in pretty stark contrast to pretty much every Pinkie episode that came before. In it Pinkie suffers pretty hefty consequences for her desire to be able to be with all of her friends at once, including inflicting her clones on the whole town, suffering an existential crisis, and having to be subjected to a difficult test to prove that she is who she is both too herself and her friends. Many have complained that her friends should have been able to easily tell her apart from the clones, but I have to strongly disagree. When you actually stop to look at how the clones behave, it really isn’t all that different from how Pinkie normally behaves in other episodes, particularly ones that do not focus on her. It would not be unreasonable to believe that the others could not tell her apart from the clones or that Twilight would be suspect about the one sulking off on by itself being the real one. Pinkie also gets a unique opportunity to actually look at her own behavior (albeit exaggerated) without her own internal biases to tell her that what she is doing is perfectly fine and normal.

After being forced to go against her general nature in order to not be banished from Ponyville, could this mark a point where Pinkie would have to seriously exam her actions beyond this and whether there are aspects of her that should change? Probably not for the meta reasons set out above, but it does offer an interesting contrast to how things have gone before with Pinkie, and at least leaves the door open that Pinkie might not remain static forever.

Thanks Sereg .

@ Mio

I'll read it.

@Mio: That's quite interesting. I actually agree with the fact that things work out in Pinkie's favor too often.

I do agree that Pinkie does get too much slack. As her biggest fan, it pains me to say it but, she could do with being knocked down a bit more.

*resists urge to complain about "A Friend In Deed" again*

@JT At least Pinkie has demonstrably learned her lesson from that episode, as you were afraid she hadn't.

Annoying Stalker Pinkie is annoying.

There's a reason I make the comparison between Princesses and Primes. Optimus Prime is clearly meant to be the hero, leader, "most important" Autobot, but despite being an Ideal Hero it doesn't mean he doesn't have flaws or isn't likable or other Autobot characters aren't as important (or awesome). The current Transformers continuity even has Optimus being a librarian before he became a soldier and then a Prime and he seems to believe in The Power of Friendship in Fall of Cybertron.

Basically, I'm saying Twilight Sparkle is Optimus Prime. And I'm OK with this.

@Applelight: I'm not sure if her getting less slack would necessarily be beneficial, since I doubt for meta reasons that her character would change anyhow. There is no need to subject her to anything worse if nothing is really going to be gained from it.

Don't let its cute looks fool you. This baby can go from zero to Rainboom in Ten Seconds Flat.

Hey, that Double Rainboom fan animation has a release date! 30th March! ^_^

Total agreement.

Which is part of why she's my least favourite of the Mane 6 and why I like it so much when she does get development.

Admittedly, part of what causes me to have a low opinion of her is due to my own issues though.

edited 24th Feb '13 2:29:19 PM by Sereg

I agree. I don't see how developing Pinkie a bit would get in the way of jokes though. Fluttershy gaining a spine and Rainbow being less of a jerk hasn't stopped either from being funny. Pinkie being less annoying would stop jokes about "my god she's so annoying" but she's still an intentional comedian, meaning you can get plenty of jokes with normal interactions with her friends.

I just hope the lesson of "Too Many Pinkie Pies" sticks at least. Not that it's something that would come up that often but it would be a sign that the writers are starting to take Pinkie's Character Development seriously.

So lately AJ's jumped up to my second favourite of the Mane Six. I blame the comics personally. So now that's.

1: Rainbow Dash.
2: Applejack
3: Twilight
4: Fluttershy
5: Pinkie Pie
6: Rarity

Anyone else's rankings change over Series 3?

The evidence so far points to it not changing their relationships.

Anyway, my headcanon regarding the Sonic Rainboom is that the reason it's so rare is that you have to be able to go really fast AND have rainbow coloring. So Spitfire could go equally fast but couldn't make a Rainboom.

It was a one-horned, two-winged, flying purple people eater.

@Rhyme Beat: I don't necessarily think that Pinkie would be less funny if she were different, but it is more that the creative crew like her the way she is, which is primarily as an effective and believable platform for humor and gags. Much of the audience seems to agree as well and may dislike the fact that she is less "random, and zanny".