Nearly Spotless Virtue -- Or Why I Love My Trixie · 5:06pm Oct 28th, 2014
The phrase "nearly spotless virtue," in regards to The Great and Powerful Trixie, originated as a running gag.
You see, I first started thinking seriously about Trixie's character when I started writing An Extended Performance. That story came from me asking the question "How did the rest of Equestria react to the Longest Night?" coupled with the thought that -- if Nightmare Moon really was the pawn of alien invaders, she might not be their only pawn. That led me naturally to the Shadow Coven and the Nightstallion of Manehattan, the principal villain of the piece.
I had several sources for Trixie's character. The first was canon -- and I immediately noticed two things about Trixie that showed that she herself was not a villain. The first was that, in "Boast Busters," she actually does nothing villainous. She puts on a show, deals with hecklers, and nearly gets killed by the Ursa that Snips and Snails lead into town.
More to the point, she tries to do something heroic -- when the Ursa shows up, she could have tried to save herself or her caravan. The Ursa, after all, was chasing Snips and Snails, not Trixie. She's an illusionist -- she could have tried to escape under cover of one of her smoke bombs, and left the two colts to the monster. Instead, she tries to save their lives.
In "Magic Duel," she most definitely plays the villain. But she does so under the influence of an Artifact of Evil -- in fact, a Ponified version of the One Ring. Even so, she doesn't directly try to kill anypony (this is why I decided she has an actual Code Against Killing); she takes over the town, and then tries to impress everypony with her magic.
A strong hint as to Trixie's motivations comes from her patter in "Boast Busters." The essence of her boasts is that she is a heroine -- that she saves whole towns from monsters with her awesome magic. And this tells me what Trixie sees herself as and what she wants to be -- a heroine. Specifically, a Magical Girl and a high fantasy heroine.
Another of my sources for my Trixie was the Trixie from the Pony POVerse of Alex Warlorn. Alex's Trixie comes from a large and loving family whom she finds very annoying because she and her four sisters are almost twins (none the same age, but all very physically similar), and her sisters want them all to form a stage act together. She doesn't want to do this because then she'd be just one among many.
The Pony POVerseTrixie wants to be unique and special, and so she distances herself from her family: unfortunately, in the process she also distances herself from everypony else. She has let herself get close to only one pony in her life -- her mentor, White-Beard the Gray, who taught her stage magic but then died when Trixie was still in her teens. It's largely because of White-Beard that Trixie has avoided becoming sociopathic.
And the final source was the alternate Trixie of the Lunaverse, who becomes that world's Element of Magic. That Trixie, interestingly, is either asexual or demisexual: she does not seem capable of sexual attraction to anypony. She also demonstrates several bad traits: most notably a tendency to try to lie her way out of trouble. This Trixie has led a life sheltered in some ways and precarious in others at Princess Luna's somewhat Deadly Decadent Court (Luna is far less capable at managing her nobles or her Realm than is Celestia in the main universe, so it's a darker culture).
Thinking about it, I can see why the writers would characterize Trixie as not a very sexual being. In canon she's shown no sexual attraction toward anypony, even when she was corrupt and wielding a powerful artifact -- instead of seeking a harem of stallions, she torments Snips and Snails in revenge for losing her caravan by making them tow her palanquin around. She's a tease, yes, but to her audience in public, which is a "safe" situation. And she's constantly on the move, so she doesn't have time to fall in love with anypony.
And there are obvious reasons why Trixie would also and additionally be somepony who would only want to be sexual in the context of strong romantic love. She views herself as a heroine, and promiscuity isn't very heroic. She distrusts others, and sexual intercourse puts one in a very vulnerable position. She regards herself as superior, so who would be worthy of her? And she dislikes most Ponies, save in the very formal relationship of performer to audience -- sex is a very informal situation.
Putting this all together I had my Trixie. She's arrogant, obnoxious, even a bit cruel -- not all that nice a Pony. This was evident in her two canon appearances. On the other hand, she's also a heroic and romantic idealist, somepony who aspires to greatness. She has a strong moral code, based around being a heroine and a professional trouper: this specifically includes a Code Against Killing, which I decided White-Beard inculcated in her because he was afraid of what somepony with Trixie's personality and power level might do were she a casual killer (something of which she is emotionally capable because of her sociopathic tendencies).
And one more thing. She's stubborn.
Why do I say this? Because she gives off all the signals in canon of being a stubborn Pony. She doesn't back down before hecklers. She tries to save Snips and Snails from the Ursa. And more importantly, she doesn't even yield to reality -- to Trixie, her heroic fantasies take precedence over any mundane reality that tries to get in her way.
She's not completely crazy, of course. She wouldn't survive on the road if she was. For instance, her first reaction when Snips and Snails bring the Ursa into town is utter horror -- she knows she can't beat something like that in a stand-up fight. (She tries to do it, though -- to protect the two colts). But she's a little bit crazy. Gloriously, magnificently crazy.
The joke, of course, comes in the apposition of these two points, one from An Extended Performance and the other from The Romance of the Open Road, regarding her own sexual experience:
Trixie was not looking for a mate. She was never looking for a mate. To her, the whole messy and vulgar business of reproducing the Pony species was something she wished to leave to more common and ordinary Ponies, and thankfully. She found most stallions boring, and the notion of a romantic relationship with one laughable; other mares were not only boring but unattractive, and the concept of mating with one more than normally absurd.
She was not precisely a virgin. There had been that one regrettable episode with that theatrical promoter, a year ago in Baltimare.
Piercing Gaze had been a minor magician himself before moving into the field of promotion: nothing compared to herself, of course, but still a respectable talent. He had appreciated her own abilities, and promised her great things. He was smart and witty and kind, and in an obvious position to help her. She had worked with him, and they had been enjoying each other's company for a few weeks before things went so badly wrong. The Great and Emotionally Self-Sufficient Trixie rarely needed to employ such a concept, but he had been something of a -- friend. They had been shooting the breeze together one late night after a show, as they had done so several nights before, and things had just -- happened.
She doesn't enjoy it. This is for three reasons: Trixie is almost asexual, and she's only known Piercing a month or so at the time (so she hasn't become relaxed around him to the degree that would let her demi-sexuality kick in) and they're both drunk at the time (Trixie doesn't even grasp why that last point constitutes a problem). (*) She is so horrified by what has happened that when she wakes up she runs out of the room, hitches up her wagon and flees Baltimare. She hasn't, at the point of that story, seen Piercing since.
Her single sexual experience leaves an impression on her. It makes her feel a degree of self-loathing, for failing to live up to her own ideals. But it also makes her wonder if it might have gone better, the more so because she and Piercing seemed to have been genuinely becoming friends, maybe good friends -- and that is a very rare thing, for Trixie. So, inevitably, she starts wondering if she made a mistake by leaving town. Specifically, by leaving Piercing.
When she flees Manehattan after saving the city in An Extended Performance (**), one of the things that occurs to her is that she could head down to Baltimare and see if Piercing wants to resume their friendship. (She is completely unaware that Piercing has, in fact, been carrying a torch for her since she left).
Later, in a small diner, she wonders, not very seriously, if she is going to be attacked.
She wondered worriedly if some unpleasant incident would ensue. Would there be some resurgence of race-hatreds, perhaps led by the radical Levelers whose strength had been growing among working-class Earth Ponies? Or would some of the stallions, driven mad by desire for her beauty, make a crude and lustful attempt upon her nearly-spotless virtue?
Which paragraph, I think, sums up a lot of my Trixie's personality. Her tendency to prance through the real world constantly drifting off into Walter Mitty fantasies. Her arrogance, assuming that the diner patrons are all centering their attention on her. Her vanity (she is beautiful, but not so beautiful that she would stop traffic). Her self-delusions -- and her fundamental honesty, peeping out from among the thicket of her flaws -- because even in her fantasy she feels it necessary to remind herself that her virtue is, in point of fact, only nearly spotless.
So why do I love my Trixie? And what do I mean by "loving" her?
Well, I don't mean that she's my "waifu." I'm not really into that concept anyway. And no, I would not want to marry someone like my Trixie. I'll leave the task of dealing with her prickly, paranoid and grandiose personality on a day-to-day basis to somepony else -- such as Piercing Gaze, who has the misfortune of being the Ladykiller in Love in this particular romantic comedy.
Both Piercings, and both Trixies, are destined to have rather stormy relationships, though their mutual love is quite genuine, and they would be very unhappy if permanently parted. But then, they're just those kind of people. I love both of them -- or all four of them, depending on how one looks at it -- but they are very flawed characters.
What I love about Trixie is her courage, her dreams and her fundamental decency -- most of all, that she is so damned stubborn that she refuses to accept that there might be something she can't handle. When the sky cracks open and demons descend upon the Earth, when the world trembles on the brink of disaster, when all hope is lost, you just know that there will be one maniacal little blue showmare screaming defiance at doom, and taking it personally that Ragnarok is daring to upstage her.
Trixie may, indeed, be mad. But it is a magnificent madness -- the madness of an indomitable spirit standing up to the imperfections of the Universe and daring to hope that she can achieve something better. It is the madness that leads us to stand up to evil and oppression, to transcend our limitations, to leap from the Primal Plains to the infinite stars.
Rock on, Trixie. You are truly Great and Powerful.
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(*) I think there are some inexperienced fanfic authors who don't grasp that point either. Sexual functioning is impaired by alcohol.
(**) Trixie's default mode of coping with potentially-embarrassing social situations is "run away." This is strongly-supported, for all versions of Trixie, in canon.
In short, there are reasons the fans like Trixie, and she doesn't NEED to be in the role of antagonist or obstacle to be an interesting character.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBvFBZyi0Ms What's your opinion?
2560682
If done well, Trixie would be the sort of character who could support a series of her own.
2560698
I'd seen it before, and yes, Trixie and Zecora are in many ways opposites who both have hidden depths and character mysteries. Zecora is even more of a mystery, even though she's been in more episodes, because we know absolutely nothing about her culture (beyond "vaguely sub-Saharan African Fantasy Counterpart) or her motivations (beyond "benevolent"). I don't at all think it's a coincidence that she showed up in Ponyville shortly after Luna's Return, especially given that Luna Returned to that very same town.
What do you get when you combine all these characteristics?
*The passion for magic of Twilight.
*The stuborness of Applejack.
*The ego and boasting of Rainbow Dash.
*The beauty and drama of Rarity.
*The comedy and entertainment of Pinky Pie.
*And the antisocial tendencies of Fluttershy.
YOU GET THE GRRRREAT AND POWERRRFUL TRRRRIXIE!!!!!! BEST PONY OUTSIDE OF THE MANE SIX!!!!! in my humble opinion.