Shining Armor vs. Maud Pie: The Fandom's Double Standard · 3:43am May 2nd, 2015
Time for me to once again vent about discuss a topic that's been bugging me for some time. I may have somewhat gone over it a bit in the past but I want to lay out all of my thoughts about this subject here and now.
I remember back when Season 2 was airing. It was the first season of MLP I watched in-sync with the rest of the fandom as I became a fan of the show not long after Season 1 had finished airing. Ah, those were the days. The days where the fandom was joined in a comfortable and respectful love for the show. The days before Youtube was clustered with pony OCs analyzing every aspect of the show down to the bone marrow. Watching MLP was simple...then A Canterlot Wedding happened.
I've already stated it in the past and I'll say it again: I really like A Canterlot Wedding. It's not perfect but I still found it to be an incredibly entertaining 2-parter and a satisfying conclusion to Season 2. This was the first episode to get a significant polarizing reaction from the fandom. It seemed that fans either loved it or despised it. One complaint that I kept seeing pop up was the debut of Twilight's older brother Shining Armor. A lot of people took an instant disliking to the character and, for a while, I couldn't understand why. There wasn't anything annoying about him as far as I could see. However, I was eventually able to understand why people were miffed about his existence. Prior to the Season 2 finale, there had not be one single reference to Shining Armor. Then, suddenly, we're introduced to him and shown that he and Twilight are pretty much best friends. He's her BBBFF and yet we got absolutely zero mentions of him prior to the finale. Personally, this didn't bother me as relatives of characters in cartoons spontaneously showing up is nothing new. I liked Shining Armor (as well as Cadance, who also received plenty of backlash) and I'm always happy to see him return. But I can at least understand why people were annoyed by how his introduction was executed.
Jumping forward nearly two years, history seemed to repeat itself in the form of Pinkie's older sister Maud. However, unlike Shining Armor, Maud received a huge amount of love and positive reactions from the fandom. It's been well over a year since her first appearance and I'm still asking the same question: why is that? Why did Maud receive such praise and Shining Armor such disdain when, in actually, the execution of their respective debuts is practically identical?
Now, before anyone gets the wrong message from what I'm saying, I want to state right here and now that I really like Maud. I think she's a fun character and I look forward to seeing her reappear later in Season 5. However, I personally find the fandom's love for Maud and disdain for Shining Armor to be a huge double standard. In a lot of the analyst videos I've seen, it seemed like the reviewers were trying to find excuses and reasons that justified Maud's introduction in comparison to Shining Armor's. As far as I'm personally concerned, Maud was introduced out of the blue almost exactly like Shining Armor.
Now, I know what some of you are thinking. "But they referenced to her in Pinkie Pride! She was seen in one of Pinkie's photographs!" Yes she was...but, in my opinion, that's hardly a justification. Here's why I think so. It was established in Pinkie's flashback in Season 1's The Cutie Mark Chronicles that Pinkie had two sisters. Maud was nowhere to be seen in that original flashback. Then, four seasons later, she magically appears in a photograph showing the events of that flashback. Why did a third sister have to be practically pulled out of thin air for Maud to exist? The writers already had two sisters to choose from. Why couldn't have one of the previously established sisters been Maud? This decision still perplexes me.
Another "reason" I heard came from Silver Quill and Ink Rose's review of Maud PIe. He said a difference between Shining Armor and Maud was that Shining Armor didn't develop past his introduction scene while Maud did. Um...how? As far as I can tell, Maud didn't go through any significant character development. Yeah, we got to see a couple more layers to her character than we did Shining Armor but, at the end of the day, both characters went through about equal amounts of development. By the end of their respective debut episodes, they're both shown to care deeply for their respective younger sisters. And...that's about it.
Again, I like Shining Armor and I like Maud Pie. But both of their introductions have similar clumsy aspects in their execution. Yeah, Maud got an earlier reference in the season of her debut, unlike Shining Armor, but that reference only raised more questions than answers and made the introduction feel even more shoehorned for me. It still perplexes (and kind of annoys) me to this day how people ignored the circumstances of Maud's introduction and yet criticized Shining Armor's. Once again, I like both characters and I look forward to seeing them reappear in future episodes; but I find the fandom's differing reactions to their debuts to be a huge double standard.
What do the rest of you think? Do you agree with me or disagree with me? As always, I'm interested in hearing what the rest of you have to say.
You know I've wondered the same thing too. Like you, I like both Shining Armor and Maud, and I've never seen a problem with their introductions as cartoons often spontaneously introduce relatives of characters all the time.
I will say though that there is a key difference between Maud and Shining Armor. As much as I like Shining Armor, I will admit he is kind of an archetypal character. I think this was a common complaint against him as well. As I said back in my original review of "Maud Pie", Maud is much more unique. At least in terms of what we've seen on MLP. The Avatarverse has characters like Mai and Desna and Eska who are a lot like Maud in my opinion.
Personally, I don't mind a new relative being introduced, even on the level of siblings.
Then again, I've got four of those, and believe it or not but even then it seldom comes up in conversation.
Not every relative will show even for a reunion. It happens, it's just... well, life. That doesn't stop them from being related
I think the particular example of Shining Armor and Maud Pie happened as it did for a rather simple reason, though.
Shining is a rather boring golden boy without near any flaws, and some people can't stand that character type even in small doses. Doesn't bother me personally since I grew up on old silver age comics were that archetype was really common, but I know it's a divisive one.
Maud on the other hand, is damn near a freaking Klingon visiting Acme Academy. Not only does that make her stick out, but her moment of awesome (the giant shield for Shining, the rock-slide punching for Maud) wasn't negated in the same way Shining's was.
One potential reason is that Maud is introduced as "oh, just a sibling, we've got plenty of those"
, whereas Shining Armor is suddenly "The Captain of the Freaking Royal Guard, my brother, you may have heard of him on the national news!"
The type of character being introduced and their position/role in society likely play a role in how an audience reacts to "a wild Main Character's Relative has appeared", as such things determine the "you-could've-mentioned-this-before factor". Most people can have a sibling they've never mentioned, but you wouldn't expect many to have hidden their celebrity connections for so long. Everyone's six handshakes away from Kevin Bacon, but it's not likely that out of the few who are only one handshake away, the character we've been following just so happens to be one of them.