Points of Canon: Legends of Magic #9 · 9:10am Feb 18th, 2019
Let’s get something done.
Stygian’s story continues from where we left it in Legends of Magic #8.
- “Legend has it that deep in the heart of Equestria there are swamps so big and dark that nopony has ever seen all of the creatures that live there. That there is danger and intrigue, and, if you’re not careful, you may never live to tell the tale. But even deeper still is the home of Mage Meadowbrook.” This is potentially written in the modern day, so the considerations listed while discussing #8 apply, but – where the hell is the home of Mage Meadowbrook, if it’s the “heart” of Equestria? The only mapped swamp we have is on the East Coast!
1. Tyranny is not the origin of this particular idea, of course, just the more notable recent implementation.
“Legend has it that Meadowbrook’s mask has special magical properties. And when she’s wearing it she can entrance all manner of creatures.” Instead of just bees. For Some Reason. Legends and the associated materials generally follow the Tyranny model of magic, i.e. when magical items are not enchanted, but acquire their special properties primarily through reputation and fame.1 This is the more egregious example where this happens for no observable reason.
- The fungus apparently confers some degree of sapience in addition to aggression, because all those infected herbivores are using fire. That is, came to Meadowbrook’s house with torches.
- “Please be careful not to really hurt any of them. They don’t really want to hurt us. So maybe stay away from the fire and acid potions, okay?” Now, keeping potions on hand for various purposes is of course sensible, but – why would you call “acid” a potion, when it’s obviously an ingredient?
“Is there no lock on the door? No bolt or anything?”
“I live in the middle of the swamp. Who’s gonna break in?”
Notably, Meadowbrook lived in a village, according to A Health of Information, even though this village was, indeed, in the middle of a swamp. Never mind that she had ponies lining up to see her. There are remains of the village in modern day, but nothing like that in the artwork in Legends.
- “Pink… Pink… This should be purple!” Pretty sure the smoke Meadowbrook is looking at is purple at the time, though…
- The bunny attacking Rockhoof has acquired a belt across the chest and a painted face for some reason. The face is painted blue. Which, I think, is a Braveheart reference. Make of it what you will.
- “Okay, I for sure do not want to use the one with the skull and crossbones.” The use of those to mark lethally dangerous liquids is ancient. Notice, though, that while Meadowbrook said all the potions are labeled, and told Stygian to “read the label,” none of them are labeled in words, when we know Meadowbrook is literate: Stygian has to guess the meaning of symbols to decide what a potion is going to do.
Notable potions:
- Tree: Causes a tree to sprout and instantly grow to full maturity. This is something you can do with potions, apparently.
- Spiral: Causes vertigo.
- Bull: Causes instant growth of animals and a major increase in strength and muscle mass.
- One of the objects Meadowbrook is using is a spray bottle of the potion she just cooked up. Trigger-based rather than rubber bulb, which requires plastics to create. A thousand years ago. Used just for this, and not for the myriad other things plastics are used for. Our only hope is that it’s still Sunburst reading this and imagining nonsense.
- “I used to travel all the time, but after I got stuck in a village full of zombie ponies… well, I decided I’d rather be a homebody.” I.e the story dates itself to after Legends of Magic #6, not that this is a surprise.
- “Wait! Can we eat first? I can’t start another traveling montage without eating first!” Rockhoof is so strong that he breaks the fourth wall too, huh?
Meadowbrook is cooking.
- On an oven with a glass door. The kind that’s got to be gas or electric – coal-fired ovens don’t look like that.
- Notable food items include a rather large amount of full lemons, as well as a ring of cheese. While there is a slim chance that a lemon tree is growing somewhere in the swamp, cheese does not grow on trees and implies being acquired from a more civilized locale.
“This is the training camp for the pegasi royal legion?”
- Notice that neither this nor any other source indicates just which possible royalty is responsible for this military force.
- This is also a relatively rare case of a three-story cloud building, which pegasi do not generally go for.
“I am Grimhoof, fifth fastest pegasus in the royal legion, and guard on duty to the headquarters.”
…
“I’m Rockhoof, lieutenant commander of the Mighty Helm and hero of the north.” … “Backwater? The Mighty Helm is the wall that keeps Equestria safe!”- Notice the peculiar style of introduction on both sides, as well as the pegasus’ rather unusual name.
- Notice also the implied claim that Equestria is unified already, when, according to the other parts of Legends, this shouldn’t be possible at the time, since Celestia and Luna are not ruling the land yet. Legends is full of strange statements of this kind.
- “Hey buckethead, we’re looking for some horse called… what was it? Hay Garrick? Mare E. Allen? Whinny West?” If these were references, they flew over my head. Maybe because I ducked.
- The events are interrupted by a war with dragons – something we were suspecting was a thing since forever – but notably, Grimhoofs refers to a “front”, which, in an air war like the one depicted, is a strange thing to have.
Sigh… To be continued.
I think all of those oddball pony names addressed to 'buckethead' are DC Comics' Flash character names. Jay Garrick, Barry Allen, Wally West. The three canonical Flashes.
I wonder if there are any true artificers in Equestria. We see dramatic objects such as the Pillar’s associated tokens in pone-henge and the species signature artifacts in season 8. But who makes them? Can a pony go to a shop in Canterlot and ask for a magical horse-shoe for instance?
Montages are like songs in Equestria, every pony knows they happen and they just sideways talk around it.
Or crystal? Like the fireplaces?
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Dunno about horseshoes, but Trixie is on record selling magical fireworks.
Nope, it would be a completely different shape if so.
I would point out that cultural unity can exist independently of political unity. A concept of a shared pony homeland can exist even without a shared government.
As an example: consider the Wall and the Night's Watch from A Song of Ice and Fire. In the backstory, they existed long before any sort of political unity in the continent of Westeros, and were established when it was still divided between hundreds of petty kingdoms, clans, and statelets. However, a concept of Westeros as a shared land already existed, and the Watch was meant to protect that shared land from threats coming from the north. A Watchman could have made a claim similar to Grimhoof's -- "The Night's Watch is the wall that keeps Westeros safe!" -- and it would have made perfect sense.
In this instance, the ponies might be divided in however many little statelets, but a concept of their being part of a shared cultural area and there being a greater world they need to defend themselves from can easily exist.
I don't have a ton to add, since I've forgotten a fair amount about these by now, and they weren't that memorable at their height. (Though Nightmare Knights is better).
The few things I'll kick in are that just as villages form around an inn or a general store, Meadowbrook's village probably formed around her. If ponies were lining up in the middle of a swamp for one of her cures, then a smart pony would build an inn next to her house. Then another pony would build a restaurant, and before you know it you have a village.
Stygian was reading books about the Legends back in the beginning of the series, right? Probably Meadowbrook has Doctor's Handwriting and only she can read it.
My guess is mold spores in that ancient barrel are messing with his head.
Also, from a Doylist point of view, I know the author and illustrators don't exactly have dark ages-history degrees and aren't very concerned with realism, but I feel like the glass oven door reaches the point where the man on the street gets obviously annoyed with the anachronisms (the man on the street who reads MLP comic books anyway) and I hope at least someone complained to them about this.
What about a Cold Front or a Warm Front?
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Only, it formed around her mother if so, as per A Health of Information. Yes, it’s still the same treehouse.
Both the artwork and Stygian’s lines specify icons.
Why would one be relevant to fighting dragons? In any case, the dragons turn up very soon along with Flash, so…
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I would further add to this that, whether you regard the Journal as canon or not (and I know Oliver does not), I can't recall any canonical source stating that the union of Equestria began with the princesses. Theoretically, there can be an intervening time between the unification and their ascendency to the throne(s). Though, it's a moot point anyway, because this issue is actually taking place after their coronations.
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Correction. I do consider it a canonical source. However, my preferred interpretation is that it isn’t what it says it is.