"Dear Princess Celestia" · 8:55am Jul 24th, 2015
It is currently 4:24 AM on Friday, July 24th. I woke up about an hour and a half ago, I had a small little panic attack, and I decided to kiss sleep goodbye. Instead, to stop myself from further freaking out, I booted up my Xbox and started up Netflix to watch some MLP. I decided to go back to Season 1, to one of my favorite episodes of the first season, Suited for Success.
I'm not writing this post to talk about the episode in the traditional sense. You guys don't need me to tell you about episode 14/101. No, I came to talk about the one thing that every season 1-3 episode had, a thing I had no idea I missed until now.
"Dear Princess Celestia". I never paid it much mind during my first run of the series, or even my second. I haven't seen anything older than Season 4 since 3 ended, so It's been quite a while. Watching this morning, I had to pause and take a minute to drink in the simplicity of the idea of a letter to Celestia. It really feels nice, especially when you consider what it truly stands for.
"Dear Princess Celestia" is all about Twilight Sparkle, poor, awkward, nerdy scrub who is half-way decent at magic, trying her hardest to make friends and do the right thing. It's not always easy making friends or dealing with them, and it isn't always immediately clear whst's right. And Twilight effs up sometimes, maybe taking too long to do right or slipping up and making some sort of friendship faux pas. That's not the point.
The point is her eagerness to learn, and her eagerness to share her learnings. She wants to make Celestia proud by proving that she can commit to this task that, just a few weeks ago, she deemed pointless and borderline awful. "Dear Princess Celestia", to me, is about change, growth. It's about learning and, eventually, teaching. And the omitting of a similar thing in season 4 onwards, while a bit saddening, is totally necessary. It signifies the next step in the evolution of Twilight Sparkle, the step from Student to Teacher. Ome of my favorite parts of Rainbow Rocks is at the very end, where Sunset Shimmer writes a letter to Twilight, effectively becoming a student to the Princess of Friendship.
And that was me overanalyzing the character symbolism and development involved in a simple three word phrase. Geez, I need some sleep. Somehow, I get even more think-y the longer I stay up. Sometimes, I might even make a bit of sense.
What sort of things do you miss from Early FiM? Please don't say unicorn Twilight. That's a whole different issue for a whole different blog. Share in the comments if you somehow enjoyed the sleep-deprived, panick-stricken ramblings of a madman.
I miss the debilitating character flaws. Each character had some terrible weakness that ultimately forced them to rely on her friends because they could've rationalize it any other way. Now it seems that while each pony still struggles with their core faults, they're able to monologue it out with some pep talk to themselves.
I guess my complaint is that they trust their friends too much to worry about it anymore? It's technically touched upon in Rainbow Rocks - that their lesson was to air grievances before they fester - but that's just not an issue in the show since they're just honest with each other to begin with.
3265231 Hm... Never considered the idea that the characters are too good. That is true, and the difference between their personalities in season one and season 4 are night and day. It becomes a little jarring to go back to some older episodes and just look at how certain characters interact, mainly Twilight. She used to be my least favorite character, but now she's sitting at a solid second place. Things change, and things will only continue to change. Whether that is good or bad is entirely dependant on how we, as a community, respond to it.
3265235 I still honestly love the Mane 6, but they're growth is astounding. Let's take Fluttershy... S1 she had to be dragged and coerced every step up a mountain, S2 she trained hard to fly but only after a little encouragement from RD, S3 stood up to her friends (on Discord's behalf) instead of standing up for them... Of course, I don't want the old Fluttershy back - it's just now it doesn't feel like she needs us anymore.
I never could rank the Mane 6, but it's probably
because I don't think of myself as a very worthwhile friendbecause each one of them is so well-rounded as a pony that they all have pros and cons.3265253 But that's the point of the Mane Six, isn't it? They're the good friends we don't have and we can never be. They grow in ways we can only envy from the sidelines, yet, they can shape our every day lives.
As for growth, I think everypony has progressed really well... except for Rarity. She's still mostly the same to me.
3265696 Yeah, I feel bad for Rarity. Maybe she was too-complete a character to start with? She was always willing to accept help for problems. *gasp* Maybe Rarity grows by being a better sister? Run with me for a sec: when we first learn Sweetie Belle is her sister, her parents are pawning Sweetie off onto Rarity who is aghast at the prospect of having her so long. To get her work done, Rarity shoves the CMC onto Fluttershy instead. S2, Sisterhooves Social. But S4, when Sweetie asks Rarity for a favor, Rarity pushes aside everything to do this first in spite of a looming deadline. (or idk, maybe Rarity's growth is ongoing and learning to balance friendship with work, citing Sweet and Elite and Rarity Takes Manehattan) Poor girl just doesn't get enough episodes to herself.
3266029 That's not exactly what I meant, but that is certainly one way to look at. I suppose they decided to look more on her relationship with her sister than her actual personality flaws.
3266034 lol yeah Rarity is a little unhinged when I try to compare her too hard. She's certainly most static... which is too bad. Now it crossed my mind that the writers don't have growth planned for the pony who's tried her best to be prim and proper.