Computer Troubles · 3:07pm Sep 5th, 2015
Let me apologize for the colossal lack of updates lately. My laptop, the one I do all of my writing on, has been going through some fairly severe issues lately, random crashing, graphical errors, all sorts of problems that I was worried signaled its deathknell.
I've been busy the last few weeks trying to isolate the problem and fix it on a fairly tight budget.
I like to think I've figured out the issue and managed to solve things, as things are running in a fairly stable manner once again. So, I'm going to try to get back to writing again and hopefully convert this pent up creative energy into some updates. That being said, if I do go dark again, chances are my computer has broken itself down into a primordial ooze and returned back to the Earth. Hopefully that won't be the case, but I can't promise that it won't be.
Once again, sorry for the lack of updates. If my computer does die on me, I am already looking for alternative ways to keep writing, during the interim period where I'm either replacing it or repairing it.
If anyone has any questions about my stories or whatever, by all means share them and I'll get back to you.
Have a good one.
I know how frustrating computer difficulties are, so good luck fixing those.
Just an update: Still working on fixing the problem. Only have very minimal functionality right now. Looks like it's the hard disk drive. Gonna try to reseat it. Hopefully won't need to replace anything.
Tentatively hopeful that I've fixed the problem. Going to be doing some stress testing on it, and if that goes well I can get back to writing.
So, out of the blue my mind went back to your blog post about Trixie, Sunset, and Starlight.
I think Trixie and Starlight make good foils but by accident. Trixie was never really meant to be Twilight's foil. She was an antagonist, but not a villain. Prior to her (clearly not originally planned) return, Trixie is just meant to be a random pony with irritating habits that is shown to provide a little moral for the audience (even if the way it happened makes it come off a bit badly from some perspectives). Twilight herself is barely affected by what Trixie's doing and doesn't really see the harm in letting her continue doing it. It's Twilight's friends that driven nuts by listening to her. While her personality and Twilight's clash in some respects, it's not in a big way-- at least from Twilight's side. Trixie herself might be upset at being upstaged but if circumstances hadn't forced Twilight to step in, that would never have happened because Twilight never meant to upstage her. Of course, that passiveness might make Twilight a good foil for Trixie, who hates people not caring about her, but it's not really the case that it goes vice versa. Trixie and Twilight are only foils if Twilight plays the "straight man" so to speak and you can get good stories out of that but they require elevating Trixie's role in the story to a more central one.
However, Sunset Shimmer and Starlight Glimmer are different. They were both meant to be warped reflections of Twilight and it shows (in more than just the overly appropriate names). Sunset Shimmer is most obvious, she's a former student of Princess Celestia who uses her greater than average intelligence to destroy friendships instead of trying to form them and wants to seize power instead of waiting to be constantly being handed it by Princess Celestia.
But Starlight Glimmer is another reflection as well. She's taken Twilight's zest for organization, for neatness even, and taken it into making a highly organized society subservient to her vision- with everything and everyone in its place. She's taken Twilight's habit of talking about the wonders of friendship and warped it into a zealot's screed based around a model of friendship Twilight could never accept. And, unlike Twilight, she's a hypocrite. But, I think that doesn't mean she doesn't believe what she's saying on some level, the mental gymnastics people use to justify things to themselves can get pretty extreme. She kept spouting her philosophy even after she was unmasked, after all. That may be part of the reason she hid so much, actually, perhaps part of her even believed some of what she was doing was wrong-- not the taking cutie marks part, but the part where she's retaining her own. Because if she really believed in her spell of sameness but couldn't cast it on herself without losing the ability to use it again, she could have formed Our Town anyway but only by martyring herself as the one pony in town who couldn't have any friends and she wasn't willing to do that. She probably could even have still put herself in a leadership position that way, as the pony who worried about things the others couldn't, because bearing the role of leader sets you apart. Starshine Glimmer wants her cake and to eat it too. She wants to be in charge but she also doesn't want to admit she's taking control, so she makes this society where everyone clearly defers to her but no one can say that out loud. As a powerful sorceress, she probably could have set herself up as queen over a podunk town out in the sticks but she doesn't do that outright. She wants a society of equals but she can't give up control. Perhaps she tells herself she's different, that the others need someone to look after them, that it's all for their own good. Of course, one thing that's interesting is that if she believes her philosophy at all (and I think she does to some extent, though maybe not all of it or exactly as she presents it) then she must believe she can't ever have any friends. Because her spell works on other ponies. Of course, it's hard to say how much she really believes and how much is an excuse she makes to herself (and others) to seize power.
But by being warped away from Twilight, Starshine Glimmer has been made into a character that would care about what Trixie's doing and one that can pose an obstacle to Trixie, which is what lets your story work so well.