Further thoughts on the finale and Starlight Glimmer as a whole. · 5:45pm Dec 13th, 2015
Okay, I sort of need to vent/provide some kind of explanation for some things regarding the finale because I don't think I really expressed some things about it when I initially made a blog post looking over the finale as a whole. You've probably heard this a million times from other people and...yeah, I've got the same problems with the ending as everyone else. But the more I think about it over and over...it really pisses me off more than I previously thought.
I'm seriously baffled that people are trying to say that Starlight's actions and reasoning behind her actions were believable and justified. It BLOWS my mind. I don't know about any of you, but I'm pretty sure that losing ONE friend in your childhood doesn't turn somepony into basically Hitler. Unless of course that pony is petty as hell like Starlight seems to be and that is just REALLY disappointing because a lot of people loved her as the villain in the premiere. This is kind of why I think some villains just shouldn't have backstories. It lets the audience wonder what drove them to this stuff themselves and come up with very interesting and believable theories. The fandom since the season 5 premiere has come up with a lot of theories surrounding Starlight's origins and while some of them were way too over the top and dark to be the actual reasons, there were some that were hell of a lot better than what we got in the long run.
The second big problem was that Starlight received no punishment for her actions. This is a BIG issue that I'd expect the IDW comics to screw up on. Not the show. A lot of people are saying that a lot of characters did some things that were not that great and also received no punishment, but let me put this into perspective here.
A big comparison is that Luna got no punishment for the Tantabus. Uhhhh, she made that thing to torture herself for the bad things she had already done as Nightmare Moon. The entire point of that thing existing was to make her suffer. She never took into account that it would try to escape and mess Equestria up, but when that's what happened, she actively tried to fix the damage she had done. Starlight Glimmer on the other hand, even after seeing what messing up the past would do to the present, gave no shits whatsoever and was willing to continue with her plan with little to no hesitation. (Seriously Starlight, did you really think messing with the destiny of a princess would cause no damage to the present?....Really? 
)
Secondly would be that people are saying this reformation was handled better than Sunset Shimmer's...I do not get this at ALL. Sunset Shimmer's reformation was probably nothing short of amazing because through the end of the first movie and the entire duration of the second movie, we saw Sunset was again, actively trying to be a much better person. But the big difference is that it was not all happy smiles and rainbows for her. Despite her efforts, the school HATED her in the second movie and she still had to repair the school after her freakout. In the end though, by helping the Rainbooms defeat the Dazzlings, she finally was able to fully redeem herself for her past actions. This is actually very realistic because it shows that friendship and respect are things that needs to be EARNED if you've wronged people. With Starlight, it's just handed to her on a silver platter and it makes me really cringe hard. I think the biggest problem with this is the fact that we only had a few minutes left in the episode at that point and they just had to go "Oh we're almost out of time! Better make them friends, pronto!" and just decided to go with a musical montage in the end. Here's the problem though. With antagonist reformations, you REALLY can't do that. Keep Calm and Flutter on made this mistake already by making a character change heart way too quickly. Granted Discord wasn't exactly accepted by the other ponies right away though. It took them over two years to get used to him. With Starlight it took about ten seconds.
In the end, I just really wish the writers of MLP would take notes on how Steven Universe does an antagonist having a change of heart. It takes them several episodes to do it and said character is being incredibly difficult in the process of doing so. The entire scenario is actually very believable. Spoiler alert: It's Peridot , at the very least look back on Sunset Shimmer and how well her reformation was handled. Or if they can't do that, then they just need to stop reforming characters altogether. Not because I think there's too many, or because I don't like seeing some of my favorite baddies turning good. It's because they're preeeetty awful at doing it.
As always, I'm not really trying to shit on anyone's opinion on the finale or Starlight Glimmer or anything like that. If you like this kind of thing, fantastic. I'm not gonna try to change your mind, opinions are opinions and I'll respect them. This is more me just expressing my displeasure with it and really not understanding WHY people like it.
I don't understand why they like the terrible redemption either.
3615782 I liked Starlight Glimmer just fine in the premiere. But because she was a victim of terrible writing in the finale, I'm really mad.
3615788 I liked her in a "Love to Hate" kind of way.
Imma draw parallels to Magical Mystery Cure and Princess Twilight Sparkle. In the end of MMC, Twilight was flying perfectly, yet throughout Season 4, it's shown she's not very good at it, and was struggling in the premiere. I suspect the writers will do a small retcon like that for Season 6, besides, the whole song thing was a montage, I DOUBT it was really that fast.
3616054 It probably wasn't. But it leaves the audience thinking it is which is AWFUL for reformations because we need time to actually grow to like the character as a good person. We don't get that here.
3616104
Patience, my friend, Season 6 will probably do something about that.
I don't think Sunset reformation was that great IMO. Her sudden heel-face turn she did at the end of the first EQG movie was so abrupt and it made no sense. Sunset not knowing how to make friends and yet she was Celestia student?
Ok, or Celestia just sucks at being a teacher or she just lying. The comic didn't help either because it showed Sunset being a 100% cunt interested only in power and not as a character who wants friends. And suddenly, right after being struck by the Deus ex Machina she change her personality into a crybaby. And in Rainbow Rocks she's a complete different character who doesen't show a trace of her old self and hammering on our heads that she has changed.
Of course compared to Starlight it seems better, but to me is hard to choose which one is actually worst.