Second Thoughts: A Royal Problem · 11:21am Jun 11th, 2017
It's here at last. In a proper quality release, that is.
So, needless to say I absolutely adored this episode. Easily the best episode so far this season, and basically everything we could have hoped for from a Royal Sisters slice of life episode, which we have of course been wanting since the earliest days of the show. And of particular interest to me personally: I have of course spent a bit of time myself writing about Celestia and Luna arguing with each other, and the possible consequences for the cosmic order. The episode is only missing a Star Swirl the Bearded reference and it could be a straight up tie-in to The Crown of Night.
This episode also sees the first use of the Cutie Map this season, and the first time it sends someone other than the mane six. My ideas about the role of the Cutie Map took a beating in season 6, but this one fits with them very well.
To recap: The Cutie Map does not actually highlight "friendship problems". It highlights troubled communities: Starlight's Village, Griffonstone, Manehattan, Smokey Mountains, and Restaurant Row all have this in common. The problems there were not about relationships between individuals having trouble, but about entire communities that had gone wrong and needed to be set right.
In addition, the Cutie Map has a particular interest in Starlight Glimmer. She was the first mission the map sent them on; she was the only mission where the entire group was sent together; and after Starlight's redemption the Map went dormant, as if to suggest that its purpose was fulfilled.
There is also a possible connection between the Map and Star Swirl the Bearded. Starlight used the Map and Star Swirl's time travel spell together. Star Swirl is closely linked to destiny magic, which is closely linked to cutie marks. The Map is linked to the Tree of Harmony, which is linked to the Elements of Harmony, which Star Swirl the Bearded studied, but could not understand. The connections are unclear, but many, and this episode only adds to them.
In fact, with this new episode the Map comes full circle. After redeeming Starlight, the Map sent her out to reinforce the bond between the Royal Sisters: the very bond whose failure brought about the entire thousand-year-plus chain of events leading to the Map's awakening in the first place.
Starlight was the only pony who could do this, and the reason for that also rings very familiar to me. Shifting cutie marks around is the stuff of nightmares to normal ponies. No ordinary unicorn would touch that magic with a patented Ogres & Oubliettes ten-foot pole. And yet the Cutie Map is fine with it, and found the one pony who had the ability, and who would dare, to do such a thing. Who thinks that way?
“This is what I do, Clover. This is my real work: I learn the forbidden magics, magics that ponies fear, magics that were wielded by monstrous beings that lurk in the crevices along the edges of the world, where civilization does not reach. I take them, and I strip away the malice from them, remove the parts that make them frightful and vicious, and I give them out for everypony to share. The ancient Saddle Arabian blood sorcery belonged to a malevolent demigod who wanted to destroy all ponykind. I took that flesh-crafting spell she used to create monsters, and I learned to use it to heal wounds and cure disease. Now every unicorn doctor in the world learns my spell, and every creature that walks the earth lives longer, and suffers less pain because one pony did not shun what came from the darkness.”
Oh right. That's who.
Next up: Yaks.
Harmony is not nice. Indeed, it cannot be solely nice. As Starlight herself said, balance is necessary for true harmony. Sun and moon. Light and dark. Beautiful and horrible. And in that last case, the two can come together in such a way that you'll be hard-pressed to say where one end and the other begins.
I'm so glad this episode is out for realzies and everyone can talk about it now. :D
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It was only after I posted the blog that I realized I hadn't really talked about what I liked about the episode itself, but only my head canons. There's just so much it's hard to know where to begin, and most of it would just be me gushing incoherently like "And did you see that thing??? That was SO GOOD".
But I will give a special shout out to DJ Flurry Heart. There might be the seed of a Flurry & Cake Twins story in that.
Yes, this episode was wonderful in every respect! It also made me think quite a lot about the Cutie Map and Tree of Harmony. I am becoming more convinced that it/they are a deity-level entity that can't quite affect the material world directly in any significant way, but must act through ponies. Given how it has operated in the past, it can see/predict the future with a terrifying level of resolution.
As FOME observed, the Cutie Map somehow knew that not including Twilight would make her interfere in exactly the right way to influence Starlight's thinking about the problem.
Ghod, I hope the writers are doing this on purpose!
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Maybe. I'm inclined to think that even without Twilight, Starlight would have worried plenty enough on her own, though. Plus Celestia was already showing signs of going stir crazy from sitting around all night all by herself.
I think the main reason Twilight was left out is as Starlight said herself: Twilight is biased. In order to repair the rift between the sisters, both sides had to be made to see their error, and as the episode showed Twilight couldn't begin to do that.
None of which is to say that the Cutie Map isn't a tool of cosmic power and a powerful link to destiny
That is actually quite terrifying if you think about it: two sister demigoddesses that control the heavens and they still have an occasional jealous fight and emotional spat.
To paraphrase one of my favourite quotes from Sphere:
"If Celestia and Luna are immensely powerful and emotional, it raises a question. What happens if they get mad?"