Starlight Glimmer's Backstory - Rough Draft · 10:56pm Jun 28th, 2017
I've run into a fair section of the fandom on Fimfiction that has had objection to Starlight Glimmer's backstory as presented to us in The Cutie Re-mark part 2.
To recap, a young filly Starlight Glimmer is in a room with a lot of books, and is playing with them instead of reading them. She and her only friend, a young colt named Sunburst, were stacking them. It seems innocent enough, it's probably not the best way to treat books, and them being unstable and falling isn't too surprising. What is surprising is that Sunburst manages some reasonably strong (for his age) telekinesis to catch all the books, and save Starlight from a bit of a rough time. He gets his cutie mark at this time, presumably for his feat of magic. He runs off, the adults are happy, and he goes off to Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns.
Starlight explains that this event put an association between cutie marks and damage to friendships firmly into her young mind. Now, we don't get much else. Instead of spending time detailing anything else about her life, that's all we get explicitly. We're left to fill in the blanks for how she went on from that to do the things we've seen her do.
Make no mistake though. No matter what your opinion is of Starlight Glimmer and her backstory, you are filling in the blanks that the show didn't give us explicitly. It doesn't matter if your opinion is reasonable, positive, or negative, you are adding in details to make sense of this whole.
So what details are you filling in?
You might take a stance that what you see is all you get. To follow this setup, we're to believe that since the show didn't sit us down for a few hours going through several key stages of Starlight's years of development from young child to adult, from a filly with a bad event to a mare who is strong in magic herself and able to bring a small town's worth of ponies to her ideals, that literally nothing else important happened during that time. Everything else was perfectly vanilla, neutral, and Starlight somehow went into adulthood with nefarious and sinister goals, just from that one event alone.
But you still have to fill in those years. You're filling them in with pretty unrealistic material. You then complain that that material lacks certain events that you feel would have been reasonable to do, such as attempting to contact Sunburst with a letter or a visit to Canterlot. You have to complain that Starlight lives a life devoid of decisions and events, and spontaneously becomes a cult leader and world destroyer.
The problem isn't Starlight in this case, it's you for lacking imagination.
So what else could we fill this void with? Well, for starters, we have a few clues. Starlight is not only really good at magic, she has a cutie mark that seems to be pretty magical in appearance. She earned her cutie mark in magic, just like Sunburst. Yet she still holds this view that cutie marks are bad. Whatever material fills this gap, it needs to include this event.
She also convinced several ponies to join her cult. We call it a cult from an outsider's point of view, but when you're forming a community based on some unusual ideas, it doesn't seem like a cult to you. How many of you like an unpopular character in this fandom? Form a group for that character? Write stories about them? How often do you receive criticism from others for liking your unpopular character? How often do you see others doing the same and how often do you criticize them for liking Applejack or Spike or some other objectively terrible character? You're in a cult. Congratulations. Hell, being a fan of MLP makes you part of a cult.
So how do we get from someone who is possibly study-focused (to get so good at magic) and hesitant to make friends, but was charismatic enough to draw in others to her ideals and form a town?
These questions have answers, and just because canon didn't answer them doesn't automatically make those answers stupid. This is what fanfic is for, answering questions like this in imaginative and creative ways.
I get the impression that the residents of Our Town had a lot of their own problems. When talking to Starlight, some of them probably thought to themselves, "yeah, my cutie mark has caused me problems. I feel kind of lonely and maybe this unicorn is right that my cutie mark is the problem." How many of you have some followers? How many of you get positive feedback from those followers? If you have a few dozen people telling you that you're right and that your ideas are good, you can easily be fooled into thinking they are good. That's just some randoms on the internet. Imagine that in real life. You have people who are face to face with you and are finding comfort in your ideas. You grow bold to spread your ideas to more. There were only a few dozen people in Our Town, while many morons on Fimfic put out clearly shitty, lazy, shovel-fics and have hundreds of followers. Many of them are assholes and not at all charismatic.
So, part of the "filling in the blanks" that I see going on is shallow. Rather than imagine interesting and fitting material to fill in all the giant gaps left to us to explore by canon, people form poor opinions of the character and backstory due to what I can only describe as laziness, and inability to actually read into characters.
So back to the analogy I've been building here. You can have bad ideas, and find idiots who will be supportive of those bad ideas. It feels like you're doing the right thing at the time. You can even feel more justified in sticking to your ideas in the face of persecution from "haters." You don't have to be charismatic to accomplish this. You can indeed be an asshole. And none of that, from the inside, looks like as big a deal as it does from the outside. Look how bad Sparity shippers and AppleDashers look from the outside! How can anyone be that wrong, right?
The other part of the overall "problem" expressed often is that in the finale, Starlight's actions are "super bad!" That she is an awful and horrible person for what she tried to do. The dissatisfaction with her backstory is often presented as not providing sympathy for her in light of her villainous actions.
Sympathy for what? Imagine if you were just chilling. You had a few dozen people in your Fimfic group, talking about that thing you like, then some mod steps in and tells you that you're all bad people, that you're a bad person for making this group, and deleting it and banning you for having made it. You'd be upset. You'd think poorly of that mod. They did nothing to convince you that you were actually bad, and chances are even if they tried you'd be pretty resistant to that anyway. In Starlight's case, she found a way to hack into Twilight's Facebook account and try to unfriend her from her besties. Only a bit more magically and reality-shifty.
Do note that until Twilight dragged her along through the portal to see the outcome of a blasted wasteland, Starlight had no idea that she was endangering the world. And why would she think that? Seriously, Twilight being friends with some other mares is that important? Get real. Nice ego you have there, mod/Twilight. You're just an asshole and have an agenda for me.
It wasn't until Twilight convinced her that no, it isn't just an ego thing, her friendships really are that important, that Starlight, shaken up by what she was apparently doing, started to back down from her revenge. Again, up until that point, she was just an angry girl out to fuck up the friendships of another girl. Imagine you're at a party and you decide to roofie that bitch that your boyfriend left you for. Only, she ends up actually getting raped. Like real rape. And it's your fault. Oh shit. And she got knocked up. Well, maybe you should have thought that through...
So, yes. Starlight wasn't being a kind and generous pony. She was doing some bad things. But like anyone doing wrong as a real person, things happen in the heat of the moment. Decisions that look pretty dumb and clearly bad in hindsight don't seem so bad when you're emotionally charged up, angry, and looking to blame someone else. Things are presented in the show from the perspective of our main characters and heroes. It's up to you to imagine why the villain thinks any of this is a good idea, and in Starlight's case it was a simple matter of, "I didn't know/realize." Unlike say, Sunset Shimmer for example, Starlight's "I didn't know" is far more believable than Shimmy's "I didn't know what friendship was at all."
Twilight offered her friendship. This rounds out the last bit of the "problems" with the finale that are often brought up. A lot of that is predicated on our acceptance that the other two main "villain points" Starlight committed of her town/cult and the revenge plot are both super bad. That you have to be a really bad person to have done either. This isn't the case. Further, the things that did lead Starlight to those bad decisions are in fact an entire life built up off of that beginning spark. Unlike with Sunset Shimmer, we can see how Starlight didn't know what friendship was. True friendship. She saw that happen and not only go wrong, but cause her pain. She encountered others who had their own similar problems with friendship. She thought she had a better idea. She had people supporting her idea. Instead of just going, "lol. You're banned, fucker. Figure it out." We get to see Twilight actually being constructive and helpful. She is showing her and guiding her along with making friends. Helping her understand how to be a good friend and do her part in making it work. Maybe things like writing letters to friends who move away. Maybe being supportive of their strengths and accomplishments, instead of feeling like they create a chasm and only disagreements.
Furthermore, our society has tried this whole "punish people who do bad things" approach, and it clearly isn't working. Because the alternative, trying to understand someone and help them actually see that they're doing wrong, is a much more delicate, time-intensive, and difficult than "hit them until they agree not to do it again or die." The easy solution isn't the right one, no matter how familiar it is to you.
Offering friendship to Starlight was not a "reward." It was a rehabilitation path. It was a way to make her better. And not just to conform to some rules or punishment for breaking those rules, but to make her a happier, healthier person. Happy healthy people don't have motivation to go out and do bad things. If you're content with your life, fulfilled, and can wake up each morning looking forward to what the day will bring you, then you don't tend to feel the need to change it by harming others. These are the methods we should be looking more closely at. These are the kinds of ideas we should be working into our values and judgments of others. This is how we can head towards peace. It isn't about killing off the "baddies" until none are left, because no one will be left. It's about figuring out why the baddies are bad, and getting them to be good. Then they can themselves be forces of good in the world, instead of seething bundles of resentment and hidden rage waiting for a chance to lash out.
MLP doesn't always get it right. But the show manages such a stunningly good job of it so often. It's amusing how one of the times they got it right and knocked it out of the park is met with so much opposition. Because for a lot of people, accepting that this is in fact better than what we have in reality would have to accept that they're part of what makes reality so bad. Rather than face that, people will nitpick things and point to how Starlight is an awful person and the show got it wrong. Kind of like how any misguided and wrong/bad idea feels right when it's your idea.
I'm sure a lot of people have convinced themselves that Starlight is a bad character. They've convinced themselves that the show did a bad job of things with her story, especially in the season 5 finale. It's pretty easy for such a person to think that it's just, like, their opinion, man. Yet despite having the exact same mindset as Starlight, they can't do that simple, tiny, easy little step of realizing that is exactly how she was thinking. That she wasn't some crazy-jealous alicorn throwing a tantrum. That she wasn't some alien spirit or bug thing just doing what comes naturally to them. She wasn't some power-hungry violent centaur-thing with no real motivation or purpose given at all. She isn't some angry girl that has a mere token effort given to her backstory who wants to do bad things simply because fuck everyone.
Instead we have a character that has received about as much (or, more accurately, as little) backstory as any other character in the show. Nightmare Moon was... something something, look Luna was upset that her big sister got more attention, ok? So fuck everything. Discord is... look, don't ask where he comes from, he's just really fun to watch and John is a talented VA. Chryssie is... fuckit, you watched Aliens, you get it. Bugs are bad. Tirek is... well, there was this guy in a previous generation of MLP, and... well, they didn't really give much backstory so we don't have to either. It happened, ok? It just happened. Go with it.
Starlight has a hint about how her path turned out the way it did, but her backstory is deemed too little. Hell, we even get the full story about how she went from "just some mare doing her own thing with her own group" to "I want revenge, fuck you Twilight Sparkle!" We have that part of her backstory as a full two-parter. We know exactly why she was mad and bent on revenge. She had her entire life's work torn down and people she was trying to help turned against her.
We still don't have even a fraction of that for Luna/Nightmare Moon. Her "villainy" is objectively worse in rational, intent, and motivation. But she's well-loved by the fandom.
So, at the end of the day, you're fine to hold onto whatever opinion you like. You don't have to like every character or choice the show and it's staff decide to present and go with. You don't have to justify your preferences. But when you start to share those opinions with others, you are opening them up to disagreement. And chances are pretty good that whatever reasons you think you have for disliking Starlight Glimmer, they're bullshit. But, like, that's just my opinion.
As indicated by the title, this is a rough draft. Rather than get the editing process done in gdocs before publishing, I felt like hammering this out and putting it out. I'll probably be looking for pictures to illustrate it with, fixing grammar and spelling mistakes, and so on as time goes on. It may wind up significantly different before I call it good. But I think the raw message has value as-is too. So, enjoy.
Personally, the only thing I take issue with is Starlight Glimmer somehow not knowing about the Elements of Harmony. I mean, she literally spies on conversations with Twilight and the gals talking to the literal embodiment of chaos, and if she asks anypony in town "Hey, how the hell is that giant demon friends with her?", she'd get a retelling of the Battle of Discord and his redemption arc.
Yes, yes, the old joke about nobody knowing who the Elements of Harmony are, but this lady literally stalked Twilight. She should have some idea of what the hell Twilight has been up to.
Of course, more surprising than that is how shocked Twilight seemed at the concept that she was important to history. Girl's literally been the center of some of the biggest fights in history, how does she not process this?
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Because neither Starlight Glimmer nor Twilight Sparkle look at the events with as big a perspective as we get to see as fans.
Luna: all of Equestria had apparently forgotten who she even was, or Nightmare Moon. Everyone sees this as just some weird thing going on where the night is lasting longer than it should on the Summer Sun Celebration. Twilight and friends, and the populace of Ponyville see some mare in armor doing magicky stuff. Nobody looks at this as, "oh shit the world is going to end in a slow, dark, and cold worldwide death by starvation.
From Twilight's perspective, she stopped a crazy mare from legends from doing something vaguely bad, and reunited her idolized mentor with her little sister! Awww, isn't that great!?
Discord: yet another oddity from the past. Turned to stone. Mostly affected Ponyville. But "demon" ? This is a world that has weird things like Iron Will doing hype seminars. He's also a very not-pony thing that is bipedal, horned, and obnoxious. As for Twiight, she knows Discord was a bad person, but he mostly did silly stuff. Nothing really "world ending" and indeed, that particular timeline just had him tormenting Luna and Celestia in clown outfits.
Sombra: most ponies seem to think Spike did that one. If you need a better example of the disparity of perception between the audience and the denizens of the world, look no further.
Chryssi: Just badly written garbage. But many fans love it for some reason. Changelings don't seem to be on the radar for anyone until they are. We saw one randomly attend Cranky and Matilda's wedding without issue. But when one was hanging around the Crystal Empire, Shiny and Cady reacted pretty appropriately by going on high alert. Still a shitty episode. But even for those most directly affected by them, it seems like accepting the most positive possible assumptions seems to be the standard.
You get the idea, I hope. It seems that while things are often kinda sorta dire in the heat of the moment, the same could be said about being late for a friendship report. There is the general paranoia Twilight displays for most everything, then there are legitimate problems, and it all sort of blends in together. The fact that it is her and her friendships that keep the world from being a desolate wasteland isn't something Twilight seems to dwell on, and certainly doesn't seem to be the topic of general discussion in town.
As for Starlight's take on any of that information: Sure, some stuckup princess would tout her own accomplishments. It doesn't seem like Starlight was stalking Twilight to find everything out about her. She was waiting to learn something useful. She pounced after finding out about the Sonic Rainboom that brought her and her friends all together. That's something you can use for your revenge plot. The rest of that stuff is easily just, "we get it, Twilight is so amazing. Blah blah blah."
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It's still 'sudden new princess out of nowhere' and 'an entire race of shapeshifters out of nowhere attack the highest-profile social event ever'. And 'sudden empire out of nowhere'. These things can be generally assumed to generate at least some level of buzz that would lead some people to make a connection.
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And yet one of the "world ending events" was Flim and Flam and industrialization. I don't think anyone would make the connection between that and the events of Super Speedy etc. The one where AJ didn't learn nothin'.
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... what does that have to do with me pointing out that Starlight Glimmer should have some clue of Twilight's previous achievements?
Especially considering Glimmer only saw the one reality where it isn't clear who caused it. Not having a spreadsheet of all possible bad futures and not understanding the basic concept that you might be fucking over the past three years of safety and stability are very different things.
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When we first come across Starlight, she's living in a town she created in the middle of the sticks and it sure doesn't sound like she knows much of anything regarding who Twilight is outside of her being an alicorn because wings. She's cut off from the outside world on purpose, much like me and Facebook, because she does not care for the values it fosters.
Once she's run out of her own village? We see her hiding in frames of, like, two episodes. She sure as heck wasn't gonna get info on how to Get Twilight from watching her suck at being Moondancer's friend.
There's stalking, yes, but there's also doing a really bad job of stalking and jumping on the first opportunity you see without thinking it through. People keep misplacing the credit they give Antagonist Starlight. She was smartest and most thoughtful as a cult leader, amd even THEN it wasn't all that much. Past that, Revenge- and emotion-obsessed little girl with lot of luck and raw magic talent on her side. (Talent she likely never paused in honing through her whole life because unlike Twilight, she found no reason to.) She is going for broke with a lot of anger and BARELY a plan.
As for "not asking anypony Why Discord" or doing research on current events? Even not counting Cryo's answer on perspectives as watchers vs. as in-show characters... she's a fugitive at that point, mang. Do you wanna roll the dice on Lyra knowing who you are--or for that matter, Special Agent Sweetie Drops?
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The point is, from a reality, social/cultural standpoint, and overall community thing, ponies are not like people. They don't appear to dwell on doom and gloom. Stuff happens that is bad, but this is a wide range of triggers. A bunny stampede is bad. The sun rising a bit late is maybe cause for panic, maybe Celestia didn't get her coffee.
Some things were pretty bad, and probably talked about. But they're over with and solved, so why dwell? Next Saturday will bring more. Rewatch Slice of Life to get a real example of what I'm talking about. Especially with Roseluck, Lily Valley, and Daisy.
The idea that these bad things would run rampant and get really bad doesn't seem to be a thing that anypony really thinks over and dwells on. The idea that "that new empire up north had some weirdness going on when it showed up" does not necessarily lead to "we end up at war with the Crystal Empire, life as we know it changes to a scarce/rationed lifestyle and everyone is miserable and ponies get hurt and die."
"That one Summer Sun Celebration was sure weird, and that cackling scary black alicorn lady was sure scary, wasn't she?" "Did you hear about the wedding of that one princess we didn't really know or care about before? Something crazy sure happened then. But it was over with the same day, and the wedding went on. So it couldn't have been that bad."
Ponies don't seem to obsess over all the muckity muck details of what all could have gone wrong. Something bad happened, and it got stopped, and now everything is fine. So, how long until cider season?
Also, not every single event was directly solved by Twilight and her friends. Celestia makes trips to various cities and neighboring countries and solves problems that could escalate into international strife or domestic misery and conflict every day. The royal guard probably handles monsters and things across Equestria daily. That some of these are extra powerful and dangerous doesn't seem to register to most ponies who would prefer to forget about them after the danger is past.
And, once again, Starlight in particular was very focused on a goal: revenge. She wasn't coldly and calculatingly gathering tidbits of information, and piecing together some master plan. Have you seen how she operates? Knives are sharp. Always be careful with knives. Yes, that's using some information from season six, but we do know more about Starlight's personality at this point. We can see additional material from after the finale that lets us know that these perceptions and theories about the finale itself were wrong. But regardless of all that, Starlight is very emotional, prone to tunnel-vision, and quick/snap decisions. She is not super clever. She is not a chessmaster. She doesn't think many moves in advance. She's a lot more like Rainbow Dash than Twilight.
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I get it, okay? I overestimated a character I like.