Help! My Heart is Full of Pony! - Cutie Mark Mystery · 5:38pm Jan 16th, 2018

Season Seven will likely be remembered for its finale, and how it tied together storylines spanning many seasons, (not to mention its tie-in to the comic books). It also had some pretty phenomenal landmark episodes like A Perfect Pear, and Royal Problems - beautiful stories that tackled subjects we have all been waiting to see explored for a very, very long time.

During the course of Season Seven, however, the show did something else - something extremely subtle. Through a series of carefully dropped clues spread out across several episodes, it fleshed out the concept behind cutie marks, and explored both how and why some of the things we’ve seen in previous episodes were possible.

Early Stuff

Let’s start with what we already knew. Season One’s Call of the Cutie was the first episode to really explore the concept of cutie marks, and after it, Cutie Mark Chronicles. Both of these episodes establish the appearance of one’s cutie mark as a sort of mystical occurrence – something transcendental.

It is presented as the one type of magic that is largely outside of pony control, and even though the concept is fairly simple, cutie magic is still, on some level, wondrous and mysterious.

Cutie Marks Getting Messed With

A lot’s happened since then, mostly in finales: cutie marks swapped en masse (MMC), cutie marks eaten (Twilight’s Kingdom), cutie marks transferred (TK). This doesn’t undermine the mysticism behind them per se, but it does fundamentally change the way cutie marks are presented, and de-emphasizes their ineffability.

Jump forward to Season Five, and you’ve got even more cutie mark manipulation going on, but with neither Starswirl nor alicorn magic to blame. We are presented with a villain whom no one had ever heard of, stealing a whole town’s worth of cutie marks with no real explanation as to how. This, to me, was always a little problematic. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a neighsayer. I love the Cutie Map (Parts 1 & 2) for its social commentary, and its story, but they never really explained how the central premise was possible. Her staff was a prop, after all. I know it’s a nit to pick, and like I said, it’s not a massive deal, but it did leave a sort of gap in our knowledge of cutie marks that the show didn’t seem to have any intent on filling.

What Happened This Year

This recent season addressed that problem in a totally casual, and utterly roundabout way. During a flashback in Rock Solid Friendship, Maud pointed Starlight at the cave that was to become the cutie vault, and let us all know that, “with the right stone, you can rule all of Equestria.”

This tiny piece of info tells us so much! Think about it.

Way back in Call of the Cutie, Twilight Sparkle had been able to put fake cutie marks on Apple Bloom for a few seconds at a time. It therefore makes sense that, with practice, a particularly powerful unicorn like Starlight who happened to focus ALL of her study and efforts on cutie marks would be able to manipulate (or steal) a cutie mark for just a little while longer, especially with a proper receptacle on hand. She wasn’t holding onto a whole town’s worth of cutie souls through her magic alone. She only had to remove them for a moment, and let the rocks do their magic.

This may seem like I’m pointing out the obvious, (and I kind of am), but it still has some pretty big implications. In Royal problems, for example, a lot of people took issue with the fact that Starlight was powerful enough to swap the cutie marks of princesses. When you think about it, though, having a vessel strong enough to hold onto an alicorn’s magic is what made the spell possible. Just like a powerful stone could hold onto a village’s cutie marks, Celestia is powerful enough to hold onto Princess Luna’s magic, and vice versa. It is their power that makes it possible. And the 24 hour cycle? One day, one night? That’s not Starlight. That’s how the magic of the Sun and Moon work. That’s why she couldn’t change it once the spell had been cast.

Again, this may seem like a minor detail, but in a way, by clearing up that little quibble, this little bit of information injects just a touch of that old mystery again. The cutie map is some sort of instrument of a higher destiny after all, and the awesomeness of the alicorn sisters are in no way diminished by Starlight having been the one to get the ball rolling and cast the spell. By switching places, we got to see more of exactly what makes both Celestia and Luna special.

What’s in a Name?

Now let’s look at A Perfect Pear - an episode that is praiseworthy for its love story, its brilliant guest performances by William Shatner and Felicia Day, and for its fulfillment of seven years’ worth of anticipation in finally showing Applejack’s parents. However, it also gives us a hint about cutie marks by answering another burning question (that is also seven years in the making).

Applejack had no idea that her mom’s given name was Pear Butter because the name she had always answered to was, in fact, a nickname. While this, once again, may seem like a minor thing – a simple explanation as to how Applejack could possibly be unaware of her shameful secret Pear lineage - what it’s also doing is giving us a clue about how cutie marks work.

For years, many of us have been wondering: if so many ponies’ names match their cutie marks, how come they don’t figure out their purpose from birth? How do the parents of these children decide what to name them? Do they have some clue as to their children’s name-related destinies, or are ponies simply blind to this connection the way that fish are blind to water?

By introducing nicknames into the equation, with Pear Butter, with Mrs. Cake (in the same episode), and later, with Fizzlepop Berrytwist (The MLP Movie), these questions are finally answered.

It makes me wonder just how many other ponies got nicknames after getting their marks. It makes sense, given that a cutie mark is one’s most unique, and defining physical characteristic. That’s often how we nickname each other here on Earth. More importantly, it brings up questions about all of these ponies whose names match their cutie marks exactly. Who were they BEFORE they found their purpose? How did they adapt to the change when it happened? Sure, you’re bound to be happy to find what makes you special, but once you find your special talent, it’s suddenly your identity.

It’s how the world sees you.

The Problem with Identity

This brings me to Marks and Recreation, the episode that deals with this particular existential crisis head on. In it, Rumble, a young colt, is afraid of getting his cutie mark because he is afraid that it might pigeonhole him into a future that he doesn’t want - that it could undermine the talents, interests, and passions he already has. I could write a whole essay on the philosophical ramifications of his crisis, (and probably will in the near future), but that’s beyond the scope of this particular essay.

The point I’m getting at is that, this year, cutie magic got a lot of new answers to old questions, and it posed a whole heap of new questions for us to turn around in our heads. It all happened under our noses. It came to us hidden as minor plot points in episodes with much bigger fish to fry (Royal Problems, A Perfect Pear). However, all of these revelations were connected.

Cutie Marks are now just as shrouded in mystery as they were when the show began, but not because of the ineffability formerly leant to them. On the contrary. We know more about them than ever, but it is their increasing complexity that requires us to to ask some pretty big questions.

Who are we? Are we our passions, (as Rumble hoped)? Are we our jobs (as Rumble feared)? Are we the face that we present to the world (as your mark can re-define your identity to the point of changing your actual name)? Are we the sum of our own feelings, or the sum of the impact we make on those around us?

Such existential concerns are at the core of the woes that plague modernity. Cutie marks continue to raise these important questions in a way that is: a) accessible to children; and b) really juicy for overly philosophical adults like myself, who lie awake at three in the morning thinking about this stuff.

-Sprocket

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