Headcanon thoughts and discussion (srs business only) · 9:29pm Aug 12th, 2018
Because I can't figure out a story to actually have this happen in.
What an angel may look like
I'm in the same boat as at least a few other people around here and think it's kinda a raw deal that Sunnybuns didn't get to go airborn after she, you know, did the seraphim of friendship thing. I've seen a number of stories where she is an alicorn, but, as always, people have to admit that it isn't canon.
Well, screw that. Like a combustible lemon, we don't have to take it anymore. Sorry. I crossed the memes. I'm not sorry at all.
Finally answering the question no one ever asked: can a beard have its own asshole?
See. We have even more canon that can be used to to combat this particular bit of canon we don't like. Namely, this asshole.
So Starswirl is basically a gigantic jerk who enjoys berating others and proving how much better, smarter, and more magical than them he is. Basically, he's a 4channer who actually is almost as smart as he thinks he is. Think: Steve Jobs, but without the PR department.
Yes, he's a world class asshole. And like most world class assholes who have talent to backup their jerkiness, he takes every opportunity to show it off. The best way to make everypony else feel inferior while making it much harder to call him out on being a douchbag, is to make everything he does over-complicated.
I know, I know. Comic Starswirl wasn't a huge1 jerk. But we're dealing with Equestria prime, not Equestria 613 where all the comic shit happens. I think it's safe to ignore anything we don't like from the comics, or at least treat it as lesser canon. What I'm saying is, yes, I read that comic. No, it's not gonna stop me.
So, if we can assume that Starswirl over-complicates things, and we assume that he did make the EG portal2, then we can safely say, he made it way more complicated than he needed to. As a side note, we can also assume that the primary reason he banished the sirens instead of beating them is that they made him look bad by not rolling over, so he had to get rid of them. This is also why they've never come up before until RR needed them. No, it's not lazy writing; it's good writing *about* a lazy asshole solvingnot-solving problems.
How did he over-complicate it? What the fuck does this have to do with Sunnybuns? Am I just filling vertical space to allow for more floating images? The answers are: no, hold the fuck on, and in the worst way possible. See, a normal person... No wait. A normal, hugely powerful and magically talented unicorn would probably make a mirror that just turns you into whatever they want when you go through. See, that's easy. Go to pony-verse, become a pony, go to CHS, become a human (or a dog if your one of the lesser races.) That's the easy way. it makes sense, and it doesn't show off how clever and convoluted you can be. So it's something a third rate unicorn would do. Which also implies all the unicorns that can't aren't even third rate. So you can put down even more ponies in the quest to make yourself more important.
So, a pony looking to make a more complicated waifu transmogifier might think to instead apply and then strip an enchantment from whoever goes through the portal. So that going through makes you into X (say, a teenager because dirtyoldmanpony), but coming back turns it off. That's still simple to understand, but perhaps a bit more complicated to implement because it involves saving state. And state makes everything more complicated. No, really. Find someone who knows at least one real computer language (PHP still doesn't count) and ask them. State sucks, and dealing with it properly is hard. But it doesn't sound hard, specially to the laypony. So let's go even further.
Instead of adding and then removing a template, I mean enchantment, this isn't Pathfinder, let's make it even more stupidly convoluted. The portal saves the state of the pony going through, and then restores that state when they come back. Instead the simplicity of add/remove, we have add and add-the-opposite. That's so incredibly fragile and needlessly complex that it could very well be the answer. Neckbeard the Be-assoled could spend minutes bamboozling ponies with explanations on how the portal derives the reverse state and then go on and on and on about how it's properly recognizes things it shouldn't un-apply and all that jazz. Basically, find a git-evangelist3 and ask them to explain rebasing to edit history to reapply changes so it seems like something has been a different way all along. The fact that the only thing I can compare this to is CVS nerdery means we're on the right level.
So now we can answer that second question. Starswirl isn't as smart as he thinks he is. The portal restores Sunset to her previous state (sans a few clever things he anticipated,) but her previous state is very much a unicorn. So all that needs to happen to let Sunset get her wings back is for somepony (or Discord) to notice and dispel the stupidly complex layer of enhancements on her.
Tenuous? Yeah. But I still honestly without memes or reaction images like this explanation. Because if you can be a princess for completing a poem and fixing a fuckup that almost doomed your five closest friends to an eternity of failing at the thing they think they were born to do, then you can be one because you used your compassion and empathy and your friends' power to save someone who has a far more compelling version of Luna's backstory from themselves, and in process, stop her from destroying at least one reality.
Figure 4: Sunset explains this entire post
There's still the problem of the sirens and (SPOILERS!) the SDCC clip and why those portals function the way they do, but I'm sure clever people can come up with equally tenuous and convoluted ways to make that work. I mean, falling back on an old D&D favorite (a wizard did it) is still valid. But arguing about is is one big giant pile of NO ONE CURR.
Anyway, like I said back at the top of this insanity, I like this thought and have a scene in mind to showcase it, but absolutely no story or fragment there of to frame said scene. While I guess I could make another 2k thing to show it off, I struggle to justify the anxiety and effort it takes to do something with words that isn't intended to be a (jacking DWK's lingo here) giant pile of spaghetti. So feel free to add more or tell me how wrong I am about everything. I actually would kinda like to discuss and refine this idea. And hey, maybe someone else will use it and I'll get more Sunset stories to read instead of doing work I know I need to do.
1He was still a bit of a jerk, but not the massive, raging, throbbing asshole he is in the show.
2See! we can take the portal to Sombraverse he made and use that to justify him making other magic mirror portals and not just (irresponsibly) opening rifts to other dimensions and shoving sapient creatures through them.
3git is fucking amazing, but OH MY GOD SHUT UP
Dude. Go wild.
This entire site was started as spaghetti. If you did spaghetti, you’d be continuing a time-honored tradition.
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I must have miscommunication. It happens to me a lot.
I can spew spaghetti that I don't care if people like. See this post and... most of my blog, I guess. I have a much harder time writing a thing if I actually care about its reception. Anxiety and a fear of confronting past successes blah blah. I'm aware I could probably get a variety of pills for this issue, but that's a whole other discussion.
Additionally, I'm supposed to be working on a Roll20 game I cancelled last week because I wasn't ready, but I keep getting side tracked by tiny horses and the people they occasionally turn into. I probably need to implement a router thing for blocking fimfic during "work" hours so I can get shit done :P
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Oh, yeah, that’s rough. I have a story or two like that myself, where I was so invested in it succeeding that I had to have several people talk me down before it was even released to prepare for the possibility that people might not receive it well.
Unfortunately, there’s no easy answer I can give that won’t sound condescending except for I’m starting to get anxious too even when releasing spaghetti because I keep thinking I have to out spaghettify myself. Also yeah I’m on a pill myself which makes me feel better, but kills my motivation. :/ So maybe you’re better off not on them.
Watch there be something as simple as an on/off switch for the portal travel transmogrification...
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I feel this.
I'll try to get the stupid scene written. Maybe just dump it in another blog post or something because it's not a story, but I'm gonna try but most likely fail. I swear, my work-stress has killed most motivation to do anything requiring effort
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Have you seen the SDCC clip? Not that I wouldn't want there to be like a species dial on the side of the mirror, but the mirror isn't the only way to get to horselandia
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Do you have a link?
"So you're saying the reason I don't have wings is because of Star Swirl's spaghetti code," said Sunset, feeling an eyelid twitch from the concentrated stupidity at work.
Discord twirled a fork, gathering curly braces, semicolons, and marinara on it. He considered the heap and said, "I'm going to say 'Yes' largely because I like that phrase that much." Then he stuck it in his mouth, fork and all.
"And Star Swirl's back from Limbo?"
"And wandering the country, yes. Want me to add you to the increasingly crowded royal suite?"
"First teleport us in front of him. I want to see the look on his face."
Discord's grin stretched several inches past his head on each side. Before he snapped them halfway across Equestria, he said, "Oh, Sunset, we really must spend more time together."
(In all seriousness, this is super-tenuous, but I still like it. Personally, I go by the hypothesis that there wasn't enough magic available to make Sunset's wings last. Between the human world's nearly nonexistent magical field and Twilight sucking most of the mana out of the Humane Six earlier, Sunset was lucky to get as much as she did. Meanwhile, Purplesmart Thumbs Edition got permawings even after getting her sanity restored. Clearly the answer is to repeat the experiment.)
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That's the thing! The SDCC clip shows that purple's wings and thumbs are linked! More bad pointer math I assume
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I could see Sunset's face when she finds out she's a princess.
I can see her freaking out
I can see her flipping off the whole dimension as she moonwalks back through the portal to highschool where no one wants to put her in charge of concepts or geographic areas. And I can see Rarity hitting her because "You mean you're now royalty and could get a palace? WHY WOULDN'T YOU WANT A PALACE?!"
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>>Purplesmart Thumbs Edition
This is her new name, nobody argue with me.
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I can see her quietly and repeatedly whispering "what the fuck"
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My first decree as princess is: you are all lunatics and I'm not a princess anymore. Stop doing that bowing thing! STOP IT! NO BOWING.
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Someone should write that as a story.
Like a less fucked-up / retarded version of Sunset Reset
"Look Sunny, you've got wings!"
what the fuck
"Coronation is next week"
what the fuck
As an aside, I do enjoy (and am utilizing personally) the fact that the mirror seems slightly context-sensitive, in terms of clothing and etc either being generated to fit personalities and equivalent function. Sunset Shimmer is tough as nails and bold as fuck, rad-dad boots and a bitchin jacket. Starlight is a scene/emo kid in recovery, she gets a hipsterish outfit. Twilight is... Twilight, she gets something a half-step above a good-girl Catholic school uniform.
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Gotta be honest, while I never felt the venom some commenters seemed to have for Sunset Reset, I also quit reading it fairly quickly on account of not being enamored of the writing nor the seemingly bizarre plot-points.
In all seriousness, being faced with the offer of being a princess might actually scared the ever living fuck out of her. Sunset (in my headcanon) still has battles with her past. While mostly behind her, the recent temporary reset in Most Likely to be Forgotten probably have dredged some of those up a bit. Even without that, having the catalyst for her start down the dark path being thrust so unexpectedly in her face like that is going to cause a lot of fear, uncertainty, and doubt for Sunset. She might very well demand it be "fixed" because this is the dream she had before running away and she wants nothing to do with her past self.
This doesn't even take into account the fact that she seems to genuinely like being at CHS and with her friends there. I kinda hate most of the fics where she comes "home" and just kinda, substitutes them out for the pony-versions without comment or anything. I like the idea of her relationships with them being different too, and well, that goes for all permutations of them.
Example: None of the mane5 ponies seem like they ae super tight with Starlight. Like she's there, but they don't hang out unless Twilight's put them on call for a lesson. I mean, I'm me, so e21, but even without that, DWK had a point when he had Trixie say "just like Twilight's friends are your friends" to Glimmer. And it makes sense to me. But I am perfectly willing to admit the whole mind rape thing is a huge hurdle to me. But the EG girls have none of that baggage. They know Starlight as the pony/girl who helped save them from Juniper and who was pretty chill considering.
So the scene goes like this: Starlight's reading some novel or whatever, eating lunch outside and Rainbow Dash walks up and is all "hi!" And Glimmer's polite, but like you are when you see a guy you work with, but aren't all chummy with, at the grocery store. Dash is a bit put off because this is not how she expected meeting Glimmer again to go. Sunset walks up and is all "Come on, Starlight. Is that how you greet friends from out of town?" And then the lights go on one by one in Glimmer's head and she breaks out in a huge smile and rushes over to hug both of them. Because this is CHS Dash and they are actual friends.
I could (and someday should) go on about this, because it's a fascinating way to highlight how different events can result in the same character being two very different people/ponies. But now I need to make kids sleep, so g/night.
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It just... it wasn't great, because of what you said. It lapses into informal language frequently, fucks up Sassy Saddles' verbal tic, Ret-Gone's a ton of stuff we know exists, messes up basic equine anatomy throughout, etc.
It was really like Split Second in that it had several good ideas working for it, and some great beats; like making Celestia own up to the fact that she was basically Sunset's mother, and a lot of the very early interactions with Cadence. Good foundations, upon which was built a house of soggy wheat-bisk and sticky tape.
Sunlight will always be my OTP, because to stretch a metaphor further than a human entertaining Big McIntosh;
Overdosing on Equestrian magic is like drug addiction. Thumb-Twi is the bright eyed newbie one day clean. Sunset is her sponsor who has been around the block a bit. I can see Twilight jerking awake at 2am in a cold sweat from a nightmare, texting Sunset 'im scared', and she shows up no questions asked. Because they're fighting against the same demons.
Starswirl being a complexity-addicted know-it-all who thinks he's so good that he can ignore all the principles of
good codingthaumaturgical design (and actually is good enough that he can get away with it, most of the time)... yeah, I can buy that. (Also, we know already, as seen in Magical Mystery Cure, that his commenting habits were dismal!)4919265
Starswirl rolled his eyes towards the sky, begging for one--just one, mind--competent thaumaturge. "Nonsense!" he said, in a very calm voice and at a very reasonable volume--just loud enough to penetrate this pony's thick skull. "That part of the enchantment is perfectly fine."
"But-" the good-for-nothing, nearly all black unicorn started.
"No buts!" Yelled Starswirl. As the unicorn wilted beneath him, he sighed. That prissy gint who thought she ran the place was going to lecture him about screaming again, he just knew it. "If you can't tell what it does just by reading the residues then you're not good enough to be in my workshop! Out!"
"But the glyph has ground state flaw that doesn't account for-"
"OUT!"
Horn nearly digging a furrow in the door, the unicorn plodded away.
A hoof alighted on his shoulder. Scathing words were swallowed as he saw the hoofs owner. While Rockhoof had no real magical talents, this close, he could pound Starswirl into the dirt without trying. So he bit back his true thoughts and chalked it up to yet another annoyance foisted onto him by the so-called royal sisters. The ungrateful whelps.
"Don't you think you were just a bit hard on him?" Rockhoof had to point to the retreating unicorn twice before Starswirl understood what he meant. Earth ponies were such bad communicators. "Sombra's just a kid."
He snorted. By that age, he had already banished three threats to Equestria and founded an entire new thaumaturgical discipline. "He's an incompetent boob who will never amount to anything." He shrugged off the larger pony's hoof. "Equestria won't even notice him missing."
"Now get out of here!" He shoved Rockhoof, pushing himself further then he did his "fellow" pillar. "I'm conducting highly sensitive magical research!"
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I found Sunset Reset to be a Sunset Redemption fic in the same way that Tuck and Dale Vs Evil is a horror movie. It's raucously stupid, yes, but it has enough fun doing so to be an amusing ride.
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I didn't have fun, nor was I amused. I wanted off Mister Bones' Wild Ride.
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i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/565/375/17f.png
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I think Sunset would be the one to do what Twilight should have done. 'Sunset, you're a princess now...' 'Celestia, with all due respect, eat my entire ass. Not just no but hell no. You and Luna can run the government just fine, and I have things to do.' 'But...' 'Do you want to see us invade the Seaponies? Because I will totally do that.'
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that is actually a different fic idea entirely...
i didnt say don't write it