Sunset Shimmer: living the biggest second chance in gaming · 4:12pm May 16th, 2017
(This video is what made me realize the following.)
Once upon a time, there was a magical land with dim-witted bulldog people,
red-and-black fire-breathing centaurs (note Tirek-style firebreathing at 1:37, and low-to-the-ground charges that look kind of like pushing or being pushed through a mountain),
oceans of precious stones and magical artifacts, a highly varied climate, some dangerous magical forests, and I forget what else. Apparently it has reincarnation, too.
In this world, there lived an ambitious, talented aristocrat, very close to the throne but with no chance of getting there; he felt unfairly marginalized, especially for someone of his rank and position. Proactive, impetuous, and firmly convinced that he deserved whatever he could get, he threw away his privileged position for a small chance of claiming the throne; he fled the country, traveled into another world, stole an ancient magical artifact, and transformed into a terrifying demon, only to be stopped in a last-ditch confrontation.
He had long red hair, a striking appearance, and a commanding presence. He was equally talented as a magician, a scholar, and an athlete. He had a permanent problem with any authority except his own. He was a capable leader, who knew when to delegate and when to take on a challenge in person; and he was surprisingly persuasive for someone who was so obviously in it for himself. He thought, until the end of his life, that what he wanted was power, but what would have really satisfied him was respect; and he was never quite as ruthless as he tried to appear. (Imagine how the last boss fight in The Wind Waker would've ended if he'd been willing to try to kill Zelda while she was trying to kill him.) He had a cruel streak that he wasn't proud of (at least not in Hyrule Warriors), and a hot temper that he kind of liked; he was so magically potent that he routinely took on a new, stronger form at the climax of a conflict. His opponents were often thinking on a much smaller scale than he was. And he was haunted by a demon who may have played a critical role in how badly he turned out.
But the world wasn't meant to have anyone quite as good at holding a grudge and pursuing it as Ganondorf Dragmire. Over the generations, the world forgot why he kept attacking it. By the end, he himself forgot why he kept attacking it; it was mostly force of habit by this point. By The Legend of Zelda, Ganondorf no longer knew who he was, or what grievance had turned him against the world; by Breath of the Wild, he had lost his mind entirely. Eventually he was killed; the stories vary about what laid him low, but they mostly point to a magic arrow of some sort. (A silver arrow, or a crudely improvised piece of ancient technology, or something like that.) His followers tried to revive him, but fortunately failed.
Civilizations rose and fell, humanity gave way to new species, and eventually a race of intelligent horses rose to preeminence in what had once been Hyrule, while Ganondorf worked off his guilt in the afterlife; but eventually, he was able to reincarnate. The soul who used to be Ganondorf became female rather than male (The Legend of Korra comes to mind), and a small tawny horse rather than a tall tawny human, but was still a red-haired aristocratic firebrand, close enough to a throne to have designs on it, intelligent, athletic, and acutely aware of the game-changing possibilities of stolen magical artifacts:
Sunset Shimmer.
Perhaps it was the gods' will that Sunset's circumstances should resemble Ganondorf's as closely as possible; this was a test, to see if she had really changed. And she failed it.
Almost failed, that is. But not quite.
When everything else had gone wrong, when the exact same plot had ended in the exact same disaster, and there was nothing in her future but death or sealing away, Sunset Shimmer did what Ganondorf Dragmire had never had the courage to do: she admitted that she was wrong, and that the path she'd taken through life had led to a dead end. And then, with the heroic will that she had previously used so destructively, she held herself to the difficult path of not destroying the world -- despite a long period of marginalization, countless slights from the dubious friends Twilight left her with, and a very serious crisis after she thought that she'd already won everyone's trust.
And in the end, she achieved more than she'd hoped; there's even a "Legend Of" title where Sunset Shimmer's the good guy. She didn't even have to change how she relates to magic, at least not very much:
The Pony of Second Chances is living an even bigger second chance than we thought.
But that's just a theory. A Literary Theory.
Hmm. Not quite as catchy. But in all seriousness, this is a very cool way to tie together seemingly unrelated franchises. I can only imagine what Demise would think of the ultimate fate of his curse upon the world.
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Thanks for your friendly response! I had no idea what kind of reception this would get; the Sunset-Ganondorf parallel is the creepiest thought in the world when you first notice it, so I was pleasantly surprised that, when fully written up, it turned out to be hopeful and heartwarming more than anything else. ("Heartwarming" and "Ganondorf": two words that don't really belong in the same sentence. At least, not outside Equestria.)
The whole thing certainly is just a theory, but I've always felt that MLP has a very Zelda-y feel, and I was astonished by Breath of the Wild's Tirek-like Lynels (especially the part where they passed the legal department). It's hard to imagine that Nintendo didn't do that on purpose; maybe a crossover -- maybe even this particular crossover -- will come about one day, if the reefs and shoals of IP law can be navigated.
Click here for Demise's current emotional state.
For the rest of the curse, Cadance is obviously Zelda -- and Cadance and Sunset grew up in the same castle with the same mentor, there must have been so much fur flying, even if this theory is complete bunk -- but I'm not convinced that Shining Armor is Link. Rainbow Dash has more of his personality (go back and watch Sunset quietly seething at an oblivious Rainbow Dash again, it's so much funnier this way), and then there's Quarter Hearts. Link tends live in obscurity if no crisis calls him into action; he'd probably be a background pony in normal times, although he must have had a pretty busy life in the Pony Downfall Timeline that really should have appeared at some point in the Season 5 finale.
(Also, if Quarter Hearts is Link, behold: The Maximally Awkward Ship.)
That's certainly an interesting point of view. I'd read a story that dealt with such incarnations
This is actually one of the most amazing headcanons I've ever seen. I'm not sure I can adopt it, given what we know about the history of Hyrule, but it definitely fits the history of Equestria just fine.
Absolutely fascinating. Have a follow.
Well, that's one of the more brilliant things I've ever heard. Have a follow.
You think wayyy too much.
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Game theory fan?
4536284
Just familiar wirh the tagline.
This is solid. I like the jib of your cut. Get followed.
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Well, FoME was right, this is a crazy amusing headcanon!
Wow! So much interest -- and so much positive interest, at that! A couple more posts on all this, coming right up!
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I have two ideas: one's small and achievable, the other could make a good long-form television series. Both are about the Yiga Clan, Ganon's cultists from Breath of the Wild, who should've appeared several console generations ago.
The smaller one: Teenage Pony Sunset and Professor Inkwell clash with the Yiga Clan. (They kidnap Sunset for ransom as she strolls home after her curfew from a dance at a fellow student's house, then get a good look at her appearance, check their orders, panic, and deposit her in the castle gardens with a hoofful of flawless rubies and their sincerest and most faithful apologies. With Celestia's encouragement, Sunset follows up on their advice on how to contact them again, and brings along Inkwell and not enough royal guards to scare them; and onwards past that.) The ultimate outcome of this is the Yiga Agricultural Buyers' Club; you form fast friendships in cults, after all (Sunset and Starlight will be able to bond over that one day), and the Yiga tropical-fruit supply chain is amazing; Sunset Shimmer has never had such a fresh, flavorful banana anywhere north of Zebraica itself!
The larger story idea should be a blog post, not just a comment; full posts are much more discoverable, and I doubt my ability to make real use of it.
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I think too much, and occasionally it leads me into traps. You have no idea how creepy this observation was, until I wrote out the full post and it turned out to be heartwarming!
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Breath of the Wild upset the apple cart so darn thoroughly that literally the only convincing timeline theory left is that Hyrule Warriors actually happened. (In-universe only, of course.) So at this point, I don't think you should be too wedded to any particular history of Hyrule.
If I was going to pick a pre-BotW timeline for this, though, I would call Equestria the distant future of the Downfall Timeline; Ganon died for real at the end of The Legend of Zelda -- despite everyone's frightening experiences in The Adventure of Link -- and so the only remaining questions are literally matters of Hylian theology: how reincarnation works, and the exact details of Demise's curse.
Whatever the curse does, it doesn't take away Ganondorf's free will or make him purely evil; The Wind Waker proves as much, and Downfall shares enough of a universe with Child that the curse has to operate the same way in both. Demise wanted a representative of his hatred to always be there to haunt Link and Zelda; but he didn't expect a situation where one person managed to yoink that hatred -- and the immense magical power that came with it -- to pursue a personal grudge. But Ganondorf discovered the curse in his research on possible sources of ultimate magical power, and was so impressed by its potential that he... you know... hijacked it.
(FLASH SENTRY: "Wow, you looked different in your previous life."
SUNSET SHIMMER: "Don't worry, I'll buy a wig.")
If Demise's curse was literally Hijacked by Ganon, that explains how Ganondorf was able to curse the Great Deku Tree and Lord Jabu-Jabu without the Triforce of Power. They were guardian gods of their regions, but they wouldn't have been a match for Demise, and they couldn't stand up to the combination of most of his power and all of the power of Hyrule's most practically-minded student of magic.
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4548992 Thanks!