Something that was brought up in the Writer's Group got me thinking. Do we even really know what kind of person/pony Sunset Shimmer is?

I mean, the (Hu)Mane Six are pretty easily distinguished: Twilight is the rational, studious nerdy one; Applejack is the rustic, practical down-to-earth one; Rarity is the stylish, cultured and romantic one; Pinkie Pie is the zany, happy-go-lucky one; Rainbow Dash is the athletic tomboyish one and Fluttershy is the shy and timid one. They're pretty easy to keep track of, and they all contrast with each other one way or another.

So, what about Sunset Shimmer? What are her primary personality traits? Now that she isn't a horrible, manipulative, power-hungry bully, I mean. What's her "thing" as a character, so to speak. As much as I liked her in Rainbow Rocks, she didn't really do much except act worried and feel guilty over the whole "literally turning into the devil" thing. She's still kind of a mystery.

All we really know is that she's supposedly just as smart or very nearly as smart as Twilight, but she doesn't seem like the nerdy-sciency type: She appears more practical-minded and more geared towards social skills. I don't really see her being the Twilight of the human team, even though they're obviously meant to play similar roles.

I have some vague ideas but I'm more interested in what everyone else thinks about this: Who is Sunset Shimmer? How do we characterize her, say in a longer story that doesn't focus on her situation as a humanified pony or the stuff she did in the movies?

3752620

3752620

Vell, Zunzet's just zis girl, you know?

3752620 Well, that's just it. She WAS a manipulative, power hungry, rage filled, spiteful, and evil bitch. Now though, she has a shattered identity. She doesn't know who she is. She seems shy, scared of over stepping boundaries, and very earnest. These all seem like new experiences to her though. She had a bit of snark left, but it isn't the bite she used to have. I would be hard pressed to simplify her character though. Calling her like the others; the jock, the nerd, the farmgirl, the drama queen, the crazy one, or the quiet one. She is the unsure and uncertain one. Her identity of before was crushed under a magic rainbow of friendship and now she is having to re-find herself.

Who Sunset is, is a girl who has made a mistake and is looking for reform from her old ways. The mistakes of her past have shaped her but she has chosen to no longer be that girl. I really wish to see more of her to watch as she finds herself again. Perhaps she could be a great leader with all her ambition. Or perhaps she is a closest nerd and could be much more like Twilight just without the OCD. Perhaps she finds a lofty goal and pursues it in a positive manor like Rainbow Dash. Maybe she takes her own path. Her character now though, is shattered, and that is exciting from a writing standpoint.

3752661

Bingo.

The video I posted wasn't meant to be a glib response, merely an all-encompassing one. Sunset's character has been reset to zero. The knowledge we have of her pre-Rainbow-Rocks's finale is both incredibly useful and utterly useless. She's got so much flexibility in her character right now it's possible to be paralyzed by options.

So just go ahead and pick a few.

3752724

My response is simply my default. Type very many words until my point is made in a mess of ideas concepts and extrapolations. I tend to just shotgun an argument, eheh. Maybe someday I will develop the skill to get my point across and not sound like a lunatic.

3752620 I think what makes Sunset Shimmer so appealing to me is how similar she is to Twilight and yet how little their differences are. For now I think its going to be a little hard to sum up Sunset Shimmer's character type. Because other than being the repented one she's pretty much a clean slate to be developed. Before Rainbow Rocks however I think we can say her basic character trait was her ambition, which in itself isn't a bad thing. Ultimately her down fall was her lack of patience and empathy.

3752661

I dunno, she doesn't act like a girl suffering a major identity crisis - if she did, she'd probably be more likely to relapse to her old ways than anything, because lacking an identity sucks. She's lost her persona, that is to say her social role, but it's not like the Friendship Laser erased her entire personality. She'd have regressed into small child or some kind of zombie if that was true. People don't just lose their entire selves and keep functioning.

Besides, she only turned bad over the last four years of her life, and the first movie implies it was a gradual change at that. It's not like it was the core of her being, that's why the Care Bear Stare worked on her in the first place.

What I'm basically saying is, Sunset must have had some kind of hobby or interest or talent or quirk other than "being a huge bully." What does she do in her spare time? What kind of stuff does she like? This is very basic characterization we're talking about, not heavy stuff like life goals or self-image.

See, if she was the lead protagonist in her own show, they would have nailed this down in a single scene, because cartoon characters usually aren't allowed to be vague.

3752724

I appreciate the clarification. Still, you do know that's not a real answer, right? When someone asks you a serious question about writing, then "I don't know, you can write whatever you want!" is one of the least helpful replies you can give.

How would you write her, with your imagination? If you really had to establish her personality, give her a serious character arc, how would you do it?

Sunset Shimmer takes on more of a Riku role in Rainbow Rocks.

She knew what she did was wrong, got scorned by others for it and is now trying to redeem herself for walking on the path of darkness. It's a great concept, and it makes me see Sunset as someone who has emotion, instead of someone who felt sorry for themselves.

Another reason why Sunset is more of a Riku character in Rainbow Rocks, is that she deals the final blow to The Dazzlings. Similar to how it has to be Riku who ends Ansem's Heartless (who the game constantly calls Ansem), Sunset got the Ranbooms back on their feet after The Dazzlings pulled off their climax Attack on the group. Again, it's a great concept, and it really moves Sunset's character in a way I find enjoyable. It shows you that even when times are bleak and the odds seem unbeatable, you must never give up on yourself, or your friends.

3752852 Oh, no I didn't mean to imply her personality was erased or anything. I do not believe she has an identity disorder. More that just she no longer knows what she wants to be. Trust me its a real thing you can feel, because I was there at one time. Maybe she didn't have a hobby? She seems to be the focused type. Blind to all else but ambition. Even basic logic seemed to get in the way of her goals and thus was ignored.

No, she for sure has a personality and an identity, it's broken but still usable. She just needs to find the pieces of herself that meant a lot to her. Finding oneself is difficult especially after such a large life changing event. Sometimes it feels like the world moved out from under your legs. She needs time to adjust and adapt to her new situation before we can really see who she is now. She's currently walking on egg shells around everyone. So maybe she's neurotic? Through her own admission she feels like everyone one is just waiting for her to screw up again. Perhaps this new feeling of hers replaced the ambition and now opened a hole for her focus to shift to something more positive.

Although, I would say she has at least two cannon hobbies. She can play guitar, and she can sing. From what I could tell with the limited exposure to those talents she does enjoy both greatly. At least enough to learn how to play with hands. Sunset just doesn't know herself and is afraid to act on impulse so we won't see too much of how she would act in a comfortable environment.

Ugh someone take my keyboard away if this is how I am going to express myself.

3752661

She WAS a manipulative, power hungry, rage filled, spiteful, and evil bitch.

You're saying it like it is a bad thing on its own. It is not. The bad thing is when such bitches don't keep their impulses in check for their own good. Abrasive personalities may inflict terrifying damage to a person, but when they keep themselves from inflicting damage they are fun to be around from time to time. Actually, the characterization you gave makes her perfectly suited for management positions. Sunset's problem was that she got power but was not wise enough to recognize what was dangerous to do with it.

3752620
SS had potential to become a determined strategist. Not that she is going to, Hasbro carefully ruined it. Hopefully, some ficwriter could work around it, but... I'm skeptical about it.

3752852

I appreciate the clarification. Still, you do know that's not a real answer, right? When someone asks you a serious question about writing, then "I don't know, you can write whatever you want!" is one of the least helpful replies you can give.
How would you write her, with your imagination? If you really had to establish her personality, give her a serious character arc, how would you do it?

3752724

She's got so much flexibility in her character right now it's possible to be paralyzed by options.
So just go ahead and pick a few.

That was my answer.

This isn't rocket science, dude. Pick from what we know about her now, take stock of it all. Then let it serve the side of Good instead of Narcissism. Or whatever purposes you might wish if you don't want her to go that route. I'm sorry if that's not "helpful", but it's the truth given the bloody circumstances.

Unless what you're really asking is for people to give you free ideas. I'm not in the business of giving people my own ideas straight out for free. Those go into my stories. :P I point people towards being able to find their own, and that won't change. Working off other peoples' ideas is rarely as fulfilling as working off of your own, and yes, I say this fully aware of the fact that we're on a fanfiction forum.

3753004

SS had potential to become a determined strategist. Not that she is going to, Hasbro carefully ruined it.

I'm awfully curious as to how you arrived at this conclusion, because from what I've interpreted from canon, this statement is objectively wrong. But again, I'd like to know we got there.

3753330

as in both movies she has a secondary role

There is a very strong argument that Sunset Shimmer was the primary protagonist in Rainbow Rocks.

In fact, I'd argue the entirety of Rainbow Rocks was setting up for Sunset Shimmer to be the lead in future EQG stuff.

I could write a bunch of paragraphs on this, but I'll just go with this instead: Compare the opening song to the closing song; Rainbow Rocks to Shine Like Rainbows. The first is a recap of movie #1 and strongly features Twilight. It's indicative of Twilight's central role in the first movie as well her continued prominent role in movie #2. The second, however, is an entirely different beast. It features the Humane 5+Sunset in a mostly equal role. It's focused primarily on their harmony together. The animations during the song, though, shift the focus a bit more towards Sunset and her now-successful attempts at fitting in with the rest of CHS. And even though Twilight is put in the center of the row of pictures at the end, I'd argue that's more representative of her role in bringing them all together, not that she's still going to be the focus of the series.

So, yeah, based on the differences between Rainbow Rocks and Shine Like Rainbows, I'm much more inclined to believe EQG is shifting away from Twilight and more towards Sunset Shimmer.

However, I realize that I have 0 stories posted here and because of that, a majority discount what I have to say as tertiary at best.

The number of stories you have published is 100% irrelevant. If anyone tries to tell you otherwise, they're dumb.

She's the one that will pull the trigger when everyone else has wussed out.

I agree with believing that the writers intent was to make this "Sunset's movie" - and they even talk about arriving at that conclusion themselves after a few revisions (in the commentary on the DVD - I think it was Meghan who says it). Sunset's arc from start to finish is what has made it so memorable in my mind, as well as setting up a lot of possibilities for her in fiction and character growth beyond the awesome bits that she had in the film.

And if the before-and-after progression that Csquared noted wasn't enough, check out the before and after here:

Before: http://i.gyazo.com/acdfcce86c2a169c56cc4fe19e66b44b.png

After (spoiler if you haven't seen it): http://i.gyazo.com/786a41f0e42087376327658c3ae6feba.png

[Spike, get off Rarity's leg.... /punt *my waifu* (and I just noticed he's looking up her skirt in the first one... oh, you guys)]

As far as what "her thing" is, I think others have said it better. So I'll just note that I think one of the things that's so appealing about her IS that open-endedness that's just waiting to be explored. They've set the stage beautifully with showing that she does have a good, true heart behind the clouds that had developed in her youth. I'd especially love to see more of the dynamic between her and Celestia explored, as I'd like to think the latter has as much regret and sadness as the former over the things that happened.

3753287

That was my answer.

Well, then I'm disappointed. You seemed promising.

This isn't rocket science, dude. Pick from what we know about her now, take stock of it all. Then let it serve the side of Good instead of Narcissism. Or whatever purposes you might wish if you don't want her to go that route. I'm sorry if that's not "helpful", but it's the truth given the bloody circumstances.

Ah, you misunderstand. I'm not interested in advice, nor am I particularly interested in "truth." I'm interested in discussion. I just think it seems sorta pointless to join a discussion when your only contribution is "I don't know."

3753330

Now, what BD said is the truth of the matter even if it doesn't seem useful to you.

I meant helpful in general, not to me in particular. "Just use your imagination" is a platitude. It sounds profound but doesn't contribute anything worthwhile.

Arguably, writing established characters can sometimes be more difficult then creating your own, but at this moment, Sunset is rather open. There are a lot of possibilities, you just need to draw out what works for you.

Again, this isn't about me. I want to hear what works for you. More importantly, I want you to actually think about this if you haven't already, because it's an issue that deserves consideration.

It doesn't even have to be your own totally original opinion - maybe you have read a story that does a good job addressing this subject? If so I'd sure like to read it, because I haven't come across any myself. And if you can't think of a single one, well, that would be exactly why we need to discuss this, isn't it?

Still, she makes off better then Trixie ever did.

And yet we know a lot more about Trixie's character than Sunset Shimmer's. Writing Trixie is easy.

As far as who she is? I can only determine a few traits by analyzing both films, as some basics should still apply even after being hit in the face with skittles harmony cannon. It would seem wrong to think that it alters or changes the base nature of a creature. However, I realize that I have 0 stories posted here and because of that, a majority discount what I have to say as tertiary at best.

I don't see what your writing experience has to do with this - you don't need "credibility", we're not trying to prove anything here. You seem like a fairly intelligent human being with your head screwed on straight, so if you have an opinion or idea, I would like to hear it.

3753987

As far as what "her thing" is, I think others have said it better.

Wow, you guys keep missing the point.

3755824

Well, then I'm disappointed. You seemed promising.

I get that a lot. I'm terrible at telling people what they want to hear.

Here's the thing about platitudes: just because you're tired of hearing them and they don't answer your question in a straightforward manner doesn't mean they aren't true.

Ah, you misunderstand. I'm not interested in advice, nor am I particularly interested in "truth."

Oh, well. At least you're being honest.

Again, it really sounds like you're looking for free ideas (without doing any work), or free headcanon, or, at best, group brainstorming. Except people aren't contributing anything because they're either saving it for their own fics, or because her character's a bloody closed loop right now.

Writing for Sunset is... enriched white bread. Good things have been added to it, but even now, there's still very little actual substance. Writing for her is still writing for a background pony like, say, Vinyl, just with a much more endearing character arc and backstory behind her, so you're going to get "discussion" of about the same level of merit. Even given RR, Most of Sunset's development has been plot-related, not character-related. You said it yourself: we know very little of who she actually is. The show doesn't give us much. We're starting from zero and no one feels comfortable just throwing out random shit because they know it wouldn't be useful without a story to back it up.

So EVERY POSSIBLE ANSWER one could give as to what Sunset is like now is unsupported headcanon. You'd've had a better time with this thread last year, mang. Y'know, before she erased almost everything she was.

Magical prodigy? Stuck in a magic-less tech world!
Raging she-demon? Repentant villainess!
Student of Celestia? Now pen pals at best!
Kind of a douche? Yeah, probably still!

Those were her four main tenets. Are you starting to get it? This is why no "discussion" is happening. We tried this with the background characters in the EQG group forums. It went only slightly worse than this.

She's willing to study, can turn on the bad girl when she needs it, and is probably conflicted since she can still be a mean girl to an extent even after being blasted with Friendship Power (which she's still learning the ins and outs of). Oh, and she probably knows how to manipulate people since she did it to CHS for 3+ years, but who knows if she wants to turn that faucet back on. That's all we got. Go. Oh, and be sure to quote this paragraph as "the one I should have just said all along."

3752620

We don't really know. After the events of the original EQG she has made a very large change.

Though we can say she's not bad on the guitar though

Well id say that she's definitely a very determined character.

Sunset is a pony, apparently.

3770585
Skirts is the greatest.

3752852
Not only has she lost her social role, she has also become disconnected from her personality (for the time being). Because not only is she afraid to overstep boundaries, but she doesn't even know what those supposed boundaries are. This makes for a person who has second thoughts about saying or doing anything, no matter how seemingly innocuous. She has no comfort zone left, unless she wants to regress to her old one. And that's not just "the last 4 years"; she has been an alpha bitch her entire life, or as soon as Celestia took her in.

She should feel as if everything she says and does, feels like an act. As if she's putting on a nice mask, but it's not who she really is. She will doubt whether she really is a "good girl" or just a good actress (which she is), even while she says and does nice things altruistically. That's the effect of a shattered identity. Because of all this, she will not be the leader of the girls for a long time. But ofc, the story of EqG3 and the TV show will probably push her to be.

3753004

SS had potential to become a determined strategist. Not that she is going to, Hasbro carefully ruined it. Hopefully, some ficwriter could work around it, but... I'm skeptical about it.

Hah, you saw it too. Yes, this is one personality trait that Hasbro will not be expanding on. They're dead set on making Sunset Shimmer a safe playmate for little girls in pink frilly dresses, which I can understand. Hopefully the studio sneaks some of Sunset's old edge past the suits upstairs, so that she doesn't become completely bland.

It's not hard to work it into a fanfic though, since we're not writing for little girls. Under the right circumstances, she basically becomes like Lelouch Lamperouge of Code Geass. And I mean after learning Friendship.

3752864 This is a reason why I am shocked we don't see more Riku Sunset Shipping fiction and artwork.

I once saw someone say that what Sunset Shimmer wants is to be an admired leader. The fridge scene of Rainbow Rocks is the decisive argument in favor of this, I think, but her initial monologue as a demon makes more sense from this perspective than from any other perspective -- and this also explains why her boots have a print based on Princess Celestia's hipposandals.

It's possible to imagine her wanting to be a princess from early on, following "The Fall of Sunset Shimmer" in the comics, but I read her in Equestria Girls as being more interested in leadership than in the perks of princesshood; I think she would be fine with dying as a mortal if she got to live as an admired and beloved leader.

But her instincts are not particularly leader-like. She has many virtues, which give her a great deal of power as a leader and otherwise; she's brilliantly intelligent (though not particularly bookish), charismatic, decisive, and brave; and she always has standards (at least outside of demon form, and I think that what shocked her back into goodness was that she had tried to outright kill Twilight as a demon). But she has some dangerous weaknesses as well. She thinks she's sly, devious, and subtle, but in fact she's an open book. She's hot-tempered, witty, sarcastic, sometimes jealous, and not particularly aware of her own motivations and what makes her tick. She was almost as bad at maintaining "the Masquerade" as Twilight was, so that I like to imagine that the whole of CHS knew that she was secretly a magical pony and yet she thought she had kept them in the dark. She likes to make threats and project an air of menace, but she's not willing to threaten anything too nasty (she let Spike go at the portal), and when her bluffs are called (Twilight at the portal, the Dazzlings in the dark corridor), she's powerless.

And, when she faces problems, her instinctive response is to solve them herself. That's why she's so startlingly fit, strong enough to launch herself through the air like a javelin and handle a sledgehammer like a baseball bat; but in both movies, this instinct led her to problems that she could have otherwise avoided.

She's also prone to getting caught up in herself and getting completely out of hand. Part of why I don't like The Fall of Sunset Shimmer is that Equestria Girls indicated that she and Princess Celestia parted ways on relatively good terms, and it was her acceptance at CHS and her success in its social events that went to her head and led to her behavior in _Equestria Girls_. (But on the other hand, maybe it's unfamiliarity and uncertainty, not repentance, that gets Sunset into "waifu mode", so that she went through the portal an entitled raging narcissist, but emerged into this strange new world as adorably cute and uncertain as she was in Rainbow Rocks.)

And there are a few other characters who she reminds me of, and who might shed some more light on what makes her tick:

First, Feanor, of The Silmarillion. In Tolkien's mythology, Feanor was a member of a cadet branch of the royal family of the Noldor, the second of the three tribes of the Elves. The Noldor were an ambitious, arrogant, technocratic people, and Feanor took this to greater extremes than anyone. He created miraculous treasures, devised the Elves' first alphabet, and was de facto leader of his people despite not being in line for the throne. He was extremely vigorous and energetic, especially for an elf; he led armies into battle, in addition to his intellectual accomplishments, and he fathered seven sons in a couple of decades -- while most elves had one or two children over the course of thousands of years.

But he was arrogant and hot-tempered, and scornful, proud, careless, and brutal, especially when his dander was up. He insulted, belittled, mistrusted, and schemed against the gods of his setting (and of course he had nothing but contempt for his half-brother, the actual king of the Noldor), but he also slammed his door in the face of Morgoth, the setting's Devil and the most powerful single being in the world.

But during a period when Morgoth pretended to be reformed, Feanor listened to him for long enough to learn about weapons, and to come to seriously mistrust the gods. Ultimately, Morgoth stole Feanor's masterwork, the Silmarils (for which the book is named), and Feanor pursued him out of the Earthly Paradise into the mortal world -- in the process slaughtering fellow Elves for their ships, defying Mandos, the god of fate, swearing an unbreakable oath that he had no hope of fulfilling, and dying in battle against Morgoth's forces; he led a cavalry charge into Morgoth's ranks, was cut off from his forces, and took an awful lot of Morgoth's most powerful demons with him into the afterlife. Feanor's name was "Spirit of Fire", and the Silmarillion raises the possibility that he had turned into a pure fire spirit in that charge, so that he wasn't killed so much as burning himself out.

The similarities with Sunset Shimmer are obvious. Both Sunset and Feanor were geniuses and brilliant scholars, but were brave, physically active, and not at all bookish. Neither was half as cunning as they thought they were. And both had strained relations with their families, the Forces of Good, the Forces of Evil, and any political authority who had the misfortune to rule them. Both would be quite capable of going wildly wrong at the impetus of a devious, semi-reformed evil trickster. Morgoth was like a hybrid of Satan and Loki, vainglorious, sadistic, and brutal, but also sly, mischevious, and perverse, and that combination let him wreak absolute havoc with Feanor's peace of mind; Discord could easily do the same to Sunset, although, at present, fear of Fluttershy's wrath (and as much reformation as he's actually gone through) would fortunately hold him back.

But I don't think Sunset Shimmer was quite as egotistical as Feanor, and I think that that's reflected in their respective outcomes; Feanor fought on the side of the angels (more or less) and ended up a smouldering pile of ash, while Sunset became the kind of being you send angels to stop (if only briefly) and was last seen in a big group hug with her six best friends.

Second, Sunset Shimmer on a bad day is like Darth Vader (Star Wars series) on a good one. Think of Vader declaring that "we must take them ship-to-ship", or joining the battle at Echo Base in person. Even his dueling Luke Skywalker at Bespin was not entirely without risk to himself -- although if Vader had been played by Sunset Shimmer, his response to Luke refusing to rule the galaxy as father and son would have been a long period of confused silence, possibly followed by an incredibly awkward offer of a ride to a really good hand surgeon.

But unlike Vader, Sunset doesn't shift the blame when things go wrong, and I think she'd be fiercely protective of her subordinates, followers, and admirers; she'd look out for their interests, enjoy seeing their successes, and fight like a tigress against anyone who threatened to hurt them -- while also snarling like a tigress to keep them in line.

And third, in a way, Sunset reminds me of Prince Koura of The Golden Voyage of Sindbad, a movie which I definitely recommend looking up. Koura is a classic "Moorish magician," an evil sorcerer of a type so ubiquitous that the original version of Aladdin, written in the Middle East and set in China, has a Moorish magician as its main villain. But unlike most Moorish magicians, and most movie villains in general, Prince Koura is a loving and paternal leader; he reassures his men when things look dicey, gets along well with his weaselly second-in-command, and sends his crew home to safety as the movie nears its climax. And Koura runs personal risks (especially with magic), does his own swordfights, knows more about the setting than everyone else in it put together, and (approximately) blackmails Hindu gods.

So much for the characters who remind me of Sunset Shimmer: two evil wizards and a narcissist. You might think from that that I don't like her very much, but she's one of my favorite characters in the setting, and the most interesting fictional character I've seen in a very long time. "Who she is" can be good, evil, or anything in between, but she'll always be a formidable figure; her dancing to "Better than Ever" was adorably cute and yet faintly dread-inspiring. A lot of fan stories here flesh out her character in ways I find very plausible; I can readily believe that she's a lacto-ovo vegetarian who plays Airsoft, sleeps with a nightlight, defends her school's honor passionately, had a terrifying first menstrual period and a long series of lonely holidays (wait, the lonely holidays are in the comic, too!), once kicked down doors and drew a switchblade over the course of getting a pizza (during her unreformed period, admittedly), and plays soccer like a freight train. She might be a better mother than I'd thought she would be when I started writing this, and she'll make some lucky region a very good princess one day -- although I wouldn't want to be the griffin city-state that had the bright idea of raiding Sunset Shimmer's subjects.

3925722
Shooting for Friendship is a great story, and you do an excellent job writing Sunset. I would say that she doesn't fear reverting to her old self so much as that she has decided that, no matter what, she will never behave like that again...

And yet, your reading of Sunset produces what I'd call a superb depiction of her, so the differences between my reading and yours must not be particularly important.

3980567
Sunset as a different leader, suited to different things: absolutely. Twilight at her best is so patient and well-adjusted as to be horrifying; but I imagine Sunset at her best as being worse at dealing with her enemies (although the example of her own history would always be in her mind), but superb at inspiring her friends.

I don't think that it's power that Sunset wants, but... ... err, wait a second. Power is exactly what she wants, or at least what she wanted as of pre-demon Equestria Girls; I was confusing "what she wants" with "what she'll be happy if she has." And that's like her, too; Sunset Shimmer can be very perceptive of others -- as part of her having "the wrong sort of social skills," as you brilliantly put it -- but she has no understanding at all of herself. I think you're right.

And good job on making it through that post. I didn't realize how thoroughly FIMFiction's commenting system would convert it into a wall of text... I need a webpage, to present that kind of content in a better font and a more visually broken-up form.

3980876
3980567
Your exchange was quite insightful, guys. I'll be copy/pasting those posts into my "Sunset Shimmer notes" document.
And I'll check out your story, Verbose, since you seem to know what you're talking about.
Right after I finish binging on Harmony Theory.

3981677
Glad to hear it! I had some similar comments along these lines on Derpibooru; they're scattered through comments on random pictures and assorted forum posts, but can probably be found by stalking my profile, if you're interested enough to do it.

Now, I just need to get some ideas for what to depict Sunset Shimmer doing. I love the Luna Beats a Dead Horse genre -- slice-of-life stories about important, adorable, emotionally unstable ponies -- but thinking up new scenes of that sort isn't something I'm very good at...

If you think it worth your time to understand, be my guest, but my fanfic I'm working on is about Sunset's prior existence.

That is to say, she wasn't always "Sunset Shimmer", or in a sense never was, but was, is, and forever will be... Clover The Clever. My first thought was that they both wore cloaks, and it was just a fan theory to me,

but then I got someone on board, and we hit the mother of all theories where Sunset's mind is a false altercation of Clover's, where Clover was never a nice little girl, and didn't do as she was told. Betraying both Celestia and Star Swirl, and paying the price. Clover tries to get revenge by using the Elements, but she fails to use them, and the backfire sends her forward in time, where she lost all her memories and grew to the name Sunset Shimmer. History repeats itself, and she gets exiled through the Magic mirror.

But what do I know? I'm the only person who ever thought of this... Ever! Wonder how many people put 2 and 2 together about The Dazzlings and the founders being the same thing. Ah, well. That's for a different topic.

3752620
Oh hey, this thread got necro'd. But there's actually new information in the form of Friendship Games for this thread's OP now.

(1) Someone had a plausible theory way back, that the reason Sunset needed an email book with Celestia while she's Celestia's student, is because Sunset isn't in Canterlot all the time; she's often away on some adventure. This is consistent with her toybox blurb.

(2) Supporting this, Sunset said in the pre-FG short: "Back when I was Princess Celestia's student, I learned best by going out in the field and doing something... I like to solve magical mysteries by rolling up my sleeves and getting my hoov- hands dirty."

(3) Finally, we have the deleted FG duet, where Sunset explicitly sings that she misses going on adventures in Equestria. She wants to sate her wanderlust, she wants to help ppl "out there".

What I'm basically saying is, Sunset must have had some kind of hobby or interest or talent or quirk other than "being a huge bully." What does she do in her spare time? What kind of stuff does she like?

So, Sunset Shimmer is an adventurer, sort of like a pony Allan Quatermain. Both studying magic under Celestia, and studying in the field outside Canterlot, are time-consuming gigs. I doubt she has too much time for any other significant hobbies. But because of her chosen pursuit she'd be more streetwise than Twilight, and have a wider but not as organized fund of magical knowledge compared to Twilight.

Good or evil, Sunset Shimmer could never turn out like Twilight who moved from a library tower in Canterlot, to a library tower in Ponyville and then was content to stay in that small town for years. Sunset would travel. If she manages to gather an adventuring party, she'd be the leader. If she had no party, she'd adventure alone like she always has. Her MLP FiM would have a very different story structure, more like a Thundarr The Barbarian story.

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Someone had a plausible theory way back, that the reason Sunset needed an email book with Celestia while she's Celestia's student, is because Sunset isn't in Canterlot all the time; she's often away on some adventure

That was me.

It is hard to really define someone in just a sentence who’s so open-ended; she’s still a character finding her place among the mane six, her role is still being debated, even now; I hope she doesn’t become just a guest-star, pushed to the side of someone who is just there.

There is so much to her character, her downfall, redemption; she is a refreshing sort of character. I think she still has an edge, not quite the bite she had in the first movie, but it’s there, that slight edge, which surfaces every now and then. Her identity was indeed shattered, everything that she used to be or was, is no more, so her identity as of this minute is a slightly chiselled blank slate, with a few etches here, and there, presenting what we already know slightly – earnest, intelligent, willingness to help, and that little bite left, slowly coming back.

However, no doubt as time goes on, her blank slate will form, and shape based through every movie, building to her character; she is complex, and writing her is more of interpretation at times. What I like about her is the flexibility of said character, you can go to the opposite end of the spectrum with her character, and still be in semi-character. She is still finding where she belongs, it is impossible to define her so accurately pinpoint on what she needs to be, when her role is still being shifted around in the movies.

Other than being a somewhat counterpart to Twilight; which grates my nerves a little.

3752620 Fair question. I've always imagined her having some Twilight-ish tendencies (being the Princess's personal student will do that to you), though certainly not to the same extent as Twilight herself. She also appears to be a bit more technically skilled than the others; I take that from both her Photoshopping trick in the original EQG and her working with the soundboard in Rainbow Rocks, plus it also gives her a role in the Rainbooms besides secondary guitarist. And being a former queen bitch bee knocked from her perch, I've always imagined she has some social awkwardness, though once again not to Twilight's extent.

Friendship Games shows she has a very strong sense of responsibility and duty (since she considers it hers to figure out and rein in the Equestrian magic at CHS), and takes these very seriously, as evidenced by her ripping SciTwi a new one (one of my favorite scenes in the movie).

I don't think you can peg her as any "the ______ one", apart from maybe "the guilty one". But if you want comparison, I'd say she's very similar to post-Nightmare Moon Luna (who happens to be another of my favorite characters), so in a pinch, just imagine what Luna's like when she's not being Princess-y.

3752620 I think that maybe she's still trying to find out who she is. She was a bully. That is what she thought she was. But know she doesn't who she is supposed to be yet. Kind of like getting a cutie marl a second time, or a re-do to be more precise. But of course, it's just a theory. A FimTheory.

Man, this thread is old.

Who posted this, anyway?

"Identity Crisis: Ronda Rousey's search for identity after failure is all too familiar."

When RR came out, many felt that Sunset face-turned too quickly. That is, she 180'ed from dominant and aggressive to meek and uncertain. When FG came out, many felt Sunset clung onto Prin Twi too much. She's an alpha her entire life, why is she suddenly fangirling so much?

While it's already been discussed, I think the above article gives some fresh insight.

Her loss of identity after a devastating loss is similar to a star athlete who suddenly discovers that he/ she is not invincible, hence her abrupt personality switch in RR. Why didn't she feel this way right after her self-exile through the mirror? Because that wasn't a loss to her. Sunset rationalized it as a betrayal, and channelled all the negative energy that would have gone into despair, into her anger.

Why did she become dependent on Prin Twi? Because she was still rebuilding her own identity, and she transferred her newfound faith in harmony and friendship onto a living symbol. She should be cured of it by the end of FG, though.

Alright folks, new tidbit of insight. I refer to this scene again:

Hey, there's a name for that! Imposter Syndrome.

3752620 Personally, I like to think of Sunset as the repenter. She did some bad things, and now she wants to make up for them. As for her being smart, well she was Celestia's previous student so...