The Sunny Starscout thread!

@PUBLIQclopAccountant
rofl
Truth to told, that would be one of the best plot twists in MLP if it turned out to be true. Though to be fair, much like Vader I doubt the ‘evil Alicorn’ would recognize Sunny initially. After all, Vader didn’t recognize Luke as his son until after the events of the original Star Wars film. So even if she were Sunny’s mother chances are she may not recognize Sunny as such, at least not initially.

@PUBLIQclopAccountant
Heh. Yeah something to that effect. ;-)

Leaping into action! Done for the Newbie Artist Training Grounds although this artist is no beginner. This is a great still from that scene- An iconic moment for Sunny.

@Pinto Bean
You are the first person in a full week to comment here.

But yes, that image is amazing. I won’t talk about it here, though, as I left my thoughts in the comment thread below the image.

@Eragor14
Yep. I won’t see this thread neglected for too long…

Also thinking we’ll be seeing more of that artifact as the years go by. Obviously, it’s meant to be symbolic. I wonder if the story of the crystal Izzy unwittingly used to enchant it will be like a recurring side story in reverse.

Somepony made her blush.

Well, it has been a while since anything was posted here, so I will do a writeup:

I like how Sunny is becoming more and more of a leader. The most recent episode of Tell your Tale, which showed the newly founded Equestria Games (which sounds familiar for some reason) shows Sunny truly learning how to lead, taking some advice from Queen Haven and Alphabittle in the process (which, fun fact, is the first time that Alphabittle appeared outside of ‘a New Generation’). This is something I have been wanting to see from her for some time now. I am just a bit surprised that they are doing it in Tell your Tale. Hopefully we will see more of this in the upcoming Make your Mark series.

@Eragor14
Yeah it’s about time.

Sunny still seems inexperienced in this leadership role and hopefully we’ll see her develop into a new leader maybe like if there is some battle with that Shadowy Alicorn.

It’s also great how Haven and Alphabrittle gave her some mentorship. Because though imperfect rulers they really are quite competent it seems.

@Cosmas-the-Explorer
They certainly have a lot more leadership experience than Sunny does. Especially in the case of Haven, who has been mentoring her own daughters to lead her own slice of Equestria after she retires. It seems she knows Sunny will be an even greater leader than she was, one that will lead all of Equestria instead of a single city. As such, she has a greater responsibility than Haven, and will require further training to reach that level of maturity and leadership.

That, and the Royal Palace in Canterlot will have to be rebuilt at some point. I hope we get to see the remains of that in the Make your Mark series. That would be quite special.

@Cosmas-the-Explorer
Another thing: I fully expect there to be a battle with the shadowy Alicorn-they wouldn’t have revealed her so early on if that wasn’t the plan-but I think the shadowy Alicorn will also prove to be a bit of a moral obstacle as well. She could end up testing Sunny’s ability to lead, potentially even saying that she isn’t capable of leading the entire country. It could make for a very interesting psychological subplot where Sunny has to learn that she is capable of being a good leader, but she isn’t perfect, and in all cases she will have to rely on her friends to help her out.

And it makes sense, too, since Twilight also relied on her friends to help her when things got tough. It will take a team effort to fully defeat that Alicorn and prove that Sunny can be a capable and effective leader.

If Sprout ever tries to make things right, he should start with Sunny.

@Pinto Bean
Honestly, I hope Sprout gets to return in the upcoming series, at least so that we can see if he has done anything to try and improve.

If he has been spending time in jail for his actions in ‘a New Generation’, then his absence makes sense. It may have also given him time to think about his actions, too.

@Eragor14
If there is one pony that should feel the most aggrieved by Sprout’s transgressions it’s Sunny. To think that they were actually friends once upon a time. Reconciling with her would be a big step forward. And lucky for him that Sunny has a big heart and will likely forgive him.

It is weird that there has been no trace of Sprout since the pilot. No one has said he’s in jail yet, though I suppose that is a thing now in this generation… sadly.

@Pinto Bean
Technically it was a thing in the previous generation as well, though it was only used for the most extreme criminals like Tirek and Cozy Glow.

Also, the jail thing is just an assumption on my end, a hypothesis as to why he hasn’t had any appearances in MLP G5 outside of the movie and the videogame.

@Eragor14
Sure. And the sisters joked around about “the dungeon”… not as if it didn’t exist and it’s an absurdity, but that it did in fact exist except that they never needed to use it. In general ponies do a good job of policing themselves, which makes the whole idea of typical human-world lockup kind of distasteful to me (Sorry Hitch, but “Foal Me Once” sucked.)

As for Sprout, I like to imagine that he left town for a little while to do some soul searching and that he’ll eventually make his way back to Maretime Bay a better pony, and reconcile and make things right, and find his true calling in life.

They did use it, though. After his attempted takeover of Equestria Tirek was thrown into the dungeon that you mentioned. He was locked up for a very long time until he was freed in S9 (I think). So it wasn’t like it wasn’t used, Pinto. It was just used for prisoners that the Princesses deemed to be ‘irredeemable’ (when they couldn’t just turn such criminals to stone).

And honestly, I don’t think human-world lockup is ‘distasteful’ in any way-rather it makes sense considering what had been going on before the events of ‘a New Generation’. I can imagine that, with the various pony species not trusting each other, and the magic to turn prisoners to stone no longer being available, a policing system and an incarceration system would have been needed. Truth be told, Hitch likely knows about this incarceration system, and it’s a big reason why he has a jail cell in his own office. I don’t know if it would have been used as much as the real-world prisons, but it would have been used for various ponies that broke local laws, just as real-life prisons are used for.

Have to disagree with you there my friend. Lockup in our world is dehumanizing. It’s nothing like you see in cartoons. It’s not a joke. It’s not civil. It’s torture. Yes, there are bad people that need to be locked away to be sure. But we’re talking about a fantasy world meant for children here. Talk to me about pony drug cartels, pony sexual sadists, pony gangbangers and pony serial-killers and it all just starts to sound ridiculous. Likewise, talk to me about ponies getting locked up for the myriad of stupid petty things people typically get locked up for (drunk driving, drug posession. probation violations, FoTC, etc.) and that sounds pretty stupid too. Maybe in some twisted brony AU, but not in Equestria proper. We’ve been desensitized to mass-incarceration. We just assume that that it’s a good thing. It’s fucked up. It’s the byproduct of our modern society and its foolish policies. Could we see some backstory about say, a pegasus being wrongfully detained by unicorns or earth ponies? In theory yes, but that would be gut wrenching. I would hope they handle something like that with some class. Go too far down that rabbit hole and they risk descending into madness. But really, do we need our fantasy worlds to mirror our own that badly? Not I, friend. I like my ponies simple & sweet. This is obviously a sensitive issue for me, and we’ve gone way off topic, so I won’t be commenting any further on this subject.

@Pinto Bean
You seem like the type of person that loves seeing crime on your streets. Maybe that’s a reason why Detroit is so messed up. People like you think that incarceration is a ‘bad thing’ when in reality it helps protect the law-abiding citizens of a city. Sure, prison is torture, but it is meant to be an incentive for people to obey the local laws! Wether you like it or not, without prisons there would be no protection for people like you to do your own jobs, unless you armed yourself. Ironic that you said how many crazy people there are in the world, and yet despite that you are still against the prison system.

As for having it in MLP, well, I think it is something that still could exist without being on the level of the real-world prison system. I mean, prisons have been seen in plenty of cartoons in the past, including ones meant for kids. They are very lighthearted versions of prisons, though, not meant to showcase the problems with real-world prisons. I think that is the route that Hasbro wants to go in with G5 MLP-having a proper justice system in Equestria, one thing that I took issue with in regards to G4 (they had tons of criminals in G4 that they didn’t lock up-I really hated that).

You’re jumping to some bad conclusions about me. I’m not against incarcerating certain dangerous individuals, but I take exception to mass-incarceration, privatized prisons and the U.S. justice system being far too punitive and arbitrary in general. Detroit has a major drug problem like a lot of big cities. It’s not all black and white, and it’s not as simple as locking everybody up that does something illegal. You’re welcome to disagree with me but you don’t need to point your finger and be harsh about it.

@Pinto Bean
before sunny and others offer him any redemption, he first needs to be treated the same way the g4 mane 6 did with discord, to make sure he doesn’t do anything foolish with them, others, and/or anything else.

@Shimmering Spectacle
Yeah, I agree with you there. Honestly, I do think it would be neat to see another pony get turned to stone as Discord (and later Tirek, Cozy Glow, Chrysalis, and the Storm King) did in G4. However, I don’t think that is what happened with Sprout Cloverleaf. Either he is in a temporary jail not too far away from Maretime Bay, or (as Pinto Bean suggested) he is in exile somewhere (though that begs the question of where would he be exiled to, now that Equestria is reunited).

@Eragor14
The no-mare’s land between the cities?

It also begs the question of just how much Equestria is left to re-unify. So far, we’ve only seen three cities. Is that all that remains? If there is more, has the restoration of magic reached those far-off places yet?