Unpopular opinion time

@Hakirayleigh
The final one was Growing Up Is Hard to Do.

Twilight Sparkle might have the lowest personal agency of any main protagonist throughout mainstream fiction. She lives to please a certain someone at the beginning episodes, and she is just as much living for that person’s expectations by the end regardless of how much power is given to her or how much time has passed.

I don’t want to turn this unpopular opinion into a bashing, so lets create a list.

I want people on this forum to bring up characters they know in fiction. A list of main protagonists in fiction that have equal or less personal agency:
Obvious criteria:
(they cannot be robots or silent protagonists)
(hobbies are not life choices or important decisions, one can still have interests but still have no agency)
(one must consider the level of exposure, the sheer number of opportunities one can act on their own agency but defer to living up to someone’s expections in a 9 season fully voiced series is rather large. Obviously an example doesn’t have to be that long a series, but enough exposure to see plenty of opportunities where life decisions are given to them and they either desire to do the role expected of them to the letter, or make choices based their own desires)

All Celestia would have to do is blink and bronies will be foaming at the mouth and write a 2,000 page essay decrying her as the worst thing to ever exist

@Background Pony #F622
True. Early brony fandom was really harsh about her.

@Background Pony #F622
When there are way worse characters than her even within FIM. I never got the hate for her at all either

@Background Pony #F622
Probably the worst complaint I’ve heard about her is why she always loses even if she is supposed to be so powerful.

For me I think it can easily be justified in that she is a ruler first wareior second. And I think Celestia probably is not as strong as she once was. She is 1000 years old after all.

Not everything is a powerscaling challenge.

@Hakirayleigh
Early?

@CronoM
Lmao no one is actually doing this.

@Background Pony #F622
I blame some of the most overzealous fans of Luna, some of them back in the day were so fast to demean Celestia to make Luna be a victim/look better.

The crab bucket dilemma.

I genuinely think Snowdrop fan animation is a good animation not just visually but in writing which I think people really underrate.

I know people often rag on Snowdrop as being sort of a sympathy sue, but I think feeling sorry for her isn’t really the point.

The point is that Snowdrop went through a character arc from self loathing and wishing for eyes she could never have, to actually using the gifts she was blessed with. It’s even foreshadowed in how she’s able to navigate a snowstorm that she has talent (something people seem to criticize).

Even the “bullies” I would not argue were so much bullies as just ponies who are only interested in the end product and seeing Snowdrop as a burden to get to those obstacles.

And I also think tying her in with Luna with how they both felt unappreciated was nice. And giving a fairy tale about why people appreciate snow was interesting. I think all the episode ties very neatly in the end.

@CronoM
The fact that no one answered this either because Twilight is actually that bad or because no one cares.

I remember when Snowdrop premiered, and honestly, I liked it but it was never my favorite. Now, I don’t wanna discredit everyone who worked hard on it, and how important it was to the fandom. To me, it really hinges on whether you get into the sentimentality and whimsical nature of it. It’s really the My Little Dashie effect - if you feel like the story wants you to feel sad for the character, instead of ACTUALLY feeling sad for them, then it comes off as shlocky and cheesy. Even if the character has very legitimate issues, the audience response is still gonna be the world’s tiniest violin.

The Friendship is Witchcraft parody felt like a response to how hard it tried to be endearing. Honestly, Snowdrop (or rather Snowblind) telling everyone off, and yelling how she’s not gonna be a some sort of ‘Christmas special martyr’ whose job it is make everyone feel better about themselves? Well, that ends up feeling more impactful.

We’re clearly supposed to see their behavior as wanton ableism, but if you think about it you can’t really fault them.

When we first see Snowdrop, she claims she’s doing just fine with the project when she’s barely done anything. Plus one of the other students had the line “I worked with her last time! You do it!”, implying that Snowdrop was legitimately unpleasant to work with. Expecting kids that age to put up with that in the name of getting all inclusive an stuff is… less that reasonable. Especially considering that the teacher a.) didn’t see through Snowdrop’s feeble attempt at a lie, and b.) had no problem with Snowdrop walking home by herself in the middle of a blizzard - chances are she wouldn’t have been able to offer much support to any group containing Snowdrop.

@Cosmas-the-Explorer
@Tiger beetle
It seems most of Snowdrop’s self-loathing comes from the way others treat her. Reminds me of a certain combination of users on this site, actually…

Cuteness bait only works for Kirby because the little dude kills gods for a living.

I’m of the popular opinion that I wasn’t a fan of Snowdrop since it felt like it was emotions over substance and it was too cutesy for its own good, but I’m not one of those who calls it one of the worst fanmade content that the brony fandom has made when I’ve seen worse. Buttons Adventures was a fan animation that also had a child character acting cute, but I thought it was good and I still think Children Of The Night is peak fandom creativity

@Butters Stotch
The latter, I disagree with what they said and I don’t want to waste my time on some pointless thought experiment over a cartoon character

@Mr.Myoozik
Button’s Adventures is more comedy focused with a tint of MILF and Children of the Night is glorifying Luna kidnapping children.

Also never been a big Snowdrop fan, it was just alright. Double Rainboom is worse though and even Dusk’s Dawn is better than “edgy” animations of fillies torturing and murdering each other.

@CloudMistDragon
Those are the ones I’m talking about and I definitely agree with Dusk’s Dawn being bad. However, I never got the hate for Double Rainboom honestly, nothing about it gave me a strong negative reaction

@CloudMistDragon
Of those you mention, I think I’ve only ever seen Dusk’s Dawn - and yeah, it’s a fun bad, the kind you can only get when you try to make a serious masterpiece but completely miss the mark.

As far as super violent/gory fan works go, I did (and still do) genuinely enjoy Cupcakes HD and Smile HD. It’s a shame MisterDavey never made that Rainbow Factory based animation he teased on his Tumblr, but then he was probably trolling just like I imagine he was about half the stuff he posted.

@Mr.Myoozik
Double Rainboom promised itself to be a fanmade episode similar to the official, only to be nothing but references to other non-MLP things like how Velma thinks references equal funny.

@Butters Stotch
IIRC more than half of the Cinemare Sins points were for references, and it was the highest sinning episode the channel ever did.

I actually like Dusks Dawn. It is bad but in a way that makes me happy. I also feel like people shit on it too much. Lullaby for a Princess and Snowdrop are exceptions, not the norm.

Not to turn into this into the ‘rag on Snowdrop thread’ but I think the best example of the story torturing the blind filly just purely for the sake of feels is when Snowdrop is forced to exit the classroom straight into a snowstorm and then walk home alone.

Like, I get if Snowdrop’s mom is at work or something, and can’t pick up her daughter. But hey, Miss Teacher, you wanna maybe, I don’t know, make sure this kid gets home safe?? Her excuse is that Snowdrop ‘knows her way home’ but then she says ‘the last blizzard of the year is always the worst’. Seems like the type of scenario where you might wanna actually supervise her return, you know?

Also, I remember staying until 3AM to see Double Rainboom premiere. And I was so confused when it decided to be a PPG crossover.

@Jonny Manz
Dusk’s Dawn is indeed lolariously bad. Just for the record, the reason Double Rainboom gets ragged on a lot is because of the false advertising and the serious writing flaws (RD suddenly ending up in the world of The Powerpuff Girls…wut). Still, animation’s fantastic and the work put into it should be respected. I also honestly really liked MisterDavey’s stuff back in the day, but it’s the kind of thing I’ve outgrown and the stuff coming out now that’s trying to mime his style…oh dear…

I tried watching Dusk’s Dawn once. I couldn’t. It’s too cringe.

As for Snowdrop, I don’t hate the video or the OC, but it tries too hard to pull on my heartstrings.