And now we come to the grand slam finale of this 3 part special with Mirror Magic, where all canon and theories burn and new theories emerge from the ashes because this was a ride of a special. I remember watching it for the first time and seeing the title card and thought “ok something going on with Juniper and I guess she’s back for vengeance. I didn’t expect fully what I got. If I were to put a moral to this special, it would be that life is too short to worry about fame and popularity and vengeance. Either than or be sure to not mess up the fabric of time and space because of a cute face.
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| “All around me are familiar faces, | worn out places, worn out faces” |
The anger is strong with this one. Juniper is now stuck with hearing and seeing the ones who ruined her plans for Daring Do fame on the big screen. I bet what eats her up even more inside is the face that the song is just so darn catchy. How these girls are not famous along with Crystal Prep, who were also in the music video, is beyond me.
And not only are they winners in a music video contest, they also get to have a mini moment on the poster for the Daring Do movie. The Humane 7 are really moving up in the fame department and at this point, I need more celebrities to be in this world. Have the girls meet Sapphire Shores or Feather Bangs as the Justin Beiber stand in we all make fun of him for. Also, poster is very identical to the pony book "Daring Do and the Marked Thief of Marapore", including cloaked figured in the back. Wish they could’ve had the lava river Daring Do would be on, but this is fine for a movie poster.
Uh oh! There goes that rogue magic again finding the exact person they need to corrupt. Good thing the dirty work is already done. Juniper already hates the girls with a passion and is too self-centered to think about anything else. It’s like these villains are made to be crazy, but we need to move the plot along for a real antagonist.
Oh honey. You don’t need a magic corrupting mirror to make you shiny and pretty. We have Snapchat filters for that. But an interesting take on the magic showing you what you want. Strangely a mix of the mirror from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and the magic mirror in Steven Universe. The use of mirrors in media are always a psychological and sociological phenomena of showing either what we want and desire or revealing a truth like the magic mirror in Snow White. In Juniper’s case, it shows how she wants to look as a star in the big pictures. Glamorous and wearing way too much makeup for a girl her age.
If there’s one thing we can count on, it’s that Sunset will always be thinking and always try to understand things. She really is a student/clone of Princess Twilight in the sense of always studying and trying to understand and figure things out even if it’s all new to her. The fact that she’s both worried and excited about magic in this human world fits her character. She wants to embrace it, but afraid of what it might do to others. And for good reason since last time magic was an issue was Legend of Everfree where an evil plant lady tried to trap her and her classmates at a summer camp. Then the magic geodes turning into necklaces that transformed them into anime magical girls. Probably a lot to take in all at once after not having magic for a long time while she was in this dimension.
And now we interrupt this love letter…I mean regular platonic advice letter to bring you the rest of the cast. I’m sure you were all wondering where they were. Well they were grabbing lunch. And apparently coming up with new celebrity names like Sun Shim. But I guess when we have names like Glim Glam, it makes sense that this nickname trend would catch on. Also it should be noted that the girls are now all wearing their magical geode necklaces since Movie Magic. Very nice detail to keep up with.
In other news, Pinkie Pie, as nice as she is to insist on Sunset sharing what’s bothering her, is still not aware of a little thing called “personal space”. Honestly with these two, it’s amazing Sunset didn’t try to lock Pinkie Pie in a closet during Sunset’s Backstage Pass. Sunset has the patience of a Pinkie Pie in a room of Pinkie Pies watching paint dry.
Anybody else jumped and got scarred for a moment here? Yeah, me too. Pinkie is…helpful. She really wants to make sure her friends are ok. But does this look like a Sunset Shimmer that is currently ok right now?
Yeah I know we should be over the whole “Sunset is a Twilight Sparkle clone”, but her worries when she does talk about it out loud is very similar to Twilight. Nothing else magic related has happened lately and it should be a good thing, but is stuck on when or if things can or will go wrong. It’s a type of anxiety that caused Twilight to stay awake watching the clocks and monitoring everything in "It’s About Time". She can’t enjoy when things are peaceful because she’s worried about when it won’t be. And during this talkdown we also have a Lyra and Bon Bon sighting along with Trender Hooves. And is it just me or is Trender possibly looking at a certain blond girl with cowboy boots on?
Well someone is very proud of herself in this mirror. And I don’t deny. I am LOVING this dress on her. I’m a big fan of purple and black (hence my OC’s mane and tail color) and the style does read as overly glamorous the way she would want to be seen. She costs a million dollars and she wants you to know it. Also, I have the sneaky suspicion that Channel 4 news is trying to re-brand itself with that 3 logo, but that’s just me.
So Juniper’s new look isn't just because she likes movies, but because she’s stuck with working at a movie theater that’s showing the Daring Do movie. We also get to meet her boss (who is credited as “boss” so no clue what to name him) of the movie theater looking to have her employee actually working and not looking at a mirror all the time. I mean, at least it’s not a cellphone? But don’t worry. They end up closer later on in the Holiday Unwrapped special.
Is love in the air or is it the Christmas spirit?
And with all people that use magic incorrectly, the magic gets stronger and stronger with its uses. In this case, it’s now granting her wishes of cleaned up popcorn just so she has an excuse to keep gazing at the mirror the whole time. Not really a good sign and any sensible person could get rid of the mirror if it seemed dangerous, but we’re in Equestria Girls. Sensible is becoming friends with the people who try to kill us. But I’ll appreciate that she looked pretty freaked out and was not expecting that to happen. At least there was some form of thought about this being trouble.
So I have no idea how safe this homemade portal was supposed to be in Sunset’s case. Not many times where she’s had to come through it compared to Princess Twilight coming to the human world. Makes me wonder if it’s just as much of a wild ride as it was from the beginning for her when she first appeared. Also, very interesting how at times Twilight would just walk through the portal and at least still have her feet/hooves on the ground while Sunset gets thrown like a fastball. Biased much, portal?
Oh hey it’s other best pony. Yes, I’m a Starlight fan I can admit it. She grew on me overtime. As a villain, she was fun and even reformed she was fun. And having two students of Twilight meeting like this was all that I ever wanted. While both have the troubled past of villainy (some better than others), it can’t be helped that they’re been compared to Twilight in a lot of cases. I talk more about the comparisons in my own video about the three and their similarities and differences. But let’s get this meet and greet started, shall we?
So it’s obviously been a while since Sunset has had four hooves and it truly shows. The confused look on Starlight’s face says everything here and how proud Sunset is with standing on two hooves is just too cute. Glad to see things like this can still be a habit when changing dimensions even down to her shoulder bag changing to a saddle bag or Twilight using her mouth to hold pens when she goes into the human world.
This is probably one of my favorite scenes of the whole special. No dialogue, just facial expressions and music and a few frustrated grunts from Sunset. The idea that she forgot she was a unicorn in this world and can levitate things with her horn instead of picking it up with her hands was just amazing to watch. And it’s interesting that she kind of got back into using a basic spell like levitation pretty quickly after forgetting to stand of all fours. Magic really is like riding a bike I suppose. And the fact that Starlight didn’t want to just come out and say “hey did you forget that you were a unicorn?” Though I can’t say much for her face in that last frame.
Sunset was really disappointed with not seeing Twilight again, but as stated, she was rushed off to solve a friendship problem, which based on the release date of Mirror Magic was during Season 7 of the show. And even by the date, nothing was really happening for Twilight that didn’t involve Starlight other than auntie duties for her spawn of a niece Flurry Heart during that season. Also, move over Lyra, there’s a new odd sitter in Equestria now. And she knows what hands are like.
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| Sunset: “Well…I have never seen you in that world so…chances are you aren’t run into yourself.” |
And that ladies and gentlecolts, was the line that broke a million fan theories. Actual confirmation that the human world and the pony world aren’t as parallel as we thought. It was very common to see certain human versions of characters (specifically, side characters and fan favorites), but not seeing pony versions of human characters. It’s safe to say that we know the world is bigger than we’re seeing in the human world so if there was another Starlight Glimmer in the human world, she would possibly be in another city or town. Even for Starlight, she lived in a different town when she was little and then made her own “middle of nowhere village” cult in Season 5’s premier. And even theory wise, we’ve seen pony versions of human people (Rick and Morty, Big Lebowski characters, Link). And we can also say the same thing about Equestria being bigger than we’ve seen even though we’ve seen A LOT of if so we can say maybe human characters like Timber Spruce, Micro Chips, or the main girls at Crystal Prep are not in Ponyville or Canterlot even though the Crystal Prep students are Canterlot ponies.
Ugh, I’m diving in too deep. I need a distraction to take me out of theory crafting and overthinking.
Yep. That’ll do. She must be a fan of the early generations of My Little Pony. I don’t think I would seen hearts and stars like that in someone’s eyes unless it was something very, very girly. But how could you say no to this face?
Answer: you can’t
And let the geek outs commence! Human Starlight! We get Human Starlight!!! And she can’t walk yet. And again, this is very on model with Twilight’s character trait of high curiosity and wanting to understand the unknown. I don’t know if I would be bold enough to walk through a portal only a few people have travelled through into a dimension I know barely anything about. For all we know, she could’ve ended up as a dog or a cat. But since pony = human in this world, we get Starlight in ripped leggings, vest and sparkly beanie. I love her wardrobe here and honestly I’m so glad she changed her hairstyle after reforming because I don’t know if the straight bangs would’ve done anything for this look.
We also get Starlight’s definition of “playing it cool”. At least Starlight has someone who can walk her through the whole “human” thing. Twilight had Spike and was lucky enough to know what and how a dog was supposed to act. This might take Sunset a minute to get Starlight people ready. I guess teaching a girl how to walk from a trot is a good distraction from her anxiety about magic so bonus points there.
We all really want to understand magic. Even if this is how you look to the public when trying to. Don’t worry folks. Nothing to see here. Just a girl dumping popcorn on the floor and yelling at a mirror to pick it up for her. I’m sure it’s for some new NikNok video trend going around like licking ice cream and putting it back on the shelf in stores. Seriously, what is with this disgrace against food?
Don’t worry Juniper. We all make that kind of face when Pinkie Pie talks a little bit too much. Also bad is that Pinkie’s excitement about Juniper being there went from exciting to crazy to concerning to just saying no. But no offense, of course. Though it was nice that her uncle Canter Zoom was able to pull some strings to get her this job. Most people would actually have to try. But I’m sure it helps when your uncle doesn’t rat you out about being a thief who sabotaged the movie production. That was very nice of him.
And now we go from picking up popcorn to taking out the main characters. Granted, maybe not have Rainbow Dash rubbing it in that if she didn’t mess with the filming, she would be with them celebrating the movie premier. Not a good idea RD. And even worse is that Juniper doesn’t seem to freaked out by the mirror as much anymore and looking to have some more fun with it.
Well we get to see more of Sunset’s Twilighting coming out with her worries about magic running loose and not knowing if they’ll be able to face it. Add to it the fact that she knows magic isn’t supposed to be in this world and that it’s different than in Equestria means it’s all new territory and can’t stop thinking of what might go wrong. She’s at least right in this case that six cellphones going to voicemail is a concern, but it shouldn’t be a constant worry. She can’t even enjoy how cute Starlight is with ice cream all over her face.
I want to say it’s an obvious thing not to trust someone who caused a lot of trouble and at the moment her friends are missing, she runs into Juniper wearing Fluttershy’s barrette as a pin. This is what makes Sunset a good character to have change from villain to ally. She can tell when something or someone is wrong and up to no good. Might be why her powers are about mind reading since she can feel and understand how others feel. It’s also great for plot purposes.
One mind meld later and we see Canter Zoom giving a stern talk to Juniper and the trouble that happened with the mirror and the others. Again, great for plot purposes, but since Sunset didn’t know why Juniper was here in the first place, of course she would need to see her even getting this job.
Still unfortunate that her plot point powers don’t work when being sucked into a magic mirror by a vengeful teenager bent on getting people to like her. In all times, this was probably the worst motive out of all the specials and movies. Vignette Valencia also had a pretty vapid goal in mind in Rollercoaster of Friendship and Wallflower Blush kinda blamed her short comings on the wrong person in Forgotten Friendship. But Juniper was already selfish and doing bad things before magic even became a factor.
Well good news, they’re all together again. Bad news, they’re all together again but trapped in a magic mirror with Starlight being their only saving grace. Strange news, them being together trapped in a magic mirror is doing something strange to their geodes and might be having their powers absorbed by this mirror space. And less shocking news, Fluttershy has still yet to get some bass in her voice to actually speak up when noticing the necklaces glowing in the first place. Anything I’m missing?
Oh right. The magic from the girls was sucked into Juniper and now she’s a 9 foot tall starlet with a fame complex. This dress is still not bad if they take off the green parts. And having her grow 9 feet tall was an interesting addition. Lady Dimitrescu, eat your heart out and drain it of its blood because we got a new glamazon stomping in.
And with this, we’re going back to the mirror motif only showing what we want to see instead of what’s really there. Juniper is so brainwashed by the mirror it’s making things more in her favor. She’s seeing fans and paparazzi instead of scared people or people trying to take videos of the freaky tall scary lady.
I can say this was a shining moment for Starlight. I know she’s good and would do this for anyone, but the fact that she really tried to go head to head with this giantess was pretty brave. No magic, not really knowledge of the world she’s in, she was just getting used to walking on two legs. And now she’s got to save everyone from being stuck in a mirror. Very eventful first day for her.
We’ve also got a ticking clock on our hands with the mirror taking damage in the real world. With the mirror cracking and it breaks, there won’t be much turning back. This was actually kinda scary to think about. I mean, yeah, they weren’t gonna kill off the main characters like this from some vapid self-absorbed attention hog. Too many people would revolt. The writers would be hunted down. A comment bomb would destroy Equestria Daily!
Luckily for the audience, we get a little bit of keep away from Juniper and Starlight with going around in circles. Funny and nerve wrecking all in one moment. I’m sure this sunglasses hut has seen better days.
Ok I don’t deny this got a laugh out of me. You are trying to live your best giant celebrity life and get your magic mirror back, but then you have to hear the same Dance Magic song interrupting your moment. Even I have to think someone put this up on purpose. This was not the best time to remind her that her moment of fame was gone in an instant. Also, for some reason they keep starting the song from the chorus instead of running the full song from the beginning. Stupid glitchy video.
This is why we love villains who are reformed. They are the best ones to understand where someone is coming from and what they truly needed to hear. Starlight was plagued by thoughts of revenge and it took someone else to reach out to help. It’s something Juniper can grasp onto without knowing the full story about Starlight. She can know she’s not the only one who’s made mistakes that would be unforgivable, but still wanted to open up to having a friend. I even love the fact that Juniper’s wish wasn’t just to let the girls out of the mirror, but to make up for her past mistakes. Now in genie language, that could mean something like erasing their memories of this ever happening, but letting the girls out and changing back is a good start.
Another scene deserving of a chef’s kiss. The fact that it’s true that they’ve all literally been there like Juniper, even down to Starlight, Twilight and Sunset all confessing their past screw ups as antagonists turned good. And just to add the bright exploding sprinkles on top, having Pinkie Pie pointing out that they are a really forgiving group. This was too self-aware not to be something Pinkie Pie would bring up. But I’m glad they all can joke about their pasts and that it did change them for the better. And not a single “no offense” joke in the moment. Truly a perfect moment. And maybe an eye opener for Juniper that she could’ve been a lot worse. She could’ve been a communist!
So not only do we get Juniper hanging out with everyone, but Princess Twilight gave permission to let Starlight stay a few more days and enjoy the movie premier. Which was actually nice that she did that. I wonder if Twilight had some concerns when she got back about her missing student. It’s not like she has to babysit Starlight, but knowing the portal was activated and Starlight and the new journal is gone would mean something like Starlight taking the journal in the portal to Sunset herself. But that’s if Twilight was really Twilighting though.
Yes I’m ending on these two. I absolutely love them together and they really bring out the best in each other. I like Starlight being a little mischievous about doing something not many have done and Sunset being a little reserved about keeping her safe and also having someone just as curious as her being introduced to a new world. I would love for more adventures with them and I like both characters as a whole being so cool with each other.
And that was Mirror Magic, a breakthrough of theories sprinkled with some great and funny moments. This might be my favorite out of all the specials if only for Starlight and more things happening in this one. I do love a good mystery caper like in Movie Magic and I like Rarity being the main focus in Dance Magic, but this one had a new character getting redeemed, a new theory element that had my scratching my head, and some much needed development for Sunset. For someone who sang about embracing the magic in Legend of Everfree, she sure got scared of in pretty fast. These were fun to watch and I can’t wait to read the comments about the alternate versions of people because I can’t be the only one at a corkboard covered in red yarn. I’m Penny Wrights and thanks to that song being played in this special again, I now have to play it for another four hours to get it out of my system.
