@Kappe
I wanted redemption for Chrysalis also. One of the things that I miss from the anime that I used to watch was several antagonists being introduced, beaten up by the main character, and then they just become side characters that hang out with the main character.
That’s why I love the Chrysarmordance ship, aside from Shining Armor getting two wives, I think it gives a interesting scenario for rehabilitating Chrysalis.
Bugbutt first plans a epic take over of Equestria by impersonating Princess Cadance, but while doing so she actually falls in love with Shining Armor.
After being defeated, Princess Cadance and Shining Armor discuss what to do with the sulking bug queen, and they decide to give her a second chance and teach her how to share and create love between ponies and to go beyond just consuming love.
@armadiloeater
Well… okay. I like Chrysalis because she’s a changeling. Changelings are interesting because they A. feed on love, B. shapeshift, and C. are part-bug. And Chrysalis is seductive as hell.
I don’t like the comics because they take pretty much all of that, crumple it up, throw it out, douse the garbage can in gasoline, and light it on fire.
IDW changelings don’t feed on love, they feed on life. They drain it right out of actively-resisting enemy combatants right in front of them and emaciate them. Which is boring and contradicts the show because Chrysalis drained Shining Armor hard enough over the course of several days to beat Celestia, and all he got was a headache. And we don’t know whether the headache was caused by the love feeding or the mind control he was also under. Even Tirek’s magic draining isn’t as bad as changeling feeding is in the comics. It makes no sense.
Love draining is a unique ability with loads of interesting, storytelling implications, and they turned it something boring, dark, and has no interesting implications.
They barely shapeshift. Chrysalis shapeshifts like, once, to lure a bunch of defenders into retreating. That was mildly interesting. Of course, why would you need to shapeshift when you can just suck the love right out of people and basically kill them in the process whether its directed at you or not?
I liked to think of the Canterlot Wedding as an anomaly, that the changelings usually operate discreetly by infiltrating towns, adopting aliases, etc., and that the wedding invasion was sort of a last-ditch effort or Hail Mary pass. The comics have it in a way that the Canterlot Wedding was an anomaly, because it’s one of the few times Chrysalis actually bothered to disguise and feed on love that way. They literally do nothing but invade city after city undisguised.
And aside from Chrysalis’ chitin armor, the comics take absolutely no advantage of the fact that they’re part bug. Can they communicate via hive mind? How do they reproduce? Do they have eggs or live young?
I mean there’s LOADS of other interesting questions about changelings that go unanswered. Can changelings transfer collected love between each other? Do they need to eat regular food along with love? None of this even comes close to being answered.
And IDW Chrysalis is about as seductive as a temperamental 2-year old.
Not to mention how depressingly dark and unsuitable for a TV-Y rated children’s cartoon the Chrysalis comics are. I watch a show called Friendship is Magic because I like to get away from grimdark shit. I want to watch something light-hearted and cheery and put that warm fuzzy feeling in my chest. I want to see the changelings, and maybe Chrysalis too, get a happy ending. Oh, and the origin story was bupkis and added nothing of substance. We could have had some very interesting stories by giving her parents.
@Perteks
It’s actually a common thing I see that people have about the changelings having strange reproduction organs and all sorts of other weird stuff, it’s not pretty.
@Pagan
At least your headcanon about her doesn’t involve several layers of national geographic levels of detailed and disgusting theories about changeling reproduction.
@Pagan
Well we do have some facts: she wanted food for her subjects and was out for world domination of course!, she managed to dupe everyone but Twilight and you could argue that she had planned to make Twi look paranoid and crazy, she managed to best Celestia and in the end won in every way, she lost because she was too cocky on several levels.
@Perteks
Well yeah, she did say that, I didn’t disagree. That’s why I said I think she’s both a megalomaniac out for world domination but also a leader that cares for her subjects. I mean she even went into Canterlot alone to infiltrate and disable the ponies’ best defense. She put herself at risk instead of throwing her armies at the shield. But again, that’s interpretation.
And yes, she could have dealt with Twilight easily, but why kill her when she could have fun with her? Even if Twilight escaped she had a plan, and if that failed it didn’t matter. She had won the moment Shinning Armor had fallen under her control and she had secured the elements of harmony, the rest is just icing on the cake. I’m guessing that since she’s megalo she wanted to announce her victory just after the wedding, maybe at the balcony where the newlyweds wave to the crowd. Maybe maybe maybe.
We don’t have much time with Chrysalis once she reveals her true self, the only motivation she gives is “collecting food for her subjects”. After that it’s all up to interpretation; is she a megalomaniac conqueror or a mother afraid for her children, we don’t know. I like to think it’s a little bit of both.
2)Her plan worked flawlessly (no one saw through her disguise, she alianated Twilight to the point where she was cast out, taking out one of the elements) until the Deux Ex Machina with Cadance and Shinning. By pony standard she’s a least very competent. Then if ponies are dumb it’s another topic. And when she threw Twilight next to Cadance I saw it as a way to get rid of both her problems: Twilight would think the real Cadance was her enemy, she would hurt her (even kill her?) then would be so distraught when she learned the truth she would just shut down. She even appeared on the crystal covering Cadance, and it almost worker. Twilight did attack her. One stone, two birds. She even had a contingency plan with her bridesmaids. But again, Deux Ex Machina flowers and cartoon logic prevailed. And EVEN THEN she still had won, and only lost to the power of Luv.
3)I just see her as another species in Equestria, the comic origin didn’t seem very interesting in a world building way. But that’s completely subjective.
And until we have another episode with her all we have is a few snippets of information and a whole lot of headcannons.
@Pagan
Actually not her motivates was to find food for power and “First, we take Canterlot. And then, all of Equestria!” aka typical warlord idealogy, more power more land.
There is nothing about her caring about her subject its just fandom thing what did it.
More to this there is absolutly no interraction with her subject at all.
And lol highly intelligent, just because ponies are dumb that not mean she is highly intelligent. Especially how she just throw Twilight to place where is Cadence (+ taunting her is overall bad idea, taunting give motivation to enemy)
About origin, I like it its very stylish and good because its same idea where they took it (folklore) Aku born is same just its different source what Tartakovsky used. You could say same idea is venom from spiderman or shitload of other characters.
Still its way better origin than oh ah discorded flutter ponies or betray princess, or that love poison story (She is completly different race and that was pony story)
And Sombra pained childhood is like bad fanfic, it could be good but too much was focused on wrong things to show it good.
Headcanon ugh she is typicall raider leader and that completly work for her. Won’t say anything more about headcanon topic
@Pagan
Well crap, I agree with everything you said, I can’t launch us into a fiery debate ending in one of us throwing his computer out the window.
I’ll say that I dislike her comic origin way more than you do, and I just gave up on the story when Chryssi throws one of her drones into a volcano. Like you I see her as a master tactician that does everything for her people. But I also see her as a sex crazed megalomaniac (writing clopfics will rot your brain) so I’m not really the most competent about judging her.
Fine, Chrysalis in the show had a more valid reason to her actions than the other villains to feed her subjects taking over Equestria would have been a side effect as a result which means she would have gained more power but the inherent reason was for her subjects not herself that’s better than almost any other villain in the show in terms of motive, she was also very cunning she laid out this huge master plan and saw it come to fruition she fumbled in the end because she didn’t know about the deus exmachina love bomb but she was shown to be highly intelligent and crafty.
The comics however show her to be somewhat dimwitted in her actions and she is very petty like wanting revenge but makes no plans to make it happen rather she just shows up fights and then loses she’s also portrayed as not as caring towards her subjects yelling at them and even using them as objects to hurl at enemies which goes against her characterization from the show.
I also can’t say I’m pleased with her overall origin the tree thing is fine and visually it looked neat (even if they did just sorta rip off AKU from samurai jack for it) but they made her born evil no build up no story explaining it nothing she’s just evil and nothing more which was actually how I saw sombra but then they woobied him in his comic and gave him a pained childhood and chrysalis got the lazy writing instead.
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And if we get into headcanon territory I think Chrysalis tried to make peace with the ponies so her and her brood could feed without fear of retribution or hiding in exchange for an alliance but the ponies back then were not as accepting and deemed her and her kind monsters and she was shunned over time she became spiteful and then hateful of them and decided a truce could never be reached between them and that they would be food and nothing more.
Of all the characters in the show I think could have and should have been redeemed was her and her changeling not discord (even though I have come to love his character) or any of the others but now it’s to the point that if she were redeemed the show would be redeeming far too many characters but I still think she should have redeemed at some point and Sombra, tirek, starlight glimmer, and maybe even Lightning dust should remain protagonists since they are but one and Chrysalis has an entire race to shun them all seems a little much especially considering the crimes of at least three of the other villains we have were worse than hers in terms of motives.
