The Descent into Corruption
Analyzing Princess Luna’s Repression in “My Little Pony”
Throughout history, social status has been a symbol of respect and power in the world. Many of the greatest wars have started due to the irrational desire for more power and influence. When placed in a position of great power, a decision must be made — to rule with generosity and kindness, or with arrogance and greed. Sometimes, even if the choice seems easy, it can be complicated to get past distorted views and wants.
In the world of Equestria, power is shared between multiple rulers. For the longest time, the primary rulers of the land were the representation of the sun and the moon, two sisters who lived in balance and harmony with one another. Unfortunately, when power is shared, there is always an imbalance. The younger sister, Princess Luna, was constantly left in her older sister’s shadow. Feeling overlooked and underappreciated, feelings of jealousy stirred inside the young Princess, leaving her wanting more out of her destiny.
Left in a state of weakness, Princess Luna reached a tipping point, and eventually, her repressed emotions and desires caused her to become Nightmare Moon, a figure she never really wanted to be.
A Bitter Beginning
The setting of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic takes place many years after Nightmare Moon was banished to the moon. Through the lens of the protagonist, Twilight Sparkle, we see how it happened, and when the young Princess reached her breaking point.
Since birth, Princess Luna has been forced to live in her sister’s shadow. After becoming rulers of Equestria, she found that her subjects admired and looked up to Celestia for guidance while they slept away Luna’s nights. The Princess never truly felt that there was an equal balance of power between the two of them, and when she reached her tipping point, she allowed her desires for more power to take control, claiming that there could be but one ruler of the land and becoming an evil version of herself, Nightmare Moon.
To fight back against this, the older sister had no choice but to use the Elements of Harmony to banish her to the moon, never to be seen again for a thousand years.
The things that Princess Luna was forced to endure were a domino effect that had long been developing in her psyche. In the Sage Dictionary of Cultural Studies, Chris Barker defines how Freud, the father of psychology, describes the unconscious as “aspects of our minds and bodies of which we are not self-conscious.”
In Luna’s case, she had long been outshined by her elder sister, providing her with something that she did not realize she wanted or needed. These unconscious thoughts lead to a nagging feeling of desire that bubbled up, eventually spilling over. Mary Klage, in Key Terms in Literary Theory, outlines that desire, contrary to need, is “the constant unattainable longing for a (re)union between self and other.” For Luna, this was the unacceptable desire to be superior to her sister that rose within her.
Hiding the Rising Envy
For a long time, the Princess pushed down these feelings since she knew they were wrong. This act of repression — defined by Morris Eagle in The Edinburgh International Encyclopedia of Psychoanalysis as the hiding of “forbidden mental contents” — resulted in powerful emotions that consumed Luna. The Princess’s psychological thoughts and actions created a lasting effect on the way that she carried herself and paved the way for her inevitable downfall.
Princess Luna’s transformation is a direct result of her repressed emotions towards her sister. She longed to be the one her subjects looked up to and admired, hoping she could one day surpass her sister and become the more powerful of the two.
“I, too, have a sister who often shines more brightly than me, and with this, I have struggled.”
This demonstrates how Princess Luna often felt overlooked in her life. She never intended to act on these desires, however.
“Go see what the future holds if you fail to rein in your worst instincts, as I once did.”
When she expresses how she failed to “rein in” her worst instincts, she displays how they built up and eventually got out of hand.
In Key Concepts in Critical Social Theory, Nick Crossley writes that the desires we have that are considered unacceptable or evil are “pushed out of consciousness.” This supports that Luna bottled her feelings, using the act of repressing these emotions as a guard to prevent them from emerging. However, feelings pushed down for too long have the potential to reveal themselves. Morris Eagle describes in The Edinburgh International Encyclopaedia of Psychoanalysis how when a breaking point is reached, “anxiety and other dysphoric affects hitherto held in check by repression erupt.”
Without even realizing it, Luna was becoming more bitter by the day because of the heartache that she was keeping within her. As much as she knew that the things she considered were harmful and damaging, she still let the worst get the best of her.
A Sibling’s Struggle
The young Princess is not the only one who has suffered from repressed emotions.
Since having to banish Luna to the moon, Princess Celestia has been battling her better judgment and her own personal desires.
The elder Princess never wanted to imprison her sister, but using self-control and reason, decided that it was the best choice for her subjects. One may wonder, however, that when taking over responsibilities for both day and night, did Princess Celestia ever feel that she enjoyed ruling alone and having power to herself?
In season 7, we are given a glimpse of an alternate version of Celestia, Daybreaker. Similar to Nightmare Moon, she takes on villainous characteristics, giving us an idea of what Celestia could be hiding deep within herself.
These clips give the impression that Celestia may have enjoyed the power she had while her sister was imprisoned. However, unlike her sister, Celestia may have used her maturity and strength to ignore these thoughts. In The Concise Corsini Encyclopedia of Psychology and Behavioral Science, Edward Craighead expresses that there are two types of repression: one that is hidden, and one where “unwanted material is turned away before it reaches awareness at all.”
The elder sister may not have even realized her desire for power before it was pushed away, influencing her confusion and denial of Daybreaker’s presence.
These personas are created by the mind’s weakness and guilt, which Celestia, as the older sibling, was able to turn away. Taking this into consideration provides evidence that Nightmare Moon was likely created due to a weak state of mind and immaturity that lessened Luna’s ability to deflect unwanted thoughts.
Vulnerability
Before Princess Luna underwent her transformation, she found herself constantly being pried at, weakening her psyche until she was vulnerable enough to be attacked.
In the first episode, we see the two sisters ruling together, taking on the responsibilities of day and night. However, the younger sister felt jealous. The ponies are described as having “shunned and slept through her beautiful night.” Because of this, Luna felt a rise in resentment within her. This first displayed itself as an act of stubbornness. The Princess refused to lower the moon, desiring her subjects to enjoy and acknowledge her nights.
After her elder sister tried to correct Luna’s actions, the young Princess lashed out, allowing a dark essence to emerge and consume her. Luna’s desires likely presented themselves slowly, this “darkness” acting as a symbol that appeared in her mind, convincing her to follow a destructive path. In Critical Terms for Literary Study, Françoise Meltzer illustrates that Freud finds evidence for the unconscious through “obsessions, slips of the tongue, neurotic symptoms and dreams.” For Princess Luna, this manifested as impatience and a longing for more influence.
We are given evidence that the Princess spends much of her time alone. Working through the night, she is awake while everyone else is asleep, often isolating herself with her own thoughts. As she lacked a support system or people to notice her steady downfall, it was easy for her to be taken advantage of and give in to her selfish desires.
A Slow Recovery
Princess Luna moves forward in maturity and forgiveness of herself. However, her feelings of repression and self-doubt almost once again result in a harmful darkness taking over.
In this episode, we see a snippet of her forcing a nightmare upon herself in the form of the Tantabus, a creature she created to give herself nightmares as a punishment.
When the creature gains strength, it escapes her dreams and starts infiltrating the dreams of her subjects. She is forced to confront the creature she created and finds that it feeds off her negative feelings towards herself.
The Princess felt overwhelming guilt for what she did, but instead of coming forward about it, she kept these feelings concealed. Françoise Meltzer, in Critical Terms for Literary Study, notes that the unconscious is presented as “concrete metaphors or analogies.”
The young Princess experiences her desires and concealed feelings through the form of the Tantabus, who embodies her desire to atone for her mistakes. This episode symbolizes the way that desire manifests in dreams. Gregory Castle, in the Encyclopedia of Literary and Cultural Theory, distinguishes how dreams “represent in a disguised form the secret wish that lies hidden in the unconscious.” For Luna, the Tantabus was an embodiment of her shame and her desire to punish herself, revealing within her dreams Luna’s true fears of becoming the same evil being that she used to be.
Not only does this give insight into the Princess’s guilty psyche, but it also confirms that as she kept her feelings inside and hidden, the Tantabus became stronger. This supports the idea that when feelings are hidden for too long, they will eventually become too much to handle and slip out, causing more damage than they would have otherwise.
Accepting Herself for Who She Is
Princess Luna’s journey and transformation have become a significant part of who she is as a character. Sometimes, the things we know are wrong can be challenging to control and ignore, making us behave abnormally to what we would typically do. Just because unconscious thoughts can begin to long for something harmful, does not mean we necessarily want those thoughts and desires, nor are we even always aware of them. The young Princess never meant to become Nightmare Moon, yet her feelings still led her down that path. Everyone has a side of themselves that they wish to hide and keep secret, but it is crucial to know the effects hidden feelings can have. Princess Luna demonstrates the harm in keeping negative emotions buried and the importance of being truthful rather than hiding resentment.
Additional Sources Used in this Article
Chris Barker. “Unconscious.” The Sage Dictionary of Cultural Studies. 2004. Found on Credo Reference.
Edward Craighead. “Repression.” The Concise Corsini Encyclopedia of Psychology and Behavioral Science. 2004. Found on Credo Reference.
Françoise Meltzer. “Unconscious.” Critical Terms for Literary Study. 1995. Found on Credo Reference.
Gregory Castle. “Psychoanalysis (to 1966).” The Encyclopedia of Literary and Cultural Theory. 2011. Found on Credo Reference.
Mary Klage. “Desire.” Key Terms in Literary Theory. 2012. Found on Credo Reference.
Morris Eagle. “Repression.” The Edinburgh International Encyclopaedia of Psychoanalysis. 2006. Found on Credo Reference.
Nick Crossley. “Repression. (Psychoanalysis).” Key Concepts in Critical Social Theory. 2005. Found on Credo Reference.
