Recap / My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic (IDW) Issue 43 to 45

For every light side we have, there's a dark side waiting in the wings.

Ponies of Dark Water

Story by Thom Zahler, Art by Tony Fleecs

The Mane 6 and Spike are returning to Ponyville after dealing with a matter in the Kingdom of Abyssinia to save Equestria. On their way back they come across a hot spring that had just appeared a few days prior, according to one of Fluttershy's animal friends. The Mane 6 decide that they need a break and decide to take a well-earned soak in its waters, while Spike waits for them. They eventually get back home and have a good night's sleep.

The next day, Spike wakes up in Twilight's castle, finding it oddly empty. Out on the streets, he finds there is a bit of chaos going around, and quickly discovers that Applejack has become rather direct and punctual, making other ponies get out of her way. Furthermore, Rainbow Dash is causing random Sonic Rainbooms over the town, Twilight's image appears at the castle, calling herself the most intelligent pony in Equestria and that all will bow to her demands, and Rarity, in a mask, demands perfection from everything around her. Spike and the Cutie Mark Crusaders quickly gather at their clubhouse, realizing something in the hot springs' waters has corrupted their friends, though they have yet to have seen Fluttershy or Pinkie Pie. Spike decides to send a message to Celestia for advice. Celestia sends Luna to Ponyville, given her past in dealing with such mind-warping entities. Luna arrives in time to protect Spike and the CMC from AJ chasing them out of Sweet Apple Acres. Luna attempts to study the magic affecting AJ, but it is too strong and AJ is able to escape by overpowering Luna's telekinesis.

Luna suggests that Zecora's potion knowledge may be of use, and sends the CMC off to fetch her, while she and Spike will try to minimize the damage to Ponyville. The CMC enter Everfree and discover that Fluttershy has turned the creatures of the forest against them, blocking the path to Zecora. Meanwhile, in Sugarcube Corner, a maniac Pinkie had done makeup and starts laughing hysterically.

The CMC manage to make their way around Fluttershy's animals to warn Zecora, and the group makes their way back to town. Meanwhile, Spike and Luna try to keep the rest of the Ponyville citizens safe, as Pinkie takes to more violent forms of comedy and Rarity goes on a destruction spree of any other clothing store in town. Luna and Zecora work out that because Spike had also encountered the waters, there is something about him that they need to study to revert the changes to the Mane 6. When Pinkie's and Rarity's ways cross, Pinkie gets upset and starts lashing out at the town with water balloons - filled with water from the hot spring. Those splashed with it become as corrupted as the Mane 6, and start creating an epidemic. The CMC, Spike, Zecora, and Luna try to race for cover, but Luna is splashed with the water during their run, and cannot help as she transforms back into Nightmare Moon.

Rarity makes her way to Twilight's castle to challenge her ego, while Pinkie comes out of the theater to challenge Nightmare Moon. This gives Zecora enough time to figure out a cure for the water using some of Spike's scales. They manage to strike Pinkie with the cure one Nightmare Moon has knocked her out. As Nightmare Moon heads for the castle, Pinkie helps Zecora, Spike and the CMC to help fix Applejack and Rainbow Dash, and Rainbow uses her weatherpony skills to seed the clouds above Ponyville, curing Fluttershy, her animals, and most of the other ponies in town, leaving only Twilight, Rarity, and Nightmare Moon affected.

In the castle, Twilight and Rarity are fighting over superiority of Ponyville when Nightmare Moon arrives. She calms the two down and suggests a truce, dividing Equestria into three parts that they each rule over. The others agree, and Nightmare Moon proposes a toast. Twilight is quick to realize this was a ruse, and while Rarity has drunk some of the cure, Twilight zaps at Nightmare Moon, revealing she was a complicit Luna all this time. The others arrive as Twilight explains that with her intelligence she had seen this to have been a likely scenario and they had failed to trick her. But as she walks out of the room, she falls for a bucket-over-the-door trick planted by Pinkie, curing her. Twilight and her friends quickly help to return the town back to normal.

Later, the group examine the hot springs, and both Luna and Zecora know that the waters have a strange magical pollution. Zecora is able to rid the waters of the bad magic. As Luna sets off, the Mane 6 apologize for their actions, but Luna knows they weren't under their own control. However, it was fortunate the waters had turned them against each other, as if they had been working together they would have been unstoppable.

Tropes appearing in this series.

• Actor Allusion: The alternate Issue 43 cover for the 2016 Pop Con convention showcases a ponified version of Tara Strong in a recording booth with Twilight and Spike. ^note Tara and artist, Andy Price, were guests at the con that year..
• And I Must Scream: Once the Mane 6 are broken free from the dark water's influence, they reveal that they could tell what they were doing but couldn't control their actions, as if their inhibitions and moral compass were stripped away.
• Call-Back: Zecora's potion-making skills are mentioned as a possible solution.
• Continuity Snarl:
  • Nonsapient deer are part of Fluttershy's army, despite previously having been established as a sapient race in this universe. On the other hand, nonsapient deer did appear on the show.
  • Despite previous issues and arcs implying Nightmare Moon possessed Luna, here she's simply Luna's dark side made manifest.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: Applejack takes on this as a persona.
• The Corruption: The Mane Six are corrupted into twisted reflections of themselves by the hot spring (the title dark water).
• Covers Always Lie: A cover of 45 shows Nightmare Moon fight the corrupted Twilight and Rarity. This never happens, because Luna returns to normal by the time she confronts Twilight and Rarity and just fakes her evil side.
• Easily Forgiven: Once the Mane Six is purged of the dark magic, everypony recognizes that they weren't themselves and forgive them.
• Evil Gloating: Twilight's flowchart for taking over Equestria has, as its penultimate step, "GLOAT!" in big bold letters. She duly indulges in this at the end of the comic, boasting about her genius, how she predicted everything that happened and how none of the other characters have a chance to stop her... right before she falls for the old bucket-over-the-door trick and gets the evil washed out of her.
• Flanderization: In-Universe, the effects of the water amplifies some of the negative personality traits of the Mane Six, like causing Rainbow to be so speed obsessed that she's constantly doing Rainbooms, Rarity wearing a mask because her makeup isn't perfect, etc.
• Heart Is an Awesome Power: It's demonstrated just how useful Fluttershy's ability to deal with animals is when Fluttershy organizes them to form a guard in the Everfree. Unfortunately, given that Fluttershy is corrupted, her ability is put to the negative use of keeping the Crusaders away from Zecora.
• Noodle Incident: Applejack notes in the beginning of the comic that the Mane Six weren't prosecuted this time. It makes you wonder how often this happens.
• The Perfectionist: Rarity wears a mask because she couldn't get her make-up exactly how she wanted it.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: After becoming corrupted, all of the Mane Six's eyes become dark red rather than their natural eye colors. Somewhat confusing in Rainbow Dash's case, since her normal eye color is not all that different.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Applejack flees after escaping Luna, threatening to return with muscle.
• Shout-Out:
  • Each of the corrupted Mane Six is based on a comic book villain.
    • Rarity is Doctor Doom, walking around in a mask and cloak too vain to let herself be seen due to an imagined deformity. That said, Rarity's mask◊ is based on Korgano's mask seen in Star Trek: The Next Generation.
    • Pinkie is The Joker, dressing up like a clown and quoting him at several points. Her first appearance post-corrupted has her watching her new looks on a broken mirror, clearly referencing Jack Nicholson's interpretation in Batman (1989), and even has her quoting the line "Wait 'til they get a load of me" from the same film.
    • Fluttershy is Poison Ivy, though for animals as well as plants, declaring her hatred of ponies for ruining the forest and intending to turn civilization back to nature.
    • Twilight is the Riddler as depicted in Batman Forever, using a magic device to absorb the intelligence of others to make herself smarter. The fact she had figured out all the actions, including Luna's plot, is similar to Ozymandias from Watchmen.
    • Rainbow is based on the numerous evil speedsters The Flash encounters, showing off her speed and boasting about how she's the fastest mare alive.
    • Applejack is mostly based on Lex Luthor, a corrupt and vicious businessmare.
  • The title refers to the obscure '90s cartoon The Pirates of Dark Water.
  • Spike mentions having tickets to a "Celestia rap musical", a nod to Hamilton
  • One of Twilight's mind-drained ponies notes "Mashed potatoes can be your friends", while another states that the two main character's mothers have the same first name.
• Suddenly Voiced: DJ Pon-3 starts talking upon being infected by the water. Though she could always talk in the comic series beforehand, this was before the TV show portrayed her as never speaking. It's used to emphasize the waters effects.
• Superpowered Evil Side: The waters didn't just corrupt the Mane Six, they made them more powerful, even allowing Applejack to break free of Luna's hold and Rarity to fight her competently (though she's still outmatched). Luna notes at the end that it's quite fortunate their friendship was also destroyed, as they would have been unstoppable if they'd worked together.
• Take That!:
  • The corrupted Applejack is clearly a take on Donald Trump, becoming a vicious businesspony who only cares about profits, puts emphasis on the word "huge," and is planning on building a wall around her trees.
  • A pony who's had his intelligence reduced by Twilight rambles about how two ponies' mothers have the same name.

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