Princess Twilight Sparkle

Twilight was voiced by Tara Strong, and her singing voice was provided by Rebecca Shoichet.

Tara Strong was initially cast in the show when series creator Lauren Faust personally approached her about the project in 2010; the two had previously worked together on Cartoon Network's The Powerpuff Girls and Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends.[2]

In addition to auditioning for the role of Twilight Sparkle, Strong had also auditioned as Pinkie Pie and Applejack.[3][4]

Unlike most of the series' voice cast, who recorded their lines in Vancouver, Strong recorded all of her dialogue in her home studio in Los Angeles.[5] Although, she occasionally made trips to Vancouver to record with the rest of the cast.[6]

Rebecca Shoichet initially became involved with the series through frequent collaborator Daniel Ingram; she performed a number of song demos for him, including for the PBS animated series Martha Speaks.[7] During the show's casting phase, Shoichet was cast as Twilight Sparkle's singing voice after recording a demo for the series' theme song and because she sounded similar to Tara Strong, who provides Twilight's speaking voice.[8]

Twilight Sparkle is dedicated to rules and organization. She is an intelligent and dutiful scholar with an avid love of learning and skill in advanced unicorn magic such as levitation, teleportation, and the creation of force fields. A recurring theme since season two’s third episode, "Lesson Zero", Twilight's perfectionism causes her to be prone to nervous breakdowns when faced with seemingly difficult problems or things beyond her understanding, fearing that a mistake on her part will inevitably result in disastrous consequences. In season nine's seventeenth episode, "The Summer Sun Setback", she puts all of that aside in order to make preparations for the last Summer Sun Celebration and her future role as the ruler of Equestria.

Twilight begins the story as the devoted protégée of Princess Celestia, who tasks her with studying the magical properties of friendship in Ponyville and reporting her findings. Viewing friendship as trivial and unimportant, Twilight resents her assignment in the two-part series premiere. However, as the series progresses, she comes to form strong friendships with the rest of the Mane Six, realizing the value of friendship both from a magical standpoint and in the importance it holds in a person's life. She resides with her assistant Spike and pet owl named Owlowiscious (pronounced "Aloysius") in Ponyville's Golden Oak Library, where she also serves as town librarian.[9] At the end of season three, her apprenticeship to Celestia ends when she reverses an ancient spell by creating new magic based on her studies on friendship, transforms into an alicorn, and becomes a princess. At the end of season four, she becomes the Princess of Friendship, and she starts spreading friendship across Equestria with her friends. In season eight, she runs her newly-established School of Friendship to teach ponies and creatures the benefits of friendship with her friends serving as the teachers. In season nine, she prepares to become the new ruler of Equestria before Princess Celestia and Princess Luna's retirement. At the end of the show, she becomes the new ruler of Equestria, and she establishes the Council of Friendship to maintain her relationships with her friends over the years.

After studying the legend of the Mare in the Moon, Twilight believes the evil Nightmare Moon is about to return to wreak havoc on Equestria. She informs her teacher Princess Celestia of the danger. But the Princess declines her evidence, insisting that her isolated life of study is unhealthy. She sends Twilight and Spike to Ponyville to supervise the preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration and make some friends. That is when Twilight meets Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie. That night, she attends the celebration, only to find that Nightmare Moon has returned and kidnapped Princess Celestia. Twilight goes back to the library to search for a book regarding Nightmare Moon, and her new friends follow her. Together, the six ponies travel into the Everfree Forest to find the Elements of Harmony in order to stop Nightmare Moon. After a series of trials, Twilight grows to trust and respect the ponies, realizing their strengths and personalities and growing to care about them on a deeper level. They arrive at the Castle of the Two Sisters and confront Nightmare Moon herself, and are able to use the Elements of Harmony in order to defeat Nightmare Moon and restore her to her former self, Princess Luna. Twilight was welcomed as a hero, and she decides to stay in Ponyville with her newfound friends. Twilight successfully completes a number of impressive tasks with the help of her friends, the new wielders of the Elements of Harmony. After she and her friends thwart the return of Discord and help to prevent Queen Chrysalis' takeover of Canterlot, she is tasked with protecting the newly returned Crystal Empire from King Sombra. Upon her success, Celestia and Luna agree that she is ready to face another challenge: finishing an incomplete spell started by the legendary wizard Starswirl the Bearded. After accidentally switching her friends' cutie marks, Twilight is able to return them to normal and complete the spell. As a result, she creates new magic and becomes an alicorn, and Princess Celestia acknowledges her as a Princess.

While Twilight was preparing for the Summer Sun Celebration, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna have disappeared and an overgrowth of black vines from the Everfree Forset are attacking Ponyville. Twilight and her friends think Discord is responsible, so they summoned him for answers, but he claims he is innocent. They consult Zecora, who gives Twilight a potion that will help her learn what is causing the havoc. She learns that the Elements of Harmony came from the Tree of Harmony and believes that it must be in danger. As they found the tree entangled by the vines, Twilight assumes that it needs the Elements to survive, so they return them to the tree, eradicating the vines and freeing the princesses. The tree then sprouts a flower containing a chest with six keyholes. Some time later, Twilight is unsure of the role she is meant to play in Equestria. When Lord Tirek escapes from Tartarus, he begins stealing the magic from every pony in Equestria. Twilight was eager to stop Tirek, but Princess Celestia sends Discord to capture him. Discord convinces Twilight and her friends to try opening the chest from the Tree of Harmony, because he believes it contains a way to defeat Tirek. While reading their shared friendship journal, Twilight discovers that her friends have each been challenged over their respective Elements of Harmony and rewarded with a gift from someone they inspired. The gifts became five of the six keys needed to open the chest, but Twilight is yet to have a challenge of her own. The princesses summon Twilight and tells her that Tirek convinced Discord to join him, and they gave their magic to Twilight to hide it from them. She later engages Tirek in battle, but surrenders her magic in exchange for the safe return of her friends, proving faithful to her Element of Harmony. With the help of a repentant Discord, she and her friends opened the chest, gaining a new powerful magic which they used to defeat Tirek, while also bringing a new castle into in Ponyville. Joined by Celestia, Luna, and Cadance, Twilight reveals that she has discovered her purpose: to spread the magic of friendship across Equestria as the Princess of Friendship. While settling in her new home, the Castle of Friendship, Twilight and her friends create a magical map that sends them to various locations in Equestria through their cutie marks to solve friendship problems. Their first friendship mission brings them to a mysterious village run by Starlight Glimmer, a unicorn who wishes to build a "perfectly equal society" by magically removing everypony's cutie marks because she believes differences cause disharmony between friends, until they stopped everything she built. Some time later, Starlight returns to get revenge on Twilight and her friends by travelling back in time to prevent their friendship before it starts by stopping Rainbow Dash from performing her first Sonic Rainboom. Twilight and Spike followed after her, but they get trapped in a time loop as they repeatedly fail to stop her from altering the past. When they tried to show how her actions are ravaging Equestria, Starlight refuses to believe them and shows them how she was separated from her friend Sunburst, the day he earned his cutie mark and left to study magic in Canterlot, which sent her down her villainous path. But Twilight convinced Starlight to change her ways and make new friends. Twilight takes Starlight on as her student and teaches her the ways of friendship. After defeating Queen Chrysalis and bringing harmony to the Changeling Kingdom, Starlight is honored a hero and graduates from being Twilight's student.

Shortly after the Storm King's defeat, Twilight and her friends discover that the map has expanded to cover lands beyond Equestria. Twilight decides to open a school to teach ponies and creatures from Equestria and beyond the benefits of friendship, with her friends serving as the teachers. Soon, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna have decided to retire from ruling Equestria and they choose Twilight as their successor, so she starts preparing for her new role. Later, Twilight steps down from running the School of Friendship and puts Starlight in charge. Soon, she is crowned the new ruler of Equestria and she establishes the Council of Friendship to maintain her relationships with her friends over the years. In the future, Twilight is visited by Luster Dawn, her best student at the School for Gifted Unicorns, who believes that friendship is a waste of time. She tells Luster about how she was worried of losing her friends on her coronation day years ago. Luster thought that Twilight's story was proof that making friends is pointless, but after meeting her friends and seeing how close they have stayed over the years, she realizes that friendship is not a waste of time after all. After that, Twilight sends Luster to Ponyville, where she starts to make friends and have adventures of her own.

Twilight is a heroic adventurer and her exploits far surpass those depicted in the animated series. On numerous occasions, Twilight has been instrumental in saving both the nations of her world and the nations encountered on other worlds, and her adventures have involved traveling to the Moon in order to free Rarity from Nightmare Moon, traveling to the Changeling Kingdom in order to save the Cutie Mark Crusaders, and traveling to various alternate universes.

The Friendship is Magic television series is continued in IDW comic format.

Twilight Sparkle is set to appear alongside the rest of the Mane Six in the upcoming series My Little Pony: Pony Life. The new show will feature a different animation technique and will focus more on slice of life-style stories than its predecessor.[10]

Twilight Sparkle, colloquially referred to as Sci-Twi by the fandom and official Hasbro merchandising, is the human counterpart of Princess Twilight Sparkle and is currently a student of Canterlot High School. Human Twilight's character design differs slightly from her pony counterpart: she wears thick black glasses, her hair is tied up into a bun, and the pink highlight in her hair is wider than the pink highlight in pony Twilight's mane. In Legend of Everfree and on the back cover and spine of the chapter book Twilight's Sparkly Sleepover Surprise, human Twilight wears her hair in a ponytail as opposed to a bun.

Twilight is a genius student who is extremely sweet, kind-hearted and caring, physically weak, socially withdrawn, and emotionally reserved. She had no social life and friends before transferring to Canterlot High. Her intelligence exceeds almost everyone else she knows in the human world, with exceptional proficiency in a vast number of subjects. She inherits telekinetic abilities through the use of her geo stone. Like her pony counterpart, Twilight cannot bear the thought of not knowing something. Unlike some of her friends, Twilight lacks artistic inclination, but seems to enjoy acting.

Twilight's evil alter ego, Midnight Sparkle, first appears in Friendship Games; she haunts her in her nightmares and gives her severe anxiety of her previous actions in Legend of Everfree. However, with the help of her friends, she is able to overcome her fear of Midnight Sparkle and gain control of her magic.

Like her pony counterpart, human Twilight is well-spoken and exhibits extreme intelligence, having skipped two grades in elementary school, and is the youngest student at her school. She holds a great interest in knowledge and science, being able to create intricate scientific devices and solve complex mathematical equations, exhibits welding skills and engineering abilities, and is an absolute nerd in regards to her love for astronomy and all types of literature. Her intellect rivals that of Sunset Shimmer, as both maintain highest GPA among their class. Unlike her pony counterpart, human Twilight is a "wallflower", acting very awkward and timid around others, especially the standoffish students of Crystal Prep. While not a coward, she appears to lack the bravery of her pony counterpart; while her pony counterpart would loudly confront bullies for their mean behavior, this version of Twilight seems willing to merely ignore them.

In "Spring Breakdown", Twilight admires and admits jealousy over her pony counterpart's adventurous life and many accomplishments; comparing her to a superhero. The Princess reminded her that no good can ever come from trying to compare herself or her accomplishments to that of their friends.

• Twilight is a reincarnation of an "egyptian cat" who bravely fought against the evils of the Nightmare and the former empress of Ponyville. The cat is the Element of Magic and is tattooed with Twilight's 5-star cutie mark symbol, but her personality is the polar opposite of Twilight's; arrogant, reckless, and chaotic, with disdain for books and learning. She and Discord are best friends and is romantically attracted to him.
• The Great and Powerful Twily was a unicorn mare and counterpart of Twilight Sparkle who either visited or was native to Eris' dimension.[11][12] Unlike her Equestrian counterpart, her personality and attire resembles the Trixie Lulamoon, and she seems to have pursued an interest in stage magic rather than actual magic. In this Twilight's homeworld, Princess Trixie is the Element of Magic and Ruler of Equestria.

Twilight appears as a main character in the first two Equestria Girls films.

In My Little Pony: Equestria Girls, she travels through a magic mirror to the human world with Spike when Sunset Shimmer steals her crown containing the Element of Magic. There, she poses as a student at Canterlot High School and befriends the human counterparts of her friends, who help her win the crown back by getting voted Princess of the school's Fall Formal, defeating and reforming Sunset when she tries to use the crown to brainwash the students into becoming her personal army to invade Equestria.

In My Little Pony: Equestria Girls – Rainbow Rocks, she returns to the human world with Spike when Sunset uses her magic book to warn her of the emergence of the Dazzlings. She is then recruited to join her Canterlot High School friends' band, the Rainbooms, as the temporary lead singer to compete in the school's Battle of the Bands, while she works on a counter-spell to break the mind-control spell the Dazzlings have on the students. With Sunset's help, the Rainbooms defeat the Dazzlings and leave them powerless. After she returns to Equestria with Spike, Sunset keeps in touch with her using her magic book.

In My Little Pony: Equestria Girls – Friendship Games, her human counterpart is fully introduced and becomes a main character in the franchise with Sunset and her CHS friends, with Princess Twilight meeting her in a pre-credits scene.

In later media, she appears as a recurring character, often advising Sunset and her friends when they ask her for assistance regarding Equestrian magic.

While Twilight and her friends are preparing Equestria's first Friendship Festival in Canterlot, the city comes under attack by the army of an evil conqueror called the Storm King, led by his second-in-command, Tempest Shadow, a unicorn with a broken horn. Twilight and her friends journey beyond Equestria to defeat the Storm King and make new allies in the process.

In My Little Pony: Best Gift Ever, Twilight and her friends do a "Hearth's Warming Helper" to get just one Hearth's Warming present for another pony, so they travel all over Equestria to find the perfect gift.

In My Little Pony: Rainbow Roadtrip, Twilight and her friends travel to the town of Hope Hollow to attend their annual Rainbow Festival after Rainbow Dash had been invited as a guest of honor. When they arrived, they found out that the town’s color had faded away. Twilight and her friends starts working to restore the town’s color and bring the Rainbow Festival back.

Twilight Sparkle appears in the official My Little Pony: The Manga, a manga anthology series published by Seven Seas. The first volume contained 8 stories, with the first six being based on members of the Mane Six, the seventh story featuring the original character Star Dancer and the eighth story featuring Discord creating a manga-themed dimension to "mess with the Mane Six". The manga was first announced on November 13, 2018 with volume 1 released on June 18, 2019.[13] The manga is currently set for a three-volume run.

Volumes

• A Day in the Life of Equestria volume 1
• A Day in the Life of Equestria volume 2
• A Day in the Life of Equestria volume 3

Twilight Sparkle is featured in the non-canonical My Little Pony Manga spin-off adaptation by Pucchigumi. Twilight is depicted as a unicorn mare and the owner of Golden Oak Library. She lives with her best friend, Spike and is the younger sister of Shining Armor and the sister-in-law of his wife, Cadance. Twilight is far more dramatic here than her animated counterpart, being prone to giving off highly exaggerated expressions when good or bad things happen. As in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, she is extremely brave, compassionate, and loving; however unlike the show she is shown to be immature and has a sarcastic sense of humor and a fiery temper. Her best friend is Spike, with the relationship dynamic being reversed from Friendship is Magic, in that Spike takes care of his irresponsible "big sister".

Pucchigumi is a Japanese magazine that contains stories, manga and games primarily aimed at young girls. In 2013, the magazine published 17 My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic stories. The stories have yet to be officially released in North America. The comics are drawn and presumably written by Akira Himekawa, a pair of two Japanese artist and "mangaka". Because show writers did not collaborate on the project, Akira Himekawa took creative liberties with their version of Twilight and is considered by Hasbro to be non-canon within the Friendship is Magic multiverse. The manga currently contains a little over 70 pages with 17 total stories. The stories are typically down-to-earth slice of life scenarios that are often jumpstarted by exaggerated versions of the Mane Six. The comedy of the manga is considerably different than the sense of humor depicted in the comics and animated series, as it instead uses "super-deformed" and "chibi" artstyles and much more off-the-wall humor. The manga does not explore the other genres that Friendship is Magic is known for, such as adventure and action, though isn't devoid of such stories either.

Volumes