Shadow Lock

Shadow Lock
Friendship is Magic character
Biographical information
Species	Pony  • Unicorn
Gender	Male
Occupation	Wanderer
Nationality	Equestrian
Relationships
Family	Stygian (distant ancestor)
Real world
First "Shadow Lock" Last —

Shadow Lock is an young stallion unicorn with a gray coat and black mane. Despite his young age, Shadow Lock is an incredibly powerful unicorn, seemingly rivaling even Twilight Sparkle in magical powers. Although not evil or malicious, Shadow Lock was a deeply paranoid individual who let his paranoia get the better of him. In spite of his paranoia causing harm to others, he fundamentally had good-intentions at heart and believed causing every pony to forget the history of Equestria would ultimately save them from the Pony of Shadows.

History

After years of living in his family's ancestral castle, Shadow Lock came across a record of an ancestor who fell to darkness and became a great menace to Equestria. He soon discovered other references, and came to fear either the return of this dark relative or that the Darkness would claim him as it had claimed his predecessor. After studying magic related to words, he set out to erase all record of the villain, hoping that it would prevent his return. However, his actions erased not only the knowledge contained in books, but in the minds of ponies, including himself.

Eventually, Shadow Lock's quest led him to the Castle of Friendship, where he stole several books following a confrontation with Twilight Sparkle. Twilight and the rest of the Mane Six later tracked him to Cauldron Bubbles' village, where they found Twilight's books with their text erased. They later found Shadow Lock checking out more books from a local library, only for him to use his powers to unleash several book monsters upon them. Shadow Lock briefly touched upon his reasons for acting before fleeing, leaving the Mane Six to contend with the creatures he had unleashed.

Shadow Lock would subsequently encounter the Mane Six again as he continued his quest, but managed to erase books from Ponyville Schoolhouse by summoning the Mane-Iac from a comic book. He also succeeded in an attack on the Canterlot newspaper archives, while failing to appear in Colonial Whinniesburg as expected. Shadow Lock eventually made his way to the Canterlot Museum, and used his magic to imprison Spike and the Mane Six-minus Twilight-in magically animated exhibits, before being confronted by Twilight herself. However, Twilight explained that she wanted to hear him out so she could understand his motivations clearly.

Shadow Lock explained his fears and quest to Twilight, who helped him see that his efforts wouldn't protect Equestria but leave it vulnerable, as even Shadow Lock couldn't remember how his ancestor had been defeated. As such, he agreed to halt his quest to erase records, and apologized to Twilight's friends after they escaped his traps. He thus set out to find more records, but this time to insure that Equestria would be prepared to contend with his ancestor if he returned. He or a counterpart of his later appeared in Princess Eris' castle, watching a magical duel between Trixie Lulamoon and Twily.

Powers and abilities

• Magic:
  • Sorcery:

Appearances

• Shadow Lock - Part 1
• Shadow Lock - Part 2
• Shadow Lock - Part 3

Behind the scenes

In terms of real-world importance, Shadow Lock is more notable than the vast majority of comic-original villains given his creation. Shadow Lock was created to be a villain to tie-into an end-season two-parter of the actual show, that being "Shadow Play".

References

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