You've just made a nice description of what Sunset Shimmer is. Sunset is originally driven by sheer lust of power and then she makes a sudden and complete U-turn. No trace of her previous bad traits at all. Unlike Starlight.





Starlight wasn't originally evil, just her personal experience completly twisted her perception. She did several bad calls and when she was brought back to her senses, her mistakes and the possibility of her unintentionally making them again have terrified her ever since. Besides, she still has the traits that led her to her moral failures. She tends to pick extreme solutions, her lack of experience with friendship can be seen when she bottles up her anger with Trixie because she has no idea what to do with it and she thinks scolding her friend is bad. With the combination of her being one of the most powerful unicorns in Equestria, a smart and natural leader, there is plenty of space for another misstep. And she knows it. And she fears it - thus pushes herself into a very submissive bystander role.





I find her VERY relatable, actually more than any of the Mane6 because she's the only one who has made serious moral mistakes in her life and had to deal with the damaged "can I be truly good after this?" self-confidence. Mane 6 seems very flat compared to her, only Rainbow Dash and Rarity come a bit close - only they have traits that can be trully called negative. I've been waiting for a pony I could truly relate with ever since S1. I thought I found such pony in Sunseth Shimmer who I still love but watching Starlight's character develop, I figured she stands above others - that I can relate with her in MANY aspects ♥. And I used to hate her at first because she appeared to be just a carbon copy of Sunset Shimmer who would then never really come back to Equestria.

