Soapbox time, where the fandom expresses its opinions! As always, we are open for submissions on these. If you'd like to submit your own soapbox, hit up this post for infos.
As always, these are the opinions of fandom members, not us here at EQD.
Have some headlines:
- Did Misty Have the Best Reformation Arc in All of G4/G5?
- The "Friendship is Forever" clip shows
- The Minty Mystery
- Did Grandma Figgy Raise Hitch?
The Minty Mystery
By: ManaMinori
Something strange is happening…And that something is a little mare named Minty. You see, while she was one of the original ponies of g1’s toyline, her fan favorite notoriety among later generations didn’t take off until her next appearance in g3, where she was a pony who liked socks. G4 fans - who also have an obsession with throwing socks on ponies aside from Minty- took their love of this pony to the extreme (as unfortunately, she was she only thing the g4 fans appreciated about g3….never mind the banger theme song or breathtaking backgrounds, of how cute and horrifically underutilized and under appreciated Star Catcher or Kimono were…,but I digress…)
Hasbro caught on to the Minty madness and began inserting her into G4’s toyline, comics, and even gave her a cameo in the ever popular g4 animated series of FIM. And before too long, though g4 had run its course- Minty was then inserted into G5’s series as well, appearing with other g1 ponies in a band called the Dreamlands.
So why does this present a problem? Well…given the fact that Minty is canonically in every pony generation except for g2, Friendship Gardens, I am left to wonder what she really is…is she just a pony, or a time traveler who is crusading through these generations with some purpose or ulterior motive in mind? Is she an anomaly? Is she hiding her true nature as an Alicorn under the guise of a mere earth pony? Why is she throughout so many generations, through the history of MLP’s 40 year run, but mysteriously absent from g2? Is she biding her time for something? Is she the cause of the war that Twilight mentioned in the future, back in “it’s about time”? There are just too many questions in this Minty mystery that I fear we will never find the answer to!
Did Grandma Figgy Raise Hitch?
By: Grace
By: Grace
In Generation Five, we still haven’t seen many parents in this show as of May 2023. One of those is Hitch. In the 2022 Christmas special, we saw Hitch’s Grandma Figgy. He literally does the same traditional thing every year. We even got to know that Grandma Figgy was familiar with Argyle and Sunny. In her house, Hitch’s grandma has a lot of pictures of Hitch, but we see no other known family. I used to just assume that Hitch was an orphan, and lived at an orphanage or with his grandma. We also assumed Scootaloo was an orphan until season nine when we met her aunts and her parents. Perhaps Hitch has a similar situation where his parents are rarely around and his parents entrusted him with Grandma Figgy for whenever they had to go away?
The "Friendship is Forever" clip shows
By: FirePuppy
By: FirePuppy
Ever since that leak occurred at the time before the series finale aired, it's confirmed that the studio produced a clip show miniseries called "My Little Pony: Friendship is Forever". We just didn't know that was the title until they aired in Australia over 3 years ago. But now here's the big question: Why was that miniseries made in the first place, and what was their purpose for?
My guess is that those clip shows were designed for networks that are close to losing their broadcasting rights for the main show, but to do so, they had to air all nine seasons first. And yet, Discovery Family has still refused to air this miniseries. What they instead are doing is air marathons of full episodes, as a complete substitute for the clip shows, as long as their broadcasting rights of the show will ever last. I mean, every time I think we're getting closer to seeing that miniseries, our chances get ruined each time with episodes and even full seasons being brought back to the network after not airing for a long time. And worst yet, the network is even refusing to let their contract with Hasbro expire, even with Warner Bros. and Discovery each getting 30% of the network.
If the Friendship is Forever miniseries can't air on Discovery Family, at least just put it on Netflix or Hulu. After all, Hasbro is almost done with Make Your Mark, and with most of Friendship is Magic having disappeared from the service, this is an opportunity for Friendship is Forever to appear on either one of these services.
I really don't want the clip shows to remain forever in the "shelf of movie languishment", seeing as though they're already taking as long as it took Sailor Moon to be imported from Japan to the United States.
Did Misty Have the Best Reformation Arc in All of G4/G5?
By: yondaime500
By: yondaime500
A lot of fans have been saying that Misty's reformation arc was handled better than that of any G4 character, so I decided to draw some comparisons between them to try and spark some discussion.
In most of the high profile G4 reformations, such as Luna, Sunset Shimmer, Starlight Glimmer, or Tempest Shadow, the characters in question were very much sure of what they wanted, until a single event caused them to realize that the path they had chosen would not lead to anything good, and that shell shock caused a drastic shift in their worldview, which almost made them feel like different people altogether. Some of them had their arrogance literally beaten out of them. While that is not completely unrealistic, it might have felt jarring to some.
Misty, on the other hand, always knew what she was doing wasn't right for her, but she did it anyway because she was told by her narcissistic mentor that it was the only way to get what she wanted. Until she eventually made the courageous decision to stay true to her beliefs and do what she thought was right, no matter the consequences. In that sense, she is more similar to Coco Pommel or Coloratura, but with a lot more screen time and a much more central role in the main storyline. She is also somewhat similar to SciTwi, except that the latter ultimately made the wrong choice and had to be rescued from it, which made her arc more similar to the ones from the previous paragraph.
Another topic that is often brought up is that of consequences. Most of the previously mentioned characters suffered both internal and external pressures as a result of their past choices, which literally kept them up at night (or at day in Luna's case). This is part of the reason why Rainbow Rocks received so much praise. In Misty's case, she suffered that pressure while she was still on the evil side, because she didn't truly want to be evil, but we have yet to see if she is going to be affected by it going forward. The story mainly seems to focus on her social anxiety and feelings of not belonging, which are more of a cause than a consequence of her past mistakes.
Ultimately, whether Misty was handled better than the G4 villains comes down to subjective experience and beliefs. But in any case, it is refreshing that at least one aspect of G5 was so universally well-received by the fandom. I hope we get more of that.
