MLP G5 Discussion and Speculation Thread

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These discussions about the comics are the reason why I’d prefer Make your Mark and other G5 specials to speak for themselves. I don’t want an interconnected story that’s gonna be told in different episodes, comics or books. I want a simple yet effective story, that’s not too much to ask for.
Background Pony #26B8
So the Mane Six aren’t perfect beings with perfect plans? The misery! I thought they were flawless entities.
DarkObsidian
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Smiling Panzerfuchs 2.0
Well, I’m honestly not even sure they all really do. So taking Discord at his word. Aside from Hitch (who probably trusts Discord as far as he could throw him), Zipp & Pipp tend to show doubt. And don’t seem very impressed by Discord’s little show anyway. Sunny does briefly lapse into fangirl mode, but then also comes to her senses quite quickly. And Izzy is just Izzy. She doesn’t fall for Discord’s little trick of manipulating her with words. And after that Discord uses his chaos magic against the 5 anyway. Like I’m saying… He tried and failed…? I guess?
I think it’s not all the magic in the whole world, just the pony magic, Discord may have been wrong - and he is also associated with the pony magic itself by being partly pony, and can not use his chaos magic as a result.
Ah, I don’t know. May well be. But at least that doesn’t really come out of the comic in the literal sense. You the damage is already done with some fans who really take it literally.
It is certain that Twilight had informed the other world leaders - and since many centuries have passed without them reacting, it may mean that only the ponies were affected.
I also don’t think Twilight would do anything without first consulting with the other World Leaders. But to know more precisely, I guess we’ll have to wait for the show. I guess. :-/
“Great Pony Tribe War 14-18 TA”? Are these facts?
No! Celestia forbid, that was just a joke on my part. I just didn’t want to say pony tribe racism again. I’m getting tired of that term. Sorry for the misunderstanding.
In the end, the Mane 6 won, but the damage was done, they had realized that the emotional instability in the pony magic has become so strong, that it must be prevented. The non-ponies that may have entered into a loose world order with Equestria will undoubtedly put the Mane 6 under strong pressure, along with large parts of the Ponykind who only want peace and security. Twilight may have tried to remove the problem only to realize how profound it will be when dealing with the very essence of the Ponykind. Then this had to be sealed away, with a kind of “dam”, and together with her friends she took the magic from the ponies.
Yes. I see it the same way. The Unity Crystals are a killswitch, so to speak, that ensures that ponies (or their magic) don’t go crazy again. That makes me think. Wasn’t it mentioned in the Tirek comic that the ponies’ magic is the strongest in the world? If that’s really the case and IDW sticks to this (at least comic) lore, then the ponies are sitting on the magical nuclear arsenal, so to speak.
Heh… Maybe the Windigos aren’t a curse at all, but the safety mode of the world, that this species doesn’t pull everything and everyone with it in its anger against each other immediately into the ruin. But that doesn’t make sense either, considering Luna’s Future in A Hearth’s Warming Tail. My impression at the time was that if the Windigos rage virtually unchecked, then really nothing and no one will survive this catastrophe. Damn… How grim is this world, anyway?
It was not the best solution, and the spell that was probably Twilight’s masterpiece in her life was an emergency solution. But the Mane 6 had no choice, for this surpassed all they had encountered.
Eeyup. So far, at least, it looks like it.
It was not a good ending, but it is the writers behind G4 who must be blamed for making such a scenario possible, especially by making the magic very fragile, erratic and far too easy to manipulate as when Cozy wants to remove all magic. There are underlying tendencies towards anti-magic where the magic is denied by fear, and this had repeatedly emerged, most recently in S10. A “mature” magical world was deliberately made as unrealistic as possible.
Indeed. Something tells me that a lot of work is being done here to show that friendship is just not magic. Or rather, friendship is the real magic. But the magic of this world, which was there before, is chaotic and almost a little toxic. That would also partly explain the existence of Discord (except that the show wanted a Q character). Here I just have the envy of the Earth ponies in mind in the special. How great must the envy of the other species be then? And how great the anger, if they really have lost their magic… I mean, nothing has been confirmed yet. Personally, I don’t know with 100% accuracy at this point if all the magic in the world has really been banished into the three crystals. Or just as you said, the magic of the ponies. This can probably only be said exactly when we see the dragons again. Did the ponies not see them for generations because A.) the ponies isolated themselves B.) the magic was missing, so that the eggs did not hatch or C.) because the other species kept away from the ponies.
The G5 will thus be about repairing the pony magic and making it safe again to continue the course of civilization for better or worse. Although Mane 5 would like to continue to have magic, Zipp is skeptical about whether this can be justified in the face of possible disasters, and Sunny in mind may have thought that it is a bit reminiscent of coercion aimed at the ponies. Like Mane 6, they need to think about their people and their world in relation to magic.
Amen, brothers and sisters! And by that I mean: I couldn’t have put it any better. I don’t want to say: Make magic great again. But I would like to say: The ponies themselves must first learn how and what role they play in this world. And how big their responsibility towards magic and the world is.
The ponies (all tribes) are a natural part of this world. And they can really use their magic for the common good. But if you get used to it, or act under the wrong conditions, magic corrupts the whole system. The caste system hardly worked, so the two sisters stepped up. Under Celestia, the system didn’t work because it only gave preferential treatment to Equestria. Ponies had to learn friendship first, so to speak. And after Twilight failed to protect the ponies from their own inner conflicts, it is now the task of the Mane 5 to provide a natural balance from which all can benefit.
So either MLP is much more meta than I thought, or, what I rather suspect, it goes along with the current developments in our world. In 100 years, will historians and media scholars be discussing the fact that MLP addressed things that are a little above the average of a simple “kids’s show”? Or is it us, the older fans who, as beings of this world of ours, just interpret way too much into it? Either way, it doesn’t hurt to take a look at these thoughts at some point. ;-)
A human being will automatically give up magic if it is not possible to reconcile with human nature. Star Wars with the emotional division of the Force comes to mind, everyone saw what the consequences of this were in the SW universe with constant battle without stopping in the millennium after the millennium, the “light” against the “darkness”. In MLP, on the other hand, it is a question of having, with the risk of doom, or not having and surviving.
Not to mention that even Star Wars realized at some point that the Jedi way is not necessarily the only true way. There is more than one way to deal with responsibility. And yes. Of course, it’s the classic literary battle of good versus evil. But in this case, good versus the evil within. I like the idea of MLP taking on this (very human) struggle. Children, in my opinion, can’t learn early enough that values like cooperation, friendship, and fighting one’s fears is something that makes perfect sense. Especially because the world (our world) hasn’t necessarily improved for the better in the last 20 years in these areas either.
The magic needs to be fixed. There is no other way out.
In Equus, Absolutely. In our world, if you substitute the word friendship for the word magic: also absolutely. Be nice. Be supportive. And above all, don’t give in to your own fear. No matter what it is. Only the magic of friendship can save everyone. That’s all I have to say at the moment ;-)
Background Pony #26B8
People will never accept that there are no happy endings, that there is no utopia, that the Mane Six have flaws.
DarkObsidian
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Twinkling Balloon - Took part in the 2021 community collab.
Ten years of changes - Celebrated the 10th anniversary of MLP:FiM!
My Little Pony - 1992 Edition
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Smiling Panzerfuchs 2.0
I want a simple yet effective story, that’s not too much to ask for.
You may be right about that. I’m afraid, however, that Hasbro will hardly agree to this for economic reasons alone. Think about it, what’s better for a company that just wants to sell its product? That the fans have the impression that it would be enough to see only a part of the product range? Or that one rather tries to position oneself as broadly as possible and shout: Buy our products!
Sorry, of course I think just like you and others that consuming only one thing should actually be enough. But something tells me that we have long since passed that point. Unless Hasbro backs down again on this. But somehow I highly doubt that.
I thought they were flawless entities.
🎵 We’re not flawless
We’re a work in progress
We’ve got dents and we’ve got quirks
But it’s our flaws that make us work
🎵
Without our flaws there probably wouldn’t be any friendship at all.
Well said, Twilight. ;-)
fredsworth
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@DarkObsidian
I didn’t say “we” as in the characters; I said “we” as in the fans. Why are we, the fans, taking Discord at his word? Especially his telling of the origin of the crystals and the motivation for creating them.
Background Pony #2FAC
I think my main issue is that the unity crystals really don’t feel like they help the plot, rather they’re constantly forcing the plot to focus on them. Bring the unity crystals together to restore magic. Ponies can’t argue anymore because the unity crystals might break. Steal one of the crystals to cripple ponykind. Make the Mane Six act OOC to explain how the crystals were created. I was okay with the crystals being the focal point in the movie and MYM because they were close in time the two are, but I was hoping the ponies’ magic would become less reliant on the crystals, but the comic pretty much blows apart that hope. If the crystals were an actual character, they’d be a Black Hole Sue imo.
TheQuietMan
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House of the Arcana
@DarkObsidian
Tried and failed at convincing them with his rhetoric. In the end, he probably would still destroy the Crystal anyway. Only thing standing in his way is its apparently highly resilient if smashing it on the floor didn’t occur to him already.
@Lord WyrmSpawN
Better go and find Twilight.
DerpyFast
Solar Supporter - Fought against the New Lunar Republic rebellion on the side of the Solar Deity (April Fools 2023).
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My Little Pony - 1992 Edition
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Friendship, Art, and Magic (2018) - Celebrated Derpibooru's six year anniversary with friends.

It seems like Equestria and the power it wields has always been a liability. The single most common villain goal has been to steal/drain Equestria’s magic. At the same time, the three tribes not getting along seems to lead to problems regardless. (My theory is that whatever the storm that created those voids in MYM was, it’s cut from the same cloth as the windigoes, since both are weather-themed problems that show up when the three tribes fight.) So that’s kind of the baseline for the setting. So here are, in my opinion, the advantages of The Unity Crystals:
  • It’s a lot harder outsiders to steal Equestria’s magic and use it against them. Given that not even Discord can destroy them, that’s a pretty good safeguard.
  • The Crystals serve as a concrete symbol of what’s at stake; what ponies can accomplish when they work together, and what they stand to lose if they start fighting.
  • Equestria has a chance to rebuild.
  • Here’s an unpopular opinion: with great power comes great responsibility, and an emergency shutoff valve for the amount of power the ponies wield is reasonable.
Ring Team
Silly Pony - Celebrated the 13th anniversary of MLP:FIM, and 40 years of MLP!
Lunar Supporter - Helped forge New Lunar Republic's freedom in the face of the Solar Empire's oppressive tyrannical regime (April Fools 2023).
Ten years of changes - Celebrated the 10th anniversary of MLP:FiM!
A Really Classy Artist - 250+ images under their artist tag
An Artist Who Rocks - 100+ images under their artist tag
Artist -

@DarkObsidian
By that logic, the nine seasons of Friendship is Magic, the four EG films, the EG show, the EG shorts, the MLP shorts, the Pony Life show, the toys, the commercials, the IDW comics, the 2017 film… were also made with money in mind.
I think that argument is very reductive. We can go beyond that.
DarkObsidian
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Twinkling Balloon - Took part in the 2021 community collab.
Ten years of changes - Celebrated the 10th anniversary of MLP:FiM!
My Little Pony - 1992 Edition
Economist -

Smiling Panzerfuchs 2.0
I think I understand what you mean, but I don’t think you understood what I meant. I think. I’ll try to put it in a better way.
My argument is that Hasbro shifted the marketing of its MLP brand a bit with the start of G5. At least in my opinion. And that’s understandable in my opinion. Because of the pandemic, some distribution chains have changed, or even completely broken down. So digital content will become more and more important in the future. That affects comics, for example. Presenting show elements on a streaming service like Netflix, too. It makes sense. For economic reasons, it’s better for Hasbro to be more broadly based. And, of course, they want to link the individual products of their brand together somehow.
Whether you like that or not, that’s not the question here. And I’m sorry if you have to deny my logic right away. Personally, I don’t think this is a particularly good move on Hasbro’s part. It may even be that it’s not doing itself any favors in the end. But that will ultimately be up to the fans. That’s all I wanted to say. ;-)
Ring Team
Silly Pony - Celebrated the 13th anniversary of MLP:FIM, and 40 years of MLP!
Lunar Supporter - Helped forge New Lunar Republic's freedom in the face of the Solar Empire's oppressive tyrannical regime (April Fools 2023).
Ten years of changes - Celebrated the 10th anniversary of MLP:FiM!
A Really Classy Artist - 250+ images under their artist tag
An Artist Who Rocks - 100+ images under their artist tag
Artist -

For the most part I agree, although when the main story is being told in film or a TV show, I consider comics and books as alternative content for people who already loved the original content. That’s how I viewed Equestria Girls, the EDW comics and Pony Life regardless of the many complaints I’ve read about the last one.
In my case, it doesn’t attract to me as much as other fans. I’m only interested in A New Generation (which, by the way, I’m impressed how it looks for a 2021 animated film that was made during the pandemic), Make your Mark and Tell your Tale a little bit.
And about the comics, I don’t consider that problematic considering that Friendship is Magic has tons of egregious episodes in the last 4 seasons.
Background Pony #E026
Today’s TYT episode has Sunny, Izzy and Hitch as foals.
Dies from cuteness
DarkObsidian
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Twinkling Balloon - Took part in the 2021 community collab.
Ten years of changes - Celebrated the 10th anniversary of MLP:FiM!
My Little Pony - 1992 Edition
Economist -

Smiling Panzerfuchs 2.0
Eeyup. I want to see what’s going on with our mama’s boy. Fully spoiled with a self-confidence that could be pierced with a needle. No, seriously, I don’t really find him unsympathetic. Rather childishly naïve. I just wonder if he will get a revenge or retribution episode/arc.
Oh, no. I just had a Chronicles of Narnia Flashback. Sprout and Shadowy Alicorn. Oh, please don’t… Or maybe, yes? Hmmm… (in my brain there are different scenarios going on right now, how you could make a good, or a totally stupid episode out of this)
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