Choosing to believe the student/young six have so much focus on them and their greater capabilities than other students because they've been chosen as student committee members and are student cultural ambassadors/representatives, that all the times the mane six are dumb af are on purpose to help the students learn practically through their own problem solving that leads them to ideate real world solutions later on in life on their own instead of mere theoretical reading as well as being a learning experience for ponies in humbling the mane six in being new professors who can always learn a thing or two from their students and that they are never infallible regardless of experience or status.
Chhoosing to believe that all the weird racial equestria-being-the-white-savior-to-other-nations undertones in the way they depict them and the positioning of the friendship school is not necessarily out of thinking equestria is better or more civilized, but as a genuine showcase of the power of friendship being needed in dark times, to help and aid each other like times before and equestria doing better in accepting cultural delegates to open up and strengthen ties rather than previous history, that this is as much of a learning process for ponies in ridding themselves of their prejudices [particularly with the mane six seeing non-ponies having ideas and their own connections to the elements and tree of harmony] as it is for all other kind in trusting equestrian resources, and is a friendship forged in alliance.
And initially I thought the young six was a dumb name from an obvious literal standpoint of them being young and there being six of them and the student six was better for catchiness but looking at it from a cultural standpoint and viewing it through a representative lens, the young six gives the importance deserve, in that they are each members of their respective kingdoms and a successive group to the mane six in being those to eventually step up to not just save equestria as was the mane six's oft-repeated mission, but all kingdoms and equestria-beyond. 'Mane' being specific to only ponies but simply the 'young' six showing the way forward.
Basing this on the justified criticism I've seen of the writing of G4 S8, how the mane six encounter mixed responses as ponies when interacting with other kinds or visiting other kingdoms or the features of delegates as well as learning their culture in various G4 episodes, the ways in which the mane six bond with members of other kind in the G4 2017 movie, how S9 furthers the idea of diversity and friendship 'ambassadors', and the G4 finale S9 EP25 The Ending of the End Part 2 scene/quote:
"Because of you I almost lost my way. But every creature here has reminded me of the true power of friendship.
There will always be darkness in the world. But there will also always be those who find the light.
The Pillars knew this. That's why they created the Elements of Harmony. The Elements showed me and my friends how strong our friendship could be.
Together we worked to bring harmony to Equestria. But there will always be more to do. Which is why we teach others about the magic of friendship. Others who will continue our mission after we are gone.
Now I truly understand. The Elements were just symbols. The real magic has always been right here. And the more who understand how powerful friendship is, the stronger we will all be.
Together."
Choosing to believe the school of friendship was the first slightly wonky step of many in equestrian activism, allyship and alliance, and that S8 showed the mane six can still learn more about friendship: that one is never an expert if they cannot learn new things, especially if they cannot learn from new friends.
Yeah this is subjective and show flaws remain show flaws, but part of why fandom exists is to want to see canon do better, to elaborate in a different way they feel true to the heart of the series and core of the characters.
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i was watching made in manehattan (season 5) and this background pony looked familiar... i feel like it doesnt FULLY make sense for him to grow so much in the time in between this and the school (season 8) but like.... timeline is already kinda a nebulous thing in mlp, so........ SANDBAR IS THAT YOU
A prank gone wrong ruins Hearth's Warming Eve preparations; while Twilight tries to figure out which of her students is behind it, the students bond over shared memories of home.
S8E16, “ Friendship University” / 8.11.2018
When Twilight discovers there's another school of friendship, she and Rarity go to investigate and are shocked to discover that Twilight's idol and Pillar of Old Equestria, Starswirl the Bearded, is enrolled at Friendship U!
S8E17, “The End in Friend” / 8.18.2018
Rarity and Rainbow Dash begin to question why they are friends when they can't find anything they both like to do together.
S8E18, “Yakity-Sax” / 8.25.2018
Pinkie Pie has a new hobby that she absolutely loves - playing the Zenithrash. But when her friends discourage her from playing due to her lack of skill, it causes a series of events leading to Pinkie Pie possibly leaving Ponyville forever!
S8E19, “On the Road to Friendship” / 9.1.2018
When Trixie is invited to bring her magic show to the far off land of Saddle Arabia, she can think of nopony better to bring along than her great and powerful assistant, Starlight - but, not all friends are meant to travel together.
S8E20, “The Washouts” / 9.8.2018
When Scootaloo becomes enamored with The Washouts, a touring group of stunt ponies, Rainbow Dash is concerned for her safety and worries that Scoot's days as her number one fan are over.
S8E21, “ A Rockhoof and a Hard Place” / 9.15.2018
When Rockhoof, a heroic Pillar of the past, is having trouble fitting into the modern world, Twilight and her friends strike to help him find a new purpose.
S8E22, “What Lies Beneath” / 9.22.2018
The students of Twilight's School of Friendship are cramming for "History of Magic in Equestria" exam in the school library when they discover a part of the school that no pony else knows about. When they decide to do some exploring they end up learning much more than they bargained for.
S8E23, “Sounds of Silence” / 9.29.2018
Fluttershy and Applejack journey to the edge of the map on a Friendship Quest to help a group of ponies named Kirin -- who are so afraid of hurting each other's feelings, they've taken a potion of silence.
S8E24, “Father Knows Best” / 10.6.2018
When a strange dragon crash lands in Ponyville claiming to be Spike's father, Spike is ready to do anything his "dad" says in order to learn how a to be a "real" dragon.
S8E25, “School Raze Prt.1″ / 10.13.2018
When the magic of Equestria mysteriously begins to fail, Twilight leads her friends on a quest for answers, leaving the School of Friendship open to attack from a dangerous mastermind.
S8E26, “School Raze Prt.2″ / 10.20.2018
While Twilight and the rest of the Mane Six try to escape Tarturus, Cozy Glow furthers her plot to take over the School of Friendship with only Twilight's students and the CMCs to stop her!
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I’m a Little Upset They Made Me Excited for Something Called Hascon
But, they did, and over the past two days (and counting! expect an IDW comic panel on Sunday!), they’ve released some spoilers and news that’s pretty damn cool.
No real movie news aside from Hype! It’s coming in 4 weeks! because they didn’t want to reveal too many spoilers for that (although I’m still waiting for Hasbro to step up its marketing game with this one), but aside from that, let’s see what news we got for MLP this weekend [if you want Movie insight, I actually recommend picking up the art book. I just got mine in the mail and WOW is the concept art ever pretty]! This is your spoiler warning if you don’t like that sort of thing.
UPDATED: TONS OF STUFF! Movie Screenshots, more season 8 news, IDW comics, and more!
MLP: The Movie!
Not much in the way of spoilers (you can read the novelization or the art book for those, I guess was their thinking), but have three stills!
Equestria Girls
New outfits, designed by an actual red carpet stylist, Carol Lam, for both the new doll line and the characters in canon
New Youtube series officially announced, and it’s Choose Your Own Adventure style! Expected in November
Shorts to continue, and one has even been teased
Another one was a “2 minute short about Sunset Shimmer drawing a comic and them animating it... based around [the] girls catching a jewel thief.”
School play is a concept that’s coming up. Whether in short form, 22 minute special form, or perhaps even movie (although please note there has been no explicit mention of an EG5, so lovers of the movies will have to be patient)
“When asked if there is a Sunset Shimmer doppleganger rolling around, one of the panelists noted that her pet theory is that it was always Sunset's fate to travel to humanland, and there isn't an original Sunset in the world. They are leaving this open in canon though.”
No plans for Discord in EQG at the moment, but who knows?
Find EQD’s report on that here.
Okay, so first off? Loving the new outfits. With any other teenager characters, it would be ridiculous that they’re so well dressed and styled (I noticed Sunset’s hair is juuust slightly different, can’t see the others well enough to tell), but for these girls, it makes sense, since they’re all friends with Rarity.
So, yes, Hasbro. I’ll buy your crazy marketing tactics for now, because cute outfits.
As to the Choose Your Own Adventure series, I think that’ll be interesting, but not quite as cool to me as stuff like the shorts, specials, and movies. Just a matter of personal taste, but the world-building going on in the Overpowered short, for instance, is only really cool if it has a lasting effect on the characters and their world (the report said something about a coal miners daughter wanting to disco, and while that sounds possibly cute, it’s not exactly my cup of tea).
But it’ll be fun to try, no doubt! And definitely cool for younger fans!
The post wasn’t super clear on whether the Choose Your Own Adventure stuff was the only EQG content coming to Youtube (we have been teased about a series, similar to the Hana Zuki show Hasbro has on there already), but until we hear otherwise, assume it’s just the CYOA series.
And a school play theme really does sound like it could be used for a movie or a special, if they wanted to keep doing long-form stories, so that’s what I’m hoping for, personally.
Oh and we still don’t know what these are from/for:
A currently unreleased summertime short, most likely a music video.
A Netflix listing we found out about back in August. This might be the place they feature the specials and shorts, but who knows?
Season 7 News
Clips were shown for next week’s episode, It Isn’t the Mane Thing About You (which might end up being a Pinkie and Rarity episode) and Marks and Recreation
It Isn’t the Mane Thing About (better clip than the first that was released)
Marks and Recreation (featuring the last song of the season)
Find EQD’s report on that here.
In addition, have some stills from a promo yet to be released on the rest of the season!
Likely from Secrets and Pies
Likely from A Health of Information
Likely from A Health of Information
(Not shown: Applejack falling into the party cave) Likely from Secrets and Pies
From It Isn’t the Mane Thing About You
From Once Upon a Zepplin
Likely from A Health of Information
Likely from A Health of Information (mask modelled after Mage Meadowbrook, so this will undoubtedly feature her story in a similar fashion to Daring Done, possibly told by Twilight, from the earlier screenshot)
From Once Upon a Zepplin
From It Isn’t the Mane Thing About You
Additionally, I’ll point out what we know for the season 7 finale: that there’s a tie into the Legends of Magic comics, and it’s called Shadow Play parts 1&2. Whether “shadow” refers to the character Shadowlock from the main comic series or King Sombra or something else entirely, we’ll have to wait and see!
Okay, so the most exciting thing for me is that Vincent Tong, voice of Flash Sentry and Feather Bangs, gets to sing again! As a villain this time! I could make a joke about him embracing the role the fandom has given him this season (Feather Bangs, the waifu stealer, and now Rumble, the antagonist).
Oh and for those who don’t remember, Rumble is Thunderlane’s little brother, who appears in Hurricane Fluttershy. It’s been a while, but he looked cute there.
I wonder if Starlight will have any role in this episode...
The addition of the Cake twins is to Mane Thing also adds hype for me. I’m still on the fence with the episode concept, mostly because I need to see how they’re going to run with it (could be uncomfortable to watch Rares lose her mane if done wrong), but the Cake twins were extremely endearing in Baby Cakes, and it would be nice to see more interaction between them and Pinkie Pie.
This season has been spectacular so far, so I’m glad not too much was spoiled (or you know, leaked...) so we get to enjoy it in full!
Season 8 News
Seaponies confirmed for season 8, the Movie will tie into the show
An animatic was released as well:
Find EQD’s report here.
SHE RETURNS!
I find it super interesting that Chrysalis is outright ignoring Starlight Glimmer while gathering DNA, given that she swore revenge against her. A large number of fans are speculating that this will be some sort of voodoo plot, where Chrysalis literally turns Starlight’s friends against her, like Starlight did to her.
Not only that, but if you look in the background of that animatic, you’ll find the mane 7 are in a suspiciously new building...
Some have speculated it’s Twilight’s new castle (meaning the crystal castle will get destroyed at the end of season 7, which is alarming because it’s connected to the Tree of Harmony). I feel like it might be more of an addition to her castle, either a school of Twilight’s own (hence, calling the rest of the girls Twilight’s “teachers”) or a house of diplomacy of some kind, like a U.N. building for the different nations that Twilight and company have been befriending (dragons, changelings, griffons, yaks---heck, even Sunset Shimmer could be considered a diplomat from Equestria to the humans).
It’s still a mystery...
Also, sea ponies! And they’re adorable! They translate to show style really well, actually! And it only makes you wonder just how many other things will carry over from the movie....
New info!
Look for a Cheese Sandwhich cameo
G. M. Berrow wrote a Season 8 episode she is super passionate about and her favorite episode overall. Maybe more book tie-ins like in "Daring Done".
Josh Haber's favorite pony is The Great and Probably Going To Be In Season 8 Trixie!
Derpy won't get a featured episode like Episode 100, but she will be around, likely more than season 7.
There will be two-parters, and that's plural, so it sounds like we return to the opening and closing episodes being epic two-parters. So expect You-Know-You that we saw in that animatic to be in one of these!
Things we already know about season 8 that you may have forgotten:
26 episodes confirmed
Orchestra music from the movie to be used in some of the season’s songs, which are all finalized by now
As well, there will be twice as many songs are there are in season 7, since Daniel Ingram’s time won’t be split up between the show and the movie
Discord confirmed
Josh Haber returning as story-editor
Mike Vogel returning finally after working on the movie
IDW Comics
This year’s holiday special!
For those of you who have listened to the Christmas album, that’ll look somewhat familiar...
MLP:FIM #60 Sara Richard cover!
MLP: FIM #61 Cover revealed! A collection of foreign dignitaries, from dragons, to deers, to cats/abyssnians, to gryphons!
“The story is going to be a "united nations" type gathering where all the various creatures throughout the planet convene to discuss the future of the planet. So think a Meeting of the United Nations but with Dragons, Buffalo, Hippogriffs, Anthro Cats, and a pony who controls the sun with a mere thought. Oh but there is a discovery made at the conference that could lead to trouble for our little ponies! A problem that might end up costing Equestria ownership of Canterlot!”
Legends of Magic #9! Seems to be a continuation of Flash Magnus’s previous issue, if the cover is to be believed.
Aaaand a page from Legends of Magic #6! Yes, that’s right, zombie ponies drawn by Andy Price. If 28 Pranks Later wasn’t grim enough for you, surely the master of expressions will deliver!
