I showed these two off in the updated version of the “Upcoming Characters” image, but here’s one in better quality. Yes, I have brought in some more G1 characters: Night Shade and Zeb who appeared in the “Bright Lights” episode of the original show in the 80s.

Night Shade (sometimes spelled Knight Shade) was meant to be a pastiche of Michael Jackson, but he didn’t really look or sound much like him, so I did the best to make my G4 version look more like MJ and a lot of the songs Night Shade sings are inspired by real MJ songs, Instiller instead of Thriller for instance. His hair was more magenta in G1 and he had a white coat, but I made mine have darker more muted purple and a greyish coat. Oddly enough, Night Shade didn’t have a cutie mark in G1 so I gave him one. The outfit is the same as the one he had in G1, but Night Shade dresses in many different outfits much like Michael Jackson did.

As for Zeb, he underwent a massive change. The Zeb we knew in G1 looked ridiculous and more like a donkey and was always bipedal for some reason. This Zeb obviously looks more like how we know zebras to look in the G4 universe with the grey color scheme and tribal tattoo designs for cutie marks. No, he’s not related to Zecora in any way, but he does come from the same country she does and his voice would be more like a low English/Australian voice like Idris Elba. Zeb is more serious and darker in my story so I thought that would fit. Much like G1 Zeb, he is still Night Shade’s manager, though his motives and how he’s using Night Shade are far different this time.

And will we see Erebus one day? Who knows.