Trick question: It’s neither better nor worse than G5 at the moment. It’s too soon. It’s a silly thing to say when G5 has few months in comparison to the content that G4 has received in ten and a half years.
Give Sunny and her friends one or two years of adventures, conflicts, contextual situations, secondary characters, villains, dangerous places, character arcs and themes that enhance the experience. Then we can make a fair comparison.
Anyway, this is a comic that I wanted to make for a couple of months and it was based on some arguments I’ve read that G4 was better than G5, even in september of last year, when the film was recently released in Netflix. I think it’s an unfair statement so I wanted to adress it, especially when you have unmeasured expectations based on the experience you had with Friendship is Magic. The only thing that statement does is to alienate people and to create unreal expectations in G5. I don’t want fanboys to suck all the fun out of this generation.
The funniest part of the whole process was drawing Twilight smoking a cigarrette. I love drawing annoyed characters who have to deal with a lot.
The dialogue from the 14th panel is based on sentences said to me by a couple of problematic fans I’ve met in the fandom, one in 2014 and another one in 2020. It’s kinda creepy to meet people in a fan community who want everyone to follow the rules while they were being self-righteous. Someone told me I was just unlucky to meet them at that moment, but it’s really hard to be honest when I met this kind of person.
In conclusion, Friendship is Magic is pretty good, I have good memories of my favourite episodes. But you don’t have to compare G5 to G4 just to conclude that G4 is better when G5 has very few months. Since I’m the kind of fan who likes new things, this generation is an opportunity for the writers to create new characters, new worlds, new themes, etc.
Also the 2010s was a shity decade anyway I prefer Golden age of the web and cartoon Network and Nickelodeon newgrounds stickdeath joecartoon ytmnd something awful ebaumsworld sfdt etc
@Background Pony #2312
I never moved on from my Discord hate either but hey, at least I don’t twist my hate into some mouthpiece to pretend to discuss a topic. If I hate Discord, I hate Discord. I’m not gonna be like “Is G4 better than G5 because Discord’s in it?”
TL; DR: “Friendly reminder number… (I’ve lost count, but 100 could easily be an underestimate): I hate Starlight. So I’m gonna draw up a comic where I put words in her mouth more reflective of my twisted and reality-challenged view of her rather than of a more stable mindset. All I need now is a pretext. How about…G4 vs G5 dispute? Perfect!”
@Wayneponeth
I see everyone ignoring that fact but it’s more like they don’t want to bring it up than agree with him. Because even 7 years wasn’t enough to heal his mental state.
@Myoozik @Background Pony #2312
Honestly the only point I think this piece is trying to come across is that this artist hates Starlight Glimmer which has already been established many, many times so it just doesn’t need further discussions anymore.
@Myoozik
Starlight pretty much reformed a long time ago with actual effort unlike a certain draconequus who’s now apparently gone Last Jedi in the comics.
Sunny if anything adores g4, thanks to her dad. If she acted like that, g5 wouldn’t even happen. She just listened to her best friend and wouldn’t even want to be Izzy’s friend even when she arrives. The status quo would be maintain. To Sprout’s delight.
And finally, Twilight being a fallen hero is a very unpopular idea and should never be canon. In universe, everyone hates Discord’s guts as compared to that other pony did more harm than help. In fact, he actually doesn’t even help anyone at all, and it’s usually too late to do so.
All in all, none of the characters used here are spiteful in canon. Trixie and Discord maybe but due to the blatant biasness. The argument falls flat. I get the point, but the execution is horrible.
The thing that’s frustrating about this is it makes some good points, but it takes preexisting characters and uses them as mouthpieces at the expense of their actual characters. If this was say, some random ponies or even the artist’ own OC, then the message would go down a lot easier but the fact that it takes beloved characters and turns them out of character just to spout arguments is what undermines the whole piece, even Twilight. I get that it’s bias, but I don’t think Starlight and Sunny would ever say that to each other, it’s just unpleasant. It also demonizes one side with strawman arguments instead of taking a more neutral approach for both to reach a compromise which I feel like would make the message feel a lot stronger without unnecessarily pointing fingers. I just don’t see both saying things like that and the execution could’ve been way better.
@Vengir
Now that you mentioned it, I like the two films, although I love the 2017 film more because it was the only thing that made me go back to the fandom. But the fact that A new generation has so likeable characters is a good sign for the future of G5. I always said for years that, if you have decent likeable characters, you can tell any story with them and you’re gonna be fine, because the audience has someone to root for.
I haven’t watched Tell your Tale, but I’ll give it a try. There was one joke that totally sold me.
And you’re right about the videogame! To be honest, I really didn’t espect a fully produced videogame by Hasbro that looks decent (it could have been very tempting to produce a shovelware game that looks like a Wii cheap game). back in 2012 we had Pony Kart and Fighting is Magic, but these were fan-projects.
So yeah, so far G5 is having a good start from scratch.
So far, in my opinion, G5 content has been proven to be better than its equivalent G4 content. The 2021 movie was better than the 2017 movie, and Tell Your Tale is so far better than Pony Life. And the video game has basically no equivalent in G4. Now, getting to FiM’s level with Make Your Mark is going to be a whole different beast, but G5’s track record has been pretty good up to this point.
@Wayneponeth
There you go, I was going to ask if you are confused about the argument or the characters representing the argument. May I introduce you to this guy, the OP and artist, and also the only sole Starlight hater who thinks compared to Discord who showed absolutely no improvement compared to said target, still think she’s worse. Replace any villain with Starlight and it’ll only serve to prove his point. Trixie and Zipp would fit better. Trixie is actually arrogant and spiteful even to her own best friend while Zipp is cool-headed, a g5 character and doesn’t care too much about the history as much as fairness.
Honestly my problem with this is the artist using Starlight as the representation of irritating G4 purist just because they don’t like Starlight. And no, it’s not because she is the one that split the fandom. If that’s the case then wouldn’t alicorn Twilight be a more fitting spokesperson? That is really a lot of effort to say “I don’t like this character”, a lot more than mine.
G5 is not a baby being compared to a toddler. G5 is a Sequel. G5 is G4 going to highschool. G5 has a headstart that G4 never did. It’s G4, with a gameplan. It’s G4, with an instant fanbase. It’s G4, but not as good… It’s not it’s own new thing. It’s Friendship is Magic Shippuden.
This. It’s not a new My Little Pony, is a sequel, so it’s natural that fans are going to be harsher on it, it’s just the nature of sequels. But the thing is, there’s nothing to really criticize. The movie to me felt like an extended pilot and the shorts, though nice, don’t really resonate with me. I don’t know these characters yet, haven’t had the chance to really see them in their everyday lives and know what makes them tick. Imagine if G4 had started with Pony Life, without the context of the show, it wouldn’t have worked on its own.
With that said, we have only been teased so far, fans should really hold their horses before condemning or defending G5. But once that season one drops it’s every man for themselves its going to be an interesting day for the internet.
This is the definition of a strawman argument. Starlight was in the wrong because she doesn’t represent anyone that dislikes G5.
And it’s quite sad you made such a huge comic just so you can argue and win against someone that’s not real. Everyone that predicted the G5 series would be bad has been proven right. That’s where we are right now.
G5 is not a baby being compared to a toddler. G5 is a Sequel. G5 is G4 going to highschool. G5 has a headstart that G4 never did. It’s G4, with a gameplan. It’s G4, with an instant fanbase. It’s G4, but not as good… It’s not it’s own new thing. It’s Friendship is Magic Shippuden.
And despite it not meeting our expectations, I think this fandom has been DAMN nice about the movie. So whilst I think some people are causing grief and trouble and trying to split the fandom, I don’t think those people are the ones on the side that dislike the G5 series.
I never moved on from my Discord hate either but hey, at least I don’t twist my hate into some mouthpiece to pretend to discuss a topic. If I hate Discord, I hate Discord. I’m not gonna be like “Is G4 better than G5 because Discord’s in it?”
I’m no fan of Starlight. I’m just disappointed he didn’t move on.
It already did.
I see everyone ignoring that fact but it’s more like they don’t want to bring it up than agree with him. Because even 7 years wasn’t enough to heal his mental state.
@Background Pony #2312
Honestly the only point I think this piece is trying to come across is that this artist hates Starlight Glimmer which has already been established many, many times so it just doesn’t need further discussions anymore.
Starlight pretty much reformed a long time ago with actual effort unlike a certain draconequus who’s now apparently gone Last Jedi in the comics.
Now that you mentioned it, I like the two films, although I love the 2017 film more because it was the only thing that made me go back to the fandom. But the fact that A new generation has so likeable characters is a good sign for the future of G5. I always said for years that, if you have decent likeable characters, you can tell any story with them and you’re gonna be fine, because the audience has someone to root for.
Edited
There you go, I was going to ask if you are confused about the argument or the characters representing the argument. May I introduce you to this guy, the OP and artist, and also the only sole Starlight hater who thinks compared to Discord who showed absolutely no improvement compared to said target, still think she’s worse. Replace any villain with Starlight and it’ll only serve to prove his point. Trixie and Zipp would fit better. Trixie is actually arrogant and spiteful even to her own best friend while Zipp is cool-headed, a g5 character and doesn’t care too much about the history as much as fairness.
it’s every man for themselvesits going to be an interesting day for the internet.This fandom has been splitting itself apart long before G5 even came into the picture
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