My Little Pony: Pony Life

Am a fan of 'My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic'. Sure all of the nine seasons had at least one misfire, but when the show was at its best it was fantastic and made for one of the best animated shows in recent years. Was actually not expecting to love it so much but it is a fine example of not judging a book by its cover or something with prejudice (with it being a show that breaks the stereotypes of the show being a toy commercial excuse or just for girls in primary school).

Was really hoping that 'My Little Pony: Pony Life' would be good, even if it was not quite that show's level. It didn't look great at all and neither was the marketing particularly, but after 'Friendship is Magic' bettered all expectations there was the feeling "what if the show turned out to be better than it looks and sounds". It saddens me to say that 'My Little Pony: Pony Life' was a huge disappointment and as bad as others have cited it as. Have gone against the grain quite a number of times with my opinions, but not this time sadly. This is also coming from somebody who has never had a problem with the 'My Little Pony' franchise, while being mindful that its appeal is not as wide ranging as 'Friendship is Magic' turned out.

'My Little Pony: Pony Life's' only redeeming quality is the voice acting, though all did better elsewhere. Everybody nobly made the most of what they're given, with well beneath them material, and give energy and nuance to character writing that is anything but.

However, so much is wrong. In fact, everything else fails and at worst disastrously so. The animation has a very rushed and careless look, no vibrancy or imagination here and it just felt indicative of rushed production and not particularly high budget. The music is never dynamic with the action and is quite cheesy at times. The theme tune also grates.

The storylines have no soul or charm, and almost all of them are very thin, predictable and overly-simple. The writing is very childish and goes too far on the cutesiness, complete with an over-reliance on limp, never imaginative and non-sophisticated slapstick. The moralising can be tacked on and heavy-handed and are not near as relatable as those in 'Friendship is Magic'. After that show did such a wonderful job at providing plenty for people of all ages and genders and breaking away from the ignorant target audience stereotype people have for anything 'My Little Pony' related, 'Pony Life' dumbs down and reinforces it.

Which is going to make it hard for older viewers to enjoy likely and even younger viewers may find it too juvenile. The character writing is far from complex, none of the characters are interesting or easy to relate to (even at times not having much personality). Instead they are all shallow cliches and have excessively overblown character flaws, am aware that a number of episodes of 'Friendship is Magic' were guilty of this but not to this extreme an effect. The chemistry is very disconnected and they don't come over like friends.

Concluding, very poor. 2/10.

I would be much more harsh, but honestly, its hard to get mad at, its terrible, but harmless. Its best to ignore it and not see it as canon.

Which at least i remembered watching that show.

this gen (not sure if it's supposed to be gen 4.5 or 5) however, isn't really that interesting to me. things are fast paced, art style of the animation looks like an inspiration of gacha life, and the reboot itself flopped.

I can't believe it. I can't freakin' believe it! Almost immediately after the sweet and bitter goodbye to FiM, Hasbro followed it up... with THIS?! Are you... are you serious, Hasbro? This is how you honor the end of MLP's most successful and iconic era? THIS?! You're literally spitting and taking a dump on the very thing that resurrected this franchise, broke the "it's just a show for little girls" stereotype AND made you a gigantic fortune. This is insulting!

First off, the animation is cheap. It's literally a rehash of the same bland, boring CalArts visual style that i'm sick and tired of seeing! Hell, they don't even do anything new or remotely good with it. They just shrunk the characters down to chibi-style without any changes, and gave it some of the laziest backgrounds i've seen in a cartoon in a long time. Seriously, these backgrounds look like they were drawn by a 4-year-old in the span of 10 minutes. Remember the beautiful visuals and backgrounds FiM had? well, Hasbro literally said "Screw all that!" and gave us something that's so flat and lifeless to look at.

Then comes the characters.... oh boy! Remember how i said FiM went against the cutesy, lovey-dovey stereotypes most girl shows before it suffered from, and actually made it enjoyable for all ages? That was completely thrown out the window here! Instead, what we got here are grotesque caricatures of the original Mane 6 we all know and love. And they're not even likable or interesting in this show! These clones literally have only one single trait to them: Twilight is the psychotic nerd, Pinkie is annoying, Rarity is the hoarder, Rainbow Dash is overly competitive, Applejack just breaks the fourth wall for no real reason, and Fluttershy.... oh my god, Hasbro! What the hell did you do to her?! as for the others, they're no better either. They even got rid of Luna and Cadence, and Twilight doesn't have her princess status anymore. What were you thinking, Hasbro?

As for the comedy.... again, going back to FiM: the original show had jokes that actually landed and were legitimately funny. It didn't focus on the juvenile aspect to insult the audience's intelligence, because the writers knew what they were doing, and went outta their way to make it legit funny. It even found ways to make slapstick funny, which is pretty rare in cartoons nowadays. And it also had heart to it. It made sure the audience cared about the characters and what they went through. What does Pony Life do? COMPLETELY THROW THAT IN THE TRASH! Like it meant nothing! Now, we're stuck with what Hasbro THINKS is "comedy", but in reality, it's the Teen Titans Go-kinda humor: all the jokes are surface level, the slapstick is way too overused, it focuses way too much on modern technology (something that SHOULDN'T EVEN EXIST IN THIS WORLD!), and worst of all: it's never funny! the best this show has in terms of humor are the occasional small chuckles, but even those are few and far in between. But then again, the pacing in this damn thing is so break-neck fast, it's almost impossible to catch a good joke (if there even is any).

And all this brings me to Pony Life's biggest sin. The one thing that pulled me outta it entirely. After watching a few episodes, this is the thing that - at one point - made me go: "Ya know what? I'm done. I'm done with this show". It has no soul, heart or even a reason to exist. The basic things that made FiM so entertaining and so worthwhile, they got rid of them here! It's all a corporate downgrade to what was once a great show. The charm and heart of FiM is completely gone. We're left with a soulless clone that offers us little-to-nothing to enjoy until G5 eventually comes around, and that's NOT something to be proud of. That's NOT how we should honor G4 and everything it brought us, and how it literally started one of the best decades in animation. You can erase Pony Life entirely from the MLP lore, and nothing would change. I'm telling you, it would all stay exactly the same. That's how pointless Pony Life is. It only exists because Hasbro wanted to make more toys and more money.

What a turd! Despite a few bright spots in some episodes here and there, this is nothing more but a shameless downgrade to what was the best era of My Little Pony. It might not be as bad as Teen Titans Go or G3.5, but it's pretty close. Like i said, i'm officially done with this show. I seriously waited for it to hopefully get good at some point, but with how it's turning out.... probably best to abandon ship and wait for G5 and the next pony movie. Just skip this thing and stick with FiM. I promise, you're not missing anything worth your time here.

While I loved MLP: FIM (since the older MLP was one of those shows I used to loved as a lil girl and felt FIM was a good show I could use to bond with my then toddler son circa 2014), this spin off is so stupid. It reminds me to freaking TTG. FIM was one of the best episodic western cartoons I've seen in a very long time. However, this spin off is just horrible. Those aren't my brave mare six, just some mockery of them.