Infinity

Assumptions like this irritate me. Maud's "symptoms" are incredibly vague and could be attributed to a large number of psychological disorders, if one were to be the cause. She could be showing symptoms of depression for all we know. But, and let's face it, the brony fandom has a very large autistic/asperger portion, and so are undoubtedly biased in labelling character with what they themselves understand. This is by no means an attack on autism/asperger's. I personally do not care if someone is autistic in the same way that I do not care of someone's sexuality or whathaveyou. However, I feel that many people want a character to relate to, a character they can say "hey, (s)he's just like me!" And thus end up projecting their situations onto characters where there is no evidence. Character is quiet and introverted? Must be asperger's! Character has short attention span? You got ADHD, buddy! Character likes neatness? OCD, here we come! While these are traits of said disorders, they are by no means exclusive. A quiet, smart person does not equal asperger's. As someone said above, Maud was quite aware of her social situation and standing within the mane 6. She simply said nothing to avoid upsetting Pinkie. Social awareness is key in diagnosing Asperger's. After all, it is on the same spectrum as Autism and the 'aut' in that comes from auto; pertaining to themselves, hence why the whole spectrum is universally defined as having lacking social skills/awareness. This is unrelated to intelligence, before anyone accuses me of calling those with Asperger's stupid, which is not the case. I suppose it can be an interesting fanon, but it is certainly not serious within the show. If it were, it would be front and centre, as her syndrome would have been the whole reason she wasn't bonding well the with the mane 5. Think Flight to the Finish.

I wish I knew. I'm speculating that RD would not be nearly as popular if not for her rainbow design. Many people say she is popular because she is the tomboy of the group, but Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie are incredibly popular as well. Fluttershy is perhaps even more popular than RD, yet pretty much as girly and feminine as Rarity. Similarly, AJ is rather tomboyish as well, yet lingers at the bottom of popularity polls. The tomboy argument holds little water with me. Rarity is disliked largely because she strikes too close to home as the snooty-popular-girl archetype. Obviously she's anything but, but if someone's first impression is a negative one then they are unlikely to delve deeper into her character and see what a fantastic character she really is. It's funny how Rarity's vanity is "omg so annoying", while RD's arrogance is "a character-building flaw!". Double standards, anyone?

I can't be the only one who shed a tear at the Nightmare Moon/Celestia battle and consequent banishment, surely I absolutely adored this premier. Especially the second part.

This already happened in the comics and it was magnificent. The fandom has made evil Pinkie/Flutters too obvious and overdone to be entertaining, and I just can't see it being done well with Rainbow or AJ. That leaves Twilight or Rarity. As the Nightmare Rarity arc shows, her seldom-seen insecurities make her an interesting baddie without being too obvious. However Twilight has the whole alicorn-level magical potential and brief interactions with dark magic, which is a great set up already. I vote for Twilight. Dunno whether or not I'd enjoy it, though. It'd certainly be nice for a more mature theme, but personally I think that's best left for the comics and leave the light hearted entertainment for the show.

Personally I think the best example is from Green Isn't Your Colour. This episode shows how Rarity's generosity transcends not just things (giving away clothes, dresses, that stuff), but shows how unselfish she really is. She spends the whole episode battling her jealousy in order to place what she considered her friend's best interest at heart. The fact that Fluttershy's best interest isn't modelling at all is irrelevant; Rarity had no idea about Fluttershy's discomfort and thought Flutters was honestly enjoying it. And Rarity even got to the point where she was demonising her own feelings (iirc, she moaned how terrible it was of her to feel jealous) to try find happiness in her friend's happiness. Especially the scene where Twilight tries to sabotage Fluttershy's modelling career. There, faced with a room full of upper class ponies who could have easily burned down Rarity's reputation alongside the failing fashion show, Rarity applauded Fluttershy nonetheless. She chose to save Fluttershy from embarrassment and save her possible future over her own reputation, the one thing we are constantly shown to be the most important thing to her. Rarity fits her element to a T. It's just harder to see behind the almost ham-fisted obviousness of Fluttershy's Kindness or Pinkie's Laughter. People see Pinkie being laughter incarnate, and because Rarity is much more subtle (clearly her style), they think she doesn't live up to her element.

I actually have tons of Pony stuff, I just don't have the patience to get a group shot ^^; I've created a site for my collections to view them more easily here. But for now I'll attach some pics of my blind bags ^^ The empty squares are where I plan to get the rest...