Fall of G5: The Inability to Let Go

[Bright Honor 2,678]

So recently it was confirmed that Tell Your Tale is ending. All signs point to G5 being done and G6 not being far behind. One wonders what went wrong? How did this end up happing? My opinion: the inability to let go of G4, both the fandom as a whole and Hasbro themselves.

i feel like there should have been a wider gap between the end of G4 and the start of G5. That way the fandom would have had more time for the grieving process of G4’s end and possibly be more accepting of G5. However even then feel like as a whole the fan base was never gonna fully embrace G5. We refused to move on. I myself have seen fans on here and on discord outright refuse to give G5 a chance. They just couldn’t accept that G4 was over and held on no matter what.

Now for Hasbro. Tbh, I feel like Hasbro never wanted G4 to end either. That’s why G5 ended tying into G4. Perhaps a bit too much. It couldn’t find its own identity. It was always stuck in the shadow of its precedessor. It wasn’t allowed to make its own identity. Heck Hasbro still sells G4 merch and airs G4. G4 recently blew up in popularity in China.

 

overall I think the fall of G5 is the result of both sides being unable to move on. Does that apply to every one? No. But enough that it had the impact. The fans refused to accept that G4 was over and the company refused to move on fully and let their new product make its own mark. I fully expect G6 to be mostly a G4 reboot/AU. 
 

I am sorry for those negatively affected by the sudden cancellation. If G5 is truly over, may it live on in our hearts.

[Starlight Serenade 3,428]

Great post Bright!
 

I feel the same way. Hasbro just couldn’t let G4 go. It felt like they were trying to tie in G5 with G4, almost like a spinoff series and much more. I still say that they planned everything this way to bring it back. I could go on and on, but honestly I’m tired of all this talk lol 

[Moch 133]

yeah, G5 ended as soon as it finally started to grow on me 

[Silver Wind 114514 64]

It's such a shame that g4 kind of act like a legacy or an element to advertise on for merchant purpose here in China

[Metemponychosis 1,262]

I feel like nothing went wrong. It just ran its time, and G4 was the outlier in the present times.

If something was the problem, it was not letting go of G4, but not in the temporal sense. It could have started years later, and it would have had the same reception. It should have been a different world. I don't think that the fandom's opinion had that big importance to the IP holders (at least not past buying merchandise and viewership). It's whoever made the decision that it should remain attached to G4 that made a gamble. If Hasbro didn't want g4 to end, they wouldn't have ended it. It ran its cycle and ended very deliberately.

It was a poor business decision and that is it. To be honest, the reasons I didn't like G5 went beyond it being attached to G4.

[Felis Amafeles 1,055]

I think it's time to celebrate the end of the G5... 
As a work that started during the COVID-19 pandemic, it hasn't been easy for G5 to get to this point.
I love G5,but I think ending it may be a good choice compared to maintaining the status quo...

[YGSilverstream 35]

One of the main issues with G5 that definitely had a part in it's failure was the merch. Kids are the primary audience of these shows and a lot of the profit the show gets is from kids parents buying said merchandise for them.

Seriously, compare the sheer amount of G4 stuff that was out during the shows prime and the depressingly low amount of G5 nowadays. Every time I go to a store like Walmart, Target, Five And Below, etc and check the toys at MOST they have one shelf of toys. And every time almost none of them were sold. I'm guessing it just reached so much of a low point Hasbro felt it wasn't worth it anymore to keep G5 going any longer.

Honestly, I wouldn't be shocked if they just keep milking G4 from now on. Either that or we're just never getting more My Little Pony. Either way, not looking too good. D:

[Bright Honor 2,678]

32 minutes ago, YGSilverstream said:

One of the main issues with G5 that definitely had a part in it's failure was the merch. Kids are the primary audience of these shows and a lot of the profit the show gets is from kids parents buying said merchandise for them.

Seriously, compare the sheer amount of G4 stuff that was out during the shows prime and the depressingly low amount of G5 nowadays. Every time I go to a store like Walmart, Target, Five And Below, etc and check the toys at MOST they have one shelf of toys. And every time almost none of them were sold. I'm guessing it just reached so much of a low point Hasbro felt it wasn't worth it anymore to keep G5 going any longer.

Honestly, I wouldn't be shocked if they just keep milking G4 from now on. Either that or we're just never getting more My Little Pony. Either way, not looking too good. D:

Excellent point. I think some underestimate the importance of merch sales. A cartoon can be the best thing ever but it can still get axed if merch sales aren’t up to snuff.

[TransitPony 238]

On 2024-09-26 at 4:47 AM, YGSilverstream said:

One of the main issues with G5 that definitely had a part in it's failure was the merch. Kids are the primary audience of these shows and a lot of the profit the show gets is from kids parents buying said merchandise for them.

Seriously, compare the sheer amount of G4 stuff that was out during the shows prime and the depressingly low amount of G5 nowadays. Every time I go to a store like Walmart, Target, Five And Below, etc and check the toys at MOST they have one shelf of toys. And every time almost none of them were sold. I'm guessing it just reached so much of a low point Hasbro felt it wasn't worth it anymore to keep G5 going any longer.

Honestly, I wouldn't be shocked if they just keep milking G4 from now on. Either that or we're just never getting more My Little Pony. Either way, not looking too good. D:

I don't see MLP going away because of this news of G5 ending. Fandom (in regards to nerd culture) has many ways to survive long after the property ended it's run. Star Trek and Star Wars are examples. I am also in the Codename: Kids Next Door fandom, and the Discord server I'm on has new art content daily alongside discussions of the characters. 

Edited September 27, 2024 by TransitPony
Typo fix

[Brainstorm 4,112]

I still think G5 has potential

[YGSilverstream 35]

2 hours ago, TransitPony said:

I don't see MLP going away because of this news of G5 ending. Fandom (in regards to nerd culture) has many ways to survive long after the property ended it's run. Star Trek and Star Wars are examples. I am also in the Codename: Kids Next Door fandom, and the Discord server I'm on has new art content daily alongside discussions of the characters. 

I mean yeah, obviously the fandom is going to live on no matter what that goes for about every piece of media.

But like, the franchise in general? I'm not too hopeful.

[Rafa Stary 3,209]

I doubt so much that connecting G5 with G4 was a reason for the failure, specially that we are in the "decade of the fan", companies are giving their "best" (interpret this as you wish) to deliver fanservice, nostalgic characters coming back, references, multiverse, etc, and I believe that even if G5 tried to be different, separate from G5, with better stories etc, this still would've happened, I know this is just a opinion, but I already said this back in 2023, and I'll repeat it here: G4's success was a anomaly, it shouldn't've been the hit it was, a lot of things in that scenario of the early 2010's contributed to its success, leading to the success of the toys as well. We are not living that scenario anymore, a lot of popular IPs are failing to adapt to the modern times, kids are losing interest in toys, etc, Hasbro maybe could've tried to make Videogames to sell this generation, but the ones they did unfortunately are very lackluster and just bad (sorry, but they suck, their target audience are playing games like Mario, Kirby, which are just much better games, or stuff like Fortnite too)

Hasbro themselves apparently weren't excited about making high quality and interesting, appealing toys.

And there are other multiple problems too, I also said this a while ago, changing the designs of the ponies drastically was a mistake, 95% of the fandom thought that the G4 visuals/character designs were just much better and appealing than the ponies of G1, G2 and G3, Lauren Faust's G4 visuals are beloved and almost everyone just accepted them as the new and permanent face of the franchise, now, get rid of that visual identity and change it for a new style that almost everyone just consider inferior to the previous generations' designs, man, the number of franchises that failed right after they decided to abandon their so beloved and consistent art style and visuals is just huge, try to change Dragon Ball's art style by a style that has nothing to do with Toriyama's and you'll see the chaos in the fandom, people still prefer G4's style (me included)

Consider all of this + the fact that the survival of these animated productions are dependent of the success of the toys, and you have the recipe for disaster.

You can disagree with me, but I personally still think that the franchise's destiny is to go back to its roots, only be popular amongst kids, with a very niche adult fandom as once it was with the first 3 Generations, the franchise won't go back to its glory days of the first 4 Seasons of FiM, it already started to lose its power when G4 was still around, imagine now, it won't be happening again and I think it's time for you fans to accept it, sorry. But If you really still have hope, then keep it up.

[Pentium100 2,136]

Well, trying to replace a show that people really like is difficult. The new show has big shoes to fill and some people may just not like it. Too similar - problem. Too different - also a problem (maybe not for the same people). I saw this with Stargate. SG-1 was great, but the writers written themselves in to a corner (power creep), Atlantis was pretty much more of the same, but it was not the same - someone who loved the original main characters may not love the new main characters. Universe was a completely different show and it failed to attract the same fans that liked SG-1, because it was, essentially, a completely different show - not necessarily bad, just different enough to be a problem.

G4 was unique, trying to replicate that is difficult, maybe impossible. Maybe it even depends on the timing. If G4 was released today, maybe it would not be as popular, because the circumstances are different (someone who was 20 when G4 was released is 30 now - would he still try to watch a show for little girls?). 

My opinion of the G5 shows - I am not a big fan of the chibi art style, so the 2D show (I always confuse their names) was a bit off-putting because of it, even though some of the stories were OK. The 3D show looks good though. The new characters are OK (but now there are two annoying types, though less annoying than Pinkie). The smartphones and live streaming are something negative IMO, with the technology level being even more weird than it was in G4. The main characters are kind-of equal in their likability, but there is also nobody who became an instant favorite for me, so I am less interested in their stories. Then again, maybe I am spoiled by fanfics.

11 hours ago, Rafa Stary said:

companies are giving their "best" (interpret this as you wish) to deliver fanservice

I think this is a good thing, companies should try to make the fans happy (as fans are the ones who will watch the show, buy merch etc) instead of trying to find a new audience or appeal to a wider audience (which usually turns out to be nobody). The problem is that if the writers are not fans themselves (a problem for long running shows as the writers change over time) then they may not understand why fans like what they like and completely fail in appealing to them.

[Casey Pones 100]

If it's true that neither fans or Hasbro wanted to move on from G4, why did it end? In fact I read that fans weren't that bothered by the end of G4.

I think the problem was that G5 just wasn't that good. I made a long post as to why it isn't good and I stand by it. G5 had a huge amount of established lore to work with but it kept disrespecting that and mangling it's own storylines.

To me, G5 has been what the Jurassic World films and Disney Star Wars has been to their originals. Studios stumbling around to make money without making the effort of their predecessors and thinking brand loyalty will make up for any bumbling on their part, forgetting that (as fans) we are acutely aware of the lore.

[Bright Honor 2,678]

17 hours ago, Rafa Stary said:

I doubt so much that connecting G5 with G4 was a reason for the failure, specially that we are in the "decade of the fan", companies are giving their "best" (interpret this as you wish) to deliver fanservice, nostalgic characters coming back, references, multiverse, etc, and I believe that even if G5 tried to be different, separate from G5, with better stories etc, this still would've happened, I know this is just a opinion, but I already said this back in 2023, and I'll repeat it here: G4's success was a anomaly, it shouldn't've been the hit it was, a lot of things in that scenario of the early 2010's contributed to its success, leading to the success of the toys as well. We are not living that scenario anymore, a lot of popular IPs are failing to adapt to the modern times, kids are losing interest in toys, etc, Hasbro maybe could've tried to make Videogames to sell this generation, but the ones they did unfortunately are very lackluster and just bad (sorry, but they suck, their target audience are playing games like Mario, Kirby, which are just much better games, or stuff like Fortnite too)

Hasbro themselves apparently weren't excited about making high quality and interesting, appealing toys.

And there are other multiple problems too, I also said this a while ago, changing the designs of the ponies drastically was a mistake, 95% of the fandom thought that the G4 visuals/character designs were just much better and appealing than the ponies of G1, G2 and G3, Lauren Faust's G4 visuals are beloved and almost everyone just accepted them as the new and permanent face of the franchise, now, get rid of that visual identity and change it for a new style that almost everyone just consider inferior to the previous generations' designs, man, the number of franchises that failed right after they decided to abandon their so beloved and consistent art style and visuals is just huge, try to change Dragon Ball's art style by a style that has nothing to do with Toriyama's and you'll see the chaos in the fandom, people still prefer G4's style (me included)

Consider all of this + the fact that the survival of these animated productions are dependent of the success of the toys, and you have the recipe for disaster.

You can disagree with me, but I personally still think that the franchise's destiny is to go back to its roots, only be popular amongst kids, with a very niche adult fandom as once it was with the first 3 Generations, the franchise won't go back to its glory days of the first 4 Seasons of FiM, it already started to lose its power when G4 was still around, imagine now, it won't be happening again and I think it's time for you fans to accept it, sorry. But If you really still have hope, then keep it up.

I def agree with you on the future of MLP. I wouldn’t be shocked if they dumb it down and going back to being more kid focused.

[Pentium100 2,136]

21 hours ago, Casey Pones said:

If it's true that neither fans or Hasbro wanted to move on from G4, why did it end?

Because like a lot of long-running shows it ran into a wall. Basically you want the protagonist to grow and overcome challenges, but eah challenge has to be harder than the one before - a stronger enemy etc. So, after a while everyone becomes so strong it's ridiculous.

The most obvious with this from the shows I watched are Dragon Ball and Stargate SG1. Hey, the protagonists won against pretty much literal gods, now what? 

With G4, they probably ran out of "friendship problems". Twilight started a school so there would be some new characters who could have somewhat different problems to solve, but maybe the young six were not as popular as the main six (just because I like the show and I like some characters in it does not mean I am going to become a fan of other characters as well).

[Casey Pones 100]

5 hours ago, Pentium100 said:

Because like a lot of long-running shows it ran into a wall. Basically you want the protagonist to grow and overcome challenges, but eah challenge has to be harder than the one before - a stronger enemy etc. So, after a while everyone becomes so strong it's ridiculous.

From a writer's perspective, is there a way around this problem? Does everyone feel the same way about protagonists?

[Pentium100 2,136]

3 hours ago, Casey Pones said:

From a writer's perspective, is there a way around this problem? Does everyone feel the same way about protagonists?

I am not a writer, so I have no idea. It's just something I have noticed. I guess shows that are more episodic in nature and do not have super strong characters/groups can last for a long time. For example - detective shows - if you can come up with a new crime of the week, you an keep the show going indefinitely, until the audience gets bored. There is no need for power creep, since the main characters are just cops who investigate crime. I have seen something like that on Elementary - the main characters went from solving normal crimes to busting gangs and large conspiracies. On the other hand, the Law and Order series stayed normal.

I guess one way to do it is to keep the main characters static - in Law and Order, the main characters do not become some super cops - they just to their jobs until the actor gets bored so the character gets killed or promoted. 

It probably is not possible to do on a Fantasy show that relies on the protagonists beating up very strong enemies. I guess they could find some single-use super weapon to get rid of the enemy, but that would likely get boring.

[YGSilverstream 35]

15 hours ago, Pentium100 said:

Because like a lot of long-running shows it ran into a wall. Basically you want the protagonist to grow and overcome challenges, but eah challenge has to be harder than the one before - a stronger enemy etc. So, after a while everyone becomes so strong it's ridiculous.

The most obvious with this from the shows I watched are Dragon Ball and Stargate SG1. Hey, the protagonists won against pretty much literal gods, now what? 

With G4, they probably ran out of "friendship problems". Twilight started a school so there would be some new characters who could have somewhat different problems to solve, but maybe the young six were not as popular as the main six (just because I like the show and I like some characters in it does not mean I am going to become a fan of other characters as well).

Oh the young six were 100% not as popular. By the time the season came out in 2018 the show was around 7/8 years old so not only did the original target audience of the show when it came out grew up and moved on but it was also a LOT less prevalent to the general public. With such a smaller and newer audience compared to when G4 started the young six never really stood a chance.

And it's such a damn shame because they're my favorite characters in the entire show. =(

Edited September 30, 2024 by YGSilverstream

[Jon the VGNerd 885]

I wanted to give G5 a try, but it seems Hasbro ultimately dropped the ball on it. And I'm pretty sure I gave my full explanation regarding G5's utterly wasted potential too, both on TVT and MYM too.

[Casey Pones 100]

On 2024-09-29 at 7:15 PM, Pentium100 said:

Because like a lot of long-running shows it ran into a wall. Basically you want the protagonist to grow and overcome challenges, but eah challenge has to be harder than the one before - a stronger enemy etc. So, after a while everyone becomes so strong it's ridiculous.

The most obvious with this from the shows I watched are Dragon Ball and Stargate SG1. Hey, the protagonists won against pretty much literal gods, now what? 

With G4, they probably ran out of "friendship problems". Twilight started a school so there would be some new characters who could have somewhat different problems to solve, but maybe the young six were not as popular as the main six (just because I like the show and I like some characters in it does not mean I am going to become a fan of other characters as well).

I'm not 100% sure that's strictly true of all TV shows. As for running out of friendship problems. that's simply not true. They never covered autism, neuro-atypical people or other conditions that make it difficult to socialise. They could have brought in some such characters to study at the school and thereby teach kids how to interact with such people. And tech kids with these conditions that they have nothing to be ashamed of and how to interact with people.

[Rock-O-Jello 221]

I gave G5 a fair chance. I thought the movie was ok, but I didn't like the characters or the forced connection to G4. I ended up dropping it after the first TV special.

[Casey Pones 100]

On 2024-10-02 at 7:03 PM, Rock-O-Jello said:

I gave G5 a fair chance. I thought the movie was ok, but I didn't like the characters or the forced connection to G4. I ended up dropping it after the first TV special.

I thought the movie was great and promised a lot of potential for the new show. And it could have worked if the writers had done a better job and respected all that established lore.