First thoughts on MLP:ANG

[TheTrueMelissa 70]

The first thing I noticed is that our new protagonist, Sunny, is a child -- a filly who lives with her father, not a mare. Soon I learned that the glorious, friendship-driven culture of Middle Equestria has been replaced by strife and hatred. The pegasi and earth ponies are both convinced that other kinds of ponies are bad, though the unicorns seem innocent of this. 

Also, during all the time that's passed, the earth ponies developed modern technology and now have things like phones. This technological development may be because Equestria has somehow lost its magic -- pegasi can't fly, and most of the unicorns seem downright ill. Can the new team save the day? Of course they can.

There was some good music. I got into "Angry Angry." The style's a little more pop-rock than the kid-music style of the old show. I preferred the old style of music, but this is okay.

The lore development was interesting, too. We now know for sure that pegasus flight is, indeed, their own form of magic. We also know that an earth pony can become an alicorn. I'm intrigued to note that earth ponies, no longer growing the food for three species, had a real creative explosion. I'm sure the show didn't intend it, but it kind of supports the notion that the G4 earth ponies were being oppressed.

The vibe's a bit different. They're going more for sassy fun than for the old show's sweet and innocent approach. I guess they figure that's what modern kids like.
 

[ExplosionMare 24,935]

It would make sense if the pony race segregation had started with the oppression of the Earth ponies since they were probably seen as "less than" for not having any magic (at least until later on in the series) like the unicorns or pegasi. They probably wanted to see themselves as more than farmers or as the "plain" ponies but they couldn't convince the unicorns and pegasi otherwise.

I imagine this all played out similarly to the events that lead up to Hearth's Warming in G4. Everypony became hateful and jealous until it became too much to handle. I guess it was worse than what happened during Hearth's Warming, though, if the only thing ponies could agree on was sealing magic away. This is like a "Starlight Glimmer" approach to things: stripping away anything that made ponies different from one another so they wouldn't fight anymore.

Only thing I don't understand is why ponies still hated each other even after the magic was taken away! They should be happy with each other now that they're all "equal", right? I guess there was still enough prejudice in everypony (except ponies like Sunny) that it didn't matter. Ponies were still pointing hooves at each other, most likely blaming one another for being responsible for the disappearance of magic. It also didn't help that Canterlogic made profits off of prejudiced devices.

I have to wonder if the divide was similar to what Cozy, Tirek, and Chrysalis attempted. They were pretty successful in turning pony races against each other until the Mane 6 were able to stop that. It makes me think that pony racial tensions were always a thing, they just get more ugly and tense if a powerful figure like a supervillain feeds them.

[Max Manesly 155]

Keeping in mind the unexpected commercial success of G4, showing the majority of Earth Ponies in the main cast being involved in food prep was likely the easiest category to write for at the beginning, connection to nature equals food. Don't think the writers really accounted for any racial discrimination topics, because if the protagonist is a unicorn then why do the earth ponies need special powers?

The reason for the conflict amongst the ponies in G5, besides an obvious need for the new gen's convenient premise, can be seen as the eventual outcome from lack of a common enemy.

It's always the same in any story, different personalities and cultures are only brought together when they face a mutual threat. Take that threat away, and tensions will gradually rise from small differences regardless. The reason they'd still want to fight despite now being on equal ground is simply because they want to, conflict is bred by a desire for competition, and that need will only grow more from the boredom of peace.

Tell you what would really make them mad, trying to understand how they can physically operate electronic devices without fingers. I try not to think too hard about it as I'm typing this, being an earth pony and all. Haha