#why is Zipp consistently the best character in this show

[angeltannis]

Zipp Storm Autism Moments ????

[protagonistheavy]

Ah I finished the newest season on My Little Pony g5... I forgot what theyre even still calling this gen. Is it just "A New Generation?" So much of this show is just unremarkable like that. There's nothing going on and while I obviously speak from the perspective of a grown adult, I also can't fathom many children being that enthralled with the show either.

There's definitely a significant downshift in the target demographic. Even season 1 of g4, the "babiest" of the seasons, was never oriented this hard towards literal babies lol. And again, I can't even imagine young children enjoying this show more than, say, g4 -- which is also on Netflix and just 1000% more quality. If I had a kid and they wanted to watch something, why on earth would I ever choose g5 over g4? What does g5 have over it? Genuinely every aspect is just a total downgrade, offering nothing original or creative, and worst of all, it outright relies on itself standing on the shoulders of g4!! If you want the "best" experience with g5, then you ought to come in familiar with g4, which is just begging viewers to feel that downshift I was talking about.

Like if I was told to make a new generation of ponies for a new young audience, idk, I would choose one or the other: either go hard on being based on g4 and effectively make it a sequel/continuation, and stay consistent with the established lore, OR I'd go the opposite and abandon all/most previous lore, starting with a clean slate that any dumpy 6 year-old can keep up with. Instead we get this back-and-forth cocksucking of g4, g5 is just incapable of making moves on its own, it relies so much on g4 having been there.... UGHHH!

Beyond that, everything else is just worse. The animation in particular is so fucking bad and a BIG reason why I wouldnt make a kid watch this lol. It's barely competent most of the time, but there's so little heart, so little personality (which can be said of the whole production). You know those early ref sheets cartoonists get from the lead artist/animator? And it shows "dos and do-nots" about how to animate characters, e.g. "don't make them stand in straight lines" "add dynamics to their posture" "exaggerate expressions." Yeah well they got the notes flipped fucking backwards for this season. Characters are CONSTANTLY as stiff as cardboard, barely moving at all to accentuate their dialogue -- dialogue that DOES have character and personality! It feels so sad that the VAs probably imagined a better animated cartoon and thus acted the way they did, but it only highlights how stale the animation is when you have so much life in a character's voice, like urgency or quirkiness, only to see the pony barely lift a hoof or turn their head. Gravity also just exists differently in this world, where something can bounce on the ground like a rubber ball two times, and then drop dead where it next lands, not even a slight roll or sway. It's bad enough the characters arent the most vibrant nor is the world very colorful or engaging.... but then youre looking at them and they barely even freaking move.

And the characters. Theyre trying, but its not doing enough. These five just do NOT have any chemistry worth watching. None of them have motivations, between them all is maybe like three quirks, but otherwise they have nothing interesting going on. Hitch and Zipp could almost fill the same role as being these "investigators" so it's odd that there's two of them, which sucks because for the plots this generation wants to make, a detective-focused personality is a great fit -- just weird that it's two people basically. Sunny is very plain and is made especially dumb for the sake of conflict; Izzy remains okay but it's so clear theyre just taking notes off of Pinkie Pie. And then Pipp, just shut the fuck up. I went from disliking Pipp to hating her, the idea of "social media influencer" as a character in a kids cartoon is so frustrating, especially since they have no intent on exploring this concept in any interesting way lol. Her trait is just "she's popular" and sometimes she sings, which is a weird aspect to focus specifically on in a world traditionally known for everyone breaking out into song lmao.

So yeah nothing exciting going on.... The villain is extremely lackluster, but Im glad there's at least some sort of consistent uhhhhhhhhh "threat" I guess. Misty is sometimes interesting, but the dumbness of this plot ruins most chances of finding her appealing. Maybe she'll be more interesting once she gets the inevitable redemption/turn-around, I predict she'll end up being the second unicorn to the main cast, but I doubt she's going to really sync with anyone or improve the chemistry. Overall a very let down experience and probably the weakest post of g5 yet lol.