Whoo, best thread gets a bump! Now I can post without feeling weird about it!
I love MLP:FiM so much. I have a very special place in my heart for the first season, especially the premiere. When I first started watching it I was like "Am I really doing this? I can't believe I'm doing this." I couldn't believe how much I was enjoying it. It was simple, sweet, made me giggle, and introduced a lot of really interesting lore/concepts. I feel like the show could have gone in so many different directions all forking out from the first episode; some parts of today's canon I dislike, others I'm still excited to remember are canon to this day.
I actually hated My Little Pony as a kid, along with Barbies, Care Bears, dolls in general (although I did love my little porcelain dolls and their tiny china teasets), anything pink and girly (I've since realised that it was because even at such a young age, I picked up on the fact that girls and girly interests were seen as inferior, so I distanced myself from it. Now I know that girls aren't inferior, so I embrace soft pinks and flaunting my femininity!)
My first MLP toys were a blind bag pack of Twilight, Rarity, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie, and the Wave 1 brushable of Twilight Sparkle, both presents from my auntie. I was so happy. Now I've got 188 pony toys, in various locations. I keep track of them by spreadsheet.
Things I'm sad about being canon:
- I miss Twilight writing letters to Celestia.
- I don't like that Cadance is an alicorn (I like Cadance, but she should have been a unicorn, to keep alicorns special and celestially aligned).
- Characterisation of Spitfire; I'm not fond of the military personality and preferred her "cool" persona as introduced in the Gala.
- I'm not fond of Cranky Doodle Donkey, Bulk Biceps (especially), Ms Harshwhinny or Silver Shill, I find them really grating characters!
- The Hearth's Warming Eve origin story. I really liked the concept that Celestia and Luna created Equestria! The two cannot coexist :c
- I think "Magical Mystery Cure" got cutie marks all wrong. When their cutie marks were switched, they merely switched occupations, not talents or drive- which is what I think cutie marks are really about. So much wasted potential :c
- I miss the Elements of Harmony. As well as being cool in concept, they also looked super good on the ponies.
- Daring Do being an actual real-life character is very strange :s
- I miss Twilight's library :c
- It was cool to see The Smooze but it would have been even cooler if they'd made it a serious threat!
- Pinkie's characterisation can be very, very off. She's supposed to be silly and hyper but also sensitive- her strength is people skills, but this gets ignored a lot and it makes me sad.
- Big Mac's crossdress episode could have been handled so much better.
- I feel like Fluttershy's family's design choices were very strange! Green...? And her brother to be tall and gangly and strange? :s
Things that I love are now canon:
- WORLDBUILDING! We got to see the Griffin kingdom, we know there are elephants, we know there are yaks, so much culture, so many places.
- Mane 6 dreams are being fulfilled! It's so good! You go, girls. Rarity and Rainbow Dash getting their boutiques and Wonderbolts memberships especially.
- Princess Luna's new singing voice is amazing, I can't wait to hear more.
- Vinyl and Octavia live together and Vinyl is mute.
- Twilight actually went back and apologised and made peace with the friends she snubbed in the first 5 minutes of the entire show.
- Luna's character insight by way of the Tantabus was amazing.
- Flashbacks to Nightmare Moon's rebellion and glimpses into alternate disaster timelines were fascinating.
- The second Nightmare Night episode was amazing. Halloween is my favourite holiday!
- The concept of Rainbow Power (even though the key system was a bit odd) was amazing to see. I loved their alternate designs, and I loved that they were basically spiritual racial ambassadors to restore harmony to the land.
- Tirek. Was. Awesome.
Things I'm excited to see:
- Rainbow Dash's parents (but then again, only partially? because I was excited to see Fluttershy's parents, and while her mum is sweet, the rest of it really seemed out of place to me. So I'm not sure that I wouldn't have a similar reaction to Rainbow Dash.
- Cutie Mark Crusaders take their secondary talents to new heights (construction?/singing/rad skooter skillz)
- Twilight learns to move the stars.
- Celestia's "god mode"/Solar Flare/evil alter ego.
- More Celestia in general.
- The movie!
- Perhaps a trip to Africa, where we can see zebras and giraffes and elephants and lions. Maybe.
- Other draconequui!
- More Fancy Pants. I really like his character- how even though he's one of the rich elite, he's also genuine and nice. Fleur de Lis is gorgeous too.
- More Everfree Forest stuff- its existence is still an enigma.
- Further bonding between the Mane 6, two characters at a time.