@Chopsticks  

 
FTFY
 
Besides, G1 transformers was popular.

The whole fact of Applejack being a country farm pony in the first place is because she’s down-to-Earth, she’s the voice of reason when things seem bleak or out of hand, and she doesn’t overthink things as much.
 
And it seriously upsets me if someone thinks she’s a hillbilly.  
She’s an honest, reasonable and down-to-Earth farmer.  
How can someone get tired of someone who can listen to you and help out in problems that may or may not be impossible?
 
She just knows what could happen and how to solve a problem the old-fashioned way without overthinking.
 
New is good, but in some situations, old-fashioned is the way to go.
 
That’s why she’s not a background pony at all (like some people say).

@Ihhh  

 
G1 - G3.5 didn’t explode into an absurdly popular fandom drawing a crowd from the unintended audience.
 
We, the pony fans here, don’t know much about past generations for a reason.
 
.  
I understand that this is the running “tradition” of how it works, but what attaches the bronies to My Little Pony are the specific particulars they performed in Generation 4. We don’t go to the store and buy cheap-o plastic toys en mass. We’re a fandom, we want collectibles and things for display.
 
 
When a popular story franchise is successful, and it’s time for a change or an update, nobody picks it up and throws it in the trash and starts from scratch with a reboot. “Yes, let’s take this stuff which works extremely well and everyone likes, fire everybody, and work on hiring an entirely new production team.” A reboot occurs when either the material is running very dry, the fans have run their course, the production team spread their resources too thin and they have to back out and cut losses, but most often a reboot happens because the original failed or is failing.
 
Instead, a popular franchise series creates a new generation. They keep the timeline, they keep the events, but they shift the perspective to somewhere else. Star Wars (the prequels and the new series), Harry Potter (Magical Beasts), Doctor Who (each new Doctor), Star Trek (a new generation), CIS (NCIS and expansions), etc.
 
 
That is the smart move to make. I have a feeling that the production team knows this, but they’re dealing with corporate meddling. Hasbro isn’t legitimately interested in the fandom. They want new, big, shiny things for little kids to gawk at. The show’s purpose for existence is to make an excuse to sell toys; we can’t deny that. It just show happens that G4 was a big labor of love by the production team, doing their best to work within those confines.

Take out those stupid anti-RD panels and change “greedy corporate” to “big toy company” or some such, and I’d tweet this comic to Vogel and McCarthy.

Preach

Honestly I don’t mind some of these redesigns. Applejack looks okay…that huge hair is kinda over the top but the palomino coloring kinda works. Twilight looks great, just put her horn back on and Fluttershy and Rarity look pretty much the same…kinda makes the email we seen leaked look bad since, why bother making such new personalities for the core cast? Why not just look to G3 and older and use new characters to fill in the new personalities? If you’re banking on G4 fans to follow the new series you will alienate them by making the characters they want to see be so radically different in how they act.

@Darth Sonic  
I like your attitude.

@Ihhh  
You are correct, and I really wish to emphasis that this situation with AJ isn’t really getting me all that angry. I’m just flabbergasted. I’m more than willing to give this new AJ her fair shake, even if her name kinda annoys me in the beginning.

@Hilcenias  
“Kegan”?
 
Whoops, I meant “Megan”.

@Micro-Cyberbrony  
Well, I’m perfectly ok with that.
 
G4 Applejack doesn’t resemble her klutzy G1 self, but I don’t mind.

@Hilcenias  
Maybe, but the redesigns, personality/species change and cutie mark design aren’t a thing I’m going to get over. Fluttershy as a unicorn ain’t good - the horn just doesn’t look right on her. How is she going to hog someone without wings? Twilight has always been a unicorn (then an alicorn), and always must be, NOT an earth pony. Applejack must always keep her hat and coat color, not some white splotches and a “bad girl” personality. If G5 won’t have any of those, it’s fine by me. If not, the show is dead to me forever.

@Background Pony #60B5  
I just got into this fandom on New Year’s Day after stalling since at least 2013 and even then I knew the drama in this fandom can be overwhelming, heck, the guy who got me considering joining the fandom was one of them.
 
Twilight’s Ascension, Equestria Girls and Starlight Glimmer, all of them were events that seemed like they could tear apart the fandom. And now we’re going into our eight season with a 9th one planned and a G5 (Which I really REALLY hope includes Kegan Williams), I’m sure the fandom will get over this.

why is this so overdramatic

@Darth Sonic  
From a marketing standpoint, you do make a solid argument. However, marketing decisions aren’t as big a concern to consumers unless they affect the quality of the product from the point of view of a consumer. All that really matters is how well written she is within the context of G5’s cartoon, not how she compares to the cartoon from G4.

@Ihhh  
Yes, I was splitting hairs on Rarity. Frankly I feel stupid for that.
 
But I stand by Rainbow Dash. She is still visibly the same character, so she is NOT a good comparison to G5 Applejack. Honestly, if they’re going to do this, I’d prefer the RD route over the Rarity route.
 
It’s what they usually do with Transformers characters. Animated Optimus and Prime Optimus were very different people. So were Animated Bumblebee and Prime Bumblebee. Yet you could always visually identify the characters immediately regardless.
 
Then of course there is the exact opposite route taken with Prime Soundwave and Starscream; that is, complete visual redesign but nigh identical personalities to their sources. I don’t recall MLP ever doing that though…
 
Honestly, MLP has always had troubles maintaining a consistent brand. Now that they actually have a real fanbase and a visible market share thanks to G4, now is the best time to fix that issue. And for the most part, that seems to be what they’re doing. Similar cast, Cutie Marks, Earth Ponies/Pegasi/Unicorns being the 3 core Pony races, a High Fantasy SETTING (bolding that so you don’t misrepresent me). Frankly, what they’re doing with AJ seems to be the last horaah of bad habits.

@Random Ambler  
You can’t believe how hard it is for me to do that. I just thought “Oh, it’s nothing special”, but once I saw the concepts, I tried so hard and failed not to freak out. Redesign and species change is an abomination for me

@CronoM  
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy g4 because of its different direction in promoting a girls show where they just don’t make it a sugar bowl of babyish and pretty princess nonsense but instead make something completly original and intelligent that can be enjoyed by everyone regardless of age, gender, or race. But I just don’t care about this upcoming incarnation one way or the other until further notice.

@Oops  
You are right, despite me not wanting to be spoiled about the leaks, i agree. G4 AJ will always be G4 AJ.

@Marima  
OK, so which episode was this? Also, you are in the minority, meaning that just because the show doesn’t appeal to you, doesn’t mean it doesn’t appeal to other people. You can’t say a show has lost its appeal if plenty of other people like it.

@Ihhh  
Well, I was exaggerating of course. It’s just, well, I was watching a recent episode and nearly a quarter of the runtime was exposition that explained things that were already expressed nonverbally, then they proceeded to retread a dumb plot but worse as the conflict was entirely driven by the characters acting unrealistically stupid. It was like watching a typical bottom-of-the-barrel kiddie show.  
I think there was total of 5 episodes in season 7 i found tolerable, I suppose I could just be getting tired of ponies, but then why do I still normally browse these fansites? No, I think the show is slowly losing the family appeal that hooked me early on.

@Darth Sonic  
Don’t you think you’re splitting hairs? The main point was that character being completely changed between generation is nothing new, and some shared traits between them don’t change that. Rarity and still a completely different character in G3 then she is in G4, as is Rainbow Dash. We all must remember that each cartoon is it’s own universe, and this is how it’s always been. What G5 is doing is exactly the same thing as every other generation, and if we didn’t complain then, we shouldn’t start complaining now.

@Ihhh  
I’ll give you G3 Rarity, but the two Rainbow Dash’s look like they could be twins with very different personalities. And even in the case of the Raritys, they at least shared their love of gemstones.
 
Edit: Also, while I also called Marima out, I’m gonna have to point out that he is obviously using hyperbole. He’s saying the show is bad via said hyperbole, which is the shows fault. I don’t agree with him, but I won’t misrepresent him like you are.

To everyone complaining about them making applejack into a completely different character, do you know nothing about the previous generations? Many of the characters in G4 are characters from previous generations, And many of them have completely different personalities and or appearances. Compare G3’s Rainbow Dash and rarity to those of G4. How is this any different?
 
@Marima  
How is it the shows fault that you become physically ill when you watch it? That seems like your own psychological problems.
 
@CronoM  
So basically, you’re complaining that my little pony is a slice of life comedy and not a high fantasy epic. That is not a flower with the show, that is you expecting something out of the show that it never set out to give you. That is your fault, not the shows.
 
@Background Pony #ED62  
Every word of your comment is wrong.

I figure if Applejack appears in Gen 5, it would be another pony with the same name, but it wouldn’t be the same AJ from Gen 4. Nobody is going to steal her memories.

AAAAANNNNNDDDDD HEEEeeeere we go
 
this will be just like save derpy all over again  
like, I don’t have any problems with Derpy nor AJ  
but this will be another drama trip that I am not looking for going thorugh again.