G4 3" Pony Multifeature Extravaganza
September 23, 2023.
G4 Ponies are easily the most commonly found in thrift stores these days, in my experience. Because of this, my collection of G4 ponies is by far the largest, consisting of ponies I received during my childhood and ponies I found secondhand in recent years. These ponies reigned for a decade, and the cartoon that accompanied the era was a huge success, so there is no question that there are a lot of these ponies floating around in the world. In Year 8 of G4 (2017), the toyline went through a soft reboot, transforming the ponies to look a bit more cartoony. The rebooted line also included more varying poses and face molds for the ponies. The rebooted ponies were a little more round, and had more exaggerated faces and proportions. Though different, they are still cute, if weird, so I will be showing off some of the ponies that have made it into my collection. A lot of them are marked up with markers, have tangled hair, or may be in other states of disshevelment. Almost all of them are secondhand, so forgive their flaws and think of them as pre-loved.
We'll start with Twilight Sparkle, the main character of the G4 cartoon. Twilight is a purple alicorn pony with a horn and wings.
She is represented well by this G4 toy, though maybe more excited than she generally appears in the cartoon. I must say I like the body sculpt of this pony. Her wings look cute, and the shape of them is much more interesting than the more static, stiff looking wings as seen in the original G4 toyline. Her open mouth is a little strange, and her eye placement seems really close to her maw. On one side of her body, she is decorated with a purple glitter motif inspired by her cutie mark, which is a pink sparkle. She has a lot of messy hair of middling quality. I would like these toys a lot more if they were made of high quality materials, but they aren't.
Another kind of standard Twilight, in a normal standing pose and a tall, yawning mouth. Her hair is shocked, standing straight up, and appearing very frizzy. This strange arrangement is only a brief vision of how her mane might fare in the future as the material used for her hair degrades.
Here she is represented now as a seapony, as featured in the My Little Pony movie (2017). She's made of a sort of pearly plastic, which looks nice, but has a lot of visible seams. Her body and tail have some glitter on them. Her cutie mark is on her dorsal fin near the base of her tail. As a seapony, she still has wings, which look like exaggerated pectoral fins, but these fins are not present in non-winged seaponies. It's kind of difficult to make this pony stand up without falling over.
Next, Fluttershy. One of Twilight's best friends and allies, a yellow pegasus pony.
She grins wildly, and has a mural of herself painted on the side of her body. Strange. This pony is from the "All About Me" series, in which ponies are adorned with images of their own faces, as mentioned in a previous bootleg review. This pony's wings are also articulated (slightly), set in the pony's body on a ball joint, which allows for some movement around the socket.
Pinkie Pie is Twilight's earth pony friend, a bright pink pony.
This Pinkie is wearing a dress that can be secured to show off her legs and tail. The dress can be unfastened and pulled down past the back side of her body to resemble a tail (I think). This toy is listed on online retailer sites as "Land & Sea Fashion Styles" Pinkie Pie, and is a release to go alongside the My Little Pony movie, which, as before mentioned, featured the cast as seaponies. This does not resemble the seapony design featured in the movie at all, but I understand the transforming mermaid concept here, a popular gimmick among fashion doll lines.
Applejack is one of Twilight's friends who is an earth pony. This AJ's hair stands right up in its ponytail, while her tail defies gravity. She's posed as if she were trotting excitedly, and she looks pretty cute.
This pony is Trixie, one of Twilight's rivals, and later, an ally. I quite like her representation in this toyline, her expression is as smug as it should be, she's got nice, vivid colors. The star graphic on the side of her body looks pretty cool, rendered in silver glitter. Her hair was unfortunately frizzy out of the box.
Rarity is a unicorn pony and another member of the main cast of Twilight's best friends. For whatever reason, she makes up the bulk of the reboot G4 ponies I have. I don't know if she was particularly popular, or if it's just coincidence that she appeared so often at my local stores. She's a sophisticated lady-pony, so a lot of these very animated, smiley toys of her seem a bit out of character for her, but she looks cute enough.
Here are a few standard Raritys:
This Rarity has a weird skirt on. If one presses the button on her flank, her skirt spins around. Her body is weirdly long and her back legs oddly skinny. Her expression combined with the angle of her neck does not seem very flattering. I am, however, amused by the strange novelty of this toy.
Here they all are, compared to a pre-reboot Rarity. Their proportions are very different, but the size is about the same across the board.
The pink pony is Princess Cadence, standing next to her pre-reboot incarnation. The colors of the newer version are more show-accurate: a paler, less magenta pink. Her head is appears quite bulbous, and her neck thick compared to her very thin body. The shape of her back legs are a bit uncanny, precariously thin at the joint. The indigo pony is Princess Luna, who has an affinity for the moon and night. I like her expression here more than those of her previous incarnations, as it's a bit more mature-looking,. She has the same bulbous head as Princess Cadence. Her hairline doesn't seem to work well with the shape of her head. Perhaps a rooting pattern that would allow for her to have a nice forelock, or some better quality hair would allow for her mane to lay more favorably.
I love G4 ponies-- they're cute, small, and represent loveable, iconic characters from the franchise. Though these rebooted ponies are a little different than the G4 toyline I'm used to, they are still just as cute (and have just as many flaws as the originals). These toys becomes more nostalgic as the years go on; I enjoy looking back at them, especially as I'm a bit underwhelmed by the G5 pony releases. These creatures hardly resemble horses in the slightest, but they're funny little characters that charm me despite their flaws.