[SPOILERS] Future Equestrian Stories Analyzis Firework! - Part 2: "My Little Pony: The Manga - A Day in the Life of Equestria"

On Tuesday, Volume 1 of the first, official, english manga for My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic got released! I have this volume pre-ordered for months now, ever since Equestria Daily reported about it last year. Unfortunately, I still have to wait for quite some time until I can read it, because Amazon UK only gets it on July 1st for whatever reason (and because I didn't ask my local comic shop if they can order it, because I'm only used to buy the official comics there, so I forgot that they're selling manga too), and the official preview for the manga doesn't make the waiting easier, because what it shows looks awesome!
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And the manga series starts with..... ZOMBIES. I feel at home with this manga already. I feel at home with Equestria anyway, but this makes everything 20% homier~
This entire debacle here started when Pinkie Pie went through a mirror portal and found herself in a universe in which Rainbow Dash's prank we've seen in "28 Pranks Later" resulted in actually turning all of Ponyville into zombies. I hope we'll be seeing a lot of this alternate, zombie apocalypse universe.
What I'm wondering about is the mirror Twilight is seen talking about on this page. Is this one of Starswirl's mirror portals? As far as we know, all of Starswirl's mirror portals are destroyed by now (even the one Luna, Stygian, Trixie, Capper and Tempest Shadow used recently, as seen in "Nightmare Knights"), so unless another one is hidden somewhere and Twilight discovered it, it either has to be a different magical portal or the official manga shows indeed an alternate universe for a change. Which would be very funny, considering this story is thematically about travelling into an alternate universe.
It would be even more funny if this story starts out in an alternate universe, with an alternate universe Pinkie, Twilight and Spike, but without us knowing that and assuming it's the Equestria we know. And at the end, we find out that one of the universes she travelled into is the universe we know from the show and the official comics and she meets "our" Pinkie Pie there. That would be a nice plot twist.
Of course, that's just me joking around right now. It's not even enough to call it "speculation", just a funny thought. The portal itself isn't enough proof that the manga shows an alternate universe, so I'll analyze that possibility more and determine that once I can read the entire manga volume.
Either way, ZOMBIE PONIES! That's what I look forward to the most!
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Pinkie and Celestia inside an arcade. This is the crazy one of the preview pages. Celestia acts quite unusual there. We know that she had a childish side, but usually, she still keeps a regal and royal appearance for the most part even when her childish side comes out. And she also never shows that childish side of hers in public, but here she does. This makes me wondering even more if the manga will show an alternate universe. But there is another explanation.
The first preview page indicates that the manga shows events that happened rather recently in Equestria, not in the past, because Spike is seen with wings on it. However, it could show events from the future.
Celestia makes sure to keep a regal and royal appearance around her subjects, but if she wouldn't be ruling Equestria, she would likely act differently. Maybe the manga shows events that happened after Celestia and Luna retired, and therefore after everything we have seen and will still see in Season 9. It would make sense that Celestia starts acting more casual in public once she doesn't rule over Equestria anymore and when she and Luna have given the throne to Twilight.
I'm excited to find out if that theory of mine is right.
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Last, but not least, the first volume of the manga already has an appearance of Sweetie Belle! And she looks adorable in the third panel! Just the right face a cute filly makes when it is waiting for a hug and an intense dose of snuggles.
What I love even more from here is how randomly she teases Rarity there. A second Rarity would not quite create chaos, unlike it would be if there were two Pinkie Pies (or, a horde of them, FUN, FUN, FUN!), but Sweetie drops that merciless tease on Rarity anyway.
I wonder what motivated that tease. Is there maybe a certain background to that?
Also intriguing is the letter that Rarity received. Someone wants her to create formalwear for a dignitary who visits Equestria and that someone even implies that they could help her with opening a new boutique somewhere in Equestria if she does a good job for them.
Whoever that pony (or creature) who sent the letter is, they must have a lot of influence. Likely, political influence, and while I'm wondering how politics should help with getting Rarity a new boutique, the mysterious letter writer probably would pay the expenses that come with opening a boutique for Rarity. Rulers of kingdoms tend to have a lot of money, naturally.
But the letter also feels ominous. There seems to be someone who wants Rarity to do certain things for them and who promises her more success with her business in exchange for that. And while the first task sounds innocent, we don't know what else they could want from Rarity in the future.
I hope that Rarity won't get abused for something sinister there.

Overall, these pages make my mouth watery for this manga. This is also only Volume 1, two more volumes are confirmed for 2020 and if they do well, we might get more. I'm hoping very much that this manga series will be a huge success, so that I can see more from Equestria even after the show has ended.

Comments

[Bronycommander]

Saw those before, the zombie one got me laughing!