Top Ten New Characters of Season 5 · 3:23am Dec 19th, 2015
Season 5 gave us a good variety of characters new and old alike to work with, not just in the form of antagonists as is often the case, but also in the form of supporting characters. Season 4 gave us Coco Pommel, Suri Polomare, Cheese Sandwich, Trenderhoof, Toe Tapper, Torch Song, Sea Breeze, Silver Shill, and Lord Tirek. Season 5 gave us a new character almost every episode.
But which ones left the greatest lasting impression? Well, it's time to find out. A quick note before we begin, background ponies don't count, so sorry Derpy, Doctor Whooves, Lyra, Bon-Bon, Octavia, and Minuette, but you won't be on this list. Hey, don't feel bad, you all got your own lists to be on, it's time to let other characters have the spotlight.
10. Stormy Flare
She's certainly get a lot of love from me with these lists, is it any surprise she'd pop up here? Well, I can't put her higher than this since she really didn't contribute much to the only episode she was in. But it was still nice to see her, and I would love to have her pop up in the background or the comics. Spitfire truly is the spitting image of her mother.
9. Tree Hugger
Tree Hugger definitely made for some excellent comedic moments in "Make New Friends, But Keep Discord", particularly because of her seemingly clueless nature. She's basically what a stoner character would look like in a G rated cartoon about technicolor horses living in a magical fantasy world, and that's part of what makes her stand out so much. At least in comparison to Stormy Flare, I can see why people may not like writing for her that much, she's basically every single hippy sterotype you can think of made into a character. Unless you've got experience with such characters (or know the way they think), you're going to have a hard time properly writing her.
8. Double Diamond
A couple of people seemed to consider shipping him with Starlight Glimmer at one point, but he remained confined to be shipped with Night Glider (which I can understand given their brief amount of interaction) and Party Favor (which doesn't make much sense when they only shared scenes together before Starlight Glimmer showed up). If Tree Hugger is a sterotype of the 60's and 70's (when hippies were most widespread in popular cultural and American affairs) then Double Diamond seems to embody those extreme sports sterotypes from the 90's and early 2000's. But hey, at least unlike those sterotypes, he doesn't spout outdated lingo every five seconds. Perhaps, if he'd started questioning Starlight sooner, his heel face turn would've been better recieved, and more people would write stories featuring him. As it is, every other member of the equal four outshined him in the fandom.
7. Night Glider
Basically a poor man's Rainbow Dash, with Rebecca Shoichet voicing the character. It works well, but there's really not much else to her character besides that, and she was only shipped with Double Diamond for some odd reason (you'd think that the poor man's Rainbow Dash would inspire tons of leziban and straight ships with just about every fandom character). Plus, she was the last of the equal four to be introduced, and the only one not mentioned by name for some reason. Still, she was the one to lead the assault on Starlight Glimmer's cottage, the one to get her to confess the truth about the staff (as well as the one who brought up the whole "Cutie Unmarking" ceremony). So that counts for something.
6. Sassy Saddles
In terms of a compelling antagonist, Sassy Saddles was just like every other Season 5 antagonist, not compelling in the slightest (Starlight Glimmer was hardly compelling from the start, but at least in the premiere we could speculate what reason she had for hating cutie marks so much). But when she managed to redeem herself and become a better character, the fandom became willing to overlook her being a Fleur De Lis recolor. Her appearance in "Rarity Investigates" was brief, but it was a major step up from the huge role she had as the antagonist in "Canterlot Boutique". Hopefully, she and Canterlot Carousel will return for Season 6, so we can see more of her. She and Rarity make for a pretty good pair in my opinion, it's about time we had someone besides Fluttershy and Applejack to play the straight mare to Rarity's antics.
5. Sugar Belle
Poor Sugar Belle. Despite winning a poll on Equestria Daily for best of the equal four, she only got shipped with Party Favor, and the few fics that did got swept aside. Seeing as so many people seemed to declare her their new waifu, and considering she was voiced by Rebecca Shoichet, I'm not sure why she was is so unloved on this site. She was the one who first alerted the mane six to how much of a dystopia Starlight Glimmer's village was, and while she did the least to aid in the fight against Starlight, she still made a pretty good contribution with her snow pie (she almost managed to make Starlight drop the jars with the cutie marks because of said snow pie).
4. Party Favor
Party Favor's mad balloon skills actually bled over into the fandom, to the point where it's impossible to go to Equestria Daily, and not see at least one ballon post a day featuring balloon recreations of different characters and scenes from Season 5. And out of all the equal four, he was the only one to get a ship outside of just the group. In addition to being shipped with Double Diamond and Sugar Belle (but not Night Glider for whatever reason), he also got shipped heavily with Pinkie Pie, and at least one fanfic tried to ship him with Moondancer of all ponies (go figure). His "But I didn't listen!" face actually spawned a meme that is still making the rounds on the fandom as of now. About the only thing he likely did to get people angry with him, was being declared the new rule 63 Pinkie Pie, thus making him enemy number one of Cheese Sandwich fans and CheesePie shippers.
3. Starlight Glimmer
Leave it to the fandom to make lemonade out of lemons. When Starlight Glimmer's backstory turned out to be underwhelming and disappointing, several fans quickly rushed to expand it. While others tried to make Starlight face punishment for her actions with various alternate endings, a few even kept her as a villan. Despite the fact that she's not the most original villan of all time, and her backstory certainly needed work, she sure doesn't deserve to be labled the worst villan of the show, even by major villan standerds. Least we forget that Sunset Shimmer was a really weak and disappointing antagonist in the first Equestria Girls movie, but when she became her own character in the second movie, the fandom started singing her praises. Hopefully, the same will hold true for Starlight.
2. Moondancer
Who'd have thought that desite being the fourth Twilight Sparkle foil we'd gotten in five seasons, Moondancer would become the most memorable and most talked about? Well, at least in comparison to Trixie she doesn't have that tendency to talk in the third person all the time, in comparison to pre-reformed Sunset Shimmer she doesn't get by largely on luck because of stupid decisions she made (or because of plotholes), and in comparsion to Starlight Glimmer, her reason for turning her back on friendship made more sense. Granted, I still feel like she overreacted, given the circumstances, but at least unlike Starlight, she didn't go all super villan because of said bad experience.
1. Countess Coloratura a.k.a Rara
It's ironic that a new character would be overshadowed by Applejack, instead of it being the other way around. And in many scenes where Applejack wasn't there to take the attention away from Coloratura, Svengallop's behavior attracted more attention. But she was definitely in her element with her songs, especially when she sang "The Magic Inside Me", and Lena Hall did a terrific job voicing her. One thing the fandom seems to have not noticed, when she was the Countess, Coloratura's mane and tail looked a lot like Sonta Dusk. Considering how many people made jokes about Starlight Glimmer looking like Aria Blaze, I'm surprised Coloratura wasn't subjected to similar jokes. Makes me wonder if a pony in Season 6 will get a mane and tail style that makes them look like Adagio Dazzle?
And there you have it.
I'd put Starlight at number 1, Party Favor at 2, Double Diamond at 3, Sugar Belle at 4, Night Glider at 5, Moon Dancer at 6, Rara at 7, Tree Hugger at 8, The Smooze at 9, and Tree Hugger at 10.
Speaking of Rara her voice actor reacted to her own episode.