) I can safely say that My Little Pony: A New Generation was great! 
And here are my random thoughts:
MLP villain rankings: Stygian/The Pony of Shadows · 7:46pm Feb 22nd, 2019
0/10 - AWFUL (unsalvageable, never should have been made, wouldn't recommend to anyone)
1/10 - HORRIBLE/BORING (tedious, hurts to watch, a bore, no reason to watch him/her, whatever positive things about him/her are tiny and not enough)
2/10 - VERY BAD (slightly less terrible, maybe there were one or two things you liked kept him/her from being a 1 but still very painful)
3/10 - BAD (the kind of bad where you're checking your watch over and over to see how much time is left before he/she gets off the screen)
4/10 - MEDIOCRE (not awful but not really that good either)
5/10 - EH (average, didn't love or hate him/her)
6/10 - DECENT (the first positive rating on this list, fine overall, glad you saw him/her once but wouldn't watch him/her again)
7/10 - GOOD (enjoyable enough that you'd maybe watch him/her again in future, had some noteworthy flaws but is overall a worthwhile villain)
8/10 - GREAT (a solid, enjoyable villain, very entertaining)
9/10 - EXCELLENT (very engaging, awesome, you definitely recommend to anyone)
10/10 - MASTERPIECE (extremely engaging, an absolute must-see)
Stygian/The Pony of Shadows
This guy had so much potential to be a fun villain for the show, in the same vein as Discord, Tirek and Chrysalis. I mean, just look at his design. He could’ve been like Ursula or Jafar: an unapologetically wicked entity just oozing with evilness. Hell, can’t you just imagine Jonathan Freeman’s voice coming out of him?
But nope, the writers decided to create yet another “people abandoned me/were mean to me so I’ll destroy the world until someone agrees to be my friend” villain.
A.K.A. another Starlight.
Let’s rattle off the smallest problems with him first: He was missing for a majority of the finale. He barely did anything. He’s defeated with hardly even a fight. And it’s never explained what the darkness that consumed him is. Is it leftover energy from Nightmare Moon? Did he study King Sombra's magic? Nope, it’s just… ‘the darkness’.
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Just like Starlight, Tempest and every other villain with this same design, Stygian’s biggest problem is that he’s a petulant brat.
Yes, the intention was for both Stygian and the Pillars to be at fault. But in execution, it was Stygian's fault alone. He never bothered telling them how he was feeling, his very first instinct was to go behind their backs and steal from them for no reason, and he didn’t even try explaining himself when confronted about it. All this happened before the darkness even corrupted him, mind you. And then he had the audacity to claim that the Pillars wronged him. And Star Swirl's the one who has to apologise and claim he should have listened to him, even though Stygian never talked to him or the Pillars in the first place?
“But he wasn’t respected enough.”
Oh, and that justifies his dumb decision to sneak behind the backs of the ponies he claimed to be his friends and steal their artefacts without asking them? If anything, that just makes him more of a jealous petty bastard. Stygian had every opportunity to stop himself from becoming the Pony of Shadows. He could’ve simply talked to the Pillars and told them about his feelings of inferiority like an adult would, instead of just expecting them to somehow read his mind and know how he was feeling.
But he made no effort whatsoever to tell them anything. He instead chose to basically make a pact with Satan because he didn’t like the Pillars rightfully accusing him of theft and giving him consequences for his stupid actions. It’s his own fault. Simple as.
“Well maybe he did try talking to the Pillars and they didn’t listen but the episode just didn't show it.”
That makes the finale even worse. Why would you leave out a detail like that? Why would you choose to kneecap your story that way? Why would you omit something that would explain a plot hole and/or make a character's motivations more sound? If the writer has to confirm an unexplained detail on Twitter because they couldn’t be bothered to explain it in the actual episode, it’s bad writing. If you have to read a comic in order for a story or a villain’s motivations to make more sense, the story/villain is badly written. Supplementary material like a comic is meant to offer additional information, not fill in the blanks of an incomplete story. If nopony in the episode outright said that Stygian tried talking to the Pillars, then it didn't happen.
A more fitting name for this guy would be the Piece of Shit.
0/10 AWFUL
LINKS TO OTHER VILLAIN RANKINGS
Nightmare Moon
Discord
Queen Chrysalis
King Sombra
Sunset Shimmer
Lord Tirek
Adagio Dazzle
Starlight Glimmer
Midnight Sparkle
Gloriosa Daisy
Juniper Montage
Stygian/The Pony of Shadows (you're already here, you silly sauce)
The Storm King
Wallflower Blush
Vignette Valencia
Chancellor Neighsay
Cozy Glow
PostCrush
Grogar
Ouch. Scathing, man. (I'm in agreement, they epically bungled this guy's execution. I mean, seriously, the idea of there being this Well of Shadows hidden beneath Equestria that leads to some sort of hell dimension of primal evil darkness... that's all kinds of awesome material... And yet, nope...
)
This is why my personal favorite take on Stygian / Pony of Shadows is from the fic "The Root of All Evil" by James Pwyll. Because that one makes him more of a sympathetic figure without going "oh woe is me, feel sorry for me!"
Yeah the new writers don’t know shot about well writing anything
5018331
Does he go behind the Pillars' backs and steal from them for no reason yet act like the victim when they rightfully suspect the worst of him, leading to him overreacting and jumping right to "I'm gonna destroy the world"?
5018335
Nope, all of that is dropped altogether. Instead of being Stygian, a pony who bonded with primal darkness, he is Stygian - an entity of Darkness (but not Evil, there's an important distinction to make there) sealed away by Starswirl and the Pillars.
His character is more like Hades from Greek mythology - popularly misunderstood through the centuries as being evil because of his nature as a creature of Shadows or Darkness, but in reality is more Neutral alignment than anything else.
5018337
Okay, that actually sounds kinda interesting, I might check that out. Thanks.
5018341
Cool. I hope you enjoy it.
5018344
5018341
its hilarious now that the fanfic writer seem to know what there doing better then the people being payed to write this stuff
5018351
Well, in fairness to the show writers, most fanfic writers do this sort of thing without corporate mandate hanging over their heads. I'm sure that at least part of the fuckups of the show as of late have to do with Hasbro or executive meddling.
5018354
im sure it is but that still dosent detract from the fact that there are fanfics out there that can be made into episodes and without falling into the pitfalls the show has been falling into as of late
5018344
Now that was the Shadow Play we should've gotten. Thanks for the recommendation.
5018358
No problem, man. Happy that you enjoyed it.
5018356
Sure, I'm not disputing that.
It's just something I think of sometimes when I see people claim that they could write better than the official creators, that's all.
5018361
yeah I know. I mean there is no way my fanfic could ever be turned into an episode. mostly cause it has Flash sentry (the character the creators seem to have abandoned all hope on) and is based on a completely different show. (sorry for the shamless plug)
Ah yes, the Pony of Shadows/Stygian aka Poor Man's Venom/Eddie Brock. The PoS had potential to be Equestria's equivalent of Aku but alas he was squandered.
I share your frustrations about this character. As a result, I'll be splitting the PoS and Stygian into two separate entities in upcoming story project.