Should the Mane Five share the same power levels as Twilight Sparkle?

Whenever I look at that Season Five animatic and all of those ponies with equal-signs as their cutie-marks, I can't help but think about my reaction to the Twilight/Tirek fight, and the heavy power imbalance between Twilight and her friends on display there.

As I kept saying in past posts, one of my main concerns with that fight was that it showed Twilight to be unnecessarily dominant like Goku, and all of her friends as stupidly submissive as Goku's fellow Z-Warriors. As a result, I kept thinking that Twilight's friends should die because they didn't have the same power levels as she does, even though it wasn't really what I wanted at all. After all, the non-saiyan Z-Warriors shared many of the same powers and fighting techniques as Goku, and they all get left behind not only in terms of power levels, but also relevancy to the story and character-development.

But then after a little contemplating, I'd come to realize that resourcefulness to the team didn't have to involve power levels. Usually, a supporting character can have their own skills other than the main-protagonist's, yet still come out resourceful in their own ways. For example, Nami and Usopp were the weakest members of the Straw Hat Pirate crew, and yet both were capable in wielding a Sorcery Clima-Tact and Kuro Kabuto slingshot, respectively. Meanwhile, the G1 Transformers had two Autobot scientists named Wheeljack and Ratchet, and in one Season One episode, the two of them were responsible for repairing Optimus Prime alongside the Witwicky family, which meant that Optimus would have died if it weren't for them. And, we can't forget about Batman, Tony Stark, Donatello, and Tali'Zorah, all of whom weren't as powerful as their respective teammates but didn't need to be, so long as they had their gadgets and technology. And, when I looked at objective-based team shooters like Call of Duty and Battlefield, I'd come to realize that strength and firepower wasn't a measure of a team's capabilities, but rather the willingness to help each other out, whether in coordinating attacks on the enemy's base or defending their own.

So in a way, the Mane Fivedidn't need to become as stupidly overpowered as Twilight herself, because (1.) they already have other skill-sets that still made them resourceful, and (2.) they went through their own key episodes and learned valuable life-lessons about their Elements of Harmony. But am I right in making that assumption?

 

Dude, I'm just curious if power levels should matter at all. I'm not trying to entice anger.

 

You know, by saying that, you, like everyone else, are implying that Twilight's friends should just die for their uselessness, like every non-saiyan supporting character out there in DBZ.

Besides, DBZ taught a bad message to children. Goku, Vegeta, Gohan... they're always winning because of their saiyan heritage, while everyone else gets murdered or cast aside because they weren't saiyans. As a result, Akira Toriyama unintentionally taught his readers that if you are born in a specific heritage or are part of a specific species, then you're special. Otherwise, if you're not born in a specific heritage or species, then consider yourself murdered on a regular basis.

In other words, he was constantly promoting divine right and genetic destiny. And that was the same downfall of Twilight's Kingdom up until the end. Meghan McCarthy was beating her own audience on the head that alicorn magic was so powerful and destructive, that the magic of friendship had no longer mattered. It was why we had the ending in the first place, to show that friendship trumps alicorn magic. And yet, here you are, hating the ending but liking the Twilight/Tirek fight, to the point that you want the show to stop being about friendship and instead emphasize how useless and disposable the Mane Five are because of their species, and how stupidly overpowered Twilight is because of her species!

Yep! Stupid amounts of racism and racial superiority, just like Dragon Ball Z!

 

Okay, so I got something wrong here.

What I should've said, on the other hand, is that up until the end, the Season Four finale stopped being about friendship just to demonstrate that power level imbalance between Twilight and her friends, on the level of Dragon Ball Z between the saiyans and the non-saiyans, but not out of racism. Plus, I see tons of people want that power imbalance between Twilight and her friends, to the point that the latter be murdered for their uselessness, because Meghan McCarthy hadn't ripped off enough of Dragon Ball Z as is, with just the Twilight/Tirek fight's superficial aspects alone.

Though, at the very least, Devil Fruit users do have legitimate weaknesses. For example, Haki can penetrate a Devil Fruit user, even a Logia-type. They are also weak against sea water and sea stone prisms. Hell, I remember Tashigi defeating Monet, the latter of whom ate a Devil Fruit unlike the former, who practiced Haki and used it to defeat her! Alicorns, on the other hand, don't have weaknesses at all, and are just so stupidly overpowered that they render the other three pony species disposable and useless, like the way Twilight unintentionally did her friends.

 

Except after that, Twilight and her friends receive Rainbow Power to defeat Tirek and restore everypony's magic, followed by a Rainbow Palace with thrones for all of them to replace Twilight's library. And even though those things were to redeem Twilight's friends for their utter uselessness throughout the entire Season Four finale, people hated them for their own respective reasons.

As a result, I had to come up with the conclusion that bronies want MLP to stop being about friendship and instead emphasize the stupid power imbalance between Twilight Sparkle and her friends, and how the latter might as well be murdered for the benefit of the former's over-empowerment, similar to the way Goku's friends are meaninglessly murdered or sidelined for the benefit of his over-empowerment.

 

It wasn't just for food alone, though that is the case. It was to help a young giant woman rescue her beloved father, whom she cared for and not just for his food. Luffy had to reunite Lilly with her father, not only for the food, but because they were as much family as Luffy is his Straw Hat Pirate crew (and Ace, in some regard) on a regular basis.

Also, the Z's Ambition Arc was non-canon filler.