My Little Pony Micro-Series #5: Featuring Pinkie Pie
Written by Ted Anderson
Illustrated by Ben Bates
Lettered by Neil Uyetake
IDW Publishing
Release Date: June 19, 2013
Cover Price: $3.99

Bubbly and hyperactive Pinkie Pie goes totally fangirl when she meets her beloved clown role model Ponyacci in IDW’s latest My Little Pony Micro-Series: Featuring Pinkie Pie. This comic delivers exactly what readers expect from the My Little Pony line: snappy dialog, a clever plot, and clean and bold artwork.

Writer Ted Anderson puts Pinkie Pie through the nearly the entire emotional spectrum, starting with an elated celebration after winning tickets to see Ponyacci perform live.

She meets a sad pony while waiting to enter the show and is so concerned about his mood that she offers to give him her own ticket if it would make him happy. He refuses, so she enters and watches the show with her friend Twilight. The two are awestruck with the performance and can’t wait to go backstage to try and meet the legendary clown. When Pinkie Pie comes face-to-face with her idol, she discovers that the pony behind the makeup is the same sad pony she met before the show.

With a burst of determination and a level of pep that only Pinkie Pie can muster, she makes it her mission to make Ponyacci happy again. Hi-jinks of course follow, and the story concludes on a positive note for everyone.

I’ll admit that as a product of the 80s myself, I was drawn to this micro-series purely by nostalgia, but it was the bright images from Ben Bates that finally pulled me in–they truly propel Anderson’s story off of the page and right out of the ballpark. Though I was at first hesitant to take on the review because horror and sci-fi comics are more my forte, I was pleasantly surprised with the level and quality of entertainment in this issue.