My Little Pony: Best Gift Ever

2018 TV special My Little Pony: Best Gift EverTitle cardWritten byMichael VogelDirected by Denny Lu Mike Myhre Music by Daniel Ingram (songs) William Anderson (score) Countries of origin United States Canada ProductionExecutive producers Stephen Davis Nicole Dubuc Kirsten Newlands Sarah Wall Producers Devon Cody Eliza Hart Colleen McAllister Editors Greg Canning Tom Harris Nicole Dubuc Running time44 minutesProduction companies Allspark Animation DHX Studios (Vancouver) Original releaseNetworkDiscovery FamilyReleaseOctober 27, 2018 (2018-10-27) My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic Equestria Toyline Cutie mark Elements of Harmony Pony Spin-offs My Little Pony: Equestria Girls (2013–2020)(List of animations) My Little Pony: Pony Life (2020–2021)(List of episodes)

CharactersMane Six

Twilight Sparkle Rainbow Dash Pinkie Pie Applejack Fluttershy Rarity

Supporting

Spike Princess Celestia Princess Luna Princess Cadance Shining Armor Discord Starlight Glimmer Trixie Zecora

Antagonists

Queen Chrysalis Lord Tirek Cozy Glow

Minor

Derpy Hooves Background Six Cheese Sandwich Quibble Pants The Wonderbolts Aunt Holiday and Auntie Lofty

Equestria Girls

Sunset Shimmer

Seasons & episodesSeason 1 (2010–2011)

"Friendship Is Magic" "The Ticket Master" "Applebuck Season" "Griffon the Brush Off" "Boast Busters" "Dragonshy" "Look Before You Sleep" "Bridle Gossip" "Swarm of the Century" "Winter Wrap Up" "Call of the Cutie" "Fall Weather Friends" "Suited for Success" "Feeling Pinkie Keen" "Sonic Rainboom" "Stare Master" "The Show Stoppers" "A Dog and Pony Show" "Green Isn't Your Color" "Over a Barrel" "A Bird in the Hoof" "The Cutie Mark Chronicles" "Owl's Well That Ends Well" "Party of One" "The Best Night Ever"

Season 2 (2011–2012)

"The Return of Harmony" "Lesson Zero" "Luna Eclipsed" "Sisterhooves Social" "The Cutie Pox" "May the Best Pet Win!" "The Mysterious Mare Do Well" "Sweet and Elite" "Secret of My Excess" "Hearth's Warming Eve" "Family Appreciation Day" "Baby Cakes" "The Last Roundup" "The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000" "Read It and Weep" "Hearts and Hooves Day" "A Friend in Deed" "Putting Your Hoof Down" "It's About Time" "Dragon Quest" "Hurricane Fluttershy" "Ponyville Confidential" "MMMystery on the Friendship Express" "A Canterlot Wedding"

Season 3 (2012–2013)

"The Crystal Empire" "Too Many Pinkie Pies" "One Bad Apple" "Magic Duel" "Sleepless in Ponyville" "Wonderbolts Academy" "Apple Family Reunion" "Spike at Your Service" "Keep Calm and Flutter On" "Just for Sidekicks" "Games Ponies Play" "Magical Mystery Cure"

Season 4 (2013–2014)

"Princess Twilight Sparkle" "Castle Mane-ia" "Daring Don't" "Flight to the Finish" "Power Ponies" "Bats!" "Rarity Takes Manehattan" "Pinkie Apple Pie" "Rainbow Falls" "Three's a Crowd" "Pinkie Pride" "Simple Ways" "Filli Vanilli" "Twilight Time" "It Ain't Easy Being Breezies" "Somepony to Watch Over Me" "Maud Pie" "For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils" "Leap of Faith" "Testing Testing 1, 2, 3" "Trade Ya!" "Inspiration Manifestation" "Equestria Games" "Twilight's Kingdom"

Season 5 (2015)

"The Cutie Map" "Castle Sweet Castle" "Tanks for the Memories" "Slice of Life" "Amending Fences" "Do Princesses Dream of Magic Sheep?" "Made in Manehattan" "Crusaders of the Lost Mark" "The Hooffields and McColts" "The Cutie Re-Mark"

Season 6 (2016)

"A Hearth's Warming Tail" "The Times They Are a Changeling"

Season 7 (2017)

"The Perfect Pear"

Season 8 (2018)

"Grannies Gone Wild"

Season 9 (2019)

"The Last Crusade" Series finale

MediaFilms & specials My Little Pony: The Movie (2017) My Little Pony: Best Gift Ever (2018) My Little Pony: Rainbow Roadtrip (2019) Music

Theme song "This Day Aria" Movie Soundtrack "Rainbow" "Off to See the World"

Games

My Little Pony: Twilight Sparkle, Teacher for a Day Gameloft video game Collectible card game

Other media

Home video releases IDW comics Issues My Little Pony/Transformers

Brony fandomFan works (list) 15.ai Voiceverse NFT plagiarism scandal A Brony Tale Bronies (documentary) Derpibooru Equestria Daily Fimfiction Fallout: Equestria Friendship Is Witchcraft Legends of Equestria Love & Ponystep Ponysona PONY.MOV Them's Fightin' Herds Fandom people

15 hotdiggedydemon Jenny Nicholson Odyssey Eurobeat Sethisto The Living Tombstone Vylet Pony

Fan culture

Analysis Brony music Bronyspeak Charity Criticism Fan art Clop Ponysona Fan fiction Military bronies /mlp/ Online communities

My Little Pony conventions

BABSCon BronyCAN BronyCon Czequestria Everfree Northwest GalaCon Ponyville Ciderfest RuBronyCon TrotCon UK PonyCon Vanhoover Pony Expo

vte My Little Pony: Best Gift Ever (also known as My Little Pony: Best Gift Ever! and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic: Best Gift Ever) is a double-length Christmas-themed special based on the animated television series My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, taking place in-between seasons eight and nine.[non-primary source needed] It premiered on October 27, 2018 on Discovery Family. In this special, Twilight Sparkle and her friends do a "Hearth's Warming Helper" to get just one Hearth's Warming present for another pony, to which they race all over Equestria to find the perfect gift.

[edit] With Hearth's Warming Eve approaching, Twilight and her friends decide to hold a "Hearth's Warming Helper" so that each of them only has to find a gift for one other friend. For Pinkie Pie's gift, Twilight finds a recipe for a legendary magic pudding that is dangerous if prepared incorrectly. She becomes stressed trying to both prepare it and entertain Shining Armor, Princess Cadance and Flurry Heart, who have come to visit for the holiday. Unbeknownst to them, Flurry Heart adds extra ingredients that cause the pudding to boil over. Pinkie travels to Yakyakistan seeking advice for Twilight's gift. Prince Rutherford directs her north to the home of a trio of magical flying reindeer, Aurora, Bori and Alice. They claim to give her the "perfect gift" whose significance she will understand later. Rarity orders a special hat as her gift to Applejack, but it is misdelivered to a nut farm. She travels there to collect it, but the resident farmer couple believes it to be a gift for their budding fashion designer son, Pistachio. Deducing the hat was not for him, he offers to return it, but Rarity insists he keep it so as to encourage his passion. Spike swaps his recipient with Fluttershy so that he can give a gift to Rarity. He tries to craft a gift himself as a way to acknowledge her artistic creativity, but eventually falls asleep from exhaustion after several failed attempts. Fluttershy, now tasked to find a gift for Rainbow Dash, travels with Applejack, who has Spike, to Rainbow Falls to shop for their gifts. There they find Flim and Flam swindling unwitting shoppers into buying cheaply-made dolls. They manage to expose their plot, but only after buying several of the dolls and using up their gift money. Discord bothers Rainbow Dash against half-heartedly buying a meaningless gift for Fluttershy. Upon his suggestion, she catches a cute creature called a Winterchilla, unaware that it turns into a monstrous Winterzilla after dark. The group meet up at Twilight's castle to find it is flooded with the unstable pudding, and as they attempt to flee, the Winterzilla blocks their exit. Pinkie, realizing that her present is the pudding's remaining ingredients, uses them to stabilize it. Fluttershy manages to calm and befriend the Winterzilla, which Discord reveals to have been his plan all along. The group all apologize for the disappointing gifts they ended up giving each other. Using a homemade guitar, Spike sings a song as his gift to Rarity, hoping his uninspiring gift did not ruin her holiday. Rarity is nonetheless appreciative and the group realizes that the best gift they can give to each other is their friendship.

[edit] A song animatic from the special was shown at the 2018 My Little Pony 2018 San Diego Comic-Con panel. A promo for the special originally had a layering error involving the reindeer's flight over Twilight's castle. Supervising director Jim Miller confirmed on Twitter that this was fixed. Additionally, Miller also counted this special as an episode.

Music[edit] Main article: List of songs in My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic § My Little Pony: Best Gift Ever (2018) Like the previous three Hearth's Warming episodes, the songs were composed by Daniel Ingram with lyric writing shared between Ingram and Michael Vogel.

"One More Day" – Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Spike and choir "The True Gift of Gifting" – Spike and Twilight Sparkle; backing vocals Fluttershy, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Pinkie Pie and choir

[edit]

Tara Strong as Twilight Sparkle Rebecca Shoichet as Twilight Sparkle (singing voice) Tabitha St. Germain as Rarity, Flurry Heart, and Derpy Kazumi Evans as Rarity (singing voice) Ashleigh Ball as Rainbow Dash and Applejack Andrea Libman as Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy Shannon Chan-Kent as Pinkie Pie (singing voice) Cathy Weseluck as Spike Andrew Francis as Shining Armor Britt McKillip as Princess Cadance John de Lancie as Discord The Flim Flam Brothers Sam Vincent as Flim Scott McNeil as Flam Garry Chalk as Prince Rutherford and Oak Nut Ingrid Nilson as Limestone Pie, Maud Pie, Marble Pie, and Butternut Sean Thomas as Pistachio Gift Givers of the Grove Asia Mattu as Aurora Alison Wandzura as Bori Meaghan Hommy as Alice

Apple Bloom (Michelle Creber), Scootaloo (Madeleine Peters), Sweetie Belle (Claire Corlett), Big McIntosh, Sugar Belle, Granny Smith, Grand Pear, Igneous Rock Pie, Cloudy Quartz, and Parcel Post (Sam Vincent) sing during "One More Day", but are uncredited.

[edit] The special premiered on October 27, 2018 on Discovery Family. The special is available on Netflix as of November 25, 2018 in the United States and Canada.

Home media[edit] The special was released on DVD on November 26, 2018 in the United Kingdom and distributed by Hasbro Trinity.

[edit] The holiday special is adapted into three storybooks from September to October 2018, the book A Perfectly Pinkie Present!, Board Book and A Present for Everypony.

Animated shorts[edit] The special was accompanied by three animated shorts.

No.TitleWritten byOriginal release date1"Triple Pony Dare Ya"Kim Beyer-JohnsonDecember 11, 2018 (2018-12-11)

Applejack and Rainbow Dash challenge each other to perform a series of crazy stunts. 2"The Great Escape Room"Kim Beyer-JohnsonDecember 11, 2018 (2018-12-11)

Pinkie Pie sets up an escape room challenge for her friends. 3"Mystery Voice"Kate LethDecember 11, 2018 (2018-12-11)

Classes at the School of Friendship are interrupted by a string of odd intercom announcements, each in a different pony's voice.

Even though the story isn’t set in a winter wonderland, the themes of giving, friendship and surprise wrap up neatly with the festive spirit. Parents know the "Mane Six" can keep younger kids glued to the screen while the older crowd enjoys the witty nods to classic holiday tropes – secret Santa‑style gifts, a community coming together, and a race against time to save the day. The 44‑minute length is perfect for a pre‑Christmas evening slot: long enough to feel substantial, short enough to slot between the annual Christmas classics on Discovery Family.

If you’re stocking up for a My Little Pony fan, treat the TV special as the centrepiece of a mini‑gift pack. Pair it with a fresh batch of pony‑themed plushies – the cutie marks from the show are instantly recognisable and make for great stocking fillers. Add a small box of festive biscuits or a hot chocolate sachet for a cosy viewing session. For older fans, consider a limited‑edition pony jewellery piece or a set of colour‑changing Christmas lights that echo the show’s vibrant palette. This creates a multi‑sensory experience that extends beyond the screen.

First‑time viewers might think the special is a standalone holiday tale, but seasoned fans will spot recurring motifs from the broader "Friendship Is Magic" universe – the Elements of Harmony hidden in background décor, and cameo appearances by characters like Queen Chrysalis that hint at larger story arcs. These Easter eggs reward attentive watching and can spark discussions about the series’ continuity, turning a simple holiday watch into a deeper fan‑theory session. Encouraging kids to spot these details adds an educational layer to the entertainment, sharpening observation skills while keeping the fun alive.