YMMV / The Dear Sweetie Belle Continuity

• Broken Base: For What's Done in the Dark..., readers are split over who is less in the wrong: Shining and Luna for literally screwing Cadance over, or Cadance for her tantrum involving maiming her old mentor, trying to have Luna banished to the moon again, and seceding from Equestria.
• Complete Monster:
  • Dear Cutie Mark Crusaders: Former Captain Feather Duster was fired for drunkenly flooding rabbit holes during Winter Wrap-Up and went about taking revenge by causing a catastrophic storm, killing Applejack's parents. Feather Duster would have happily let Rainbow Dash, his replacement, face the wrath of Ponyville, had he not drunkenly passed out at the scene of his crime. Lashing out at Dash again, Feather Duster forces her to choose between saving Scootaloo and stopping him from unleashing another, even more destructive storm. After seemingly being stopped, Feather Duster returns in "Cutie Mark Crusaders Dream Warriors", where his disembodied spirit returns to feed off the nightmares of ponies and tries to possess Scootaloo's body to murder Dash.
  • The Changelings Have a King: Prince Blueblood is the spoiled nephew of Celestia who becomes king of the Changelings. After he and Chrysalis marry, he begins making plans to take over Equestria and gain revenge on Rarity. To that end, he starts isolating her in order to make her dependent on him. After moving to Ponyville, he kidnaps ponies to feed to his monstrous spawn and stirs drama between Spike and Crescendo—Rarity's former lover—to the point that Spike nearly kills him. After being found out, he unleashes his horde of flesh-hungry Changelings on Ponyville, watching with a smile as innocent ponies get violently ripped apart. After his offspring are killed, he brushes off their deaths and simply tries to kill Rarity outright, only for Spike to take the shot. He then attempts to kill his aunts in an attack that ends up killing Trixie and Shining Armor, and then drains a mortally wounded Chrysalis of all the love he gave her before leaving her to die. Even after being defeated, he shows no remorse when asked if he has any regrets; he simply states he regrets not killing everyone sooner.
• Harsher in Hindsight: Rainbow Dash being framed for sabotaging Cloudsdale's weather factory. Turns out she's not above doing that anyway.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: "Cutie Mark Crusaders Dream Warriors" showing Luna help the CMC fight back against their nightmares, since as of season 5 all three Crusaders have received aid from the night princess within their dreams.
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: The series shifting to foreshadowing/setting up an apocalyptic conflict has put off many who enjoyed the series character-driven Slice of Life stories, especially since the characters it made them so attached to are now at high risk of getting unhappy endings. Not helping is said conflict being caused in part by the controversial actions of the series' more controversial characters while likable characters are denied agency, most notoriously Pinkie Pie dying of unspecified causes prior. The first story fully set in this darker direction, The Changelings Have a King, had a high body count and higher ratio of dislikes to likes than any other work in the series. While later works were better received, their having only one-fifth the likes shows that a large majority, all save the most dedicated fans, stopped caring about the series to the point its cancellation went largely without notice.