1989:

SUNSHINE PONIES

The Sunshine Ponies introduced another new gimmick for My Little Pony.

After the Baby Sea Ponies who changed colour all over, these new characters would have a streak of hair in their manes that was sensitive to sunlight. In each case, the selected streak of white or light pink would change to magenta when exposed to the sun. This gimmick was also repeated with Twice and Fancy Sundance in the final Megan and Sundance release.

Unfortunately, there were two main drawbacks to this technique. The first was that, in the case of ponies with pale pink hair, they were very prone to fading. And the second was that the colour change sections of hair were prone to becoming frizzy and coarse with too much play.

Consequently it can be difficult to find these ponies with silky hair.

Despite these drawbacks, however, Hasbro would re-use this colour change concept for the Sundazzle Ponies later on!

To confuse the issue, the Sunshine Ponies adopted - at least in part - the old Twice as Fancy theme of having their symbols spread across their bodies. They did not have repeated symbols on their cheeks, however, marking them out clearly from the earlier set release.

There were six ponies sold in this set, but only four of them ever came out in the United Kingdom. Sea Flower and Shoreline never saw a UK release :S