Yona

Yona, or Yona Yak, is a female yak and one of the Young Six who appears in season eight of the show as a student at Twilight Sparkle's School of Friendship.

Development
Yona was first previewed in a 2018 "MY LITTLE PONY SERIES" image within Hasbro 2017 Investor Day webcast presentations from August 3, 2017.

Season eight
In the season eight premiere School Daze - Part 1 and Part 2, Yona enrolls in Twilight Sparkle's School of Friendship as a student, having been brought to Ponyville by Prince Rutherford to represent the yaks. In her debut, Yona is excited at first to meet ponies and tell them all about Yakyakistan. However, when Twilight's strict adherence to the Equestria Education Association's guidelines causes the school courses to be dull and boring, Yona acts arrogant and egotistical out of frustration, saying everything yak-related is the best.

When Yona cuts class along with Sandbar, Smolder, Gallus, Ocellus, and Silverstream, the six hang out together and end up becoming good friends. When they return to school for Friends and Family Day, they accidentally ruin the event and cause damage to the school. Chancellor Neighsay of the EEA perceives their fun and games as an attack orchestrated by non-pony creatures, and the offended tribe leaders pull their students out of school, including Yona.

Not wanting to say goodbye to each other after the school is closed, Yona and her friends go into hiding at the Castle of the Two Sisters. While they have fun together at first, they come under attack by ferocious puckwudgies, and the Mane Six, Spike and Starlight Glimmer save them. When Yona and her friends are asked to come back to school, they are reluctant to continue their boring lessons, but Twilight and the others assure them things will be better and more fun than before. After Twilight defies the authority of Chancellor Neighsay and reopens the School of Friendship, Prince Rutherford allows Yona to re-enroll.

In Grannies Gone Wild, Smolder, Yona, and Sandbar reluctantly listen to Rainbow Dash gush about the Wild Blue Yonder rollercoaster in Las Pegasus. In Horse Play, she takes part in Twilight's play about Princess Celestia.

In Non-Compete Clause, Yona and her classmates are taken on a teamwork field trip by Applejack and Rainbow Dash. One of the activities is canoeing, something which Yona is nervous about, due to being unable to swim. When the canoe crashes against a rock (due to Applejack and Rainbow's arguing), Yona's life-vest is torn, and she almost drowns before being saved by Ocellus and Silverstream. Afterwards, Applejack and Rainbow get the students lost on a nature walk, and the two end up trapped over a ravine while trying to cross it. Yona and the rest of the students work together to save them. Once they return to school, Yona and the other students nominate both their teachers for the "Teacher of the Month" award, believing they were pretending to argue in order to teach the students how not to work together.

In Molt Down, Yona appears on the balcony of the School of Friendship, and later in the library.

In Marks for Effort, she appears attending Pinkie Pie's class on sharing cupcakes and compliments. When Ocellus compliments her and throws her a cupcake, Yona jumps up and eats it, landing on Pinkie afterwards. She is later seen exiting the school with her friends after a test.

In A Matter of Principals, Yona and her classmates are shown various magical artifacts by Twilight just before she is summoned by the Cutie Map. When Iron Will substitutes, he makes Yona act assertive and shout at the other students to be her friends. She and her friends are later forced to run laps by Discord, who conjures up a bugbear to chase them. Yona is unable to keep running, but Starlight Glimmer saves her by blasting the bugbear away. During the Spell-venger Hunt, Yona is paired up with Sandbar, and before they find one of the artifacts, Discord's ghost traps them in quicksand. Yona and her friends are present when Starlight Glimmer apologizes to Discord for not including him and offers him the job of "vice headmare".

In The Hearth's Warming Club, a prank ruins the Hearth's Warming tree, and the students are all under suspicion for it and charged with cleaning up the mess while they are questioned one by one. During this time, Yona tells her friends about the yak holiday of Snilldar Fest, during which she had her hair braided for the first time. When the guilty party doesn't come forward, the students start accusing each other. When Gallus confesses that he was the culprit, resulting in him having to stay for friendship lessons over the holidays, Yona and the others all choose to stay with him. As they finish cleaning up, Yona offers to braid Gallus' feathers, which he declines.

In Friendship University, Yona and her friends appear looking at a flyer for the titular university. In The End in Friend, she and her classmates observe Rainbow Dash and Rarity as part of Twilight's lesson on compromising in friendship.

In A Rockhoof and a Hard Place, Yona becomes an admirer of Rockhoof, not only due to his great size and strength (similar to a yak), but his storytelling style. She is stunned when she later hears that, due to feeling out of place in modern Equestria, he wishes to be turned to stone. She makes him the subject of her essay on heroism and shares that she went through similar difficulties to his when she first came to Ponyville. Yona and Twilight then work together to persuade Rockhoof to serve as Equestria's keeper of tales.

In What Lies Beneath, Yona and her friends start to question their friendship due to comments made by Cozy Glow. During their studies for an upcoming test, they discover a cavern beneath the school, where the Tree of Harmony interacts with them. As part of a test, the Tree forces Yona to confront her fear of spiders. After befriending the spiders, Yona escapes with the rest of her friends.

In the season eight finale School Raze, Yona and her friends go on a field trip to Cloudsdale just before a crisis in Equestria causes magic to start disappearing. The loss of magic causes the cloud-walking spell Starlight cast on the class to fail, with Yona almost falling to the ground before caught by Gallus and Ocellus. After Twilight and her friends leave for Tartarus to investigate, Yona and her friends discover Chancellor Neighsay taking over the school in their absence, and Neighsay captures them under suspicion of stealing Equestria's magic themselves.

After Sandbar and the Cutie Mark Crusaders help them escape and reveal Cozy Glow's true sinister nature, they try to free a magically-trapped Starlight Glimmer, but Cozy catches them and convinces the students to turn on them. Yona and the others get trapped with Starlight and are nearly sucked into another realm with all of Equestria's magic, but they are saved by the Tree of Harmony, and they succeed in foiling Cozy Glow's plans.

Best Gift Ever
In My Little Pony Best Gift Ever, Yona and the rest of the Young Six appear at the beginning, boarding the Friendship Express. Yona also briefly appears celebrating Snilldar Fest in Yakyakistan during the ending montage.

Season nine
In Uprooted, Yona and her friends experience a shared dream that turns out to be a summons from the Tree of Harmony. Returning to the School of Friendship, they learn from Twilight that King Sombra destroyed the Tree. They decide to find some way of making a memorial for it, but Yona's friends all have different ideas of the best way to do so. After breaking up their arguments, Yona proposes using the remains of the Tree to create a treehouse. Their small, unimpressive effort is then magically transformed into a beautiful structure, revealing that the Tree's magic still lives.

In She's All Yak, Sandbar asks Yona to accompany him to a dance.

IDW comics
Yona appears in celebrating Nightmare Night with her friends. In, she attends the All-Equestria Mane Styling Conference with Fluttershy, Zephyr Breeze, Silverstream, and Sandbar.

Storybooks
Yona appears on the cover of the adaptation Meet the New Class.

Commercials
Yona appears in the promotional music video Saved by My Friends.

Software
Budge Studios' mobile game Pocket Ponies.

My Little Pony (mobile game)
Yona is a character in Gameloft's mobile game. w:c:mlp-gameloft:School of Friendship LTS. Her in-game description states, "Likes: her friends; representing Yakyakistan at the School of Friendship; smashing stuff. Dislikes: tripping over her braids; tripping over her hooves; tripping over everything else."

Animated shorts
In Mystery Voice, Yona and her friends attend Rarity's lesson on how to make traditional Hearth's Warming dolls.

In Teacher of the Month, Yona and her friends are shown in flashbacks depicting how Fluttershy earned the titular award, and later attending the "student appreciation day" party held by Applejack and Rainbow Dash. In Starlight the Hypnotist, Yona is briefly shown in a flashback, accidentally scaring Twilight with the ladybug Fluttershy assigned her to care for.

Appearances
Starting with The Maud Couple, Yona also appears in the theme song.

Merchandise
Enterplay collectible card game Friends Forever #57 C, #58 R, and #Pƒ1.

Yona is featured on a magazine card.

Personality
Among the Young Six, Yona is portrayed as very excitable and clumsy, initially frequently tripping over her own hair. Like most yaks, she speaks in broken English and in the third person. She harbors a lot of pride and love for her home of Yakyakistan, repeatedly proclaiming everything yak-related to be "best" and wanting to share that with the other creatures of Equestria. Her pride for her heritage at the expense of other creatures is conceited at first, but after getting to know some of her fellow students, her jabs at other creatures become more good-natured. In What Lies Beneath, it is revealed that Yona suffers from arachnophobia, a fear of spiders.

Quotes
"Yak can't wait to meet ponies! And tell all about Yakyakistan!"

- School Daze - Part 1

"Ugh! Pony school waste of time! Yak school teach how to braid yak hair! Braiding yak hair is best!"

- School Daze - Part 1

"Yona not really like school. But Yona like new friends!"

- School Daze - Part 2

"Cupcakes are best cakes!"

- School Daze - Part 2

"Yona not scared! Yona have friends!"

- School Daze - Part 2

"Not bad! [quickly] For pony."

- School Daze - Part 2

"Yak best at field-tripping!"

- Non-Compete Clause

"Be! My! Friend!"

- A Matter of Principals

"Yak win! Yak best at cleaning!"

- The Hearth's Warming Club

"When Yona come to pony school, Yona not fit in. Pony ways strange. But Yona find friends! Yona meet Professor Rockhoof! Pony brave and strong as yak! Not afraid! Hero! When Yona grow up, Yona want to be just like Professor Rockhoof!"

- A Rockhoof and a Hard Place

"Yona always scared of spiders. But then Yona meet Spindle. [...] Yona realize no reason to be afraid. Spiders and yak friends!"

- What Lies Beneath

"If Smolder get homework, Yona get homework."

- School Raze - Part 1

"Yona knew Sandbar was still our friend!"

- School Raze - Part 2

"Yona not scared of puckwudgies anymore! Friends save whole school from evil Pegasus!"

- Uprooted

"No! Yona mean even though Tree not here here, Tree here. In hearts. Tree made friendship even closer."

- Uprooted

"Sandbar mean something awful and embarrassing. So awful, Yona cannot come down from treehouse ever! [whirring] Will Sandbar bring Yona food and water?"

- She's All Yak