Wonderbolts

The Wonderbolts are a squad of six or more Pegasus ponies who perform aerial acrobatics and demonstrations. Early in season one, Rainbow Dash dreams of meeting and joining this group. She wins the prize of spending a day with them in Sonic Rainboom, and spends a short while with them in The Best Night Ever.

Depiction in the series
The Wonderbolts are first mentioned by Rainbow Dash in Friendship is Magic, part 1 as her idolized flight acrobatics group. In the following episode, Night Mare Moon takes the form of The Shadowbolts, to lure Rainbow Dash into joining them and abandoning her friends during their quests to get the Elements of Harmony. While Dash appreciated the offer, she declines and stays loyal to her friends. Upon hearing this, the Shadowbolts turn back into the purple mist and slither away.



The Wonderbolts attended the Best Young Flyer Competition in Cloudsdale as celebrity judges in the episode Sonic Rainboom. The winner of the competition would spend an entire day with the Wonderbolts. During the final performance, Rarity's wings burn up when she flies too close to the sun at the end of her act, causing her to plummet down toward the Earth. Soarin', Spitfire and an unnamed Wonderbolt then immediately take flight and race down to save her, but her flailing hooves knock each of the Pegasus ponies out before they can save her. Rainbow Dash then saves Rarity and the Wonderbolts, and in the process she performs a sonic rainboom successfully. Spitfire thanks Rainbow Dash for saving them, and Dash gets so overwhelmed with excitement that she can't utter a proper reply to her heroes. She then begins her day with the Wonderbolts, and the episode ends.

A Wonderbolts Derby takes place in Sweet and Elite. Five Wonderbolts take part in the race held over a cloud circuit in Canterlot. Two of the contestants resemble Spitfire and Soarin', and two are named Fleetfoot and Rapidfire, though only Fleetfoot is identified.

Three Wonderbolts try to stop a grown Spike from rampaging through Ponyville in Secret of My Excess, but are largely unsuccessful. They only manage to partly shear off the spikes on his head before becoming caught in a makeshift container and then trapped when Spike slams the container against a mountainside.

Uniforms
The Wonderbolts are always seen with their uniforms which obscure their cutie marks, but they wear one of two different emblems where their cutie marks should be: one looks like a winged bolt mark, found on the flanks of the male members, and the other is a long bolt mark, found on the flanks of the female members.

In Rainbow Dash's dream in The Ticket Master, when she imagined herself as a Wonderbolt, her own cutie mark appears in place of the emblems. When she imagines herself as a Wonderbolt again in The Best Night Ever, she sports the long bolt emblem usually found on any other female members' flanks. The Wonderbolts appear to have very dark outfits in the dream, and their outfits are lighter during The Best Night Ever.

Named Wonderbolts
At the Grand Galloping Gala in The Best Night Ever, Rainbow Dash meets the Wonderbolts again when saving an apple pie from falling to the floor, after one of the Wonderbolts, Soarin', drops it. The orange-maned Wonderbolt, later named Spitfire, mentions their encounter at the competition where Dash saved them, and invites her to join them at the gala.

Two more Wonderbolts are named in Sweet and Elite: Rapidfire, a male pony, is pegged as the winner by Fancypants, while Rarity picks Fleetfoot, a female pony. The first pony to fly over the finish line is a white-maned mare, and the announcer declares Fleetfoot the winner "by a nose". One of the show's layout artists wrote that the white-maned pony is indeed Fleetfoot, and that Rapidfire isn't specified.

Gallery

 * Wonderbolts image gallery

Trivia

 * Usually depicted as having three members, six are flying during the opening of the Best Young Flyer competition, and at the Grand Galloping Gala. Half are male and half are female. Two females and one male serve as celebrity judges during the event and are later rescued by Rainbow Dash. Two of the judges, Spitfire and Soarin', are named in The Best Night Ever.
 * There are seven ponies on the Wonderbolts' poster, seen in episode one, however only six of the Wonderbolts are depicted performing at once in The Best Young Flyer competition and the Grand Galloping Gala.
 * The Wonderbolts appear to be an amalgam of both the U.S. Navy's flight demonstration team, the Blue Angels, and the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds. They resemble the Blue Angels in uniform color–blue and yellow–and the "flying bolt" logo, evocative of the "flying shield" portion of the Blue Angels logo. Their performances in flying displays are similar to that as the British Red Arrows. 
 * Their appearance in the episode Secret of My Excess closely resembles the use of Navy bi-planes against King Kong in the movie of the same name.
 * The Wonderbolt with a white coat and yellow mane resembles Surprise, a G1 Pegasus pony. Pinkie Pie was originally based on her.
 * There appear to be eleven different Wonderbolt members in the VIP section of the Grand Galloping Gala in The Best Night Ever, though they are generally seen flying in groups of six.
 * Some Wonderbolts in The Ticket Master and The Best Night Ever leave flight trails of smoke that shoot small bursts of lightning.