Okay on both accounts.
I have one question: you don't want to show turn into some kind of blood bath, though, right? If so, maybe you should just quit watching.
Television IS getting less afraid to kill characters more recently, I will tell you that much. For one, Thundercats started out by killing Claudus, king of the Thundercats and Lion-O's father.
Well, technically, there HAVE been deaths in the MLP: FiM series.
When Nightmare Moon was defeated, she was killed, but her host; Luna, was kept alive.
Twilight is turned to stone by the Cockatrice, which can also count as death (Even though she revived later in the story)
Philomena died, but she was a Phoenix, so it was expected.
True, they haven't been out right never coming back from the grave deaths, but still...
Maybe I should stop looking deep into a little girls' show about magical ponies and pegasi that teach us lessons...