Cartoon Corner- My Little Pony The Movie

For this one, I feel the need to issue a reminder: these are not really reviews and are much more interested in discussing why a work is the way it is (and, on occasion, delving into picking out themes and very very rarely what is probably actual critical analysis, although that’s rare and amateur at best), both in terms of analyzing emotional response and in looking for evidence of production history within the work because we are in fact nerds here and trivia is fun.

See, I don’t know how to feel about this one, and I’m gonna have to discuss in detail a critical plot point of the movie to figure it out.  Sorry folks, I don’t have an easy up/down is this worth watching note this time.



Hasbro has gone back to deep wells for this one.  The core plot is essentially “special movie big bad shows up, heroes have to travel to distant lands to meet new allies to combat it”, which is basically how every movie of kids TV show has gone since such things existed.  Which Hasbro was deeply involved in in the 80s, so yeah, back to the well.

Now, within that framework, the movie’s… average?  It’s not terribly subtle about the toyetic nature of these things.  And I have to admit that some of the designs on the new characters (pretty much all of them except Tempest Shadow and the Storm King I’d say) do clash with the established material for me.  Mostly the color pallet and gait of everyone feels off.  But the characters themselves are fine.  I mean, they got Zoe Saldana to voice a character, and decided fuck it, she’s a pirate bird captain.  Because I’m pretty sure if you put a microphone in Zoe Saldana’s room as she slept her nighttime mutterings would be usable material for that character. 

And of course we’re a good 7 seasons into the show now so they’re real good at the main cast now.  Pinkie is mugging the HELL outta that camera, Apple Jack’s snarks are perfectly placed, I think the song they give Rainbow is probably the best Dashie song I’ve seen in the series.  They seem to have made a conscious effort for the incidental cast not to interact with the plot too much, for all they were most generous with visual cameos.  And Derpy shenanigans.  Can’t forget those.

And now that we’ve nibbled up to it, let’s dig into the issue.  The main goal of the quest is to get the help of the Hippogriffs.  Once everyone gets there, they discover they hold a magical artifact that let them shapeshift and escape the Storm King, and are understandably not keen on going back to openly fight him.  And so, noticing how cripplingly lonely the princess is, Twi sends everyone else to win her over while she… steals the goddamned artifact?

WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING WRITERS.
TWILIGHT SPARKLE IS NOT THAT FUCKING STUPID.

I mean, like.  I actually went home from the theater and had to look up if this was supposed to be somewhere earlier in continuity.  Like I mean maybe… I can see Twi being that panicked and dumb right after becoming a Princess?  Bit of a stretch, but I can kinda buy it.  But you’re telling me that Twilight used befriending someone as a feint at this point in the show’s continuity?  I just don’t fucking buy it.  You already have to buy a lot of nonsense up to this point in the film, because frankly I just don’t see how the Storm King is somehow a larger threat than some previous villains, but hey, I guess they got a good sneak attack in.  That can matter a lot.  And let’s be real, a certain amount of contrivance just to get the plot started, and to justify some new toys characters and locations is just part and parcel of a marketing-driven series, and you do accept a bit of that if you stick with the series. 

But that sort of break in characterization really kicks you out of the movie.  They follow that up with a big blow up between her and Pinkie, and honestly that’s why it’s there.  They needed Twi to be isolated so she could be captured and set up the endgame.  But no, you done fucked up whoever wrote that, and I’m really not sure if all the other stuff I liked before and after makes up for it.

In light of which, let’s rewind.

LET’S SING!

We Got This Together- Does every big episode in the series start with one of these?  The town song as they prepare for a big day?  If not all of them, at least most of them I reckon.  This one is a bit longer and more involved than average, which makes sense all things considered?  I feel like some of the intent behind the film here was to draw in lapsed fans, so reintroducing the main cast to get everyone on the right page is a good move.  It also reinforces for that audience that we’re focusing on them, not the expanded cast like Starlight or Sunset or any of a number of characters.

Totally snuck in a Discord cameo there.  Granted I had a short conversation with a random stranger in the theater, since we both happened to be checking to see if there was a stinger (there’s not for the record).  We even designed it: totally should have had Discord pop back up and be mad he missed all the fun.

I’m the Friend You Need- Y’know, I kinda like Capper actually but… the naiveté on display here… I’m gonna need an assist.

Thank you Sir Patrick.  Not much to say about the song, since it’s more for the montage than a show stopper if that makes any sense?  But yeah, lives or dies on how much you want to like Capper.

Time to Be Awesome- I gotta admit, there’s a big disconnect here.  I mean, didn’t they stop piracy because they were afraid of the Storm King?  I don’t know how “be awesome!” got them past that hump.  Maybe focus more on how they could totally defeat him as long as they got to the Hippogriffs?  But y’know what, I don’t care that much because fuck it, it’s time to be awesome!  Very nicely captures a soaring spirit feel.

One Small Thing- I swear this is Pinkie’s theme song with lyrics.  Actually, I think Time to Be Awesome was also Dashie’s theme with lyrics.  So anyways, most of the music in the movie’s been pretty good, this one’s no exception, but it’s not really standout one way or the other.

Open Up Your Eyes- So there’s… about three songs through the series I’ve kinda fallen for:  True True Friend from Magical Mystery Cure, Welcome to the Show from Rainbow Rocks, and Light of Your Cutie Mark from Crusaders of the Lost Mark.  I’m not sure if this surpasses any of those for me, but it’s definitely among them. 

I do think they oversell the tragedy for Tempest Shadow a bit, since when they dramatize her backstory here it really feels way more like she just kinda gave up rather than cracking under the trauma she went through.  But it does set up nicely why she’d both be so driven to be strong (to show them, SHOW THEM ALL) but also have a giant gaping blind spot towards someone who valued her abilities.

Rainbow- Holy shit Sia really is an aussie.  The way singing erases accents in English is sometimes amazing to me.
Oh right, song.  It’s a nice ending concert thing?  Certainly not Sia’s best song, but I do have to say… there’s a gravitas to it?  It’s both melancholy and determined, and I feel like that’d be a great fit for the overall plot…

… y’know, if they hadn’t completely fucked that up?  I really can’t tell if they wrote parts of this four years ago and just touched it up for the “now” point it occupies in continuity without actually changing the parts that matter, or didn’t bother paying any attention to the basic Hasbro Movie Formula script aside from character-specific gags, or if they just are kinda at the limits and don’t know how to write the more mature characters they have now and keep falling back on the basics from earlier in the series to inform character flaws. 

But for all that, the fluff is really quite great; what I’m having to chew on is, which do I weight more for this series?  Do I toss the complaints with the plot since it’s there to string together characters moments and gags I’m enjoying, or is the plot issue so badly out of character it’s poisoning the whole movie?

Rating- 6/10.  You’ll be unsurprised to learn I instead toss it the “it’s… okay, with a few standout moments” score.  I mean, I did the whole song bit because I picked all the songs up off iTunes, it’s doing quite a bit right, but damn man.  Damn.