Movie Review: Friendship Games · 5:45am Sep 29th, 2015
Directed by:
Ishi Rudell
Jayson Thiessen (consulting)
Written by: Josh Haber
Produced by:
Devon Cody
Stephen Davis (executive)
Kirsten Newlands (executive)
Sarah Wall (executive)
Running time: 72 minutes
The My Little Pony movies and I have a little... troubled history. We have a lot of traits the other doesn’t like, but on the bright side we don’t tread across each other’s invisible line in the common area. Just stay on your side, and I’ll stay on mine. I don’t question your strange fascination with ambiguously-aged girls and you don’t question why I cover every mirror in sight to avoid existential terror. Just keep the status quo and everything will be fine.
Still, as the smoke cleared and those who watched Rainbow Rocks were allowed to look for survivors, I began to question a few things: besides buckets of money, why are these movies being made? Just about every episode is lovingly crafted with wonderful DHX artwork and themes 4 dayz. The movies are the outliers. They both try to mimic the same formula as the show, and yet try to wander off and do their own thing. It’s... it’s like that stage of adulthood where you’re transferring between high school and college. You have so many ideas about your future and the outside world, and yet you feel so intimidated about the butterfly effect of each choice. It is a rather apropos metaphor given the estimated age of those involved. It also fits the themes commonly found with Twilight when she’s moving on as a student and into a role as a princess. The first two movies however still feel lost and confused, not knowing where they want to be in the world.
I had exactly zero expectations going into this one in terms of overall quality. I loved the songs in Equestria Girls and the general theme of loneliness, but the plot was poor and the villain cliche and uninteresting. Sunset Shimmer had probably the best characterization in Rainbow Rocks—or any individual episode for that matter—compared to any other character, but just about every other aspect came up short. I was hoping—praying—that the third time's the charm. Hasbro might have found some solid foundation for this iteration, or it may still flounder like a fish. So, does it?
It appears the recent events at Canterlot High have caught the eye of a peeping tom. There’s a girl from the rival Crystal Prep Academy sniffing about and she bears a striking resemblance to Twilight Sparkle. With the upcoming Friendship Games competition between the schools on the horizon, it becomes a race to not only beat their longtime rivals, but to curb this new girl’s snooping before she stumbles into something she can’t hope to control or understand.
I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe...
On the technical side of things, we see the typical DHX magic that drew us in from the start but it’s combined in some fairly interesting ways this time around. As I stated in my previous review of Rainbow Rocks, there is a unique divide when it comes to audio that Western animation does that differs from Eastern animation. Western animation records the audio before they start the actual animation; this way bodily motions, especially facial animation, can better respond to the actor or actress’ stresses and enunciation. Eastern animation doesn’t do this. The difference this time around is primarily the human version of Twilight, as we don’t get to see Princess Twilight until a pre-credits stinger (For the remainder of this review, all mentions of Twilight will refer to this human Twilight rather than Princess Twilight, unless specified otherwise). I was fascinated by the Siren’s belly dancing in Rainbow Rocks. Now what’s going on here is that DHX seems to have finally gotten a firm grasp on their rigging and character models in order to render some pretty terrific animation. The flash style worked well for the MLP TV show because the exaggeration fit the cartoon pony style. Here we have humans and even though it took a few tries to nail it with this particular style, it was worth the wait. No back-breaking sympathy pains here, save for one or two scenes that are meant to stress absurdity. These are actual people this time around.
What’s even more fascinating to me because I am in a dark room with nothing but generic brand soda and a box of Cheez Its is the exceptional sound design, and I don’t mean the music; we’ll get to that in a moment. I’m a pretty big fan of cyberpunk myself so when the movies kicked off and I heard electric and techno music assault my ears, I was in heaven. Characters each have a unique set of audio queues to them: for Rarity it’s the harpsichord, for Rainbow Dash it’s the guitar riffs, etc. The new sound design was primarily set for Twilight and after some retrospective thought it very much fit her. It felt very alien and unnatural and it fit the socially awkward outcast she was played for in the movie, very secretive and subdued as to not attract notice.
The movie centers on the usual main five A-listers with the addition of Sunset Shimmer. Twilight from Crystal Prep Academy also becomes a star of the show, something hinted at after her brief cameo at the end of Rainbow Rocks. The development of the main five however yet again takes a back seat to Sunset Shimmer, and the additional Twilight Sparkle. Providing the central focus of the film was these two alone I wouldn’t mind the other five taking a back seat. That cannot be done because a central point of the plot revolves around Sunset Shimmer discovering the reasoning behind a little inconvenience of theirs. Ever since the previous movie, the main cast has been able to transform into their anthro forms under special circumstances. That too occurs in this movie. They are required their own little space in order to “pony up” as it’s called. Okay, fine. On the negative side of that coin however that uses their already scant seventy two minute runtime. That’s not a lot of room to maneuver and a fair portion of it is dedicated to Rarity, Pinkie, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Fluttershy’s screen time. The focus of the film is still on Sunset and Twilight, yet a good chunk of time is spent on these five transforming and their minor scenes that don’t amount to much else rather than padding. To give the film credit, it does rationalize part of it away because Twilight is near and the biggest part of the movie is her reaction to magic. It still wouldn’t have hurt to give these five something to do in the meantime. In the previous film they were boiled down to nothing other than their character tropes. In this they have gotten better, but they still don’t do anything to contribute apart from the usual friendship fluff we’ve seen a thousand times before. Would it have killed the staff to do something with their already short runtime? Principal Abacus is a terrible antagonist, no one really does anything, Flash is still boring and useless, and the remaining five get shoved to the side. At least the humanized princesses don’t get shafted again but come on; you’ve got a big enough cast for this movie. Use them.
Sunset Shimmer, the absolute strongest part of Rainbow Rocks, has unfortunately diminished as a character. A great part of the film was that she had a fellow intellectual and student of Celestia to bounce off of. Here that can’t happen. The only one she has to work off of is Twilight and she is completely oblivious to magic. A great part of their dynamic occurs in their differing views on magic (more on that in themes), as Sunset is a genuine magical creature and Twilight is a regular human being who is trying to tackle something far bigger than her. While confronted, it doesn’t feel resolved. It does of course involve the tried and true and getting very boring ‘the magic of friendship conquers all’ BS. I just don’t know what was supposed to be done with her. No one except the other five trusted her throughout the previous film. That’s not addressed beyond a passing mention. Neither is the one point I was looking forward to more than any other: the possible exploration of her relationship to Princess Celestia. Despite all the magic-related problems in this movie, which I will not explicitly share for those who haven’t seen it, she feels like she should be more capable than she is portrayed her. Many of her high emotional points were of her complaining she couldn’t fix the problem. Okay, no one is perfect, but it happens again and again and then becomes enough that we are retreading territory in the same movie. It still doesn’t match with her being a canonically clever person as implied by her being a former student of Princess Celestia. She gave up far too easily to be convincing.
Twilight was handled just about flawlessly, although they did start to retread material towards the end of the movie. Here she is portrayed as a shy, nervous, socially awkward girl who’s the brunt of a lot of bullying by other Crystal Prep students. She’s a lot like me but without the congealed mass of black hatred for human life. She buckles and folds under pressure easily enough just because she wants her dreams to come true. Learning more is her passion and her love and she doesn’t care that much about those around her. Making friends just isn’t a priority or all that interesting when there’s all these wonderful events to explore and discover. It’s not an act of misanthropy, just different priorities. While she is keeping true to herself, it also prevents her from receiving guidance from another who may know more, or more importantly, may know a safe path through dangerous territory. Trying and failing and exploring without conscious knowledge of consequence is a central part of her character and seeing it pulled off is a wonder to behold. It comes to a head at the end of the movie where her desire to know more is being used against her by Abacus and her classmates, and in a way she doesn’t approve of. This occurs throughout the movie, and it is that point above that I mention where the same point of her character development gets used a little too much to my liking. Her thirst for knowledge is used like a carrot being held just out of reach again... and again, and again, and again. She would have been just about perfect if it was used a little less.
While I do like Daniel Ingram, and his work saturates this movie, I’m glad he has less songs than usual; any more would feel unnecessary. Equestria Girls had a good balance but a few songs felt extraneous. Rainbow Rocks had better songs but had so many it felt bogged down. Here I can’t really say a bad thing about any of them. Friendship Games sets up the events to come nice enough while CHS Rally Song helps explain more about their opposing school and the mindset of the games themselves. What More is Out There? almost won out as my favorite song with an utterly superb analysis of Twilight as a character and the inner workings of an analytical mind. This song alone explains everything you need to know about her as a character in wonderful detail and I was truly disappointed when it ended. The movie can’t rightfully be called Friendship Games without actual games and that is shown through a montage while ACADECA plays in the background. It’s a little too subdued for my taste but I’d say it makes up for it in actually showing the games the movie advertised. My absolute favorite song is the final one of the theatrical release, Unleash the Magic. I would have loved to hear a minor key version of this instead of major key. This song alone highlights both Twilight’s character flaw and a great failing in humanity as a whole. Sunset was a terrible human being in the first movie, as were the Sirens in the second. Here on the other hand Twilight is just a regular girl who has been led astray with one of the greatest questions of humanity: what’s hiding in the dark? The vocal ensemble is kept in very low volume and slow tempo in order to be as enticing as a silver-tongued devil. I want this song played when Old Scratch himself comes up from the depths.
That final song ties into the big theme running throughout the movie. Themes... oh, holy shit, I was not prepared for this movie.
Initially I was expecting more magic of friendship crap after the last movie. The movie started and ended with Sunset being disliked by the rest of the students at Canterlot, and that was a good thing in the confines of that movie. I thought acceptance of new things and forgiveness would be taking center stage this time around. What I got was one of the most sobering lessons in cosmicism and the folly of human hubris I have ever seen in my life. This movie has shockingly dark undertones that made me need to just get up and take a walk. It was rather terrifying.
Twilight Sparkle knows strange things are going on around Canterlot High and her investigations are a critical plot point. Her folly begins when she believes she’s equipped to deal with the wild, untamable forces that constitutes magic. There is an interesting aspect that is shockingly accurate and self reflective of us as a species. People in fiction and nonfiction are commonly portrayed seeking things that they don’t know or understand just to know. A great failing of our species and a common point of hubris in many works, often relating to knowledge or artifacts far beyond human comprehension, is that because we don’t know and we acknowledge that we don’t know, that absolves us of responsibility when things inevitably go wrong. Ignorance, while a human flaw that may even be recognized and explored, still doesn’t act as an automatic shield for when things go wrong. Hubris is a sin, but so is accepting hubris and doing nothing about it.
Why do we as a species explore the darkest depths of the ocean and the unfathomable emptiness of space? Because it’s there. It’s there and we don’t understand. We want to understand because we can’t stand a mystery or an affront to our supposed superior intellect. Twilight has the means to interact with magic but she is by not even close to the definition of the word capable of controlling it. These are things best left in hands not our own.
Sunset knows better and Twilight doesn’t, and Sunset lets Twilight know early on the terror she will unleash if she toys with things beyond her control. It’s a very Lovecraftian theme that while seemingly out of place in a children’s story, in that little divide between adulthood and child fantasy, teenage idealism and sobering reality, it fits right at home. Twilight is tempted by forbidden knowledge and the siren call of truth. Magic is an answer, but it may not be the answer she wants. By movies end that constant pressure to learn is undermining her morality. It’s not safe. It’s not right. But... what if? That most terrible question of all, “What If?” No one’s been hurt. What’s one little peek in the dark depths going to do? What is wrong with unleashing the magic after all? Isn’t it worth the price? Imagine what you can learn if you just set it free...
I can give you the world and more...
Much of the film, while set around the Friendship Games, revolves around forbidden knowledge and cosmicism. Despite the magic is wonderous and amazing, it can do so much damage even through blind ignorance and a craven desire for more. If Princess Luna’s sin to Nightmare Moon was envy, Twilight Sparkle’s own descent into madness is the lust for the arcane.
Such themes seem to dominate the movie’s short runtime and it was pulled off amazingly well. I feared for this movie more than that time I feared for my safety when I saw that thing staring back at me from behind the mirror. This movie was far more adult than I gave it credit for.
Wrapping things up, go see this movie. I didn’t endorse the second movie and I only gave the first one a recommendation conditionally. This one I say go see it. It does have the same problem as the first two in regards to not being kind to newcomers and suffers from a pretty bad case of continuity lockout that almost requires knowledge of the first two movies to make sense of things. If you have been keeping up with the Equestria Girls franchise, this one is a must see for all involved. It’s a great step and contains solid footing for a stable franchise, and content that I as an adult fan have been waiting for quite some time. Hell, I might even get the soundtrack for this one. Well done Ingram, and well done Hasbro. If they managed to get their background cast to so something productive, this would have been the perfect MLP movie.
Set me free...
Harpsichord you say?
In all seriousness though I do have to say that I agree with some of your views on humanity in knowledge. Just because we know about something doesn't mean we understand it.
And it all comes down to one question in the end for me.
Would you recommend this and Rainbow Rocks? I watched the first one and found it to be okay if a little cringe-y.
3429659
I made an in depth review for both Equestria Girls and Rainbow Rocks in the past if you're interested. The last paragraph here briefly sums up my thoughts on the three
I don’t think “cosmicism” is a term I’d used to describe the movie. But if we were to put that viewpoint on a sliding scale of nihilism, then yes, this movie gets closer to it than anything else we’ve seen on the show. In fact, it has to do with why I completely disagree with the idea it relied on “the tried and true and getting very boring ‘the magic of friendship conquers all’ BS.”
The final battle at the end shows the two demi beings on equal footing, perhaps with Sunset actually being on the ropes. What shifts the battle is Spike’s intervention. Not because a measureable amount of friendship laser comes out of him, and is added to the total sum of Sunset’s Friendship Levels, or hits Twilight in her shield’s weak spot. Twilight just sees him, and feels regret, and stops putting her all into the fight. But after that point, it still isn’t decisively over. In the plane of light, Sunset and Twilight face each other, still in their Mega Evolution/One winged angel/Enchantrix forms, as opposed to making Twilight look vulnerable by reducing her back to human form. This is telling us that they’re still equals now. All that Sunset does here is reach out to Twilight, who shows a clear change in attitude that precedes her powering down. The victory here is able to come from talking someone down. This is the total opposite of how the first Equestria Girls solved everything. There, the conversation and display of emotion came AFTER Sunset had lost the ability to inflict harm, so it didn’t feel meaningful.
One of the weakest points of FiM’s adventure stories is that it just has the “light side” magic wash over evil like water on fire. It’s a given that the approved world viewpoint will triumph. What prevails here is the strength of characters, who are able to draw others into their view of the world. This is the greatest power of all, since there actually is no cosmic ruling that certain personalities or virtues will prevail over others. The only meaning to the universe and our own existence is what we assign to it.
3432273
I disagree. Mankind being insignificant or at least not important in the grand scheme of things is a pillar of cosmicism and Lovecraftian literature, so is forbidden knowledge. Twilight has no interest in sports, friends, or higher achievements; all she wants is to know more. I forget the exact name of the place, but she was constantly tempted with a school with a name closely resembling Everfree that contained no small prestige. She wants to go there because it has the resources she wants to learn more. Later she is tempted by the magic in her pendant because of all the infinite unknowns she could learn because of it. Sunset is the only one qualified to discover more about magic, as she is the only magical creature there. She knows the risks.
This isn't just knowledge or power that is some tool to be used, it's very dangerous and Twilight's blind wandering into the inner workings of magic not only ripped it out of others, but turned her into a she-demon that wanted to absorb more from another world. The act of knowing the forbidden corrupted her. The game Bloodborne had an excellent visual representation of this. People who gained higher insight saw the Old Gods and thus blinded themselves from the madness. Their eyes were opened and they saw the horror that knowing more brought them. Same thing with Twilight; knowing the forbidden drove her mad.
While I see where you were going with friendship conquering all, I still have to disagree. Yes, friendship is magic and a legitimate force to be reckoned with, but by that same token because it's such a driving force behind pony sociology and theology, it's being brought up to the surface far more than needed and in very inappropriate spots. Equestria Girls was the worst offender because Sunset's lament came during the eleventh hour when it was far too late to be relevant or thematically acceptable. Given Friendship Games overpowering sense of Continuity Lockout, it is not without reason that Sunset brought up that same notion when they were in the matrix as a way to let the audience know about the first movie and the events therein. The problem's that it is complete rubbish.
In mathematics this is known as the transitive property. If A=B, and B=C, therefore A=C. Sunset's redemption was utter garbage and was a serious Asspull (TVTropes has ruined my life). Sunset much later is referencing this same event to Twilight in order to talk her down. The problem is the argument has no firm basis because Sunset's own redemption can't stand on its own, therefore the same scene in Friendship Games is made all the more weak because of it. Because the foundation was weak, Sunset's argument was weak.
It's not helped that friendship magic is the go-to excuse for some rather lazy writing. Once in a while is fine, but it keeps popping up again and again and has started to outstay its welcome. To put it simply, this movie had no need of the magic of friendship in any respect. It was focusing single-mindedly on Twilight tampering with things man was never meant to have, and then did a complete one-eighty again and brought in the magic of friendship. It was not needed. Friendship is awesome—hell, I wrote an entire story for one of my friends on the site—but this was not the right spot for it. It was about helping someone who dearly needed it, even if she didn't know she needed it. Friendship could very well bloom out of it, but it had no place coming back when it did.
It contrasted with the movie's own themes, and the character dynamic between Sunset and Twilight. If it was removed completely and another five minutes added to the end where they did have time to chat and do the secret friendship handshakes, that'd be fine. This friendship BS as I put has nothing to support it. Sunset regrets snapping at Twilight, and Twilight regrets looking into the darkness where death itself may die, but there's nothing there. They know nothing about each other. Twilight spent half the movie actively avoiding them. There was nothing to plant that first seed of friendship, except for Sunset saving her life.
Twilight has a great deal of love for Spike, but she knows nothing about Sunset.