The movie... (possible spoilers) · 1:42am Oct 17th, 2017
I wanted to love it, or at least really like it, but... Well, meh would describe my reaction best. I don't regret the time it took to watch it, although the $24 I spent to see it is another story. ΩΩΩ out of 6.
From what I've been told this can all be laid at Meghan's feet, someone who seems to hate all characters that aren't the Mane6. Seriously, Tempest invades and basically Celestia says 'Thank you for invading, how may we help you today?'. And some of my displeasure can be blamed on all the great authors here who've shown what MLP can be.
Seriously, I expected the princesses to lose, otherwise we wouldn't have a movie, but I did expect them to put up a fight. But, let's walk through the movie, at least as best as I can a week later with my crappy memory.
We follow a few random ponies, pegasi and such into Canterlot. Really beautiful redo of Canterlot, seriously nice work. A medley of supporting cast set to a song that like every other one in the movie ranged from good to great. Time management seemed a bit week to me, better use of characters would've allowed us to see something more than a blink and you'll miss it cameo like Starlight's. Heck, I had to be told she was there, since despite watching for her, I never noticed her. By this I mean they could've replaced those random ponies with established background ponies freeing up more time during the song for the rest. Also Trixie could've been moved to the end of the movie as being a show mare, it would've made sense for her to handle pyrotechnics for the concert.
So any how, everyone came to Canterlot for Twilight's Friendship Festival™... Wait, what, why Canterlot? Seriously, she's got her own castle and all, so why not hold it there. Heck, it would've allowed Meghan to come up with an excuse for writing out the other princesses, not a good excuse mind you, but an excuse.
So, Tempest invades from south of the Badlands... How did no one notice three huge airships over Equestria? Their cloud cover alone should've set off alarms. The princesses are taken out quickly with only Cadance doing anything, and not much at that. No surprise she put up a shield, after all, her husband is a specialist in shield magic, so I'd expect her to have picked up a thing or two, but Celestia and Luna were useless.
Speaking of Luna, ummm, why did they shoot her out of the air? They need her, and yet they shot her out of the air, something that could've killed her if Twilight hadn't saved her, something that prolly would've ruined their plans.
And where's Sunset? Like Starlight, she's a product of the Magic of Friendship™, so you would think she'd be a guest of honor or something at such a festival. Also where's Discord, another example of the Magic of Friendship™. Considering how well prepared the Storm King's forces were, I suspect they could've handled him, and adding him to the fight at the end would've added another level of silliness, so where was he? I doubt John de Lancie would have any problems finding time to record lines for him.
So, Twilight and friends set out on their epic adventure to look for the Hippo Queen in the lands south of the Badlands. Where are the Badlands? South Equestria, south of Canterlot. Know what else is south of Canterlot? Ponyville. Umm, why not a stop over there for supplies and research?
So they get to the south lands and we have... anthropomorphic animals? WTF, what Disney knock off did they fall out of? Ok, I'm being harsh, but still, why? Sure, Capper and the pirates were both cool and all, but why change the rules, even the unwritten ones? So far all characters we've seen on the show are either fantasy creatures (dragons, minotaurs, centaurs, etc) or animals (ponies, cows, yaks), so why anthro animals? Its not like they didn't have choices that would've stayed within the established rules, heck, this could've been an opportunity to expand on existing species. Let's see, we don't know where home is for minotaurs or ahuizotl nor bat ponies. Plus there's plenty of mythological creatures and animals that haven't been used and races like the griffons that used to be a lot more than they are, so seeing some of them down there wouldn't've been too surprising. And Capper would've made a kick ass griffon and the pirates could've been hippogriffs. I might've understood it if there were a lot of toys and/or suggestions of a spin off product with them, but I can't recall seeing much toys featuring them, so umm, why change the mythology like that?
Speaking of hippogriffs, what was with the whole hippogriff/hypocampus thing? It seemed dumb, limiting and unnecessary, just a magical macguffin that the story didn't need. Splitting the two races, having the last of the hypogriffs scraping by as thieves, pirates, con men and the like would've worked well and stuck to the kind of species we're used to seeing, and splitting them up wouldn't've hurt the sea ponies story any. Seriously, sea ponies, untouchable by the Storm King, insulated and safe under the sea and suspicious of outsiders, not much different than what we got.
So from there we return to Canterlot, eventually get a fight, Tempest changes sides, not really a spoiler as MLP requires all villains to get reformed by the end of the episode... well, they apparently killed the Storm King, which was a surprise, but he's the exception. Nothing really against this part, funny, especially Fluttershy counseling one of the enemy soldiers. Yeah, not an original joke, but its been a while since I've seen it, and it fit the character perfectly, so it's definitely a high point to me. Flaws in this part are relatively minor, only one I can think of is why Twilight was freed. Based on their positions, it doesn't make sense that the Storm King went through her cage on his way through the castle wall, so ummm... Yeah, they needed her free to fight the baddie, but there were plenty of ways she could've been freed that would've made more sense. Still, clean wrap up to the movie.
So, what would I have done different?
Most is mentioned up there, some might not've happened, such as Starlight having a bigger part because of the production time. Still, I would've liked to see Starlight fight Tempest, that would've been fun. A high powered and high skilled unicorn who tends not to think things through well versus a highly skilled fighter who doesn't care about the collateral damage. Yeah, that'd be an interesting fight. I would also have like to see Tempest... I mean Fizzlepop Berrytwist take off her uniform, after all she's not part of the Storm King's army any more, and I for one would've liked to see her cutie mark. And as mentioned, I would've loved to see Trixie supplying the pyrotechnics during the concert, with FB contributing her own work, some how I suspect a rivalry and one impressive like show would've developed out of that.
So, in the end, not a terrible movie, but one that could've been a lot better, it was mostly just a really stretched out episode and nothing more.
