The Legend of Everfree [Spoilers Ahead] · 5:24am Sep 27th, 2016
As no doubt many of you are aware, Equestria Girls 4: The Legend of Everfree was aired early down in Brazil, leading to copies of the English airing to pop up on video sites. For no in particular reason, I figured I may as well give voice to my thoughts about the film. If you haven't seen it yet, then I suggest you either go find it (check Youtube or Reddit, it shouldn't be too hard) or just ignore this until the movie's released for the rest of the world on October 1st.
Tread no further if you want to avoid spoilers.
In a nutshell, I quite enjoyed the film. It was a logical progression of the setting's story after Friendship Games, and I would probably put it as my second favourite of the series. It's still no Rainbow Rocks, sadly, but it's hard to top that level of awesomeness.
I absolutely adored seeing the return of our favourite sassy little redhead. She's definitely settled into her new position as the sort of moral center of the group, as well as looking after the newest member to the group, Sci-Twi. The storyline is fairly straight-forward with the expected worries and uncertainties as Twilight struggles with the magic growing inside her, and the fears that stem from it. It does feel a bit redundant since we had Sunset confront Twilight about those fears before back at the end of Friendship Games, but this movie fleshes it out a lot more so I'm not too fussed over it.
Still, I had expected Sunset to be a lot more 'I've been there, remember? Raging She-Demon and everything.'
One thing that came as a pleasant surprise despite its brevity was Flash Sentry. Poor ol' Flash has become something of an afterthought now that Princess Twilight's gone back to Equestria and is unlikely to play much of a role in EqG any more. It's an understandable division, given that the cartoon MLP can't really reference EqG for whatever reason. So Flash Sentry gets left in the dust, forced to deal with a lookalike Twilight that isn't the same person that he knew. That's gotta suck, you know? And I'm glad the movie addressed it early on, along with Sunset's sagely advice of 'time to move on.' It's good to see him given some degree of closure, even if it's not a happy ending for him. And I was surprised a second time to see him pop up again to speak with Sunset about a reconciliation. It was something that was completely unnecessary for the story, but they put that in anyway, and as a scene I really liked it. It gave some depth to Flash for once; it's just unfortunate that what potential planted went unused for the rest of the film. Maybe they had something planned but it got cut.
If I had one major complaint, it's that the other members of the Mane 6 (or, I guess 7 now) felt a bit lacking. I mean, they were present in a lot of the scenes, but you never really saw Pinkie Pie do much more than say or do something silly as comic relief. Rarity spent a good half of her screen time talking about the fashion show, and almost always answered by Applejack's insistence about the dock. It's pretty conclusive by this point that the Equestria Girl series stars Sunset Shimmer and Twilight Sparkle - they are the main protagonists in every film, with the other girls serving as support cast. Since they've got the regular FiM series to shine the spotlight on the others, it make sense to leave the focus for these films on Sunset and Twilight. But I can't be the only person that felt the other girls were becoming a bit... one-dimensional in the film.
Lastly, I suppose I should at least say something about the whole Timber Spruce thing. I feel a bit conflicted because on the one hand, he's totally stealing my waifu. I mean, who does he think he is being all charming and talking to her and asking her out...
Wait, that's how relationships usually work. I guess I can't really begrudge the writers for actually demonstrating something of a realistic relationship - they talked, they flirted, they demonstrated some similar interests, and he asked her out. Damn you Hasbro for showing young children that relationships aren't just 'Prince Charming saving the Princess' scenarios.
Anyways, that's my two cents on the film.
Now if you'll excuse me, the film left me with a mighty need to do some shipping. And if you've been paying attention, you can probably guess what it'll involve. Don't worry, it won't take too much time away from my current project, which has its latest chapter undergoing the editing process. Hopefully the new chapter will be ready by the weekend.
I am making my response to this. Do not put your courser or tap the black boxes. I put those there so that you wouldn't see them in this post.
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I enjoyed it quite well myself.
Timber was an alright character. Clearly intelligent and knows how to speak Twilight's egghead language.
You're right about the other mane 7. They were focused on other things rather than the problem itself. Now, I found each of their new found powers to be amazing. The best line in the movie was "That explains a lot" with Sunset's face in blank after putting her hand on Pinkies forehead. I laughed my ass off!
Near the end of the movie was things got really dicey. Those crystals around Timber's sisters neck was crazy.
I knew exactly what those crystals were once Twilight took a hold of them. It hit me in the face of obliviousness.
I did also enjoy some of the songs that were in this movie. Not that many compared to the friendship games or rainbow rocks movies.
I felt kinda bad for Twilight when she was afraid to use her magic because of Midnight Sparkle. In any case, I don't blame her. I probably would've done the same. But i wonder how interesting it'd be if it was Midnight Sparkle vs Gloriosa. That would've been awesome.
In the end with those crystals, I realized, those were that worlds Elements of Harmony!
And at the very end, the portal was slightly open. That's why there was magic at the camp and where the crystals came from.
4228805 I disagree. Those crystals acted nothing like the EoH. The Elements didn't give their bearers individual powers, instead they were part of a whole. My theory, the Tree of Harmony (or the one that planted it (Fuasticorn!)) sensed the magic leaking into the other world and sent them to help protect that world from the inevitable problems that will be the focus of a spinoff series not too different that Teen Titans or Avatar.
They definitely wrote Timber better than Flash, but it was still completely unnecessary. It's once again a shoehorned romance going entirely too fast, just because they need a token Ken to Twilight's Barbie. All he was was a red herring to take attention away from Gloriosa.
Also why keep writing token Ken characters when Sunset is right there for Twi! Accursed soccer moms and their likely complaints. Bah.
The whole romance thing is definitely the worst aspect of the movie - otherwise, it was indeed quite good. 2 > 4 > 3 > 1 is where I'd rank it.
(at least it's easy to make stories around this. 'We tried, but it didn't work out'. Bwahaha.)
Personally, I think that the remainder of the girls were on good form and written as well as they could have been when they are not the focus of the 'main' plot.
That said, their subplots about building the dock and learning their new powers take up just as much of the screentime as Twilight's Midnight anxiousness, or Sunset trying to unmask Gaia Everfree, so it seems to me as if the movie focuses much more on the group as a whole than any of the previous EQG's did.
rarity and pnkie's powers made no sense, and glorious was literally the worst villain
I agree with you. The rest of the mane 7 didn't actually have a role till the end when they helped defeat Gloriosa.
I realized something. Almost every Eqg movie always has someone turn into a demon ( Except for Rainbow Rocks). This is something I wouldn't want in Eqg5 ( which by the way, is most probably gonna exist).
Sunset in this movie is too much of a voice of reason. Of course, she earned it after Rainbow Rocks and Friendship Games. And she wasn't under pressure this time, and as such acts according to her nature. But this makes me afraid that in the next movie, she'll either will be demoted to a second fiddle to whoever will be in spotlight (Twilight, most likely) or her story will be finally wrapped up - i.e. she will go home.
The end scene with the portal emitting a new set of powers makes me think that next movie will be either about the portal itself and the decision what to do with it (this ties in with the idea of Sunset being homesick) or girls getting more and more powers.
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Strictly speaking it is same for Sunset and Twilight. Telekinesis is typically Rarities power going by her pony counterpart. While Shields/Force constructs are Twilight's. Sunset having only touch-based empathy/mind reading makes me think, authors didn't really know what power to give her and made the decision based on her supposed element. I really expected her to have teleportation at least.
What irked me with Twilight's sub-story is that Midnight Sparkle is portrayed more like Mind Control by an outsider rather than reflection of Twilight's darker nature and she is expelled by simple "We believe in you, believe in yourself" and strength of will.
in the Post-credit scene why were stye so shocked when pinkie the the sprinkle
(tbh that is coming from the wikipedia page)
4228864 did they really need the post-creit scene
Well said that that's exactly how real romances work; and they did a pretty good job with setting up someone Twilight could actually get on with, for good reasons. That said, that's presumably exactly how real romances work in Equestria, too, and we've never really seen it there, as it's always been kept separate from the series, so it feels out of place here. Also, not sure Principal Celestia wouldn't have anything to say about one of her students with the camp attendant.
Human Twilight was tolerable. Mostly. Vastly improved from the last film. But still unnecessary; I liked the direction that Rainbow Rocks took in turning Sunset into the EQG world's Twilight figure, so to add Sci-Twi seemed counterproductive to me. The internal-demon-as-external-character thing still bugs me, as you've said; it's a perfect opportunity to examine a character's flaws and instead they package it as something not far removed from multiple personality disorder. Just like they did with Luna, and sort of Sunset ('the old me was just terrible,' rather than 'I used to be just terrible'). But still, it's really strange watching My Little Pony and having Twilight Sparkle be the character you like least. It makes me feel bad.
I thought the other mane six characters were less one-note than they were in Friendship Games. Even Rarity at least got a superpower that wasn't just fashion related (incidentally, one-track Rarity is the one could-be-improved element in Rainbow Rocks). At least there weren't seven different villains to set up this time (Lemon Zest, Indigo Zap, Sugarcoat, Sour Sweet, Sunny Flare, Principal Cinch and Midnight Sparkle), so the mane six got a little bit of screentime of their own. They also pared down the background ponies to just the favourites (plus Dave Mustaine and a few other eco kids), which was a smart move. One of the lovely things about EQG is not having to wait three seasons to see Trixie. I realised afterwards that there was no CMC appearance (makes sense, given the plot), but while I like them on the show, I didn't miss them here.
2>4>1>3, for me. I'd put Rainbow Rocks as by far the best MLP thing out there, and Friendship Games as by far the worst. I'm not sure where this one sits, when compared with FIM episodes, but between RR and EG is definitely where it sits with the films.