CCC: cleverpun's Critique Corner #32 — La Da Dee (PMV) · 7:35am Mar 30th, 2017
I have reviewed some things that don’t traditionally receive deep criticism. I’ve done full length reviews of porn and a webcomic, for instance. Today, we add a Pony Music Video (PMV) to that list.
If it exists, you can rest assured that I will have an opinion on it.
Title: La Da Dee (PMV)
Creators: TheeLinker (animations) and Heir-of-Rick (drawing)
Found via: YouTube recommended videos list
Short summary: At Rarity’s behest, the Cutie Mark Crusaders give a presentation to Twilight and her friends. Even though everypony was there, that doesn’t mean the memory deserves any less than the finest puppets and rigging.
The Title: The title is about as functional and bland as you can get, which I suppose is nothing new for YouTube.
Genre(s): Slice of Life, Feels, Music Video
What does this do well?: I think this PMV’s foremost strength is very simple. Most PMVs (and AMV’s and all similar content) are content with recycling footage from one show. They are generally concerned with timing the music correctly, and the context and narrative created by the music video are ancillary goals at best. This music video goes to the next level, and it uses original art and animations to create an original story. This alone puts it above a significant chunk of other fan-made music videos, regardless of the exact nature and quality of its plot.
That’s not to say the music video also doesn’t have good timing, of course. The video uses the tempo and rhythm of the song to good effect, and it punctuates the animations effectively most of the time. I think my favorite part of the video is 1:51: it shows Twilight’s friends traveling across different parts of Equestria, each destination punctuated by a new line of the song.
Finally, the art style is simplistic, but effective. The characters are portrayed as paper cutouts on strings or popsicle sticks, and the backgrounds are cardboard and glue, with visible tracks and holes for the various puppets to pop through. The entire thing is done with very limited animation, but it looks cute and charmingly simplistic, rather than lazy or cheap. It also fits in with the meta-narrative, that the CMC are the ones who cobbled all this together.
Where could this improve?: I think this music video’s biggest issue is pretty simple; the song doesn’t match content of story. I’ve advocated in the past for songs as emotional manipulation tools. In a way, the abstract nature of music makes it closer to raw emotion than a lot of other types of art. Songs still have some specificity to them, however, and a music video based around a specific song should take into account those meager details. The vast majority of the song’s lyrics and themes clash with the music video, if one actually pays attention to them. Since the song is basically a love song, this creates some awkward mismatches, especially during the parts that pair more explicitly romantic lyrics with scenes of obviously platonic relationships.
The meta-narrative around the video is also a bit underwhelming. The prologue—which shows the CMC constructing and preparing the video—contains a large number of meta references. In particular, the fact that a large portion of the original video was lost and then reconstructed is brought up far too many times. While I complimented some parts of the meta-narrative above (i.e. the way it ties into the art style), and the epilogue is short but sweet, I feel a lot of the stuff around the video doesn’t add much to it.
Finally, the video itself spends a large portion of its runtime on things that have nothing to do with its plot. While some of the sequences are cute (particularly Fluttershy’s at 00:52 and Rarity’s expression at 00:39), they don’t add anything substantive to the arc or plot. In a video this short, every moment of screentime matters. The initial scene with Twilight and Spike does a great job of setting up the main story, but this plotline is dropped for ancillary scenes for a long time. It’s even more noticeable, because some of these ancillary scenes tie into the main plot (like Fluttershy leaving food for Angel or Applejack being sent off by her family.) This video could’ve been more focused.
In a single sentence: A pony music video that goes a level beyond most of its contemporaries, even if it has its flaws.
Verdict: Upvote (conveniently, YouTube and FIMfic use the same overly simplistic rating system). This music video goes a step above most of its contemporaries: it strives to tell an original story, rather than just rehashing bits of the show in time with music. This alone makes it much more engaging to watch. I think this PMV could have been more focused, and it’s strengths would’ve only been that much pronounced.
Ultimately, however, its weaknesses don’t diminish its accomplishments. Given its length, I think it deserves a high recommendation.
Ironically, I feel like the original version of it more closely matched the song because it cut out most of the song and put Twilight with them the whole time.
Of course, everyone then promptly interpreted the ending as "This was about Twilight thinking back on her friends, and all the times they had together before they died because she's an immortal alicorn."
Much to the dismay of the people who made it.
I liked that interpretation, possibly because I'm terrible.
That said, I do enjoy both versions.
Besides, we all know that they're a bunch of lesbians anyway, judging by fanfiction.
4477013 I think my issue with the original is that it lacked focus. There was no plot, only moments. This is probably why the finished version feels so unfocused: it's all the context-less moments from the shorter version, with some stuff added on.
I do think "everyone is dead" is a completely logical conclusion. One could argue that the way the video is edited, it's the only possible conclusion. After all, there's no other plot there. Personally, I only like that interpretation in the sense it adds some context--any context--to the video.
Also, you're only half right. According to fanfiction, Everyone Is Bi.