The Land Before Time 30th Anniversary Retrospective Part 11

With Movie 10 making up for what 9 couldn’t achieve could this movie possibly top it? Let’s find out.

After some narration involving the tiniest of things, we start off in the Great Valley once again, particularly near a blossoming tree. Though right in their grasp, they cannot eat any of the flowers because everyone wants one (it doesn’t make matters better when the person guarding the tree is Cera’s father).

Talking of whom, we get to hear his actual name when he stumbles across an old lady friend of his voiced by Camryn Manheim. Smitten as a kitten, Topsy offers Tria the first tree sweet when it’s harvesting time. This puts Cera on edge because usually she the first one for finding the tree (it was actually Littlefoot who found the tree, but she got the first one).

Back to our favorite Long Neck, now voiced once by Aaron Spann. He feels a little down about his “dwarvish stature.” His grandparents try to give him encouragement to no avail. He tries to prove the world wrong by trying to steal a flower…

The result...

[Insert Howie Scream Here]

Just to avoid being hounded, Littlefoot tells the populace that a bunch of tiny Longnecks ate the tree sweets. They didn’t take it seriously until they find tiny bitemarks (with another insult to Littlefoot’s stature). Though Littlefoot’s grandparents insist that they have every right as they do, Topsy organizes a hunting party, even Ducky, Petrie, and Spike get involved when a bounty is placed.

Littlefoot would soon stumble across their quarry’s den, and get surrounded by the little ankle biters. Littlefoot lies again when one of them, voiced by the late Michael Clarke Duncan, shows up. But with the hunt going on daily, Littlefoot offers to become their liaison when gathering food. It only turns from bad to worse as the evidence weighs heavily against them.

Cera, getting more frustrated about the development going on between her father and Tria, gathers the others on a late night and follow Littlefoot to the den. Promising not to tell her dad, Cera gets advise from Lizzy, voiced by Cree Summer, that perhaps not all dads are bad. The next morning, despite being drowsy, the young Triceratops starts opening up to this newcomer. But everything goes to pot the next evening when her father finds the den and rallies up the inhabitants to crush them, not even Tria could convince him otherwise.

“I know how…” Littlefoot responds before telling the truth, and nothing but the truth, so help him God. Upset that this hunt is all for nothing, even his friends leave him behind.

A rockslide proves to be the last straw and Big Daddy leads them away into the Mysterious Beyond. However, they turn back when a pair of Utahraptor enter the valley. They are quickly Zurg Rushed away, and the path they entered is sealed.

All is forgiven, the “tinysauruses” are granted amnesty and are given the first tree sweets the next Nibbling Day.

The verdict?

Let me give it to you this way. We’ve basically reached Season 6 of MLP: FIM standards. If you watched even some of the bad episodes in the earlier seasons combined with reading the Equestria Girls: Holiday Special comic after drinking down Nyquil with some green tea mixed in soda, your very first cup of coffee and dose of Five Hour Energy, this is probably what you’re gonna see.

The animation is okay, but it’s a step down from what 8-10 has achieved. Sometimes, characters can be very off model and move very rubbery. Let me give you an example once again,

Here’s Cera’s first appearance,

Then there’s her second appearance.

As for the story, it feels out of place for me. Maybe it’s because Littlefoot caused all this, I just don’t know. It’s nice however that some of this focus on Cera and how she is coping with this new development after all this time being just her and her father. The Sharptooth attack felt very last minute, and it probably would’ve been better if they were left out. Another way for Littlefoot to seek forgiveness would’ve worked… I just don’t know how. Perhaps cutting out the songs would add more to the story, make it stronger.

Overall, it feels pretty meh, and these days I find it comparable to “Bats.”