Movie Re-Review: My Little Pony The Movie · 8:09pm Jun 22nd, 2021
I bet many of you have been both anticipating and dreading this re-review for quite some time, but it must be done. This movie definitely has an interesting production history. It was announced in 2014 right as the show's fourth season was coming to an end, and was originally slated for release much earlier than it ultimately was. It kept being pushed back, and then at the very end got bumped up a month from November to October of 2017 so that it wouldn't have to compete with a crowded holiday box office from Thanksgiving onward. Part of the delay may have been due to the juggling of so much talent between the DHX staff and the American writers/actors who were brought in as big ticket voices. But apparently, midway through production they made the decision to switch from traditional Flash animation like the show to a new type of animating software called Toon Boom, which caused the animators to have to redo all their work. The movie itself was the result of a collaborative effort between Meghan McCarthy (who was the show head at the time the movie entered production) and Rita Hsiao, famous for her screenplays of Mulan and Toy Story 2 but at the time she had not done much else. And at some point after work was done on Season 6, Michael Vogel joined the team (though he was not involved with the story). The movie premiered with little fanfare and lukewarm reception from critics, and remains hotly contested among the fandom to this day, especially since a lot of the talent that left to work on the movie didn't return to the show (since the final season entered production just as the movie was coming to theaters). Considering Hasbro has yet to release this movie on Netflix (even though they're going to put G5's movie on there), it would seem even they have come to regret this product. But is it possible this movie is more like The Transformers: The Movie in that it's better than outward appearances would suggest? Well, let's find out.
I already talked in my original full length review of the movie that there was a planned alternative opening that would involve Twilight narrating about the different princesses of Equestria, and then Tempest Shadow would break the glass and say "Some things you just can't plan for.", though it's possible that was just an alternative bumper or promo. And yes, I'm well aware that there were a lot of things that were planned for the movie that got cut. There was supposed to be this alicorn named Cosmos, who was supposed to be related to Celestia and Luna. Rainbow power was intended to be used here. In fact, the entire movie definitely has the feeling of a script frozen in time to the state of the show in 2014. And we open up with an orchestral version of the show's theme song over the title screen, but the opening credits are a very unethusiastic and lazy ponyfication of "We Got The Beat". At least when the fandom ponyfied various songs they bothered to actually put energy into it. I mean heck, when "Equestria Girls" was just a promo music video Hasbro put way more effort into that. This feels like it was ordered last minute to fill the soundtrack.
We learn that Canterlot is hosting this friendship festival is that apparently a big deal, and Twilight is the one who's been responsible for putting it all together. We then zoom in on Twilight as she is struggling (and failing) to stay positive, and we get our first true look at what Toon Boom will bring. However, while it's definitely more stylish than Flash animation I feel like it's a case of how people refer the originals to HD remasters in that there's such a thing as "Too much polish", taking away the charm of the original. This feels like it strips pony of its unique identity, making it look to a casual audience member like it was just some Disney knock-off. I mean, being Disney esque is a compliment, but even in a day and age where Disney has abandoned traditional animation in favor of CGI looking like Disney from their old days is not necessarily a good thing. And as can be seen when Twilight tries to smile, the animators were clearly out of their comfort zone and were learning as they went along.
There's also a lot of "meme" lines throughout the movie, such as Spike saying "Whatch you talkin' about?!" and Rarity saying "I simply cannot even...", which while not as dated as the ponylicious chant Apple Bloom gave in "Pinkie Apple Pie" still show why it's better to avoid using memes in your animated product.
We then learn through Twilight's chat with the other princesses that the headlining attraction will be Songbird Serenade, apparently this big pop star we've never heard of before who's even bigger than the supposed previous biggest pop star in Countess Coloratura. The first sign that what the movie wanted to do had already been in the show and no one bothered to tell them (a reoccurring problem throughout). Anyway, the princesses are feeling particular useless today and don't want to move the sun and the moon for a concert even at Twilight's request. So this prompts her friends, the rest of the mane six (no Starlight Glimmer since the script was written with no knowledge of her existence) to give her a pep talk. And unfortunately, since the movie wanted to be accessible to as wide a general audience as possible, it opts to keep the mane six stuck in their default personalities throughout. It's not so bad now, though Applejack and Fluttershy won't really get much to do, but it'll become especially noticeable later on. Anyway, this pep talk is carried out during the song "We Got This", which has a nice hook but you probably won't really remember the lyrics. Most interestingly, this song shoehorns in cameos of Starlight, Trixie, Sassy Saddles and Twilight's old Canterlot friends which means the movie can't have taken place between Seasons 4 and 5 (as it was probably originally meant to). The song then ends with Twilight getting covered in cake from Pinkie's EZ Bake Cannon, right before she meets Songbird Serenade voiced by Sia. Sia is apparently Australian, and quite young. For the line she gets here though, she does a good job of hiding her accent. Still, why Sia? Did they really need some pop star to try to attract an audience? Couldn't they just have used Sapphire Shores or lured back Lena Hall to voice Rara?
Soon afterward, ominous storm clouds appear and a zeppelin emerges from them. And we see that Toon Boom is even worse at rendering CGI objects than Flash animation since the zeppelin looks like it came out of a PS1 game. The zeppelin is accompanied by several more, and one docks as a hedgehog named Gruber (I don't know if he ever identifies himself on-screen) voiced by Michael Pena shows up with a loudspeaker to announce that he comes on behalf of a conquering evil called The Storm King. However, Gruber is going to be quite possibly the worst thing about the entire movie, at least in terms of characters. He contributes nothing of substance the whole time, aside from one scene where his role could've gone to anyone. People call him the Jar Jar Binks of the film, but even Jar Jar at least was originally useful and relevant to the plot of his movie. Gruber has no reason to be in the movie other than to just be a token comedic henchman. Apparently, a lot of his dialogue is improv from Michael, and cudos to him for making it sound natural. But Tabitha St. Germain apparently ab-libbed her dialogue half of the time in every episode and she can attest that there's a way to do improv and ab-libbing that makes it fit the context.
Then, one of the zeppelins opens up to reveal Commander Tempest Shadow, voiced by Emily Blunt. She is supposed to be the Storm King's enforcer, and there's no denying that she proves to be an effective villain. Unfortunately, I think they did it a little too well in that department. With her black coat and red mane and tail, a scar across her face and a broken stub where her horn should be, it feels like they leaned too hard into the edgy edgelord camp. And even if that was intentional, it's still there.
Tempest demands that the ponies surrender, and Princess Luna invokes the typical "You and what army?" response right before Tempest sics the Storm King's forces on the ponies.
And the princesses get taken down even quicker than they do in most two parters, and with no sign of Shining Armor or the royal guard either. Princess Cadence is the only one who bothers to do anything to defend herself, throwing up a protective shield when Tempest uses her hooves to launch these special bombs that turn their target into crystals. But Princess Celestia gets cut off mid-sentence as she urges Luna to "Flee south" and find "The queen of the hippo-". Heck, the mane six only survive by falling into a river and being washed over a waterfall, and the Storm King's forces make the typical villain mistake of assuming the heroes couldn't have survived.
So of course the mane six survive, and don't seem too shaken up about having been forced to flee from Canterlot by an invading army. Twilight then decides that she needs to find this "Queen of the hippos" that Celestia mentioned, and all of her friends opt to go with her because they think it'll be a fun trip. Unfortunately, none of the options that should be available post Season 7 are considered: Get Discord (who only gets a cameo as a balloon), seek out the pillars or call on the dragons, the yaks or the changelings. Again, if this was after Season 4 none of this would be a problem since none of those things existed yet. Also, I know secondary media like comics and even an official licensed app expanded on the role of other characters left behind, but none of that counts since if I have to delve into secondary material to understand things or find out where other characters were that just means those characters shouldn't have been there (or the writers should've put the information in directly). Tempest, meanwhile, scoffs at the ponies apparently "wasting time on parties" before she has a chat via a potion (which makes a lot of dial up sound effects, because today's kids would totally understand that) with the Storm King himself, voiced by Liev Schrieber. It kind of reminds me of the emperor speaking with Darth Vader.
The Storm King does seem to a more "Evil is hammy" vibe going for him, which makes you wonder why Tempest has Grubber if she's already supposed to be serious in contrast to the Storm King's silliness. It's not even like Grubber is there to be abused by Tempest or be a morality pet for him, then at least they could draw a contrast between him and Spike and further hammer home Tempest being a Twilight expy. Anyway, the Storm King wants all four alicorn princesses to be able to power up his special staff so he can unleash a storm and I guess take over the world.
He also warns Tempest that if she fails "Your horn won't be the only thing that's broken", hinting at a darker side of him that we really don't get to see otherwise. We then cut back to the ponies (and Spike) as they make their way south through the badlands. It's here that the Toon Boom animation starts to get better, letting us see the ponies really sweat. We also get some pretty dark humor when Pinkie talks to a skull. She also mentions "getting sand in my everything".
Fortunately, the group finally discovers a trace of civilization in the form of Klugetown (though it's never named on-screen). Yet they discover that it's far from welcoming, and apparently the currency here is "Storm Bucks" (whatever those are). The creatures there seem to mostly be these weird fish like monsters, though there are some non-aquatic based life forms. Twilight warns her friends that they need to be careful since they're no longer in Equestria, right before Pinkie Pie stupidly shouts out that they're looking for someone to take them to "The queen of the hippos" and gets the entire town to come after them. We do get some pretty clever meta jokes when one creature says "I want all six for my collection", before the ponies are saved by a shifty cat creature named Capper, voiced by Taye Diggs. And he's definitely attended the Flynn Rider and Aladdin (the character) school of thinking on your feet.
Capper manages to use some paints to trick the other creatures into thinking the ponies are poisonious, and even warns one that because he touched them "Parts will fall off!"
Capper soon afterward introduces himself to the ponies, who are all immediately won over (except for Twilight. I can understand her skepticism but at the same time he did just save them so they kind of owe him). This leads into the song "I'm The Friend You Need". Apparently, according to Vincent Tong from the Bronies React video on the movie (where he was a guest star), he originally recorded the demo of this song before Taye Diggs re-dubbed it. It's possible that that was the case, much like Rachel Bloom reworked "A Kirin's Tale" from "Sounds of Silence" after Shanon Chan-Kent performed the original demo of it. It might have been easier to write and record the song in studio, rather than write it and wait until the voice actor for the character could be contacted since they could just have send him a recording, have him voice match, and then send that recording back to the studio.
The song boasts some clever visuals, and is really catchy. But it's as subtle as a brick in regards to what Capper is going to do. In animation at least, whenever someone is singing about how trustworthy they are and how they're the best friend you could ever have, you can be sure that they're planning to backstab you. And of course, that's just what Capper is planning to do since he gives a card to someone, and mentions Verto and a debt that will never be ellaborated on further. Tempest happens to be nearby, hunting down the ponies and knowing that she's on the right track when she sees a loose hair from Pinkie near one of the stalls. We get to see her impressive combat skills when she manages to lift up and drop an entire fish creature who refuses to give her the information she requests, though it's ruined by Grubber making a joke about "fish man". It's as cringe inducing as Mr. Freeze's ice puns from Batman & Robin.
Back at Capper's place (which is apparently atop a windmill), Rarity is repairing a torn sleeve on his jacket and Capper wonders what he'll owe her. But Rarity insists that she isn't going to charge him or owe him anything for it, which surprises Capper. However, Twilight then finds out that Capper has been withholding information, lying about not knowing anything about a queen of the hippos (we got an earlier forced joke about "Hungry, Hungry Hippos" which is a Hasbro product) since he has a map to a place called Mount Aris. And it was actually the hippogriffs. Yet before this can be discussed further, a mole creature named Verto shows up as it's revealed that Capper planned to sell the ponies into slavery. Hey, it's not like Rarity hasn't been subjected to this before.
However, it's Tempest who ends up saving the ponies unintentionally since she wants to take them back herself. But Verto turns his attention to Tempest and gets electrocuted by the sparks from her horn stub, giving the mane six a chance to escape using the windmill's blades as it tears through town.
At the edge of town is an airship getting ready to take off, and Twilight throws a rope out to it to get everyone across. However, Pinkie Pie bounces across it and causes the rope to break, forcing Twilight to stage a desperate rescue as Pinkie seems to think the whole thing was fun. That's definitely flanderization, Pinkie Pie would never be so dumb that she doesn't care about her own safety, or the safety of others. If anything, Rainbow Dash would be the one to say something like this, and even for her that would be questionable. Could they really not have made it into the cliche "Don't look down" crossing scene?
Fortunately, all are soon aboard, but Tempest has captured Capper and demands that he tell her where the ponies are going. Capper, having a change of heart, lies and says the ponies were headed east. Tempest wisely opts to keep him captive until she knows for sure she has the ponies, though again Grubber ruins the tension with an unfunny joke as though they're afraid to let Tempest get the last word in because she might scare someone. We then cut back to the airship as the ponies find that they've stowed away aboard a pirate's ship, and now the pirates are looking for them. They get found out, and the pirates propose various fates like tying them up, clipping their wings or scarring them emotionally. But they decide their captain, Captain Celaeno should decide what to do. Captain Celaeno and the other pirates are sentient parrots (because what else would they be?), with Captain Celaeno voiced by Zoe Saladana. She states that the Storm King's rules state that intruders are to be thrown overboard, which wouldn't be entirely a bad thing when almost half the cast can fly. Now, if they were being launched out of a cannon that would be different.
However, before this "execution" can be carried out a steam whistle blows and the pirates stop for a lunch break. It turns out that the Storm King is making the pirates ship his merchandise (leading fans to joke that he's actually Hasbro) and they only get one break a day. Rainbow Dash questions this, which Twilight naturally shoots a look of "Are you kidding me?!", before Rainbow decides to convince the pirates to go back to their old ways (you know, doing what pirates normally do: Piliging, plundering, terrorizing, all that stuff) with the song "Time To Be Awesome". It's great that Ashliegh Ball gets to have a song to herself more or less (though others join in on a back-up chorus), but the song really amounts to a pep talk. And for all Rainbow knows these pirates could've been pretty horrible before the Storm King made them into merchant shippers for him. I mean, pirates are far from these fine, upstanding figures despite their popularity. Pirates lived terrible lives and did terrible things to others.
And the song ends with Rainbow Dash out of the blue deciding to do a Sonic Rainboom, which has the effect of drawing Tempest and co right to where the mane six were, something that Rainbow apparently doesn't even consider. Again, this is flanderization. Even in her early days Rainbow was never this oblivious and stupid. Stupidity shouldn't be a way to drive the plot forward.
The pirates hide the mane six and Spike in the cargo hold as Tempest comes aboard for an inspection, but Twilight doesn't think the pirates can be trusted and against the wishes of her friends throws them out of the cargo hold while Tempest interrogates the pirates with the "I'm gonna count to three" routine that Grubber yet again undermines with a bad joke (seriously, that's all he ever seems to do in this movie). But the haste to leave causes the mane six to abandon their map, which Pinkie Pie drew on, enabling Tempest to figure out they're headed for Mount Aris. She then proceeds to turn on Capper and the pirates over their "betrayals" and destroys the ship, though everyone aboard will somehow survive (the pirates at least can fly and Tempest might have retreated back to her own ship for safety with Grubber, but unless Capper got carried off by one of the pirates he would've had to jump overboard without a parachute). As for Twilight, she manages to rig up a hot air balloon powered by Spike and save everyone from falling to their deaths.
They reach the bottom of Mount Aris and have to climb a ton of stairs to the top (thankfully, it's not the endless stair case from Super Mario 64), but they find the entire kingdom to be deserted and in ruins. Then, in the distance they hear someone singing. Despite knowing by now that sirens are a thing, no one thinks that maybe they should be on their guard and instead they decide the best solution is to go and investigate. Inside an urchin surrounded by water, a glowing figure is seen singing to itself, but Twilight and Pinkie Pie scare it away. Then, as everyone gets into the water, a whirlpool springs up and sucks them down. And we get a rather unnecessary toilet flush sound just to shoehorn in some toilet humor.
Once underwater, they find that the mysterious figure gave them air bubbles so they can breath. It's initially unsure of whether or not to trust them, but upon learning that they're fleeing the Storm King the figure reveals itself as a seapony and leads them to the underwater kingdom of Seaquestria. Immediately, they are surrounded by guards before learning that this figure is Princess Skystar voiced by Kristin Chenoweth, who pulled an Aerial and went up to the surface without permission and against her parent figure's permission. In this case, her mother is none other than the Queen Novo Twilight has been seeking, Novo voiced by Uzo Aduba. And I know it's not intentional, but Novo at times seems to sound like a slightly more authoriative Sapphire Shores.
Princess Skystar then exposits that the seaponies are actually the hippogriffs. They turned into seaponies long ago to escape from the Storm King when he laid waste to their kingdom on Mount Aris. I know that this gets expanded upon in comics and even a tie-in chapter book, but again that stuff is stuff we needed to see in the movie proper (even just as a brief flashback or something). Putting stuff like that into secondary material means they were either too lazy or too focused on other things to care about important details like this that would get us more invested in the characters. Queen Novo then shows off the item used to turn the hippogriffs into seaponies, the Pearl of Transformation. She uses it to turn the mane six into seaponies, but for some reason Spike is made into a pufferfish (as if him being a dog in Equestria Girls wasn't bad enough). I mean, surely they could've made him look like Seadra or Kingdra from the Pokemon franchise without driving up costs too much more, right?
Twilight is enthusiastic about this, thinking that the pearl could be used to help turn Equestrians into something that could defeat the Storm King (even though they really weren't a match for his army, so what would changing them into something else accomplish?). But Novo refuses since she claims the pearl could end up in the Storm King's posession, though it's never stated why that would be a bad thing. That's the real problem with the Storm King, he's not even an implied presence for most of this movie. We are never given an in-universe reason for him to be feared or for him to be something that is apparently this threat greater than anything that's come before him. Most likely, that's a result of discarding the original planned villain of an evil alicorn, but even so that rejection had to come fairly early into the movie's development. Also, Novo flat out refuses to lend any aid at all to Equestria even after learning that it's been attacked. It's not even because she doesn't have an army, because she clearly has guards. She has chosen to seal herself off from all allies, supposedly because of the Storm King but the way it's presented comes across as "because potatoes".
Novo then leaves for a "seaweed wrap" while Skystar goes off to sulk somewhere. Twilight then sends Pinkie Pie, Spike and the rest of the mane six to go play with Skystar for a bit. They all agree, apparently suspecting nothing at Twilight not joining them. This leads into the song "One Small Thing" as Pinkie Pie and Princess Skystar play together, and get all of Seaquestria to join in. It's here that the animation reaches its peak, really going all out. Yeah, it is kind of a typical Pinkie Pie song about her bringing joy and happiness to others, but it's done so well that you don't mind. And yes, the Disney homage is inevitable.
The song works even better than expected, impressing Novo enough to make her consider doing "one small thing" to help the ponies. But that's when an alarm sounds, drawing everyone's attention to the throne room as it's revealed that Twilight is all tangled up in a sea aneome's tentacles as she tried to steal the Pearl of Transformation. She intended to use the song as a distraction. Novo is quite furious at this and not only revokes her earlier consideration of help, but also decides to undo the transformation of the mane seven and send them all back up to the surface even though they can't breath underwater (she's lucky they don't drown, we hear them gasping for air).
I do like how we got to see what led Twilight to this point, even while they make sure to clarify that this is wrong. The ends don't justify the means. And this is something that not many kids movies or kids shows would have the guts to say (just because the good guys do it doesn't mean it's right). Unfortunately, what follows is unquestionably the movie's low point as the pacing goes from being too slow to being too fast. Pinkie Pie realizes Twilight was using her as a distraction and rightfully berates her for doing such a thing. Twilight argues back with the rightful assertion that her friends haven't been treating the journey all that seriously (treating it more like a road trip than a quest to save their world), before claiming that because they're no longer in Equestria they can't do what they've always done which would make sense if not for what occurred in Seasons 5 onward where the whole point is them bringing their values to other nations/kingdoms. Twilight also starts going off on a tangent about how she's the one Tempest wants, as if somehow that justifies everything she's done. And it really reflects how the movie has a hard time deciding if Twilight is supposed to be the cynic or the only sane one. It tries to do both and ends up with this uncomfortable middle ground. I mean, maybe this is why Squidward didn't get that big a role in the first Spongebob Squarepants movie (which this movie seems to have borrowed a lot of inspiration from, for better and for worse).
And then, in what has to be one of the worst cases of contrivence I have ever seen, Twilight responds to the accusation of not trusting her friends by saying "Maybe I'd be better off without friends like you!". Even after four seasons that is not something Twilight would EVER say, not even when stressed! And after seven seasons, after seeing for herself how a misunderstanding could cause one group of friends to fall apart, she would most certainly know better than to even entertain such a thought. Yet she says it, and all her friends abandon her despite knowing how bad it was the last time they did so. Plus, Rainbow Dash, Applejack and Fluttershy are all quite guilty of having said things in the heat of the moment that they regretted later. All this is done solely to get Twilight alone to sulk to herself so she can be captured by Tempest. But there had to be a better way to go about it, like say maybe a repeat of the army invasion from before and Twilight willingly sacrificing herself to protect her friends. And apparently, a metal cage is enough to block all magic, even teleportation.
It's here that the movie takes a really questionable turn. Tempest, alone with Twilight, mocks her for apparently having "no friends". And when Twilight asks Tempest why she's doing this, Tempest coldly replies to the assertion of being a pony by saying "I'm not like you" before launching into the villain song "Open Up Your Eyes". The song is pretty good, it's nice and haunting and Emily Blunt sings it so well. But the visuals are kind of a let down, aside from shadowy projections of Tempest with a horn we don't get anything other than Tempest circling around the cage. It's like they went over budget and had to conserve, but isn't the villain song supposed to be where you put the most time and effort in? Plus, the lyrics get repetitive, Tempest makes the same claims about being "childish" and "blind" in regards to once hoping for friendship. And what's her motivation? Apparently, as a child she was attacked by an Ursa Minor and lost her horn. As a result, she could only spark and this caused her friends to find her too scary, so they ran off to play with someone else. And Tempest, of her own free will, chose to run away and turn her back on Equestria because she'd been hurt. All of this is told via chibi felt ponies, but it's not clear how this is being told in-universe. Is it Tempest's own reflections, or is she somehow transmitting these thoughts to Twilight? Unfortunately, it has the same problems as Starlight Glimmer's backstory, even down to the possibility of "Unreliable Narrator" in that she could be using it as an excuse or justification for her bad deeds.
I mean, there's so many details we still don't know, such as was Tempest an orphan? Could the doctors really not fix her horn? Did she really run away all by herself as a child? Did she really turn her back on her own land just because her friends found her scary? I get that she was scarred emotionally as well as physically, and no two individuals respond the same way to trauma. But having a slightly stronger backstory than Starlight Glimmer is hardly an improvement. And considering Meghan McCarthy at least started Starlight's character, she should've been made aware of what happened in her absence. Again, I must ask, did no one at DHX bother to keep a line of communication open with the movie staff? Because the show basically did everything the movie wanted to do, or introduced problems that didn't exist for when the movie's script was written but would exist if the movie were canonized to take place after those new seasons. Plus, why is Tempest the one given the villain song when the Storm King is supposed to be the true big bad? It's not like having a villain song close to the climax is anything new, Disney itself has done it before.
The song ends with Twilight seeing a huge storm cloud hanging over Canterlot, and Ponyville apparently in ruins (which, why not move everything to Ponyville since that's where our heroes are from? It would carry more weight than a city we always see getting attacked and invaded). But Twilight claims that friendship didn't fail her, she failed it. Then we cut back to the beach near Mount Aris as the rest of the mane six immediately regret having abandoned Twilight (but not enough to go check on her despite knowing she can go crazy), further making the whole conflict one big contrivence. Spike then shows up to tell them that Twilight was captured (how they failed to notice the zeppelins passing by, I have no idea), though they doubt that they can pull off a rescue. Fortunately, Capper, the pirates and even Princess Skystar all show up to offer their support. Skystar was apparently meant to be accompanied by an army of hippogriffs, but that was rejected. I guess they thought it would take away from the whole "friendship" theme, but in doing so they made the search for the hippogriffs pointless in the grand scheme of things. All they really needed to do was befriend these three random individuals and that was enough, kind of like an RPG where you just need to meet characters to have them join your party and help you out.
Twilight is taken back to Canterlot as she passes by a trapped Songbird Serenade singing (making her a caged bird that sings), though we do see other ponies chained up and muzzled (which should carry more weight, though it does beg the question of why there's still no royal guard presence anywhere to be seen, not even being defeated). Then she's brought to the throne room as she foolishly pleads with Tempest not to do what she's already done, and Tempest just willingly replies that she's not going to listen. She then vaguely hints at showing Equestria "What I'm truly capable of", right before the Storm King shows up and she claims that she wishes to serve him. At no point is this followed up on, at no point do we learn that Tempest had any desire to betray the Storm King, even just to take over and rule by herself.
The Storm King plants his staff (which is supposedly made from the trunk of the Tree of Harmony, not that it matters since it's never mentioned in-universe) after he scoffs at how "cute" everything is. And he starts to make the classic villain mistakes. He plays around with his newfound power, freeing Twilight for no reason other than because he can. I mean yes, he does give off a kind of "manchild" like mentality, especially when he fools about with the sun and the moon, but when this is the most we really see of him all movie it kind of undermines the threat he's supposed to carry. I mean, you can have a villain who's evil for the heck of it and loves every minute of it, that's not a bad thing. You just need to give them a good personality and make sure they've got strength to back up their words and actions. Hammy evil only gets you so far if you're so weak that a light breeze could blow you over. Then we find the rest of the mane six delivering a trojan cake to the Storm King with Capper serving as chef. But in the only scene he's at all relevant for, Grubber helps himself to the cake and exposes the ruse. But that role could've gone to anyone at all and nothing of substance would've been lost. Heck, you could've had a random storm guard discover the ruse and the same thing would be achieved. There is nothing that indicates that only Grubber would be able to find this out, so the only scene he's relevant for and it's a scene where he's just there to be there. Anyway, with the cake plan a bust the pirates break free and aid the mane six, Spike, Capper and Skystar in fighting back against the Storm King's forces. We do see some interesting developments of Pinkie Pie going trigger happy with cupcakes (even smearing one on an unsuspecting guard's face), and Fluttershy consoling another guard to talk him out of the fight. I guess it's better than giving him a killer neck massage.
However, as the fight goes the group is forced to sacrifice some of their allies so the others can keep advancing to the castle. Capper even gets the idea to use Spike as a flamethrower, and he burns one guard who doesn't get back up. But then the Storm King holds up his staff and summons a tornado that basically sucks up and blows away all his guards. And then he makes the other classic villain mistake of betraying his underlings when he refuses to grant Tempest's wish to restore her horn, instead turning on her. He never even makes it clear if he has the power to fix her horn and refuses to do so, or if he was lying about that all along just to keep her loyal to him. And it's not like he knew she was plotting to overthrow him, or that as soon as she got her "reward" she would turn on him. He's just doing it because he can.
Twilight, out of the blue decides to help Tempest by claiming that "it's what friends do". And yeah, I get the logic: The enemy of my enemy is my friend. But you most certainly don't get to call Tempest a "friend" when she was just betrayed by the Storm King for no reason and up to this point had willingly served him without question. Following orders isn't an excuse, if she knows they're bad and is following them anyway regardless of choice, she's as guilty as he is. Yes, aiding her now is probably a good idea but it's not necessarily a "friendship" thing. The Storm King then prepares to finally deliver a killing blow, right before the rest of the mane six and Spike are able to blast their way up to Twilight's location and knock him down. We get a rushed apology before they work together to retrieve the staff before the Storm King can get it. However, the Storm King grabs ahold of Twilight and they're both sucked into the tornado. Fortunately, the storm soon clears up and Twilight descends with the staff safely in tow.
However, the Storm King survived as well. But before he can get his revenge, Tempest throws herself into the path of his grenade and absorbs the blast in close proximity. Twilight is able to use the staff to pull Tempest to safety, but the Storm King's crystalized body falls off the balcony and shatters into pieces.
And the staff is able to dues ex machina everything back to the way it was. The friendship festival is hosted as Songbird Serenade sings "Rainbow", which is a decent song but it's been way overplayed and has some very biazzre lyrics ("I can see a rainbow, in your tears as they fall on down." Supposedly, it's what Twilight sees in Tempest, but why is it being sung by Songbird Serenade in-universe if that's the case?). Queen Novo briefly shows up to reunite with Skystar and ground her, but if Season 8 is anything to go on I guess she's already forgiven Twilight for trying to steal the Pearl of Transformation?
Tempest, meanwhile, has decided to reform and uses her magic to shoot off fireworks during the concert. She also reveals that her real name is actually Fizzlepop Berrytwist. From there, "Rainbow" plays through the end credits before segwaying into "Off To See The World" which is really catchy. Interestingly, during the end credits we see Pinkie dancing with an actual hippo queen, and some of the Storm King's guards are trying to put his crystalized body back together as it glows, before it falls apart. Maybe in the salvaged sequel that became "Rainbow Roadtrip" he was planned to come back from the dead somehow?
And that's it, there's no post credits scene of any sort even though those are all the rage these days.
And that's the story, so what do I think of the movie? Well, there's no denying it, the movie had a troubled production history. It took so long to make and sucked so much talent away from the show that arguably contributed to its decline (not helped by Hasbro's insistence on faster turnaround for them, which only made the show's freelance writing style that much more of a burden for continuity). It really proved why movies based on shows (animated or otherwise) are always done either to launch a show or to wrap it up, it's rare that a movie is made when a show is still in production and when it is it usually tends to do very poorly because of that. The biggest issue is that Hasbro refused to promote this movie at all when it came out, it depended on Lions Gate (which was the distributor) which of course saw it as a Hasbro property and was repeatedly ignored when they made suggestions on how to improve the movie. So the movie stealth premiered, not attracting the huge general audience it was aimed at. But because of the way it was written it aliennated a lot of fans. It was a tough balancing act they were never going to get right no matter what they tried, but I think they compensated too much for general audiences at the expense of long time fans even with the fandom being on the decline (only two Bronies were in the theater with me when I saw this movie the night it came out). Though the movie ultimately did do well in China (due to their huge population), allowing it to break even. All that aside, the movie kind of suffers from using the formula pioneered by the Spongebob Squarepants movie, where animated movies for kids have to feel like a road trip if it's any kind of quest to save the world. It utilizes a lot of the tropes good and bad alike that that movie utilized, but without necessarily giving thought to how they worked or if they would fit. The biggest issue might be in the pacing, the first forty minutes or so feel like a drag whereas once we get back from Seaquestria things start flowing by way too fast.
The movie also introduces us to a lot of new characters, but there are lots of details they leave to secondary material that we really needed to be told about in the movie. And the one it chooses to focus on the most, Tempest Shadow, proves to be so effective as a villain that it's hard to sell her on the concept of being good. There's also the problem of hitting Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash with the stupid stick too often to advance the plot, and having a hard time deciding if Twilight is supposed to be right or wrong, on top of not really giving Applejack or Fluttershy anything at all to do. I do appreciate the movie's message about how you shouldn't abandon your better nature because of the world around you. And I do appreciate a movie for a show that had higher stakes without killing off any characters (early rumors speculated they might off Applejack or Fluttershy due to their low popularity). The story does have its good moments, even if they can be hard to see. But the movie as it was originally conceived was probably better, more unique instead of existing as it is in what feels like a very safe direction by comparison. Still, I stand by my original quick rating of 7 out of 10, and I think I'm still comfortable giving it a grade of B, maybe borderline B-/B. It's good but it's not that good.
So it is that, with the movie done, we move on to Season 8 which many regard as perhaps the worst season of all (worse than even Seasons 3, 5 or 6 which were all hotly contested), starting with "School Daze" and a concept mandated by Hasbro in the form of a School of Friendship.
I have to say that everything in this movie is good, the animation, the characters and so on. I really love Skystar as a character and she became my top 10 favorite characters. Only thing I wish they did is that they made this movie longer so we can get more Storm King and how he get the staff and more world building and if done right would make this movie better
5539493
The only thing I would like to remove from this movie is Grubber. But yeah, Storm King needed more screen time.
5539506 Same with you on Grubber. Why does he exist besides comedic relief?
This is honestly still my favorite animated movie of all time.
Tempest was the best part, and the Storm King and Grubber were both entertaining, and all of the songs were great.
I'd definitely make it a big longer
5539506
I like Grubber but I agree where you coming from
5539530
I don't hate Grubber, I just feel like he's unnecessary.
5539543
Agree, he was unnecessary, I don't mind him if he was a character in season 8 or 9 so he can tell us more about his race and try to redeem his race but still
As far as movies based on TV shows go, I'd say this one is middle of the road. Not great, but not bad either.
I think the movie would work well as a series finale. Instead, we got two mediocre seasons that came after that.
5539665 I don't know if this could've worked as a series finale, at least not without a major reworking of its story.
I agree that this movie has its flaws, but it's still enjoyable. It actually would've made a good series finale instead of the crappy and absolutely cringe filled two seasons that came after this...
5539673
I personally think the movie is just okay, pretty forgettable in my opinion. But it's still better then the season nine finale.
Yeah, I think one of the biggest flaws is they kept this seemingly as a movie set around the time of Season 4 when it was first planned, which really hampered things
I have a question:
How cool do you think it’d be if a new extended cut of this movie was eventually made? Do you think it’d also be something Boulder Media could pull off considering they used the same technology for “Rainbow Roadtrip”?
5563020 I don't think it would ever be possible.
5563058
Why?
5563062 I'm pretty sure if there was ever going to be a demand for an extended version of the movie, it would've been within a year or two of it being released. And an extended version in this case would require more animation, more voice recording and more resources that Hasbro wouldn't want to invest. It's not like the Synder cut where they can just restore all the cut content because the original director came back.
5563064
I was just wondering.
Personally, I would love to see them do an extended version of this movie. Mainly to answer some certain questions that were left unanswered and give some of the new characters more screen time, most notably the Storm King and Grubber.
5563068 That would be nice, but I think many of those were going to be answered in the planned sequel that got turned into "Rainbow Roadtrip" and subsequently made into a stand alone thing.
5563069
Really?
What was the plot of the sequel going to be about?
5563071 I don't know, I just know that "Rainbow Roadtrip" started out as a sequel to this movie. They didn't say how far along they were before they retooled it.