Chapter 4
Behind the Scenes
Dark storm clouds had gathered around the site of an active volcano. Once every few seconds, the storm would unleash a flash of lightning, followed by a boom of thunder. Under the cover of darkness, a lone individual in a dark cloak slowly approached the volcano. Once he came to a stop, the mustachioed man with grey skin and black hair threw off his cloak and let out an evil laughter.
“It is almost time!” he declared as he pulled out a golden staff with a ruby gemstone on the end of it. “Once I have all three relics, no one will be able to stop me, and Marapore will fall!” He then triumphantly held up the staff as he finished, “For I am Stalwart Stallion!”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” a female voice suddenly called out.
“Ugh! Cut!” shouted the director. Out on the volcano set, the actor lowered the staff and looked back in confusion.
Behind the movie cameras, not only was the director seated in his chair, but standing around him were the eight members of Canterlot City’s LEGO Team — Sunset Shimmer, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Twilight Sparkle, and Spike.
“Sorry,” Rainbow Dash spoke up, “but at this point in the story, Stalwart Stallion would be known as Mojo.”
Twilight glared at Rainbow and silently gestured to keep quiet.
Rainbow glanced at Twilight’s reaction and asked, “What? You think he wants Daring Do fans to call him out for making a mistake like that?”
The director rolled his eyes, then held up his megaphone and spoke to the actor on the set, “Let’s go again, and this time, say ‘Mojo’ instead of ‘Stalwart Stallion’, okay?”
As the lights dimmed and the cameras began rolling again, Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but grin widely in excitement from what she and her friends had the privilege to witness in person.
“And… action!” called out the director.
Later, after filming of that scene was finished, the group of friends followed the director away from the volcano set. The director — Canter Zoom — had tan skin, olive green on his torso, pale green on his arms and the front of his torso under an open vest, beige on his legs, a pale green hair piece that was slightly receded on the front and with a short ponytail on the back, and on his face was a pair of black-rimmed glasses and a short beard the same color as his hair.
“I can’t believe we’re really here!” exclaimed Rainbow Dash excitedly. “We’ve actually been invited to the Canterlot City lot of the Lord and Miller film studio to see the making of the upcoming Daring Do movie!”
“Thank you so much for letting us come, Mr. Zoom,” said Twilight.
“We promise we won’t get in the way,” assured Sunset. She then glared at Rainbow and added, “Again.”
Rainbow Dash responded with a nervous chuckle.
Canter Zoom stopped and turned to face the girls with a smile as he explained, “I, too, had a lot of fond childhood memories of Camp Everfree, so when I heard about the remarkable effort you girls made to save it from bankruptcy, I just had to show my appreciation by letting you all visit the set of our little film.”
Rainbow Dash chuckled and remarked, “Little? This is Daring Do we’re talking about! This movie is gonna be huge!”
Before Canter Zoom had a chance to respond, a female assistant with pale green skin and purple hair walked up to him and reported, “Uh, there’s a problem in wardrobe. They can’t find the costume Daring Do is supposed to wear in the nightclub scene.”
Canter Zoom facepalmed and muttered under his breath, “If we’re ever able to finish it, it will be.” He turned back to the girls and spoke up, “If you’ll excuse me, I need to take care of this.” He then followed after the assistant, leaving the group of friends behind.
“Quite a shame the Crystal Girls turned down their invitation to this film lot,” remarked Rarity, “but understandable, considering their friend is still in the hospital.”
“You know,” Sunset spoke up, “there’s one thing about this place that I’ve been wondering about.”
“What is it?” asked Fluttershy.
“Well, we’ve met the real Daring Do before,” answered Sunset, “but so far, I’ve seen no sign that she has anything to do with this film about one of her adventures.”
“That’s because she’s probably not allowed to do anything more than be a consultant for production,” explained Twilight. “A few decades ago, when the first film studios were being established, a lot of famous figures were invited to play themselves in various movies — people like adventurer Johnny Thunder, Captain Redbeard the pirate, and even pizza delivery boy Pepper Roni from Lego Island. But these film schedules would so often conflict with the real world obligations these people had to deal with that they started demanding higher wages as compensation. Eventually, it got to the point that many of these film studios were forced to shut down because they just couldn’t afford to keep hiring these famous people, so a law was passed that only full-time actors and actresses would be allowed to play major roles in any movie, with the real people they were based on allowed to provide any advice they were willing to share on their own time.”
“Ah, that explains a lot,” remarked Sunset. “I was honestly a little confused by some details when this film studio once offered to make a movie about me, but now I guess it all makes sense.”
“Lord and Miller once offered to make a movie about you?!” asked Rarity in astonishment.
“After everything we’ve been through, I wasn’t surprised,” admitted Sunset. “I rejected the offer because I wasn’t quite ready yet to share my whole life story with the entire Lego World.”
Rarity sighed dejectedly and muttered, “Such wasted potential…”
“If it makes you feel any better,” assured Sunset, “I’ll be sure to let you know if I ever change my mind.”
“Okay, enough talking,” Rainbow Dash spoke up. “Seeing as Canter Zoom’s a little busy right now, what should we do?”
Twilight pulled out her copy of the visitor schedule and replied, “According to our visitor schedules, they won’t start shooting the next scene for a while, which means we have time to—”
“Get my picture taken with Chestnut Magnifico,” Rarity spoke up excitedly, “the actress playing Daring Do!”
“And ask her to sign my petition to bring more bird feeders to the parks of Canterlot City,” added Fluttershy. When her friends gave her questioning looks, she explained, “Chestnut Magnifico is an avid supporter of a foundation that helps build homes for animals in need.”
“Oh, okay,” acknowledged Twilight. “But I was thinking that we could—”
“Check out all the sets?” asked Sunset.
“Ah’d sure like to get a closer look at that volcano,” agreed Applejack.
“Actually,” Twilight spoke up, “I thought we’d—”
“Find the buffet!” exclaimed Spike.
“And the cupcake fountain!” added Pinkie Pie.
“I don’t know what a cupcake fountain is,” said Rainbow Dash, “but I’m pretty sure they don’t have one.”
“Of course they do!” remarked Pinkie as she pulled out a pamphlet. “I read it in my ‘One Hundred Things You Didn’t Know About This Movie Studio: Insider’s Tour Guide’!”
“Is the number one thing we didn’t know that the guy who first built this film lot was an eccentric oddball with a sweet tooth?” quipped Applejack.
Pinkie took a moment to read her pamphlet, then replied, “Oh! Yes!”
Applejack raised an eyebrow, then glanced back at the others and muttered, “Ah thought Ah was bein’ sarcastic with that one.”
Twilight glanced around at everyone in the group, then shrugged and asked, “So I guess we’re splitting up?”
Everyone said various words of agreement and began to go their separate ways, leaving behind only Twilight and Rainbow.
Twilight turned to Rainbow Dash and asked, “I don’t suppose you want to—”
“Check out the props that A.K. Yearling designed especially for the movie?” finished Rainbow Dash.
“You read my mind!” confirmed Twilight excitedly. She and Rainbow then headed off in a different direction than what the others had taken.
Once the area was cleared, Pinkie Pie suddenly jumped back in with a movie clapperboard in her hand. “Scene transition!” she exclaimed excitedly as she snapped the clapperboard shut.
It wasn’t long before Rarity and Fluttershy were able to find Chestnut Magnifico’s trailer just outside the studio building. Rarity immediately ran over to the trailer’s door, while Fluttershy followed more cautiously.
“Maybe we shouldn’t bother her when she’s in her trailer,” Fluttershy quietly suggested.
Rarity scoffed and dismissively responded, “Darling, please, actresses love interacting with their fans.” She raised her hand and prepared to knock on the door, only to have that door suddenly swing open so violently that she was left sandwiched between it and the wall of the trailer.
Standing in the now opened doorway was Chestnut Magnifico — who had tan skin, a blonde hair piece tied in a bun with a pink streak in it, white on her torso and shoulders with some pink on the front, a violet skirt around her upper legs, brown on her feet, and her face had makeup with lipstick and eye shadow. She currently had a very furious look on her face as she tightly clenched a cellphone in her hand next to her face.
While Fluttershy quickly stood aside, Chestnut stormed away from the trailer as she furiously shouted into her phone, “Ugh! I don’t care if I’m under contract! This is a joke, and I want this thing shut down! Do you hear me?!” She didn’t even bother waiting for a response as she ended the call and put away her phone while she continued marching towards the studio building.
Fluttershy continued staring in shock at Chestnut until she was out of sight. She then turned her attention back to the trailer door, which was still wide open. “R-Rarity?” she asked as she swung the door away from the trailer, exposing Rarity literally flattened against the wall.
Rarity giggled uneasily and remarked, “She, um, probably just didn’t see us.”
Meanwhile, Sunset Shimmer and Applejack were walking through the Mount Vehoovius set where filming was being done today. Since there was now some spare time between takes, they were taking the opportunity get a close look at the scenery. The whole set was made entirely out of Lego parts, such as brown and grey bricks and sloped bricks for the volcano, green plant and leaf parts of various shapes and sizes for the surrounding rainforest, a backdrop that consisted of a mosaic of 1x1 tiles in different colors to create an image, and even some translucent red and orange pieces for the lava atop the volcano, and all of it was built on a large brown baseplate.
“Ah have to say,” remarked Applejack, “the guys who built this thing sure seem to be real good at their job.”
“No kidding,” agreed Sunset with a smile. “There must be thousands of pieces that go into building a set like this. It must take some really talented Master Builders to pull this off.”
“Ah wonder how long it takes to build somethin’ like this,” said Applejack.
“I’m sure there’s much more to it than just putting all the pieces together,” responded Sunset. “They probably needed to start by designing some mock-ups to determine what it should look like, then determine which pieces and in what quantity they would need for the final build, followed by actually acquiring those pieces, and I’m sure that for the actual build, they probably wrote and printed copies of some instruction pages to make sure that all of the builders were getting the whole thing done correctly.”
Applejack let out a long whistle and remarked, “Ah bet it takes weeks to go through all of that.” She smiled as she glanced around at the set. “But it looks like all that effort really payed off. They sure did go all out makin’ it look like the real deal, huh?”
Crunch.
Sunset and Applejack immediately stopped walking and glanced down. Sunset moved her left foot aside and found a candy wrapper on the floor. She picked up the wrapper as she said, “Though I don’t think the rainforest is known for its…” She read aloud the label on the wrapper, “Bon Mot peanut butter praline crunch bars.”
“Better pocket that,” suggested Applejack. “Wouldn’t want it ruinin’ the shot.”
Sunset shrugged and stuffed the wrapper into her jacket pocket as she remarked, “I’m sure one of the set builders was just a little careless during a snack break.”
Meanwhile, Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle were walking through the Marapore Village set. Like the other film sets in the studio, this one was also built entirely out of Lego parts. On top of the large tan baseplate, there were various buildings two or three floors tall built out of bricks of various shades of brown, grey, and red. There were some additional bits to the scenery such as palm trees, crates and barrels, shops stocked with food items and other goods, and of course the backdrop that was a mosaic of 1x1 tiles.
Although Rainbow and Twilight were impressed by the set around them, their smiles grew much wider as their eyes soon fell upon exactly what they were here for: the props of the three relics of Altoriosa, displayed on a cart topped with foam slots for them to fit perfectly inside. The one on the bottom was a short golden staff with a translucent red gemstone piece attached to the end of it, the one in the middle was a golden sword with green feather pieces attached to either side of the hilt, and the one at the top was a golden arrow with a translucent purple arrowhead piece attached to the end of it.
Rainbow Dash gasped and excitedly exclaimed, “Wow! Those are the three Aloriosa Relics!” She and Twilight immediately rushed over to the cart to look closely at the props.
“The staff!” noted Twilight.
“The sword!” noted Rainbow.
“Don’t forget the Arrow of Altoriosa!”
Rainbow and Twilight glanced back when they heard that voice and saw a teenage girl standing behind them. She had light nougat skin, purple on her torso and upper arms, light blue on the front of her torso under an open jacket, a black skirt around her upper legs, white on her lower legs, purple on her feet, a blue hair piece with two long ponytails in the back that were held with hair ties shaped like film reels, and a pair of small purple-rimmed glasses on her face.
“You girls are part of Canterlot City’s LEGO Team, right?” asked the teenage girl with a smile.
“Yup! That’s us!” answered Rainbow Dash confidently.
“Though we’ve recently considered calling our specific team the Equestria Girls,” Twilight pointed out.
“I’m Juniper Montage,” greeted the teen, “director Canter Zoom’s niece. What do you think of the relics?”
“They’re awesome!” replied Rainbow Dash excitedly.
Juniper continued, “Since we all know the real Daring Do is always busy on her next adventure, A.K. Yearling has the responsibility of ensuring the film’s authenticity. She’s very hands-on when it comes to the sets and props for the movie.”
“Have you met her?” asked Twilight.
“Just once when she came to check out the relics,” admitted Juniper. She then leaned close to Twilight and whispered, “I did get her to sign my copy of the latest Daring Do book, though.” She and Twilight both squealed excitedly.
Twilight quickly relaxed and asked, “So what do you do here?”
“Mostly, I bring my uncle coffee and help get everything ready for shooting,” replied Juniper with less enthusiasm. Her excitement picked up again as she added, “I’ve been on the set for all the movies he’s shot here. Pretty much know every inch of this place like the back of my hand.” She giggled at that remark, but then she folded her arms and looked away as she grumbled, “I tried to convince him to cast me as Daring Do, but… he really didn’t go for that.” When she noticed Twilight and Rainbow giving her questioning looks, she immediately smiled again and cheerfully asked, “Hey! Have you girls seen the set for Caballeron’s secret lair?”
Rainbow Dash gasped as she and Twilight smiled and shook their heads.
“They usually lock the door to that set,” continued Juniper as she pulled out a set of keys, “but I’ve got keys that open just about every door in this place. Come on, I’ll show you.”
As Juniper turned away and gestured to follow, Rainbow and Twilight didn’t say a word as they began to follow after her with huge smiles on their faces.
At the other side of the building, Pinkie Pie and Spike sat in a couple of chairs near the buffet table. While Spike was busy snacking on some candy bars, Pinkie Pie was reading her tour guide pamphlet with a look of disappointment on her face.
Pinkie sighed and grumbled, “Three lunch buffets, six different kinds of fondue, two rooms with nothing but candy, and still no cupcake fountain!” She then relaxed and smiled as she added, “Oh well. At least we found those peanut butter praline crunch bars. They weren’t in my guidebook, but they sure were delicious!”
Spike finished the last of his candy bars and licked his hands clean before he remarked, “I’ll say! You think they got any more?”
Pinkie glanced back down at her pamphlet, but then she and Spike suddenly heard the panicked voice of Canter Zoom over at one of the nearby buffet tables. Standing next to him was Chestnut Magnifico, who was searching through all of the food trays with a look of frustration on her face.
“One more month, Chestnut!” pleaded Canter Zoom desperately. “That’s all we need! I’m doing everything I can to keep us on schedule! But with all the setbacks we’ve had, I don’t think we can do it! If you could just agree to stay on for one more month—”
“Unacceptable!” snapped Chestnut.
Canter Zoom begged, “But—”
“Where are my imported peanut butter praline crunch bars?!” demanded Chestnut furiously, seemingly oblivious to Canter Zoom’s desperate request.
As soon as they had heard the reason for Chestnut’s extreme frustration, Pinkie and Spike looked at each other uneasily. Spike leaned close to Pinkie and whispered, “Now would probably be a good time to resume the search for that cupcake fountain.”
Pinkie nodded in agreement, then she and Spike stood up and began to tip-toe away from buffet tables.
Later, all four groups got back together and gathered behind the cameras at the Mount Vehoovius set, where filming for the next scene was about to take place.
As the cast and crew got into positions, Rainbow Dash turned to her friends and whispered, “You guys should’ve seen the relics.” Unable to contain her excitement, she exclaimed, “They were awesome!”
Canter Zoom glanced back at the girls and scolded, “Ugh! Quiet on set, please!”
Rainbow chuckled nervously and quietly responded, “Sorry. Maybe I’ll just go take one more peek at them.” She then ran off towards the Marapore set.
Canter Zoom turned forward in his seat as he sighed and grumbled, “The less interruptions, the better.” He then raised his megaphone and spoke, “And… action!”
As the thunder and lightning effects of a storm were played out above the set, the actor playing Stalwart Stallion began walking towards the volcano. However, as he got close to the volcano, a large chunk of pieces suddenly broke off the side of it and tumbled directly towards him.
The group of friends gasped in shock as they watched the actor barely manage to flee from the falling chunk before it hit the floor and shattered into its individual pieces, followed by more chunks of the volcano coming apart and collapsing.
“Cut! Cut! Cut!” shouted Canter Zoom in exasperation as the collapsing chunks of the volcano also destroyed some of the brick-built plants and knocked over the backdrops, with the mosaics flying apart as those backdrops slammed into the floor. Even more unfortunate was a cart parked right behind the left backdrop, which came down right on top of one end of it, sending it flipping into the air before it smashed to pieces on the floor, sending one of its wheels rolling and bouncing across the room.
“Oh no! Runaway wheel!” exclaimed Pinkie Pie.
The bouncing wheel ended up going towards one of the buffet tables, and although the people nearby were able to jump out of the way, the table and its contents were destroyed as the wheel slammed into it.
Once all of the carnage had finally settled down, Canter Zoom turned to the actor and asked, “Are you okay?”
“A little shaken, but I’m fine,” replied the actor.
Canter Zoom sighed, then said to the actor, “Go ahead and take a few hours off. This is obviously going to take a while to resolve.”
The actor nodded and walked off the ruined set. Meanwhile, everyone stared at the Mount Vehoovius set, which was now reduced to little more than a massive pile of scattered Lego parts.
Canter Zoom stood up and exclaimed, “What is going on around here?! We just filmed on this volcano and it was fine! The very thorough post-build inspection was done only yesterday, and everything was confirmed to be perfectly in place!” He slumped back down in his chair and mumbled, “This could set us back weeks. Those backdrops alone could blow our budget, and I was told that using mosaics would’ve cost less than using that expensive giant decal printer. And don’t even get me started on how many labor hours will have to go into putting all those pieces back together for the rest of the set.”
“They’re gone!” shouted Rainbow Dash in horror as she suddenly rushed back to the group. “They’re all gone!”
With his eye twitching from the increasing stress, Canter Zoom glanced over at Rainbow and weakly asked, “What’s gone?”
Juniper Montage, who appeared to be just as horrified as Rainbow, also rushed over to the group and responded, “The relics!”
Everyone in the room immediately gasped in shock. Of all the possible ways production on the movie could be set back, they all knew that the loss of the relic props was a huge deal.
Pinkie Pie suddenly pulled out her movie clapperboard and exclaimed, “Cliffhanger!” She then snapped the clapperboard shut.