On the weekends I help my brother run his newspaper route, a horrid monster that covers two whole towns and roughly 650 newspapers that we have to assemble ourselves at two in the morning. Towards the end we make our biggest stop, the Wal-Mart, where we unload 160 papers. This weekend though, I saw something at the DVD rack by the door. Yes, it was Equestria Girls. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh…

Considering how this is a group about movies on FIM Fiction, I think that we are contractually obligated to review this…movie. The only problem is that I would probably hang myself if I ever bought it.
Lucky for me Bronies do not give a shit about copyright laws. I saw it was on YouTube, and at risk of hating myself I watched it in the wee hours of the yesterday morning.. So what did I think?

Concerning the production, not even the movie itself, it is simultaneously baffling and completely understandable. A normal person would scratch their head at all the things wrong with the making of the movie. Why would a MLP movie feature ponies for so little time? Why does it take place in a high school? Why is this movie still using T.V. show animation? For that matter, why is this movie being released in theaters, and not on T.V. exclusively? It is totally baffling, but at the same time can be explained in two words.

F***ing money.

“Equestria girls” was designed from the ground up to stick it to the bastards at Mattel and their shitty 'Monster High' shit. Every confusing choice made in the production of this movie can be explained by that. It features people as opposed to ponies so that new toys can be made and sold. It was in a high school to cut into the ever-important ‘weird high school thing for girls not yet in high school market.’ It used cheap animation because it was cheap, and money talks. It was released in theaters so that it could make money and gain publicity. All in all, an effective blow to Mattel.

The only problem is that people have to watch the movie and like it, and when the production history is like that, and the movie kinda ruins the reason you like the show (there is a reason it’s called ‘my little pony’, you go into this movie with some misgivings. Are they merited?

I guess what I’m asking is how was the movie? Well, you can polish a turd until it shines like a diamond, but it's still a turd. And that is basically what 'Equestria Girls' is. The premise is weak as heck, and some of the plot points don't make a lick of sense, but the characters and character interactions are still pretty great and a lot of the movie becomes pretty enjoyable. Would I pay money to see it? Hell no. Would I see it again? If it was on TV and no one was around and nothing was on and the internet was down then yeah, I would. After this we get into spoiler territory, so read if you've already seen the movie or don't care.

So our story starts with Twilight showing up at the Crystal Empire with her friends. Why? I don't really know. A immediate problem with the movie is that if you don't watch the show and know what’s going on or who these things are, it's not going to tell you. It isn't a problem for me, but I can imagine some parents just scratching their head the whole time. Twilight goes to bed, and then a goon named Sunset Simmer steals her crown and runs into some weird mirror portal. Now Twilight has to go through and get the crown back alone. Why alone? Why not with her friends? Because it might "throw off the balance of the other world." This seems pretty weak, but I guess that we just have to go with it.

So Twilight goes through the mirror, and spike, not careing about the balance of other worlds goes to. And after that pretty crappy opening the movie picks up. It's entertaining watching Twilight adapt to human form and also interesting to see the human counterparts to all the ponies. Yet again, the character interactions are pretty great, and the story gets interesting once you accept the whole 'high school' thing.

Anyway, Twilight has to win the prom in order to get the crown back, and needs to win votes in order to do that. She meets her friends and befriends them again, and there are some funny bits here and there.
But evil goon Sunset Simmer knows what’s up, and gives out a really quick and really dumb line when she confronts Twilight in a creepy hallway. "Pop quiz, what happens when you take an element of harmony to an alternate universe? Oh you don't know?" she says with evil glee. I'm just sitting there scratching my head. Does anyone? Has that ever happened before? It could do nothing. Or all life as they know it could stop instantaneously and every molecule in their body could explode at the speed of light. What I’m saying is how the Hell does Sunset Shimmer know? oh well.

So stuff happens, prom happens, and Twilight wins because she’s awesome, but the Sunset Shimmer isn't having it, and gives Twilight an ultimatum, give here the crown or the portal to Equestria gets it. Twilight refuses, and says that even though she wouldn't be able to return to Equestria she would at least be able to keep sunset simmer from harming the people here. It's a good moment and shows how Twilight has matured as a character.

Then Sunset Simmer steals the crown, and the 'Equestria Girls' train goes off the friggen rails.
It turns out that when you use an element of harmony in another universe you turn into a demon with incredible magical powers, which can make a zombie demon army to take over Equestria. Fortunately our heroes turn into freakish pony human things to fight this, able to use all the elements of harmony out of sheer force of will. Sounds pretty crazy. It is.

At this point I was psyched, but in the wrong way. I wanted a ridiculous epic battle between demons, zombies and pony monsters just so I could laugh at how crazy the whole thing had gotten. Sadly it all ends after about thirty seconds, but there is a nice crater and the front of the high school is demolished, so that's nice. The pony monsters dance with the love interest guy, Sunset Simmer is sorry for being a jerk, and Twilight goes home. That’s pretty much it.

So in summery it's about as good as a MLP high school movie can be, which by my gauging is about a 6/10. The music is OK if you like the show music, and I left out a bunch of great character moments (generally involving Pinkie Pie). The beginning and end kinda suck, but you're going to like the middle if you like the show, which I assume you do. So yeah, as an added bonus, have the move!

So am I right? Am I categorically wrong? Did I miss anything worth mentioning. Sound off in the comments!