Equestria Girls

[byakuryuu]

I don't live in the US so I won't be able to see it, but I'll be fine enough if I can get ahold of a few reviews to see whether it'd be worth watching on a Youtube upload or something like that. However, I sincerely hope they don't thrash characterization too badly and hope folks around here that DO buy tickets for the show have an enjoyable time.

All right, with that out of the way I'm unleashing nerdrage so expect a lot of contradictions. The premise of the movie is horrendous and the plot gets on my nerves. Flash Sentry's presence wreaks of Mary Sue: Generic Kind Jock Archetype and we'll probably see a lot of instances where we're supposed to go "He's so impressive" when another pony we're already familiar with could have done the job just as well, or even Spike. The humor is your typical "fish out of water" and the laughs are so cheap that I don't think my niece (who I turned into a Pegasister) would cut her purse-strings for a laugh.

Hell, she even asked me where the ponies were when I showed her the trailer. No dice there.

I know Hasbro wants to market to the tweens. God knows I know they're probably the ones with the fastest pipeline to Daddy's wallet, but good God, what would possess any sane executive, upon seeing a periphery demographic this large and influential (Both good and bad) blatantly not consider how we would react? The show was made for young girls, but was designed in such a way it appeals to all ages. Good in-jokes, funny character interaction and development of their personalities compelled people young and over thirty to come back for another dose of pony.

Also, DHX said that there'd been "attacks" on their "competency" and are considering leaving the show. This is stealth-code for "criticism". So all I'm getting from this is that these guys can't handle the fact that they could be possibly do something bad with the show. That's pretty damn arrogant.

Rottentomatoes has a Tomato-meter with this movie, by the by.

I hope they can back their arrogance up if that's indeed how they feel.

Here's to an Equestria Girls that destroys all negative impressions and has at least one scene where Flash Sentry gets a well-place kick in the nuts. Or Merriweather Williams. Whatever works.

P.S. 70-minute movie about Mane Six going back in time to help Princess Celestia seal Nightmare Moon and creating a time loop? Y/N?

 

[whitewhiskey]

I'd sorta want to wait until I see it to form an opinion, like I did a long time ago with the actual show, but from trailers and stuff, I'm not entirely optimistic. I partially hope, aside from what little serious stuff there is, it could be a spoof comedy of sorts, parodying older tween shows.

I did enjoy reading through the TVTropes page though (Discord would be an awesome chemistry teacher)

 

[nick012000]

I'd sorta want to wait until I see it to form an opinion, like I did a long time ago with the actual show, but from trailers and stuff, I'm not entirely optimistic. I partially hope, aside from what little serious stuff there is, it could be a spoof comedy of sorts, parodying older tween shows.

I did enjoy reading through the TVTropes page though (Discord would be an awesome chemistry teacher)

Didn't they do something like this with the original G1 My Little Pony back in the 90s, only to see it bomb just as horribly? I mean, Good God, do these people even bother to look at the history of their franchise? I suppose they're smart enough to not replace an entire season with it, this time, thank God.

 

[byakuryuu]

All right, I got a first-hand review from my bros in the US of A (I KEEL YOU) and the general consensus is... that the movie is boring.

Not terrible, not sadistic, not evilly fandom-breaking, just... boring. There's rare moments to build up excitement and suspense, there's not much character development and "Brad" (Which is what my dudes prefer to call him) is so flat you can roll a steamroller on him and won't see much of a change. I wasn't spoiled for it, but I was given "Dexter's Ego Trip" as a measurement to what I CAN expect if I tube it, but while there were one or two moments that I was told I could enjoy, the whole movie falls on the low tier of enjoyment for the series.

Apparently, Sunset Shimmer's not as hammy as Mandark and inferior as a villain and Twilight and Spike do share some moments, but all three of them were bothered by the inclusion of "Brad", who had a role some other pony could have filled in anyway. There's not much of a build-up, a few funny moments but not to the extent that you'd feel satisfied with the money you paid for the theatre (and in one of my friends' case, fuel). It's not a movie that' worth the money and my journalist bro compared its level of enjoyment for anyone watching to that of GI Joe: Retaliation.

Which actually made me wince. Wow, that is a slog of boredom and eye-rolls indeed.

 

[burnerx7]

It wasn't that bad, at least not GI Joe: Retaliation bad, yeah "Brad" was... just there in a very "romantic chick flick" cliche, but just the interactions between Spike and Twilight are good enough, at least IMO. Hell this was the best Spike I've seen since he helped Twilight in her meltdown in first season.

Think about it like if it was a three parts special not a movie, about the money well if it was in my country I would have payed for it, hell I like to see movies in the theater even if they are bad but I supose it doesn't justify to pay if you have to travel to another state. Still when it comes out (somewhere around october) I'll buy the movie. just my two cents

 

[akun50]

Brad did help when he could've just as easily been the typical dumb jock. That said, he was still a stale note, but I think that had more to do with the fact that he was helping fight Sunset Shimmer's villainy.

Brad's boring, but not entirely flat. To me, he seems flatter because of how little he CAN contribute. I'll freely admit that his role could've been filled by anyone else. Hell, Spike could've been the one to find those lazily hidden clues. Or Luna could've... y'know, been more than a bit suspicious about Sunset after the fraud was revealed.

As one person once said "A hero is measured by his villains". If anything was terrible about this movie, it lies not in the romantic subplot that was barely there, but in the lameness of the villain. Seriously, at least Sombra managed to be ominous and foreboding, even if he didn't measure up to the same level of threat as the three that came before him. Sombra might not have accomplished much, but he at least had an EMPIRE quaking in its boots at the thought of his return.

Sunset? She could barely get respect in a HIGH SCHOOL, it's doubtful the teachers thought of her as anything but a pest, and half of the kids who 'feared' her would likely avoid conflicts with bully-types to begin with. Hell, the majority of the school goes from fearing what Sunset might do to openly supporting Twilight in THREE DAYS.

Sunset had no teeth to her character, no chops that made a VILLAIN. And really, I felt more menaced when I fart in an empty elevator.

EDIT: I've given a bit more thought on this.

I've thought about it and I believe they were originally intending Sunset Shimmer to be more of a Social/Intellectual villain, the sort that had to be beaten by cunning, wit and one's friends. The problem with that is that it needed to be allowed to go far darker than MLP or Equestria Girls COULD in order to make the villain work. And when it couldn't go where they needed it to (likely due to editorial mandate), they slapped something together at the end which... in all honesty, basically made Sunset a confusing villain.

Spoilers for those who haven't seen the film:

Spoiler

Sunset Shimmer goes from seeming like a character who's only in it for the power and prestige of being a princess/Element of Harmony to basically someone who wants to rule Equestria with one of the lamest armies ever ("OH NOES!, IT'S TEH TEENAGE HUMANS! Maybe they'll go away if we close the malls and the latte shops!"). Now, you could argue that she was either really good at being two-faced about her goals or she just goes mad with power, but by making her a "conquest" villain after all of that was kind of a flat note for a largely non-combat villain.

It _was_ interesting seeing Sunset dodge a good number of the tropes involved with social-based villains, but at the same time, I'll continue to harp on the fact that she was hardly a credible threat in either world.

 

[byakuryuu]

I'm going to give a quick summary review of Equestria Girls here since I finally saw it via piracy (Don't judge me). It's not as bad as the naysayers first said it was at its announcement, but not as good as the more rabid bronies have continually reminded their lesser cousins. The animation style and aspect stays the same, ala flash animation style, but that's a problem. In theatrical releases or movie specials for large franchises such as this, there usually is an improvement on shading, movement and transition. The change I see here is poor compared to what I have experienced in "Batman: Mask of Phantasm" and "Batman: Return of the Joker"; there's no improvement at all, in some seasons. The visuals for the characters, especially the girls, are rather jarring compared to their more minimalist counterparts.

The story in itself refers heavily to its source material while trying to mix in its own unique take on the franchise (Again, the two Batman films); while this is commendable in effort, it ultimately falls flat on its face. The plot revolves around the retrieval of a MacGuffin; that part is simple. The strange part of the story is that for a herculean effort, from the lips of the writers, the movie does not expand at all beloved cast, instead shoe-horning lookalikes to take their place. What's that about? Isn't My Little Pony's essence about friendship; these characters and their interactions? Why is it so different and jarring?

However, that's not the end of it. The villain has no presence herself, instead of the awe-inspiring villain or character-driven anti-villain or psychos we are used to, we have petty grudges and a high school girl who looks as though she should have been the Bonnie (Kim Possible reference) instead of centre stage, like Drakken and Shego. Sunset Shimmer's design and development is iffy and tethered, as she's as much an antagonist as a high school queen bee in a chick flick, granting her no stage presence at all. Her character doesn't fit with the situation: Lost Magical Artifact of Immense Power. You would have expected an impending apocalypse from a diabolical mastermind: not a cheerleader wannabe.

The new versions of the old characters aren't nice to be around, either, as they seem to be extremely one-dimensional in comparison to their Equestrian counterparts. Twilight didn't even have to do anything to win them over again; they just flocked to her as if she was always one of them; quite strange. Flash Sentry himself is a satellite none-character whose job could have been anyone's. His presence seemed very forced for both his versions and reeked of cheap cologne. Why is he the only guy who looks different from the Royal Guards? Is that what makes him special? Twilight falls for him instantly like a cheap tween? Why is he so special? It's so strange seeing such maturation descend to levels of forgotten lore. It makes her character development over the course of the series seem so ignored.

Weird as it may seem, I personally think that the movie is just there to advertise the title, not the content.

The movie isn't as terrible as people said before it even came out, but it IS a very forgettable experience. You'll even forget you're watching an MLP:FiM feature presentation right in the middle of it and while there are quite a few moments where you'll find yourself smiling, most of the time you'll be feeling as if you could have spent your time on something more valuable. For a franchise as large as MLP:FiM, it deserved a 90 minute slog of Twilight and her friends applying all their lessons they learned in an epic journey that would test their bonds, all while facing a seemingly-unstoppable foe. Instead we were given 72 minutes of high school popularity issues, some laughs and some heartwarming moments (The library scene is admittedly smile-inducing) but an anti-climactic finish for the franchise.

My verdict? 1.5 stars out of 4 as an expectant Brony and 2 stars out of 4 as a normal viewer.