My Little Pony: Equestria Girls

For years, fans of the weirdly popular "My Little Pony Friendship is Magic" series have been flooding the Internet with fan art of the main characters in human form. In perhaps the biggest piece of fan service ever, the creators of the original TV series have produced a whole new movie with the very premise of your favorite characters in human form and going to high school. Yes, we all want to see our favorite characters go to high school (or turn human if they aren't already). Greek Legends go to high school in Class of the Titans, Rugrats go to school in All Grown Up,Transformers became humans at one point. Heck there was even a "Gotham High" cartoon series planned which recasts Batman and his villains as high school students..

Our story follows Twilight Sparkle as she pursues a previously unheard of rival named Sunset Shimmer through a magic portal in order to recover her magic crown that was stolen. Twilight ends up in another world where she is a human, there are human equivalents of every pony she has known in Ponyville and they all go to the same Canterlot High school. Once again the fish out of water, Twilight must start from scratch to try and fit in with this new world and make friends with these familiar characters all over again. Now here comes the stinker. Sunset shimmer has apparently been manipulating students against each other through social media. an embarrassing youtube video, photoshopped pictures and anonymous text messages are enough to break up a group of girls who have been best of friends since grade school. So Twilight would help to mend friendships that were torn because the most gullible girls in the world believed some fake phone messages over actually talking to each other and ascertaining the truth. Heck even the vice principle is fooled by some badly photocropped (as in physically cut and paste) pictures. Is this the most gullible school or what. fine. Now we have the big prom, which is one huge popularity contest. instead of showing twilight winning over the hearts and minds of her school mates through her honesty, sincerity and helpfulness, she wins them over through the magic of song and dance.

Yes, the synopsis sure does sound shallow. Alas, the movie itself is shallow and that is its main sin here. But before harping on that, one must acknowledge how true to the original series this movie is. Other than cosmetic changes, all your favorite characters are exactly the same as they were when they were ponies. Fluttershy is still the little shrinking violet with an obsession for cute little animals, Applejack is still the country bumpkin, Rarity still the glamor queen, Pinky Pie still the wacko psycho and Rainbow Dash the tomboy sporty one. Their new designs as human beings take bit of getting used to with the whole quasi-Japanese-anime look with their oversized heads, tiny bodies and weird skin colour (including purple, green, pale blue etc) but once you do, they do have a certain adorable quality to them. The animation is smooth and surprisingly good considering it was animated in adobe flash. This pushes the envelope on what can be done with the over-the-counter animation software.

Now compliments aside, Equestria girls is still a disappointment because it has so much wasted potential. When twilight first steps into high school, her culture shock and the montage that accompanies the inner monologue song she sings seems to paint the premise as a clever metaphor for growing up and transitioning from the magical innocence of early years (ala ponyville where all kinds of wonders exist) to the harsher reality of school politics, competition and boy/girl relationships. That is never developed any further. Also as mentioned before, the story has many lessons to teach but glosses over them in the short 70 odd minutes run time. Trivial lessons at that. If you realise, all she did was bring the 5 main friends back together by showing them how stupid they've been in believing anonymous text messages instead of talking things out like sensible people. Or how Twilight won over Rainbow Dash by stroking her ego and losing in a soccer game.

A much greater impact would be felt if the main 5 friends were never friends to begin with and Twilight helped bring them together despite their differences (this is hinted in one of the songs where it speaks about how twilight sparkle helped them look deeper and find the qualities that united them instead of those that separated them). If it were not for the top notch voice acting, the characters would come across as bland and just, once again, shallow.

Thus, wasted potential all around. we get good animation likable characters who are easy to relate to, and catchy tunes by composer Daniel Ingram which hardens back to the best of Disney animated musicals but that's about it. the movie had so much potential yet ended up trivializing many potentially deep themes on growing up, making friends and settling differences. With an all new premise the creators do nothing new with the story.Here we have an opportunity to do something different, to take the franchise one step further. Sadly there is nothing other than the premise to justify a full length feature film. Other movies based on ongoing TV series feature pivotal moments in a character's journey or a irreversible change to the status quo of that show. Nothing changes here. If not for the fact that the ponies are now human, the story would serve well enough as a 3 episode arc in the TV series

For a start... it definitely did not warrant a theatre release.

No additional effort was put into the animation beyond the TV series other than the opening credits animation, at all. Would have been a nice two-parter to link the existing My Little Pony seasons 3 and 4 together.

Two, it's so obvious the entire movie is a giant advertisement for Hasbro to sell anthro-based dolls based on popular characters. The way the characters are introduced and stylised, it's just glaring and grating.

The basic story? As predictable as ever, even for a MLP episode. Which is fine for a MLP episode, but not for a movie, hence back to my original belief it didn't warrant a theatre release. The fact that it's set in such a tedious and over-used setting as a school formal? Awful. So much opportunity for this to have been done better was wasted on a cliché. The ponies are regressed to teenage years when in Ponyville they are already mares, ie mature. The movie should have reflected this, and used it to encourage girls (and guys) in a more positive direction than what it does.

The writing was about as standard as the series, but I'm disappointed with the whole image of the movie. Everyone is thin and anaemic, with the exception of Snails, and lo and behold, the unpopular "bad guy henchman" is fat. The ONLY fat person in the entire movie. In the series, all the ponies are rounded, or at least full-bodied; all this movie does is perpetuate the stick-insect mentality of fashion that girls are now being encouraged to pursue. Which leads to...

Concepts of friendship are nice to see in this movie, and I'm glad they are there. But the series does a much better job of teaching those concepts in a manner that isn't muddied by imagery that is counter-productive to many children's' self-esteem. This movie is a step backwards for the quality of the show, not a step forwards.

So, overall? Poor. It *could* have been so much more. Instead, we got dreck. It's 4, perhaps a 5 out of 10. For the absolute littlies only, and I say that with hesitation given the body-image impressions it's setting up for them.

I hope this stays a one-off, and is never attempted again.

To me, this just seems like one big episode of the show, not really a movie. But that doesn't matter. The Show MLP: FiM started out as a children's show, (ages 6-11 or so) never mind the fan base, it should be treated as such. If you compare Equestria Girls to any other modern kids show made into a movie, it will be obvious the Equestria Girls raises the bar for animation, voice acting, song writing, and overall quality of the show. The songs are amazing, the voice acting is incredible, and the animation is better than any I've ever seen.

I strongly recommend this movie to families, bronies, and children. That's who it was made for.

10/10 - Fantastic movie.

There's a lot of things you can say about this movie. Yes, it's corny. Yes, it panders to the fan-base. Yes, the concept is silly. Yes, it's basically an hour-long commercial for a new toy line. But that doesn't change the fact that My Little Pony: Equestria Girls is, honestly, pretty alright. No, it's not perfect, not by a long shot, but then, neither is the show (blasphemy, I know but it's true).

If you're a fan of the show and you take this movie for what it is: the pilot episode for what will hopefully be a decent cartoon and an advertisement for toys, then you'll probably enjoy it. Your kids, if you have any, will most likely enjoy it. If you're not a fan of the show, a kid, or both, then steer clear.

I haven't been watching the series for that many months, but it left so much of a mark on me that I knew I had to go see this in theaters. And I have no regrets doing so. I mean, it's not one of the strongest things to come out of the MLP G4 franchise, but for what I could've gotten with this concept, which is... let's be fair, odd, a lot of things did exceed my expectations.

Let's start with the story execution. Aside from the whole "Twilight Sparkle is a high school human" dealie, there doesn't seem to be much to the premise, just sort-of a 'win your goal'-type plot. However, they manage to make it intriguing and very entertaining to watch with how character-driven they make the actual storytelling, especially with the characters they have to work with, but we'll get to that later. What's more is that despite there being a lot of small, extra scenes involving Twilight having to get accustomed to her new surroundings, they almost never forget the actual story; and even though the spotlight stays on Twilight like it should, at its core it is still about friendship, which is really what the show always was. Finally, it's just flat-out funny, from character reveals to series callbacks to simple but fitting character-based lines.

Next, the visuals. DHX really knows how to make flash animation look good, and this is among their best work. There are a huge variety of character movements (much less restricted than the pony figures), some really cool-looking effects, and surprisingly, I even found myself getting really accustomed to some of the human designs as well. Not all of them work (ex. Celestia, Luna, and Big Mac), but many of them actually blend with their pony counterparts pretty darn well (ex. Rarity, Fluttershy, and the Cutie Mark Crusaders). Even some of the backgrounds, like the Fall Formal and the Crystal Empire (which I'm usually not all that impressed by) managed to prove appealing as well.

The music takes a different style from that of the series, going more pop-ish and overall more fitting of the high school environment. While I don't think the score is bad per say, it does prove to be a little on the generic side. The same can be said for the musical numbers themselves, and while I didn't hate any of them, the only one I truly remember is "Helping Twilight Win the Crown", which will leave you humming afterward.

Now onto the characters, starting with the main cast. Twilight is just as lovably nerdy but still admirable as ever, even further strengthened by the support from Spike, who's a dog here. Yeah, don't worry, they manage to work that out okay. The human counterparts of her friends are obviously faithful to their originals, but what makes them work particularly well here is that each of them get their own time to shine that never feel out of place, and at least most of them get something new added to their roles as well to fit the setting, which I thought was a really nice touch and it made them all the more interesting to watch in an alternate reality.

For the secondary characters, they weren't as nice. I mean, you've got those that are pretty much just cameos or throwaway jokes, such as Trixie and Vinyl Scratch, which can be fun to watch as little as they add, but you've also got some others that are put in a role that just don't fit, such as Celestia & Luna being the principals and Snips & Snails being the henchmen to the antagonist, Sunset Shimmer. Speaking of Sunset, I find her a decent antagonist with her menacing appearance, reputation, and ultimate goal, but with the bits of backstory they give her and her competence in Equestria, you really wish there were more of those. But instead, it's traded for little more than just menacing attributes and a pointless twist at the climax. The other new character is the love interest Flash Sentry, and even though he isn't a useless character, both him and the romance angle are just weak. If they really wanted this to work, they seriously needed to put much more passion and effort into it, because they really treaded some dangerous waters with this.

Of course, all this is not to say I'm supporting the high school idea in the first place. As well as they handle it, it's so bizarre merely in its existence. I mean, the film was obviously made for marketing purposes (just Hasbro doing their business), but I don't even know what the mindset was with them making the toys in the first place. What did they intend to accomplish with this exactly? Well, for me, it'll probably remain a mystery.

All in all, on its own, Equestria Girls isn't really a good movie, but if you take it as a TV movie like it was originally intended to be, as well as one made for marketing at that, you'll probably find at least something to like about it, even if the movie as a whole doesn't manage to satisfy you. I personally managed to find a lot more to enjoy. If you aren't a fan of the series, you probably won't get into it here. If you are, you should probably give it at least a chance, and be sure to take it for what it's worth.