My Little Pony: A New Generation (2021) · 6:52am Oct 8th, 2021
There is or was a debate that carried on after the end of the series My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic that centered around the leadership of Twilight Sparkle. This debate came up when the general plot of the movie I will be reviewing became public knowledge. The backstory of the movie is that somehow magic was lost, the three types of ponies were no longer able to get along and because of this a distrust and fear of the other races (Let's not get into griffins, dragons or anything else at the moment) became the norm. How could Twilight mess up so badly?
In reality, she didn't. It was inevitable.
The truth is unity can only last for so long. The world (or at least a chunk of it) can unite for a period of time for a common cause. This is most easily seen in war. However, once the enemy is defeated those that united will have their own personal agendas, some of which will be at odds with the others eventually certain tensions will rise and while the nations may still get along it's only going to go so far and it won't be perfect. The amount of no's to requests may increase and eventually what were once close allies can and will split. On the individual level these things can happen too and be even simpler. Then when you add in past potential negative associations what unity there was can become a shaky thing.
Sometimes it's just time that breaks a friendship apart. It's not out of spite it's just distance or a lack of communication. Eventually all you have left of the person is a memory and the term was gets used a lot. It happens.
Another issue is that in spite of her efforts eventually Twilight was going to be alone. Her family, friends and Spike who is kind of both would all pass. The only ponies who she'd have left are the princesses she looked up to for one reason or another and those who only know her as a princess and even if they became very close to her it would always be that thing there. Add into that the fact there would be those who derived their positions from Princess Celestia and her past associations would likely lose power and influence. Those losses would sew discord and certain generalities could form from there.
Finally, whatever pony wound up in charge of Equestria after Twilight wouldn't be Twilight. He or she would have her own hangups and interpretations on friendship or how to do things that might not jive with others after a few too many leaders like that splits could occur.
Regardless failure was inevitable in time. However, when one thing fails another can be born.
After an unspecified period of time My Little Pony: A New Generation takes place. It centers around a pony named Sunny Starscout (Vanessa Hudgens) an earth pony, who is rather adamant about meeting and befriending unicorns and pegasi. Her father ( Michael McKean in a brief role) is a local historian/scientist type who seems to know more than he lets on and tells his daughter various fantastic tales of Twilight Sparkle and company. All of which fly in the face of the local teacher/military industrial complex leader Phyllis (Elizabeth Perkins).
Overtime Sunny's beliefs and antics fly in the face of conventional wisdom. Ultimately she only has one friend left in Maretime Bay, the local sheriff (James Marsden) due to her beliefs and antics. However, one day a unicorn shows up (Kimiko Glenn) things take a turn for Sunny and a new series of adventures and possible friendships open up for her along with a mystery that could change the face of their world.
My Little Pony : A New Generation is a much better movie than it should be. The visuals and animation are, for the most part crisp, lively and pleasant to look at. The voice acting is well done and much of the humor and references are really enjoyable. In fact when one pony who has let power go to his head is dressed like Gaddafi I got the reference and laughed really loudly. The same with the "shield" to protect the pegasi from the dreaded unicorn. I laughed probably more than I should have at this and various background references. Its in the visuals and the humor where the movie really shines. That said it's not a perfect as a stand alone movie.
We never really learn why society fell apart for the ponies. There is a hefty dose of deus ex machina that is utilized to move things along especially toward the end. Sunny never really even has much of a character arc. Even when she thinks she's wrong she's not and is ultimately vindicated. They also don't utilize some characters as well as they should.
For example, at one point in the movie there's a Dance Dance Revolution battle. Sunny who has never caught a beat in her life as far as we can tell decides to take part even though it would have made more sense if say Hitch (the sheriff) who routinely catches the beat or Pipp who at least has a performance background were the ones to do battle. Heck if they wanted to expand upon it it could have been a part of an actual tournament where they have to team up against the rival squad. It could have been fun and at least would have justified their involvement beyond just being there, especially since the large action set piece at the end belongs to Sunny anyway.
The songs were largely forgettable and there was a weird ad in the middle of the movie for perfume that kind of killed the momentum for a bit and for a movie that is really under an hour and a half it could have spent some of that time on character stuff and maybe had them overcome some potential issues, explain some additional things. Something.
This movie was never going to be some epic. It does its job far better than the previous movie and even if I question the use of some characters still does a better job of using them than it did. The comedy and animation are much better than I'd thought they'd be. All in all it's a fairly solid effort that I think lands for the most part and is worth a look to see if it's up your alley.
The Stats:
Dead Bodies: 0
Breasts: 0
Heavy use of pop culture references
The most comfortable dungeon in existence
Analog DDR
Internet Influencer Idiocy
News reports
Gratuitous in universe product placement
Catapult fu
Slime fu
Box fu
Montage madness
Shout outs:
Ken Jeong as Sprout the wanna be dictator who gets obsessed with power but also still calls his mother mommy.
James Marsden as Hitch Trailblazer Sheriff. Hates litter and whose butt will find the beat of any song.
Kimiko Glenn as Izzy Moonbow a medium sneaky unicorn with a lot of heart.
Vanessa Hudgens as Sunny Starscout the earth pony who others to know they have friends in Maretime Bay.
I enjoyed to movie for all its flaws. Though I do say it feels more like a pilot than a movie.
Oh sure and much like something like My Babysitter's a Vampire it is.
I should watch this. Seems like they did a serviceable job.
I actually sat down to try to watch it, but the youth were not fully engaged and I had to chase one through the house for an hour instead of watching. Such is life. But at least the one who dragged me into Pony in the first place got to watch it and reported that it was good.
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If you get a chance to do so you'll probably enjoy it. Maybe when there's a little bit of quiet time (admittedly when kids are involved that can be a rarity).