Tag: my little pony

Cinema Dispatch: My Little Pony: The Movie

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

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My Little Pony: The Movie and all the images you see in this review are owned by Lionsgate and Hasbro

Directed by Jayson Thiessen

It took them seven years to do this?  We’ve had at least four equestrian girl movies, not to mention a slew of Hasbro properties making it to the big screen, but one of the most successful reboots of all time was put on the back burner until now!?  Well better late than never I guess, though the trailers leading up to its release have certainly strained my credulity on that expression.  Still, trailers aren’t always accurate and I’m certainly a big enough fan of this series that it wouldn’t be THAT hard to keep me at least mildly entertained.  Can the team behind such a successful television series make a successful leap to the big screen, or was this as ill-fated a project as… well pretty much all the OTHER Hasbro films that we’ve gotten so far?  Let’s find out!!

The movie begins with yet another friendship festival that’s hosted by the Princess of Friendship (how much of Canterlot’s tax revenue is straight up pork for Twilight’s pet projects?) and they’ve even managed to get the one and only Sapphire Shores… I mean Countess Coloratura… I mean Songbird Serenade (Sia), to make an appearance!  Twilight Sparkle (Tara Strong) along with her assistant Spike (Cathy Weseluck) and her friends Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Applejack (Tabitha St Germain, Andrea Libman, and Ashleigh Ball), seem to have everything under control and are ready to set everything in motion, but then a fleet of very intimidating airships descend upon the capital of Equestria and start demanding their complete and utter surrender!  It turns out that this is the opening salvo for a maniacal dictator known as The Storm King (Live Schreiber) and is being led by a mysterious pegasus with a broken horn named Tempest Shadow (Emily Blunt) who somehow manages to take out the three other princesses, Celestia, Luna, and Cadence (Nicole Oliver, Tabitha St Germain (again), and Britt McKillip) without the slightest bit of resistance!  Either this is one bad mother of a pony or the Princesses need better security!  In any case, the Twilight and her friends manage to escape but don’t have much to go on other than a mysterious message that Celestia shouted out before she was defeated and captured by Tempest Shadow; seek the queen of the hippos who lives beyond the badlands.  Not sure how hippos will help in this situation unless you dropped them on Tempest, but with nothing else to go on they begin their journey outside of The Shire… I mean Equestria, hoping to find a way to stop The Storm King and Tempest before it’s too late.  What will our little ponies find outside of the comforting boarders of Equestria, and will they know how to deal with such strange and frightening environments?  What is Tempest REALLY after in all this, and what does the Storm King have in store for all of them once he arrives in Canterlot?  Is the answer to all these questions Friendship?  I bet it’s gonna be Friendship.

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“See, THIS place could use a WHOLE lot of friendship!”

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (A Royal Problem)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Mike Myhre

We’re back with another episode of Friendship is Practical Magic!  For the most part, this season has been rather underwhelming when focusing on our core cast of characters that have had dozens of episodes dedicated to them already while episodes on not so ubiquitous ponies have been real highlights; not just of this season but of the series as well.  Clearly there needs to be a shake up if this series wants to keep being such a prominent fixture in western animation; maybe not as much as Adventure Time ended up doing, but the LEAST we can do is expand the world a bit more and maybe not touch base with Ponyville as often!  Hopefully they’re listening to my FANTASTIC advice because we have yet another episode that we’re focusing on characters that haven’t quite gotten their due in the series proper!  Will this be yet another successful gamble for the season that’s on a hot streak for these kinds of episodes?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with… oh…  oh wow!!  They’re getting back to the Cutie Map!!  YES!!  I’ve never been so happy to see this pointless MacGuffin!  After an interminable stretch of mediocre episodes stuck right in the middle of boring ol’ Ponville, this is the perfect excuse to get us out of this rut the season has found itself in and the series should REALLY utilize this plot device more!  Oh, and what’s this!?  The map is sending out Best Pony Starlight Glimmer to solve the problem of Other Best Ponies Princess Celestia and Princess Luna!  The only way this could get any better is if they send Trixie too!!  Wait, ARE THEY!?

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“Boy! This is gonna be GREAT!”     “Twilight? TWILIGHT!? STARLIGHT! I THINK SHE’S HAVING A STROKE”!

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Cinema Dispatch: Trailer Talk (My Little Pony: The Movie)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

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My Little Pony: The Movie and all the images you see in this trailer talk are owned by Lionsgate and Hasbro

Directed by Jayson Thiessen

Despite being such a popular series with a fan base that is heavily invested in the creative side of the process as much as it is in the show itself, there really hasn’t been much said about the My Little Pony movie that’s been in production.  Heck, it honestly feels like Equestria Girls, which was a spin off that only got a limited theatrical release, had MUCH more fanfare and anticipation surrounding it than something Hasbro is actually risking quite a bit of money on.  Okay, there’s no way we’re talking Transformers money here, but there’s no way a feature length animated feature with celebrity voices THIS famous was less than what they invested in freaking Jem and the Holograms which had its first trailer out five months before its release compared to four months for this film.  Still, an uneven marketing campaign doesn’t always spell doom for a film (*cough* Wonder Woman *cough*), and even if it’s a sign that the studio doesn’t have faith in the final product… well go ask Newmarket Films how that worked out with Donnie Darko.  Either way, let’s find out!!

Okay, so there’s no getting around it.  The movie looks PRETTY terrible based on this trailer.  The first thing you’ll notice is that the art style is quite different from the series which isn’t ALWAYS a bad thing (watching it for the first time, I was somewhat reminded of the changes made for the Spongebob Squarepants movie), but it doesn’t come off as an IMPROVEMENT and there are clearly areas where they were cutting corners; most notably with the copious use of CG for the buildings and backgrounds.

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WHERE THE HELL ARE ALL THE TEXTURES!?  Did they just forget to render them!?

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (Honest Apple)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Mike Myhre

We’re back with another episode of Next Top Equestria Model, and if that title didn’t make it clear enough we’ll be focusing on Rarity and her love of fashion once again!  Now Rarity is easily my favorite of the Mane 6 as her episodes tend to have a lot more range than anyone else’s and she’s a genuinely interesting character to watch with highlight such as Sisterhooves Social,  Sweet and Elite and of course the eponymous Rarity Investigates!  Will this be another great example of why Rarity is the best, or is this one we’ll want to bury away with other better off forgotten episodes like The Mysterious Mare Do Well or even Just for Sidekicks?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with Rarity and Spike handing out flyers for a fashion contest that the former will be hosting at the Carousel Boutique in an effort to give aspiring young fashion designers an avenue to express themselves as well as an invaluable networking opportunity!  With any good fashion contest though, you need a collection of colorful and sardonic judges to make it all come together and fortunately Rarity has such a group of characters in mind!  Hoity Toity will serve as our Tim Gunn, Photo Finish will be the wacky and unpredictable one that’ll generate the drama, and the anchor will be… Applejack!  Wait, WHAT!?

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Good thing she was passing by just as you made that announcement!

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (Hard to Say Anything)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Mike Myhre

We’re back with another My Little Pony recap, and while I would normally start this off with a hilarious pun, I’m pretty sure the title is already a reference to a John Cusack movie so doing another play on words would be pretty redundant!  We’re two episodes down in another CMC cycle, neither of them being particular highlights of this season, leaving us with only this Apple Bloom episode before presumably moving on to something else!  Will this outshine the other two we’ve gotten so far and one of the CMC’s standout episodes, or will this end up just as ho-hum as everything else we’ve gotten from them this season?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with the CMC rummaging through some old costumes in the hopes of using them for future shenanigans and/or Cutie Mark Crusading jobs.  Supposedly these are from when they put on their concert all the way back in season one (The Show Stoppers), but I don’t remember them using any of these particular accessories.  Maybe these were the backup outfits just in case the audience wanted an encore.

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“I’ll be a scary clown, you can be the legendary pirate Anne Bonny,”     “And I’m Eugene Levy!”

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (Parental Glideance)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Tim Stuby

We’re back with another episode of Scootaloo Explains It All, and while we won’t be breaking the forth wall this time around (I guess Pinkie Pie has the day off), we WILL be dealing with family problems as the one thing both her and her idol Rainbow Dash have in common is Absent Parent Syndrome!  All that’s about to come to ahead, at least for Rainbow Dash, in an episode that has been a REALLY long time coming, but can it POSSIBLY live up to the hype that has been generated over all this time!?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with Scootaloo doing the most Scootaloo thing imaginable (with the help of Applebloom and Sweetie Belle) by trying to launch herself straight to Cloudsdale using a makeshift slingshot.  Never mind that she’s snap her neck if she tried going THAT fast THAT quickly, there’s no way she’d have enough thrust to make it all the way to a city in the sky!  Then again, this is a land of magic horses, so maybe Newton’s Three Laws of Motion are more suggestions than outright rules.

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“Fly like an eagle!!  Through the revolution!!”     “What did she say?”     “I don’t know.  She wants to buy a beagle?”

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (Forever Filly)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Tim Stuby

We’re back with another episode of Pony Sister, Sister which means it’s a CMC episode!  Those always turn out great… right?  Okay, so maybe I’m a bit too cynical whenever Applejack, Scootaloo, and most prominently this time Sweetie Belle are a major focus of the episode, but it’s not like I don’t have my reasons for feeling that way!  Compared to the Mane6, their episodes tend to be a lot simpler and have far less of an impact which tend to make them feel like filler to pad out the season.  Still, they have managed to step up their game on a few occasions such as Crusaders of the Lost Mark and Appleoosa’s Most Wanted, so maybe they can pull it off again here; especially considering this is ALSO the first Rarity episode of the season as well!  Can the younger ponies show up their older counterparts with an episode that stands out in an already well regarded season, or are we just killing time for the better episodes to be finished?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with… um… hold on, it’ll come to me… her name is… okay, I’ve got nothing.  One moment!

…

Sassy Saddles!  Okay, the episode begins with Sassy Saddles (who we haven’t seen since Rarity Investigates) frantically running around the Canterlot Carousel Boutique in an effort to completely overhaul their inventory for the upcoming Spring Season.  All this worrying is for naught however as Rarity proves once again that she’s the HPIC (Head Pony In Charge) and has made all the necessary preparations and orders to ensure a smooth transition!  Three cheers for effective quarterly planning!!  But wait!  There is a disturbance in force (the Friendship force I guess) as Rarity suddenly becomes quite sullen despite handling her business like a boss.  Apparently she hasn’t spent enough time with Sweetie Belle recently which causes her to have a meltdown; probably less due to that one thing than the collection of stress she’s built up over the past few days finally bursting.

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“We need ice cream and ni-colt-las Sparks movies, FAST!  WHERE IS OUR COPY OF THE NOTE BUCK!?”

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (Fluttershy Leans In)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Tim Stuby

We’re back with another episode of Unbreakable Fluttershy who hasn’t had a starring role since last season’s Viva Las Pegasus and has barely even shown up since this season began.  Fluttershy isn’t the easiest character to write for considering how much her defining characteristics can sometimes limit what she’s capable of doing, but in recent seasons they’ve managed to put out a few gems with her that complement what makes her unique in the cast.  Can they continue that going into season 7, or will this be remembered as a half-hearted piece of season filler?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with Angel Bunny (Fluttershy’s own Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne) doing some parkour in Fluttershy’s house (okay…) before it all ends the same way every parkour run inevitably does so; with the runner getting GREVIOUSLY (and hilariously) injured.  Oh I’m sure he’s fine!  He’ll be back to being an abusive jerk-wad in no time!

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“Did you… get… the shot?”     “I think so.”     “My work is done…”

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (Rock Solid Friendship)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Tim Stuby

We’re back with another episode of All in The Pie Family; a show that ALSO had a breakout star named Maud!  Okay, it was spelled Maude, but close enough!!  Maud Pie is one of the most popular characters of the series since her debut in season four to the point that she’s one of the very few secondary characters to have multiple episodes focused on them.  Seriously, does anyone even remember the last time Zecora got a speaking role?  Not even The Cakes get more than one chance in the spotlight!?  PINKIE PIE LIVES WITH THEM FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!!  No… have to focus.  Lack of Mr. and Mrs. Cake aside… Maud has had a very strong record so far as her episodes tend to stand out quite a bit, and with the solid track record this season has so far with supporting characters, it seems likely that that trend will continue.  Do they manage to pull off another great episode with everyone’s favorite April Ludgate impersonator, or are we reaching the point of oversaturation one of the show’s more interesting characters?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with Maud Pie getting her Rock-torate in Rock Studies (because Geology isn’t a funny enough word) and the whole Pie family is there for the graduation ceremony… which only includes her.  Hey, at least she’s not trying to get a job in an oversaturated market, which I assume is the case with Magic Studies graduates.  I mean, if the choices are CONTROLLING THE UNIMAGINABLE POWER AROUND YOU or looking at dirt all day, I’m pretty sure we’d ALL go for the one that lets us shoot fire balls.

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Oh look!  Their mortarboards are ALSO made out of rocks!

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 7 (A Flurry of Emotions)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 2 Comments

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Hasbro

Episode directed by Denny Lu and Tim Stuby

We’re back with another episode of Flurry Heart’s Day Out!  Oh yes, the little rascal who we’ve barely seen since her debut in season six and is cute to a weaponized degree!  Feels like a wasted opportunity if you ask me!  Well wait no longer, fans of all things cute and baby related, as the writers have heard your pleas and we now have another episode with the extremely marketable bundle of joy!  Does this episode bring the adorable goodness that we require along with an interesting story about being a good parental figure, or will Flurry Heart turn out to be just as uninteresting as poor Nicky Banks from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with Twilight in her Doom Fortress talking to one of the nurses from the Ponyville Hospital about a possible appearance by the Princess to cheer up some foals who managed to get something called The Horsey Hives.  Technically hives are a symptom rather than the root cause of an illness and often caused by allergic reactions (meaning that the entire class must not only be allergic to the same thing but must have been exposed to it at the same time), but I guess they’re MAGIC hives and can be spread any number of ways.  Twilight is easily convinced to help out by delivering food, gifts, and reading materials, which of course spells DOOM for everyone as Murphy’s Law is just as stringent a rule in this world as gravity is; meaning something is gonna come RIGHT through those front doors and screw everything up!

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“I’M THE BABY!!”     “And she’s YOU’RE problem now!!”

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