Open Up Your Eyes - My Thoughts on 'My Little Pony: The Movie'

October 6, 2017 was proven for myself to be one of the best days I've ever lived, period. If someone went back in time to mid-2012 and told me that special day was going to happen, I would have denied it personally and dusted it off as a rumor.

I had my ticket that I bought off the Cineplex website printed off from earlier after the Roger Waters concert the night before. I was all set to go and see My Little Pony: The Movie. Before then, I was able to grab all four issues of the Prequel comics that got into an easy backstory for at least the four characters that would be introduced in the movie. It at least gave me an idea on what to expect from the said characters.

The city of Toronto looked quite cloudy, but there wasn't going to be any rain to my own relief until the next day which was a Saturday. I stopped off there in the afternoon at 2pm, heading off to Burger King to grab a quick lunch before heading to the Cineplex at Yonge and Dundas.

Pre-show selfie before heading out to Toronto.

I waited for a bit of a while around the square until the local group of bronies appeared, and I introduced myself to them as I only have chatted with them, internet-wise. Seeing them in real life actually was an experience. There were at least one or two bronies that I knew already - one of them I met at the recent Fan Expo!

A few others including pegasisters arrived at the theater inside already, and we made our way up to the floor where we met them and had our tickets checked to enter the theater. I didn't get any popcorn for this movie with the exception of water because I was pretty thirsty after having travelled in and waited for them. We head up the escalator to the second floor of the Cineplex - entering our screening room.

By the time I entered and went to the bathroom pre-show, I come back and I realized how much bigger the audience was when I saw more bronies and pegasisters than I thought. There were a few parents with their kids, and they didn't seem to mind or be bothered by us. I will point out in advance that a couple of seats past in my row - there were these parents with their kids who entered into the theater late and left the movie before the movie even ended 30 - 45 minutes before. Guess there are some kids who can't handle long time periods of movies and are still a bit young cause I could overhear their voices saying they were tired. My focus was directly towards the movie though as I didn't want anyone ruining my experience.

Every other kid with their parents were well-behaved and very excited to see the movie. After some trailers and a short before the film, which reminded me of the shorts that Pixar has before every film, the movie I had been waiting for was about to begin.

NOTE: THERE ARE SPOILERS AHOY, IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE MOVIE... I SUGGEST NOT READING AHEAD. IF YOU HAVE NO INTENTIONS BUT WANT TO READ IT, THEN DO IT AT YOUR OWN RISK...

By the time that the logos wrapped up, in comes the title of the movie along with an orchestra sampling in the traditional theme song. I will admit that I was really happy that they would be using an orchestra for this movie instead of putting the music in from a computer. All score done by the same music writer Daniel Ingram himself. I already have the soundtrack for the film which was released before the movie, but now I just wait for a CD of the score for the orchestra bits.

The animation though, was quite stunning as they were not using the same engine 'Flash' that they used for the show, but a new animating engine called 'Toon Boom Harmony' which were responsible for working with plenty of other animations beforehand. They added in new detail for the characters, especially on the ears and the bottom of their hooves (which is almost shaped like a heart).

Our story begins at the Friendship Festival in Canterlot where there is the biggest pop singer in all of Equestria named Songbird Serenade (voiced by Sia) who will be debuting her new song for everyone to hear. Even her character's appearance looks exactly like her. Everything looks to be going well, minus a few hiccups that Twilight was trying to get through to the three princesses: Celestia, Luna and Cadence. There's a happy song that features characters from the show, but don't really have a speaking line in the movie. Cheese Sandwich for example, who was voiced by Weird Al Yankovic.

But all of that changes when an army of airships appear in the skies and land in Canterlot, a few new beings being introduced like the Storm soldiers who serve the main villain of the film: The Storm King (voiced by Liev Schreiber). There is a loudmouth talking hedgehog named Grubber (voiced by Michael Pena) and we are introduced to the secondary villain who takes up the majority of the film trying to chase the heroes: Tempest Shadow (voiced by Emily Blunt who we know from The Devil Wears Prada).

Immediately as usual, it is always the three other princesses who pull the 'damsel in distress' card as soon when they are petrified into stone by the secondary villain. Though Luna tries to get away, but fails. Twilight of course... is the only one who manages to get away because we have the usual strong female lead along with our other heroes, thanks to her friends like usual.

And of course, the vocal minority complains about how Twilight is overpowered or how everyone except the Mane Six surrendered immediately upon the villain's presence.

Pop culture references can be heard all throughout the movie: like on the quest where they realize they have to find the Hippogriffs, and they make a Hungry Hungry Hippos joke. I recall laughing when I heard that line. I was thankful that they kept lines in from the trailers, cause those were moments that made me smile.

Our lead characters make their way into a desert setting and I am seeing a bit of a Mos Eisley rip-off like metropolis that they enter in called Klugetown. Thus we are introduced to one of the characters who will have the furries gasping in sweet awe at any moment: a feline smooth-talking cat named Capper (voiced by Taye Diggs, the guy from the musical RENT).

He has his own song after having saved the characters from a bunch of different variety of species who wanted to buy stuff they had like their manes or even let alone Spike, who absolutely contributes nothing to the movie at all in his presence. Capper's song almost reminded me of the Genie's song from Disney's Aladdin. Even so, the whole film felt like I was watching a Disney movie.

Our feline friend brings them to his place where he plans to secretly sell them off to a mole rat named Mr. Verko (who was introduced in the prequel comics). Of course, Tempest also finds them along with the Storm soldiers and the pug-nosed loudmouth Grubber who still hadn't really contributed much in the film other than obsessing over food and making one-liners, even during dark, intense moments.

They manage to get away onto one of the Storm army's cargo ships which is run by a few parrot-like pirates. Their leader Celaeno (voiced by the famous Zoe Saldana) and her crew intends to throw them off because they are being forced to by the rule of the Storm King. But of course, Rainbow Dash tells them off that they shouldn't have their lives be controlled and that they should be their normal pirate selves again.

Their song was alright, but I am pretty sure that Zoe isn't really one for singing in musical numbers. She did a pretty good job though surprisingly. However, their song in my opinion would be the most likely to be forgotten aside from it being shown in advertisements. It only takes ONE song to change their minds and become themselves again.

However Rainbow not thinking clearly, unleashes a Sonic Rainboom that catches the attention of Tempest and the held-hostage Capper and begin their pursuit again. Turns out that they are trying to stop the others from heading to Mount Aris where the Hippogriffs are and the Storm King wants the magic of all four princesses in order to power his staff which would cause... say it with me kiddies... 'destroying the world'.

Our heroes escape though and make it to Mount Aris, where they find there is no Hippogriffs there. Just when on the hope of giving up, they find an underwater entrance to the secret hideout called Seaquestria. From there, we are introduced to the shape-shifting Hippogriffs or Seaponies as you can call them - and to the two characters there: Princess Skystar (voiced by Broadway actress Kristin Chenoweth) and Queen Novo (voiced by Uzo Aduba).

They explain their problems of what is happening back in Equestria and why they need an item to save their world. The queen though just turns around and refuses to help them because they are of course "perfectly fine" with being isolated from the outside world in the underwater utopia. Yeah, she was a bit of a bitch but Skystar was being quite insistant that she help the others and is more reasonable to why everyone in Seaquestria should help them.

Skystar on the other half seems to be a lonely character, considering that she only has two friends who are sea shells with googly eyes with names related to shells. Kristin did a wonderful job portraying the character, and of course we see the characters become sea-ponies.

They have another song as usual and Queen Novo looks to be convinced on giving them the item to help the ponies of Equestria which is a pearl, but changes her mind when she catches Twilight in the act of trying to steal it in a desperation - thus casting out Twilight and her friends back to the surface.

Back on the surface, every one of Twilight's friends berate her for her desperate action. Twilight of course argues that she didn't want to fail, because it was shown throughout the show that she has a fear of failure. Of course, things turn a dark turn when she yells at Pinkie Pie and I didn't expect the film to go in that direction. This of course causes everyone to leave her behind except Spike who stays there, until she is captured easily without resistance by Tempest Shadow.

Even before this part I did find some dark moments in the film admittedly, but I won't spoil those.

Finally in comes the villain song, and one I have been waiting for.

Tempest's song Open Up Your Eyes is probably going to be the most memorable song for me in the movie other than Capper's song. It sounded like it was a blend between Hellfire and Be Prepared and it digged deep into her backstory as to why she lost her horn in the first place and turned her back on friendship. Simply because she shouldn't depend on anyone else. I have now put that song in number 2 on my top villain songs list.

Yeah, you saw it coming one way or another.

Feeling regretful for the argument with Twilight when they find out she was captured, the other heroes along with Capper, the Pirates and Skystar join up with them to take back their home and free their friend.

Back in Canterlot, Twilight is brought to the castle from the beginning of the film where we are introduced for the first time to the Storm King himself as a yeti-satyr in appearance. He is quite funny, sadistic and crazy at the same time, but Liev manages to give him the good performance he was saving for. Even some lines he said almost represent Hasbro themselves in a way.

"Yeah yeah, friendship and flowers and ponies and bleh!"

The other heroes arrive both on time, but are too late when the Storm King has finally taken all of the magic from the princesses and began to activate the staff. (No, I haven't read The Stormy Road to Canterlot yet. I still have to.) Thus unleashing a wild storm with a capacity to destroy the entire world.

Tempest wants him to fix her horn as she was promised before - but lo and behold, she has been betrayed because it was simple all along that the Storm King just wanted power and used her to get what he wanted. He tries to kill both her and Twilight, but are stopped by the other heroes.

He does return to try and make one final attempt to kill them, but Tempest stops him in a last-minute change of heart and as a result and another dark moment... the main villain dies.

...The villain... is literally KILLED.

After the villain succeeds, all the soldiers that worked with him are basically like: Yeah, we're not in the rest of the movie except the credits... yeah let's just stand in the corner and do nothing. Grubber doesn't appear in the ending either except the credits either. Though he was a funny side-villain, he didn't really contribute much to the plot either.

The festival goes on as usual as everything is fixed back to normal, Tempest Shadow is redeemed and accepts the fact that she is still powerful without the other half of her horn, but can use her magic for good.

And that was My Little Pony: The Movie! My thought's on it... well, I'll put down my pros and cons in case you thought my thoughts were too long to read.

PROS:

• The animation itself, as it reminded me of the 1990s Disney movies that I remembered growing up with and watching, though I remember growing up more with Toy Story since I watched that one constantly. Gives me sweet childhood memories after all, though this one reminded me a lot of The Lion King.
• The main characters as usual. Pinkie Pie kills it every time with every pop culture reference and stating the obvious as usual, Rarity plays the drama queen card well, and Fluttershy despite having only a few lines was adorable. She even makes one of the tough Storm soldiers cry with her sweet voice.
• Musical numbers were pretty good as well as Sia's song "Rainbow" that she was promoting for the film itself. Of all my favorite songs in the movie, I'd say it would be Capper's and Tempest's songs.

CONS:

• I had a bit of difficulty following a bit of a story. First off it's finding the Hippogriffs and then all of a sudden they need a pearl to save Equestria, and then they're back home battling the Storm army. Part of me was saying "Hi, remember me I'm the audience, you want to tell me what's going on?!"
• The main villain didn't really have as much scenes as I thought he would. Same said for Grubber too. I thought there would be much more they could have done with him - but it's the movie industry like usual that forget the important part of a character: Backstory. Even if they do, they make it cheesy as possible.
• Applejack is still a background pony.

OVERALL:

I enjoyed this movie. I mean, despite it's flaws and plotholes filled in the movie. Sure, it wouldn't be label it as greatest film of the year or put it at number one for my top 10 moments of the year, but it would be in a good number. I mean, after Season 4 I did notice that the season afterwards were dropping down on the list to lower numbers. So perhaps I am starting to find different things. I'll buy the movie when it comes out, yes. But with score: I give it a 7.3 out of 10.

After the movie, I went outside with the group of bronies and I gave them a group photo. (I took the picture btw so it explains why I'm not in the photo.)

After the group photo, a few of the bronies and a pegasister left to get back home. The others went to the Imperial Pub a street away to discuss our opinions on the movie. For me, I was in that kind of trance so I was still processing what I just saw on the big screen.

I hung out with the bronies for a while, discussing and sharing our favorite characters and artworks until 9 or 10pm, then I took the GO train back home.

A good night, and a first time for me ever organizing a meet-up for the bronies. Hopefully there will be another big meet-up like that sometime in the future.

\m/ Brayden \m/