I have come here today to discuss an existential crisis in the pony world. Princess Twilight Sparkle (voice of Tara Strong), daughter of the late Queen Nose Candy, has yet to finalize the preparations for their first Equinapalooza, or whatever. Now, you and I may reason soundly that panic over the addition of stage glint reflectors may constitute a priority of low importance, but to the denizens of Euthanasia, this lack of detail is the equivalent of the princess taking a rainbow dump on the head of each citizen in turn.
Facing a Herculean amount of work to be done and a ticking clock until festival opening, Sparkle and pals opt to sing “We Got This Together,” a song about being confident that any job will indeed be finished in lieu of actually doing any work. My Little Pony: The Movie sought to Disnify their production significantly with the addition of cutesy musical numbers. However, the greatest running theme in the film is the counterproductive nature of the songs. Let me put it this way: next time you ask your five-year-old to complete a task and they break into song instead, odds are you won’t be pleased with the work output.
At this point in the narrative, the Storm King (Liev Schreiber) shows up to rain on this parade, allowing chief toady and horn-envyist Tempest Shadow (Emily Blunt) to execute his anti-pony agenda. Tempest Shadow is a purple horse (as opposed to the seventeen other purple horses in the film) with a broken stalk where a unicorn horn once viagra’ed proudly. The lack of tumescence has made a once mirthful pony into a minion of evil, a good lesson for all children who ever suffer a setback.
Oh no! How will the ponies get their groove back? Wait a sec. Now look here: if it’s got wings and horn, that’s not -strictly speaking- a “pony,” now, is it? That’s a pega-uni-horse, or something. I dunno. But I’m pretty sure it’s no longer a pony. And having both is just cheating, isn’t it? What kind of dog and pony show you got goin’ ‘round here?
My favorite scene comes ten minutes later, when the good ponies are gathered up by a flying delivery ship, kinda like a steampunk version of “Futurama.” Seeing the delivery occupants are uninspired by their present milieu, the ponies sing “Time to Be Awesome” and within, quite literally, three bars, the ship turned back to pirate glory … which was their objective. Ummm, movie, you do, er, know what pirates are, right? Let me see if I can understand this correctly: you landed upon a vehicle run by a set of creatures with decent government jobs and when you weren’t getting your way, you sang a 90-second song about fear of commitment and turned
decent, albeit wishy-washy, citizens into outlaws and called it victory. Did I get that right?
I think it’s fair to point out I didn’t see the last ten minutes of My Little Pony: The Movie. It is #1 this year on the list of movies I should not have attended alone. [See this review for my full thoughts on the subject] I’m not going to be angry or defensive about being chased out of the theater; I feel the exact same way about single men who show up at playgrounds. Suffice to say, if this My Little Pony: The Movie suddenly became Casablanca between my departure and the end credits, I fully apologize for the star-and-a-half. I’ll offer a full retraction as soon as anyone can explain to me how making a flying horse walk the plank of a flying ship constitutes a punishment.
♪I know logic can get you down
You can’t work out morals
From the plot
Feeling that all your best prose is done
Your tears and smack is all you’ve got
But there’s a light, cuz the ‘lectric is paid
Beneath those tears and smack so
Just shirk ‘em
And let your words through all these ponies, maybe
Show it is time, yeah, time to be irksome♫
Rated PG, 99 Minutes
Director: Jayson Thiessen
Writer: Meghan McCarthy and Rita Hsiao and Michael Vogel
Genre: Movies that will drive parents insane
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Really? Seriously? You need to look up who this film is made for? No, no, please. Go on. Do tell. What did you hope to find astride that colon?
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Their parents after the seventh viewing
♪ Parody Inspired by “Time to Be Awesome”
