My Little Pony: Escape from Catrina (G1 Animated Feature, 1985, 22 minutes)

The second special film for My Little Pony, called 'Escape from Catrina', originally broadcast in 1985. This isn't done as a second pilot, as it does seem to rely on the viewer having seen the first feature to understand some of the context, and it's not really part of the TV series that's still to officially start in the next year. Again, these notes are from the original version, not the re-edited version that was used in the later series.

Summary: The witch Catrina will do anything for power, including making the bushwollies into slaves to produce the witchweed potion that gives Catrina the ability to control the weather.

Not much preamble on this one, so I'm going to go right into my notes:

Dream Castle seems to have a house built next to it in Tudor style.

Seaponies are now part of the pony society.

They have latex for balloons. They are definitely not medieval-style bladders.

Okay, this is getting to be a theme here. Ponies can't swim normally?

This must be the villain of the episode's lair.

Extensive technology here, very late Victorian/early Edwardian machines in that pseudo-Egyptian/Indian style that the British Empire was so very fond of.

What the heck are these bushwolly things?

Another lizard-man type, this one in standard Norman England garb. Named Red? No, Rep.

Machine is creating a green goop. Pleasant.

Queen Catrina. Definately a cat-woman, not a cat-girl.

Bushwolly is an idiot.

Green goop is a potion? 'Witchweed', apparantly.

Tiny amount makes Catrina into Giganta. And a blowhard..

Bushwolly is an idiot.

Wait, what? Lizard guy is a shapeshifter?

Skydancer looks like a Rainbow Dash relative, with the rainbow mane.

Art style on humans, specifically Megan, has changed. Not for the better in my opinion. She looks like a china doll.

Closer look at the house. Not tudor at all. It's supposed to resemble alphabet blocks as it's some kind of creche arrangement, called the 'Nursery'. The 'baby' ponies live there as a group, not with their parents. All the babies wear a necklace of bells. Interesting. Also, they already have cutie-marks. It's possible with this version ponies are born with cutie-marks. Maybe we'll get 'newborns' at some point to be able to confirm.

Only four baby ponies in the entire pony settlement. That seems a poor ratio. Wait, hold on. Are any of these ponies male? Or are they all mares? (checking....) Yep they're all mares. There are no stallions in this place yet. (Supposedly they will show up later.)

Preemptive bushwollies are idiots.

Elevator lift? Catrina seems to have access to technology far beyond the rest of the setting.

Catrina can control the weather with this potion, causing a winter storm. That's what the blowing was all about before. Okay.

Ponies believe the rainbow of light can fix this.

Lighting eyes. The potion seems to turn Catrina into a full-fledged storm goddess.

Rainbow is sentient! Interesting.

Da fuc? Okay, Rep and Catrina are dressed in 1880's clothing in a flash-back kinda thing. Plus a penny-farthing bicycle from the same period. So that's another reference to them being from a separate time-frame from the ponies.

Rep's a bit of a schemer, he planned for Catrina to run out of potion thanks to this musical number.

Rainbow waterfall...

Mix of Edwardian-style clothing for the ponies, specifically called 'costumes'.

Odd, I didn't think Rep would go through with this.

Okay, apparently Rep simply has a line that he won't cross. Anything Catrina asks for *before* that line is fine.

"I can be really good!" Oooookay. Still a catgirl, I guess.

Rather elaborate interior to this castle, and the ponies (and former villains) play dress-up in a variety of costumes from different periods. Megan is dressed in a 1920's style children's outfit. Probably also a costume.

Just like the last one, no indication on where Catrina and Rep (and the previous Scorpan) go after the episode. I wonder if any of them are going to be referenced in the TV series proper later?