My Little Pony: The Movie (G1 Theatrical Animated Film, 1986, 86 minutes)

 

This one almost did me in. It's not... bad, really? But the pacing is sooooo slow with side quests for both the protagonists and the antagonists, splitting the protagonists into three different groups, etc.

 

Any case, this film was the only actual theatrical release of My Little Pony until the recent Equestria Girls film. It's absolutely necessary as a bridge between the previous two specials, and the TV series that followed almost immediately afterwards.

 

This, plus the original Transformers animated movie done at approximately the same time, apparently lost so much money for Hasbro that it caused them to have a complete rethink on animated movies as a whole, switching to direct-to-video outings and cancelling several other films outright. According to my research, this is one of the reasons why many animation grognards dislike My Little Pony out of principle.

 

Summary: Three witches form a plan to drive the ponies out of their land, and unleash an unstoppable horror upon all. All the inhabitants of Ponyland have to work together to do the impossible, and stop the Smooze.

 

Anyway, on with my notes:

 

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Birds also interacting with rainbow like it's water. So it's the rainbows themselves that have different physical properties than in the real world, not any innate power of the pegasi.

 

Winter wrap-up-kind of stuff, but with the animals doing it themselves.

 

"Spring Festival"

 

Old-style basketball. I remember doing this kind of thing myself with bushel baskets. (I grew up in rural Ontario, Canada in case it matters.)

 

Another new building, this one a clamshell stage. With a rather distressed upright piano sitting outside right in front.

 

Maypole, apple dunk. Balloon pop, played by the animals. So the animals are just as sentient as the ponies here.

 

Volcano. Rednecks? Nope, witches. Two teenagers and their mother. Reeka, Draggle, and Hydia.

 

Wait, wait. This is important: Ponies a are *new* to the area. Parents of the older witch lived here first. Ponies are not native to this place, they came from somewhere else first.

 

Lots of evidence that human kingdoms surround the pony area.

 

Animals are definitely sentient. The skunk talks.

 

Lamp in the nursery, might be a candle, oil, or gas lamp, but not likely given the cloth lampshade. That means electricity or magical electricity-equivalent (fireflies?)

 

Standard pencil. Actually kind of a cute easter egg there, since Hasbro was originally a pencil manufacturer.

 

Volcano of Gloom is the official name of the witch's volcano, which is within visual distance of Dream Castle.

 

Seaponies and bushwollies again. *sigh* I was hoping for something new, not re-hashed side-characters which serve no real narrative purpose.

 

Wait, what's with that one pony's eyes? They're red rather than the standard black.Okay, quick pause for research, and that's Fizzy, one of the 'Twinkle-Eyed' unicorns that had gems for eyes. Possible connection to the Crystal Ponies of G4?

 

Nightmare Heights has more witches.

 

Smooze?

 

Mention of a Grundleland on the other side of the Black Mountains that was wiped out by the Smooze.

 

Ghosts & animated skeletons. Part of a musical number, so probably figurative rather than actual creatures from the setting.

 

One pony knew what the Smooze was right away. But nobody else did. Magic Star is apparently more well-travelled than the rest of the ponies.

 

Megan has little siblings. Fast acceptance of the ponies now by these new humans. Very 80's outfit she's wearing, overalls with the sides removed and frills. I remember seeing girls wearing that kind of nonsense at the time.

 

Smooze is semi-sentient. Sticks to stuff and makes them grumpy.

 

Lots of action, but is the Rainbow of Light really doing anything against the smooze other than making a mess?

 

Nope. Ex Machina didn't pay it's Dues this time.

 

Dream Castle is covered by the Smooze.

Magical artifacts are *easy* to come by. Let's just go pick up another Rainbow of Light at the corner store.

 

Smooze seems to be a physical manifestation of Discord's little trick.

 

That's one ugly plant. Aggressive too.

 

Back to Moochick.

 

Not in the magic mushroom anymore, and the rabbit isn't wearing pants.

 

3D checkers. Fascinating.

 

Mushrump?

 

References to Earth. Capri, Egypt, etc. as the Moochick really has an issue with the ponies being homeless. Yet refuses to understand that the ponies just want their old home back.

 

Tony Randall doing the Moochick really isn't that far off of John De Lance as Discord, really. Sort of a mirror image. It's almost like Moochick is Discord's senile older brother or something. He's not relying on a wand this time around, though.

 

Moochick creates 'Paradise Estates'. It's probably based on a playset produced by Hasbro, but architecturally is very similar to many southern California homes I've seen. A bit over-decorated, but strip that away and it's a standard adobe and tile estate with a central court surrounded on all sides by a building. Definitely Spanish heritage.

 

Flutterponies in Fluttervalley

 

Grundles, a kind of goblin. Amusing, but why are they here?

 

What now? What's an Ohg? I'm guessing on that spelling, as I can find no other reference to this thing.

 

Upgraded Smooze actually destructive.

 

Giant sunflower field on the way to Fluttervalley.

 

Unicorn teleportation doesn't work with a rider.

 

Fluttervalley is on the other side of 'Shadow Valley'.

 

Smooze doesn't seem to affect Spike the way it does the ponies and bushwollies. He's sad his tail's got goop on it, but that's it. Others get all grumpy about life in general, but not Spike.

 

You know, I expected flutterponies to be smaller. I might be remembering something else from later in the series.

 

Evil, aggressive trees. Shadow Valley feels a lot like the Everfree Forest.

 

What te fuc? One eyed spider/crab thingy? That must be Ohg.

 

Flutterponies have a queen. The Flutterponies are non-interventionalist and don't want to get involved in anyone else's problems. And live in little pagodas in the trees throughout the valley.

 

Witches were aware of the flutterponies being anti-smooze.

 

Dream Castle is recovered, and the Rainbow of Light, by the Flutterponies doing aerial cavalry charges. They're a lot more militantly organized than the pegasi have been shown to be.

 

What? Now the Rainbow gets involved again, and collects up the smooze and witches and mixes them all up, dropping them back in the volcano. Why didn't it do this back in the beginning, if it had that kind of power?

 

Grundles are given Dream Castle to found a new country. Ponies stay at Paradise Estates. I guess all the other kingdoms surrounding the area aren't going to care about a political upheaval in their neighboring country.