Okay, so I feel like I'm one of the only ones that really didn't like this movie. Right now the order of 'goodness' is: Rainbow Rocks, EQG, This.
To me, the songs were forgettable and really just nothing special. Not terrible, but not good, either.
The six (Five? There were either five or six) Crystal Prep vilain students didn't get looked into at all. One was shown to be kinda like a Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch mix, I guess, one was a wierd sarcastically kind girl, and the other was an angry person. The rest didn't get looked into. So okay, those personalities aren't that bad, let's see how this goes, how they develop. They don't. And no, a sudden reformation from bad to good at the very end doesn't count. I feel like if they were important enough to show up alongside the Mane 6 in the intro bit, then they should have got some real scenes.
Another big problem I have is that not much really happened. You've got the race, and the climax in the end. That was pretty much it. The contest itself (apart from the race and archery which was cool) was just montaged through. Twilight vs Sunset was pretty cool, but it happened so fast. Nothing like a quick montage to rush through things because the timing was screwed up. I guess you could count the Mane 6 being stripped of their magic 'stuff happening', but those scenes were fast and ended quickly. On that note, why did the Mane 6 not even seem to care that much? Sunset Shimmer seemed to be the only one that was concerened. Even when Fluttershy saw Twilight suck her magic out (ahem) right in front of her, she was just like "Damn. That sucks. Oh well, I guess I won't question it any further".
Now, the climax of the movie, which everyone loved. I... I didn't love it. At all. It was soooo cliche! "Ohh nuu, an evil version of the normally good protagonist! This has never happened before! How could we have predicted this?" The evil version of the protagonist has been done to death. On top of that, they didn't even do much cool stuff with it. We saw the portals opening - why not have someone fall in, or have a pony come through into the human world and become humanised? Why not have something terrible happen (and then be solved)? Nope, Twilight acted threatening and thenOH SHIT WE DONT HAVE MUCH TIME LEFT WRAP IT UP GUYS
All in all, this movie was really disappointing for something I was so hyped about. I just hope the pony movie won't end up like this.
Also, what's up with Cadence and Shining Armor? SA is definitely a student, but was Cadence? I don't remember. I assume her role was explained but I have no idea.