As you have heard already, Equestria Girls is getting a YouTube series starting on November 17. To honor the new series, I wanted to review the first Equestria Girls movie as this is where the spinoff began and would only add to the already fantastic lore of Gen 4. In 2013, Hasbro announced to the world that Equestria Girls would have human counterparts of the ponies. Many of us Bronies thought it was a massive risk as the brand only saw three seasons. Despite the risk, many Bronies were already up in arms especially the purists (the worst fanboys of any fandom) about an else-world story from MLP. It would not surprise me if these are the same purists that hated Twilight getting her wings as an Alicorn. However, in light of the criticism, EQG would be developed into a movie and during the time Hasbro only had it planned for a one-off story (possibly non-canon) originally. It saw a theater release across the US in 2013 with major success. I still have to commend Hasbro for taking a risk this early in Gen 4 as any other company like Mattel would have waited. It was a matter of time before Hasbro would pitch an idea like this after the success of three seasons and their else-world comics from IDW. I'm not sure how much canon IDW comics are as recently the writers of the comics and the animated shows try to connect the Pillars of Light and MLP The Movie together. Regardless, the else-world story was good as its hilarious to see our favorite ponies as humans. The reason it works so much is that we get to see another way of how they act which is something we could relate. Even though the Parallel Equis (that is what I'm calling these worlds in my head-canon because Hasbro refuses to give them one) is not as established as Equis from FIM in terms of lore. That is what happens when you start a new thing, many hints and features of that world are not revealed at first. In other words, an introduction to this new world was decent and a good set up for the later movies and the new YouTube series. The human designs so far are pretty good and we get to see how they would look like wearing clothes. The HuMane Five's clothes style may not have been the best when you consider it's made to sell toys, but each one diffidently fits their perspective characters. The one glaring flaw I see is the horseshoe boot design which makes their feet look as if they are big and are not natural at all. The ponies' hooves looked believable in their form and had a good length that made it come off less of a toy design. Yes FIM is still a blatant toy commercial just like EQG (why the fandom insists it's this series only is beyond me) but at least the artists figured out how to make them believable. One of the few things Hasbro did well for the series was placing exclusive background humans that didn't have a pony or Equestrian magic creature counterpart as of yet. It helps differentiate EQG from FIM in some way when factoring the cultural differences between ponies and humans. After all, Parallel Equis' technology is 100 hundred years ahead of Equis that seems stuck technologically from 1930s to 1950s. Where in the human world, its in the 2010s and actually makes a lot of sense compared when this world has no magic. Each background human did tell a story of its world from the techies to the rockers just as the FIM ponies did. Even the established ones from FIM as humans also did a good job telling their version as if they originally belong there. Speaking of cultural differences, I love the way Twilight came off very awkward in this story so much that it was adorable. It's true that humans and their world are something Twilight or any pony has never seen before. The way she freaked out upon turning into a human was hilarious with her flailing her arms around while screaming. I also loved how she would still use her pony mannerism such as picking things up with her mouth. The concept might have been good (probably the most interesting thing about the story), however, this isn't the best writing I have seen from Gen 4. The story was lacking some key elements that usually made FIM unique with each character involved getting development. There is so much you can do in a 70-minute movie format between Flash, the HuMane Five and Sunset. As always the high school tropes wasn't the issue as like I said this is an else-world story. The cliché moments can come off eye rolling which we see a lot of from Flash and Twilight (the worst shipping I have seen so far). It's the typical popular jock picking the cute nerd over the bad girl queen bee of the Cheerleading Squad. It doesn't help that instead of talking they bump into each other as a form of interaction and to use as an average gag. If I wanted to watch a Marvel MCU movie with its crappy jokes then I would have already and these gags don't belong in MLP. Keep this in mind, I'm a Marvel fan and even Gen 4 is better than the MCU. Then we have Flash, the Jar Jar Binks of Gen 4 with his goody two shoe and goofy personality that would actually scare women away. Of course, Twilight would fall for Jar Jar Flash (let's call him that) considering she doesn't know better as this is the first time we saw her have any attraction. Yes, he helps Twilight from Sunset's scheming but he saw no development at all and no bumping into her isn't character progression. Next is Sunset Shimmer and at the time she was by far the weakest villain with a simple plot. When compared to Nightmare Moon, Discord, Chrysalis, and Sombra, they all had well thought up plans put together even upon their returns. Her personality was the best I have seen so far compared to the usual main characters because of her swagger. However, her bad girl personality was quite average and she came off like some wannabe queen bee at a high school then some master villain. I'm pretty sure when Sunset got the crown (after all the setbacks) that turning into a "she-demon" wasn't part of her plan as she assumed it would turn her into an alicorn. However, using a school of teenagers to invade a magical land in trying to conquer it is utterly dumb and truly a pathetic plan for a villain. As for the animation, there were a few times it would come off awkward in its movement. Maybe DHX studio put this together on a moderate budget and Hasbro had given them a limited time. It's still a glaring issue when the last time they had any design flaws was with the first two episodes of Season 1. With three seasons in, DHX should've gotten past these issues in animation, especially for a movie. On top of that, I'm not the only one that doesn't see Celestia coming off like Slenderman. Just get rid of the face and the hair in Photoshop and you have Slendia, I mean it's not hard to see. As much as I enjoyed the film, this is still the worst EQG movie/episode out of all of them. No character saw any development between Jar Jar Flash, Sunset and the HuMane Five. The plot was as average as a typical FIM filler episode and the difference is that it was three episodes long. As I have stated, the high school tropes weren't the problem but rather the writing. The shipping was the worst I have seen in Gen 4 as Twilight and Flash was a cliché and a forced romance. Bumping into each other does not equal chemistry between two characters. Sunset as a villain was underwhelming when previous antagonists showed more competence in their plans. Sunset's plan to invade Equestria using teenagers was as pathetic as it gets for a villain. Despite the negatives, I did enjoy this expansion and it was a great way to tell an else-world story. What I mean is that instead of writing a story arc of an alternated Equestria from IDW comics. The writers for the show went a different route by having a world similar to Earth with humans being the counterparts. It may have flaws but it was still enjoyable and Hasbro would only improve the lore of the parallel world in later installments. Rating: 7.3/10 Solid
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RETRO GAMER
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