STOP!
Warning!
Spoiliops!
Friendship Games.
Oh boy, Friendship Games.
So yesterday I attended the premiere of the third movie in the grand saga of the Equestria Girls spinoff. After the wonder that was Rainbow Rocks (most notably its final battle which could've stood as its own movie because it was so good), I expected them to delve into the setting of Notquestria even deeper.
I warn you that the following post is for the most part pure impressions. Things I express below can become obsolete in a day or two.
The movie literally begins with a scene that sets the tone for the rest of the movie: idiocy. The scene is about Rainbow Dash calling everyone to address an emergency, which turns out to be a broken guitar string. Apparently the promise of a big accident and the discovery that the "big accident" is rather small, accompanied by everyone sighing at Rainbow Dash is supposed to be funny or something.
However, the last movie has established that the main cast, which is Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Applejack and Fluttershy, powerup and become supposedly mighty human/pony hybrids when they play instruments together. This is what allows them to guard the world from whatever comes their way, and the last movie clearly shows that the magic danger can really come out of nowhere. Essentially, their instruments are their weapons - without them, they barely can do a thing against a magical threat.
So when a guitar string breaks, it means that one of the weapons is out of order, which means their defense is greatly diminished, if not completely nullified. Which IS an emergency, and Rainbow Dash was right to call everyone. Everyone then proceed to be idiots.
After that bollocks we are treated with the introduction sequence, which reveals that this time the movie is written not by the usual mastermind behind the modern poneh Meghan McCarthy, but by a bloke called Josh Haber. I'm not a guy who considers the writer as a meaningful information when evaluating a script, but here one thing must be mentioned: Josh Haber is a relatively new addition to the script writers crew, having joined in season 4 - one season ago.
"Not everything has to be magical to be important", says Fluttershy. I remember hearing this line in the sneak peek, thinking that maybe in this movie the finale wouldn't be a standard magical blast fiesta. Maybe?
Unfortunately what I also saw in the sneak peek was this motivational song about Canterlot High sung by Rainbow Dash. She gives the overwhelming argument that Wondercolts are amazing and strong and all that because they have faced the magic threats before, and defeated them. Which is a blatant lie. Canterlot High never defeated anyone. The job was always done by Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Applejack, Fluttershy and at most two more characters at a time - at this point it's not the school itself, but a special defense force. In the first movie, everyone was mind-controlled and did nothing. In the second movie, everyone was kinda just dancing. This song is idiotic.
The next song establishes that our "antagonist", human Twilight, is practically the best student ever and has perfect grades in everything. Which, I assume, includes P.E., but she doesn't seem athletic at all. Maybe Crystal Prep's P.E. is terrible, or Twilight doesn't attend P.E. due to health problems.
We then get a scene where Twilight cuts a line in front of a bus. A bus is standing there, it's not full, you can enter it at any moment you want, and it has a line in front of it. Why does it have a line in front of it. Why!! Is this used as a storytelling device to help establish that Twilight is incredibly awkward?
What follows is a large chunk of the Games themselves, mixed with Twilight going around with her invention which absorbs magic from the main cast. With every new absorbtion, the device shoots out more and more portals to Equestria, causing more and more mischief.
Then Pinkie Pie derps out. Because funny.
I won't talk about the Games in detail since it's mostly harmless and sensible. There are some questionable moments here and there, but none of that measures to the absolute stupidity that is this movie's final battle.
Basically what happens is Twilight takes her device, which at that point has absorbed all the magic of the main cast except for Sunset, and opens it, unleashing all the stored magic.
This magic takes Twilight and transforms her into Midnight Sparkle, who is powerful, evil, and is not nice at all.
Midnight Sparkle starts blowing things up and opening lots and lots of expanding portals to Equestria. Midnight Sparkle says she does not care about this world as long as she can get to Equestria and "get more magic" to know all about it. She does not seek world domination - she merely wants to do research, and what makes her evil here is her disregard of the safety of other members of the society.
Sunset Shimmer then picks up the now empty device, then the movie shows us the main cast regaining their power, after which Sunset addesses Midnight Sparkle and says that she's been there before - she "put on the crown and just like [Twilight] I was overwhelmed by the magic it contained". Midnight Sparkle then says that Sunset is wrong - and rightfully so, because it is in to way "just like".
Sunset Shimmer wanted to follow her plan and rule the world from the beginning on Equestria Girls 1, long ago she put on the crown. The crown merely amplified her power and granted her enough strength to fulfill what she already had planned.
Here, Twilight throughout the entire movie acted rather kind and humble, she cared about what other people thought and did. As soon as she unleashed the magic, she changed. Sunset didn't. Bollocks role reversal is bollocks.
Then Sunset drains the power of her friends and unleashes the magic again, undergoing the same transformation as Twilight. However, she does not become crazy or evil - she becomes an angel which then combats Midnight Sparkle.
The movie gives absolutely no explanation for such drastic changes in character behavior and device behavior. The audience is supposed to just watch it unfold because watch out, here comes yet another anime fight scene with laser beams and the epic clast of two continious laser beams coming from the opposing sides.
Then Twilight says sorry.
Credits.
The moral is, not only loneliness will get you less results in life than friendship, it can also turn you into a bastard. And also those who seek knowledge are especially evil.
>TL;DR:
>If you want spectacle, I guess the movie's fine.
>If you want sense, run away from this movie.
>If you want sense and spectacle, watch Rainbow Rocks.
