Fun fact: the movie was released on the same day in which Nevermind got its 30th anniversary. Coincidence? I don´t think so.

Anyway, shitposting aside, what do i have to say about this movie?

I am not going to dive into the details here nor offer very strong arguments here. Just a few comments on it and then, I will decide if I continue the posts.

The setting changes vastly and we find ourselves with a world that relies more on tech than FiM and the animation looks pleasant on some characters but it doesn´t always translate too well and thus, we are left with some faces that...well, could be worthy meme material. Uncanny and maybe too human-like. While it doesn´t bug me, it exists and we could associate this kind of style on other movies from Illumination studios or Dreamworks. The unique appeal of gen 4 has been lost but as soon as we knew that this was purely on 3D, we all expected something like this.

What I would like to focus the most here consists in the influence of FiM towards the franchise in general. I have always thought that 2010 represents the year zero for MLP and thus, it would change the nature and direction of this franchise forever. My fears have absolutely vanished and instead of reducing the market to little girls like Hasbro attempted to do with the first 3 (3.5) gens, gen 4 settled the golden standard for the nature of what makes MLP to be judged as MLP.

Despite the numbers, gen 5 stands as the genuine sequel that follows gen 4. Not only in terms of timeline, but in terms of nature and the business approach. The movie, while it abandons the 2d flash animation, the callbacks and especially, the style of writing is truly reminiscent of gen 4. This movie combines parts of Mare in the Moon (the broken bridge, the moment in which Izzy helps Sunny so she doesn´t fall on the mountain with her horn), School Daze-Raze and the Ending of the End (racism against other species), The Beginning of the End (with the 3 crystals), Magical Mystery Cure (Sunny´s transformation) and Hearth´s Warming Eve (conflict among pegasus, unicorns and earth ponies without being narrated as a fairy tale).

Not only that but the main cast...at least 3 of them repeat pretty similar patterns that we got in gen 4. Sunny follows the nature of Twilight (especially when she says to the others that she has made things worse, those same lines happened in the 2017 movie and in several two parters when Twilight felt sorry for failing with her plans), Zipp follows the same nature of Rainbow Dash (her looks instantly give away her tomboyish charisma) and Izzy follows the humorous nature with her careless (yet not over the top) attitude that was displayed with Pinkie Pie.

I have held many fears that Hasbro wouldn´t care all that much nor put much effort into the gen and just follow the cheap formula of marketing towards little girls but...it seems that gen 4´s legacy has become permanent with this movie...which is a very good sign despite the different directions that they might take with it. They are follow more the industry standards than falling behind the industry with a toy commercial that would fill up the cartoon channels for a quick cash-grab.

We aren´t going to get another gen 4 but for sure, the nature of MLP is heavily (if not absolutely) influenced by the writing delivered in the 2010s. Gen 4 has opened a path that would arrive at a point of no return (the real turning point of this franchise as a whole) and with this movie, it seems that said nature surpasses gen 4 itself.