Thank you for sharing this with us, Toadettefan. I personally felt that Friendship Games was by far my least favourite of the four movies, but still enjoyable in its own right, and it sounds like you feel the same (or at least as far as the first 3 movies go; you haven't seen Legend of Everfree yet iirc but I recommend you do since that one was my 2nd favourite after the first Equestria Girls).
Your review is very well written and raises many good points about the movie for better or worse, which I almost entirely agree with, except that I did like ACADECA and Unleash the Magic quite a bit - nonetheless I do consider this film's soundtrack the overall weakest in the tetralogy. I also agree I wish they kept the duet version of "What More Is Out There" and moreover wish that Sunset had been given more development as well as Sci-Twi.
One thing I noticed you didn't mention was the appearance of the human versions of Cadance and Shining Armour. I personally found them a bit odd and felt Shining Armour was very underused, but Cadance was ok and good to balance out from how mean Cinch is. What did you think, Toadettefan?
Thank you for sharing this with us, Toadettefan. I personally felt that Friendship Games was by far my least favourite of the four movies, but still enjoyable in its own right, and it sounds like you feel the same (or at least as far as the first 3 movies go; you haven't seen Legend of Everfree yet iirc but I recommend you do since that one was my 2nd favourite after the first Equestria Girls).
Your review is very well written and raises many good points about the movie for better or worse, which I almost entirely agree with, except that I did like ACADECA and Unleash the Magic quite a bit - nonetheless I do consider this film's soundtrack the overall weakest in the tetralogy. I also agree I wish they kept the duet version of "What More Is Out There" and moreover wish that Sunset had been given more development as well as Sci-Twi.
One thing I noticed you didn't mention was the appearance of the human versions of Cadance and Shining Armour. I personally found them a bit odd and felt Shining Armour was very underused, but Cadance was ok and good to balance out from how mean Cinch is. What did you think, Toadettefan?
I felt Cadence was quite nice, which helped to balance out Cinch's personality. I wish Shining Armor had more screentime as well, since he could've acted as a motivator for the recovery from her transformation alongside Spike.
I thought the third installment of this series was very fun, and had a decent story. I think Sci-Twi has a well-written personality, since she's a lot more introverted compared to the Twilight from Ponyville. She also has a good amount of flaws as well, including being pushed around by her classmates, and giving into peer pressure without thinking of the consequences. While I didn't like her unknowingly stealing other students' magic with her pendant, her transformation into Midnight Sparkle had me on the edge of my seat.
I felt that Sunset Shimmer's writing toke a turn for the worse here. In fact, when she confronts Sci-Twi regarding her pendant, she has an angry outburst that's reminiscent of her personality in the first Equestria Girls film. So this scene not only felt out of character, but also made me feel sorry for Sci-Twi even more. Before I saw this film, I also saw some deleted scenes from it, including one where Sunset has a chat with the Twilight from Ponyville regarding her homesickness for Equestria. This made me wonder if an earlier draft had equal focus on both Sunset and Sci-Twi, which would've made the film's plot get into a proper flow.
The songs here are mostly alright. The only two that stood out to me are What More Is Out There? and Right There In Front Of Me. The opening song sets the tone for the movie, but isn't unique enough to stand on its own merits. ACADECA is quite uninspired, Unleash The Magic is a good villain song, but I've heard better ones from the first two films. The CHS Rally Song starts off ok, but it gets listenable once DJ Pon-3 adds her own music to the composition. But having seen the deleted scenes, I wish they would've kept the duet version of What More Is Out There in, since again, it would've gave Sunset just as much development as Sci-Twi.
A lot of the film's new characters from Crystal Prep are interesting, but a lot of them had too many flaws and not enough strengths. The Shadow Bolts have cool designs, but they don't get much time to fully introduce themselves, so we only see their signature traits. I don't like any of them because of how mean they are towards Sci-Twi. Principal Cinch could've been a well-rounded secondary villain, but the plot doesn't make her seem threatening enough. She also kind of gets away with her intentions, since we don't see her after the climax concludes.
However, there are still some fun scenes, and the competition's events were quite fun. I also liked when Sunset's friends were helping out Sci-Twi, as it showcased how welcoming they are compared to the students at Crystal Prep. Overall, I'd give Friendship Games a solid 7/10. It's certainly not a bad movie, and has enough good things to make it suitable for its target audience. But the previous two movies had a lot more going for them, which only make the flaws of Friendship Games stick out more. Still, I had fun watching this film, and am looking forward to how Legends of Everfree continues this series.
Hmm, I'm still on the opposite end from you in terms of how I'd rank each of these three movies (and from MiracleDinner). I actually found Friendship Games to be my favorite Equestria Girls movie up to its point, with it feeling really immersive and novel to see the movie entirely focusing on Sci-Twi instead of Twilight and how her emotions and powers work, and I found Sunset Shimmer's arc to be the most interesting out of the first three movies. I also found the new school's setting and characters to also add more suspense, I liked the overarching competitive feel to the songs such as ACADECA actually even though you found that one to be weak, and I also loved What More Is Out There, and it had by far my favorite climax out of the three movies which felt really touching to me seeing the two characters interact. I remember the scene where Sunset got angry not bothering me as much because she was under stress and I felt it showed she still had flaws she needed to work on, as Sci-Twi did do something that had erratic results. I remember thinking Cinch was a decent villain, as a good reason for Sci-Twi's behavior, although I agree that she should have gotten consequences for her actions. I did think the Shadowbolts could have been used more too, but liked their contribution to the atmosphere of suspense. Overall here, I think you have some good points, and I'm curious to see what you'll think of the fourth movie.
I know this movie got mixed reception, and while it's my least favourite of the series so far (I've seen all of the Despicable Me / Minions films except Despicable Me 4), I still somewhat enjoyed this movie in its own right.
I thought the villain, Balthazar Bratt, was kind of cool, and there were plenty of funny moments involving Gru, Lucy, the girls, and the Minions. The movie provides interesting expansions to the lore of Gru's heritage and reveals that he has a twin brother, Dru. I found interesting Gru's moral conflicts about returning to his heritage of villainy vs. his commitment to staying good, and the contrast between how Gru was seen by his mother and father.
The main issues I have with this film are that I didn't really like Dru as a character, and certain things like the pig farm and the cheese festival (explicitly confirmed non-vegan since we actually see the cows being milked on-screen) felt weird because I'm an ethical vegan, and speaking of which I also didn't like story with Niko. I would rate this movie a 7/10 or so.
Mr. Peabody and Sherman (2014)
This is a movie I'm coming back to for the first time in over a decade. I do remember seeing and enjoying it when I was a kid (I believe 11 years old, the movie came out a few weeks before I turned 11 but I probably saw it after my birthday), but remembered very little about it, so a rewatch was long overdue. And my goodness, I forgot how great this movie is.
Mr. Peabody is a very entertaining character, having a witty personality coupled with superhuman genius and talent for many, many feats. I also liked Sherman, Penny, Penny's parents, and plenty of the historical characters. I think the movie tells a heartwarming story about parent-child love, in this case an adoptive relationship between a single father and an only son, as well as a touching enemies-to-friends story between Penny and Sherman. There are lots of fun scenes involving Mr. Peabody's genius moments, and lots of fun hijinx with the time-travel plot, and an entertaining climax that had me on the edge of my seat. It's also funny how the time machine is called "WABAC" which reminds of the Wayback Machine which is used for "time travel" by archiving web pages.
I have a few gripes with this film, namely a few historical errors (e.g. highly inaccurate portrayal of Maximilien de Robespierre), a few characters who are portrayed favourably when in reality they did a lot of messed up things (e.g. Mahatma Gandhi), limited portrayal of people of colour, the movie is mostly Western-centric and has no visits to cultures such as the Aztecs, the Mayanas, ancient China, etc., no LGBTQ+ representation, and problematic portrayal of women
E.g. Grunion is permanently taken back to the past against her will by Agamemnon, who is in love with her, and then is seen marrying him later back in the Trojan Horse, which undermines womens' agency and portrays the harmful idea that women can just be taken by men who desire them at first sight and will end up falling in love with them.
But despite these issues I'd say I had a really fun time watching this movie and am definitely glad I came back to it. I would rate Mr. Peabody and Sherman a 9/10.
The Dark Knight Trilogy (Batman Begins 2005, The Dark Knight 2008, The Dark Knight Rises 2012)
I also recent rewatched the trilogy of Christopher Nolan Batman movies, and I thought they were all very entertaining, since they are very dramatic and high-stakes. My favourite was The Dark Knight, but I also liked the other two. I definitely think these movies are better than The Batman (2022). I also noticed that the plot of The Dark Knight Rises was similar to the "No Man's Land" arc during the end of Gotham TV series (2014-2019). I don't think these movies are perfect and have a lot of issues with some things that I won't fully go into as this post is long enough, but I will say that I enjoyed this triology and would rate the three movies an 8/10 or so.
@Wonder Woman I was kind of wondering what things Mahatma Ghandi did that you have an issue with. I thought he was really peaceful and an advocator of peace and I don't remember reading about him doing anything wrong or questionable, but I wonder if there's anything bad he did that I don't know about that I will agree with you when you mention it wasn't right.
I rewatched Rogue One: A Star Wars Story last night because the TV show Andor ties directly into it, and I really think it hits entirely differently after having seen that show,
plus the ending is soooo cool, the Vader's Rage sequence is (probably) my favourite scene in the whole Star Wars franchise
@Wonder Woman By the way with the Mahatma Ghandi thing, whatever you tell me he did wrong, I'm going to be very busy over the next two days and won't be able to be on here much so it may be a while before I respond, but I promise I will once I have time. I happen to be very busy with school today.
