Rainbow Rocks

You're never gonna bring me down

Hello & welcome back to Trotting Through Life.  I've decided to forgo season 4 reviews and just get to what every Brony has been curious about. The sequel to Equestira Girls and while I really liked it,  and somewhat agree with the consensus that it was better, I do have one complaint regarding the villains in the movie but we will get to that  but first...

Lyra Cameo and she's with Bon Bon.  (I will never call her Sweetie Drops,  her name is Bon Bon).   As someone that loves Lyra and considers her, his favorite background pony.  I was thrilled.   And my new headcanon (thanks to Les) is that human Lyra loves ponies.  Just as fanon pony Lyra is obsessed with humans.  I wonder what pony Lyra's reaction to this would be. Ah well, I bet she'd be happy but it'd probably drive Bon Bon crazy. 



The Plot


We open at Sugarcube Corner in the human world, where our antagonists are sitting and singing feeding off  the negative energy but they need Equestrian magic and discover that this world now has said magic.  It's important to note that this film opens on the same night of the final battle of the humane six and Sunset Shimmer from the first movie.

Okay, I can't hold this in.  We learn in flashback from Twilight Sparkle after she gets a message from Sunset Shimmer about these three, they are sirens.  Nothing wrong with that but my issue comes with their history.  You see, it wasn't Celestia or Luna that banished them but rather Star Swirl The Bearded.

Well, the show has on multiple occasions stated that he was alive before the Mane Six were even thought of, let alone their parents.  Sure, he knew Tia and Luna but they are over 1,000 years old. My question becomes if Star Swirl banished the sirens, then one why did they wait until t now o act and more importantly, why are they teenagers?   That  doesn't  make any sense! They should at best, be adults. I am willing to let Sunset Shimmer and Twily being teens slide because they don't appear much older than young adults and the first movie doesn't really draw much attention to this.   Maybe, it's like the theory that  time works differently in both realms but even then, they shouldn't be teenagers because they've been in the human world much longer than even Sunset Shimmer.  The comic story,  "The Fall of Sunset Shimmer"  at least shows Sunset coming to our world and that explains why she is a teenager but here, this doesn't make sense.

Now, supplementary material  shouldn't  give the audience back story that is needed in the film.  And I do appreciate the fact  that Rainbow Rocks takes the time to explain the back story of the Sirens but the thing with Star Swirl makes no sense with them looking like teens.  If I hadn't made this clear, I HATE these characters. Here's the best way to sum up these three.   Adagio = ruthless leader that tries too hard,  Sonata = idiot that talks in a Pinkie Pie voice, and Aria = she doesn't care, so why should I?   The worst thing about these villains is that when they aren't singing, they aren't memorable.  Compare that to Sunset Shimmer, who had quite a few memorable moments. Taunting Twilight in dimly lit hallway,  "Take those off" and  lest we forget, raging she-demon.

Hey,  those are her words. Not mine.  Now,  this does actually bring me to one thing I do like about this movie.  It's Sunset Shimmer's redemption story and it's handled quite well.  And I actually like that  story and the fact that it took place six months after the first film was a nice touch.  You really got the feeling that Sunset Shimmer felt bad about what she put the school through in the first movie and it seems to build off the final scene of Sunset in Equestira Girls. 

I really like how this film builds  upon Sunset Shimmer's  arc from the first movie and you see that Sunset is truly upset by the girl that she was in the first movie and it's not just the raging she-demon as she admits to the humane five that she was only dating Flash Sentry to boost her popularity and is repulsed by the old her.  And while Sunset is truly trying to change,  Canterlot High isn't exactly ready to forgive her as we see in the auditorium when Sunset offers to help the Crusaders with their banner for the upcoming musical showcase but they turn her down.  But thankfully, the humane five have forgiven Sunset and now accept her as a friend but things could've gone better if Principal Celestia hadn't mentioned the Fall Formal. Ooh, sorry. Which causes Sunset to get angry glares from the students.  I liked that scene as it explores what it's like to go through dealing with someone that was once a foe.

 

 We later see The Humane Five rehearshing for the school's upcoming High School Musical Showcase.  Wait, High School Musical...

Sorry, I had to and I've made my enjoyment of these movies known in the past.  Anyways, the band is preforming "Better Than Ever" and  it's one of the good songs and we learn that whenever the girls play, they sprout pony ears and wings. 

 And then Flash Sentry shows up.  

 Yeah, still not a fan of this character and the sequel didn't do anything to develop him in the sequel. Instead, they downgraded the amount of time that Flash has in the movie to only three scenes in total including an almost kiss with Twilight.  Does anyone else find the idea of Twily having a crush a human a little weird considering that she's ya know a pony.  We also see the band's first glimpse of falling apart as Dashie wants to take credit for everything and doesn't want to play any song that was written by her.  That becomes a running plot thread as Flutters has written some songs but Dash doesn't want to play them.  

 

We then hear Principal Celestia call Sunset Shimmer over the PA as she is to introduce three new girls around the school. Sunset volunteered to do this in hopes that they wouldn't find out about her old reputation.  It doesn't exactly work as Sunset Shimmer had hoped and surprise, the new girls are the same ones that we saw from the beginning of the movie.  

Sunset takes notice of the girls' necklaces and these are important as that is what powers these three.  Okay,  does anyone else think that these three's design is meant to mock Monster High.   Because they look like a parody of Monster High dolls.

Specifically, Sonata Dusk (the stupid one) with her hair.  It's here that Sunset notices that something is off about them and we later see Sunset enter the cafeteria and mentions this to The Humane Five and Pinkie goes through a funny montage of asking what kind off were they, which includes a her turning her hair into a  beard.

We then see the new girls enter the cafeteria and start singing the next song (Let's Have a) Battle of The Bands and it's actually pretty catchy and  as the staff mentioned and we will get to, it's the anti  Cafeteria song as that one brought the school together but the villains here are tearing the school apart as they sing and we see a green aurora surround the cafeteria and the villains absorb that into their necklaces as they feed off fear and hate. 

This leads to one of my favorite lines from Pinkie in the movie.   

"Oh, they're that kind of off!"

That line just got me both times, I watched the movie. We then see the girls head to Principal Celestia to tell her about these new girls but she isn't having any of it because Luna suggests that Sunset Shimmer may be trying to cause trouble like she did at the Fall Formal and when Rainbow comes in and says that they saw it, Celestia questions her because band is part of the newly formed Battle of The Bands as well. Dang, Sunset Shimmer.   With the rest of the school under control of the Dazzlings, the girls  deduce that they need Twilight back to help them but they don't know how to get a hold of her, that's when Sunset Shimmer remembers an old book that she had, where she would write a message in it and then, it would appear in a book that Celestia has and then, wee Sunset start writing those three famous opening words...

"Dear Princess Celestia..."

The movie then takes us to Ponyville at Twilight's castle, where we see that Twi is getting some new books from Celestia to restock her library after what happened in the battle with Tierk.  Now, it's never stated outright that is why, she's getting the new books but factor in that Twilight is in the castle and this movie in Ponyville picks up after the events of the season 4 finale, it's not too hard to deduce that.  And there, we see her receive the magic book that has Sunset's message in it. Twilight after doing some research deduces that these new girls are sirens, who long ago used their singing to turn ponies against each other and control minds and tried to take over Equestira but as stated before, they were banished by Star Swirl The Bearded.  Which still doesn't explain why they are teenagers in the human world.  Twilight figures that she needs to get to the human world to help them but  pony Dash points out that the portal won't be open for another 30 moons.  (I still don't get how that measurement works) and two, we see the Crystal Mirror in the Twily's castle. Uh, how did it get to Twilight's castle because the last time, we saw it, it was in  The Crystal Empire.

 One thing you may notice about the animation of the Sirens'  backstory from when they tried to take over Ponyville,  it's the same  animation that we saw in the pilot, when Twilight was reading the story of Nightmare Moon. I've seen some fans speculate that since  this was done in the same style as the pilot,   Twilight was reading from the same book that held the Legend of Nightmare Moon.

With some help from Pinkie, Twilight figures out how to get to the human world.  She harnesses the magic of the book to power the portal to allow her to travel to and from both worlds at any time, she is needed and then we see her come through the portal in front of Canterlot High and Sunset Shimmer is the first one to offer to help her up from falling out of the portal but we see that Twilight is hesitant to take her hand.  This was intentional as Twilight still doesn't fully trust Sunset at this time. We later see the girls at this world's Sugarcube Corner trying to figure how to defeat the Dazzlings and Rainbow shows Twilight a video of what happens to them as they play.  Twilight wonders where they'll find the villains next and we learn that that there is a big party for all of the bands at the auditorium and in a moment, that the staff found funny and I admit it would be to me to, if I didn't get uncomfortable watching characters embarrass themselves,  the girls try to use the power of friendship but it doesn't exactly work.

   








Though Spike does get a great line here but as I said, this is still awkward as I don't like embarrassing moments for  characters.

"You, uh... really need to go ahead and do that whole 'magic of friendship' thing now."

The Dazzlings use this  failure  of The Rainbooms to get the school to turn on them.  Not very hard as the tension was already at a huge boiling point. It's Sunset who figures out how the girls need to defeat The Dazzlings as she recalls that they used the magic drawn from Twily's crown after she put it on and  she deduces that since The Dazzlings can only use their magic when singing, they need to use a song as a counterspell  and after a reference to Magical Mystery Cure,  the girls  have a slumber party at Pinkie's, where we get my favorite moment in the movie as Twilight and Sunset connect on a personal level.  Oh and I forgot,  Twilight  is now the lead  singer.      Back to my favorite moment.

Sunset Shimmer:  We really are lucky you're here.

Twilight Sparkle:   That's what everyone keeps telling me.

Sunset Shimmer:   Who could possibly need this much whipped cream?

Sunset Shimmer:  Must be nice to have everyone always looking to you for answers to their problems...

 ...instead of waiting for you to cause a problem.

Twilight Sparkle:  Just because everyone expects something from you...

 ..doesn't mean it's guaranteed to happen."

Sunset Shimmer:   Well, that doesn't stop them from expecting it.

Twilight Sparkle:   "Which only makes things harder because the last thing you want to do is..."

 Twilight Sparkle & Sunset Shimmer:   ...let everybody down.

I  like this moment because  it shows how  much these two  feel the pressure of the world on them.  Twilight Sparkle feels it because  her friends are expecting her to have the answers to their problems whereas Sunset Shimmer feels as though her friends are expecting her snap and go back  to who she was.   That is  not an easy burden to carry and Twilight's burden isn't any easier to carry. As much as I like this moment, it is ruined by one thing.   There is a cameo right at the end that I didn't really care for.

I get what they were going for as they wanted a light and funny moment after that rather emotional moment between Sunset and Twilight but it felt too sudden and also,  I'm not the biggest fan of Maud, so that also took me out of the moment a little bit.  I see no reason to complain  as  Maud is a popular character and it's fair that she got a cameo in the movie as fans love her and I'm sure they enjoyed that, the same way,  I enjoyed Lyra's cameo. So, moving on.  The next day,  we hear  The Rainbooms  rehearse at AJ's  house  but  Twi's   singing   is rather off key  and so  bad that  Dash can only  get a small transformation.   They don't  have much time  left  to practice  as they need to get to the school  as the Battle  of The Bands  is about to start.   And  as they sing,   other  bands  start to sabotage their chances  and start to get the band fighting each other.

Which  the fighting  actually started at the rehearsal  and this brings me to something that annoyed me with this movie.   How many times have we seen Rarity  and Applejack  fight with one another? We saw it in "Look Before You Sleep" in season one,  we saw it in "Trade Ya", last season and to a lesser  extent in "Simple Ways".  The  point I'm trying to make is that I AM tired  of seeing these two bicker.   It  is so annoying  and  as a Rarity fan, I am just growing  tried of this.  And what was it about this time?  Well, Rarity  wanted to have some fashionable outfits for the band but AJ  didn't think the lovely Miss Rarity was being sensible because  they needed to try and the save world and that should be her focus. Granted, she's right but as Pinkie stated, she was just trying to have fun.

 


It's Sunset Shimmer of all people  who snaps the girls out of this fighting.  I like this as it helps to show her growth.

You don't have time for any of this! You're supposed to check in at the Battle of the Bands in fifteen minutes!

At the first Battle of The Bands, we hear the song from the trailer, "Shake Your Tail".  Which I know some people had issues with in the trailer but   I think the fact that they used it during as we see The Rainbooms start to fall apart and the idea of other bands sabotaging  the Humane Six is a neat idea such as Photo Finish use a magnet to turn Rarity's outfit into a puppet and Snips & Snails shine a giant spotlight on Fluttershy.

And well, Pinkie doesn't help matters when she turns one of her drums into a confetti cannon as Dash swallows some of the confetti.

This  leads to more petty squabbles  between the band but due to some manipulation from The Dazzlings, The Rainbooms advance to the next round and we see  a montage of other bands  being knocked out until it's only  The Dazzlings and The Rainbooms. Just as The Dazzlings wanted because they knew if they could turn the Humane Six against each other because they could feed off their Equestiran  Magic.  In the next round,  The Rainbooms  preform  Awesome As I Wanna Be (guess who wrote that!)  and as Dash said it was supposed to be 20% less cooler but Dash's ego got in the way as they almost revealed their magic and Sunset tried to help by knocking Dash down. Leading the school to think that Sunset hadn't changed at all.

Even besides all of the mishap in the performance,  The Rainbooms advance to the finals much to the dismay of the rest of the school and  Trixie  only says that the Rainbooms have an unfair adavantage with Twilight  and that it isn't  fair that they advanced  to the finals and The Dazzlings manipulate and stroke Trixie's ego, which lead her to at the concert hall trapping the band below the stage with a trap door.  So, Trixie has become our secondary antagonist.  Not sure, how I feel on this.   You know I'm a huge Trixie fan but this felt a little too fan service-y.

So,  Trixie's  band  takes stage and preforms followed by The Dazzlings and we get our first taste of their big villain song, "Welcome To The Show", which is just awesome as a fight between The Rainbooms breaks out and well, it's a bit annoying because we've seen these arguments before such as Rainbow Dash taking all the credit or  AJ and Rarity arguing with each other. That is so overplayed and  we see their magic being drained.

"Ever since you started this band, you've been letting little things get to you."



"I never said anything 'cause I didn't feel like it was my place."



"Not when I'm so new to this whole "friendship" thing."



"I still have a lot to learn.

"But I do know that if you don't work out even the smallest problems right at the start, the magic of friendship can be turned into something else."

Truthfully, Sunset gets some of the best lines in this movie and she continues  to do so as she reminds Twilight that not everyone has all of the answers and as the girls try to break out, they are saved by Spike with the aid of DJ Pon-3/Vinyl.  Spike had to find someone that hadn't been affected by The Dazzling's spell and that just happened to be her as she had her headphones on.

We then get awesome final showdown between The Rainbooms and The Dazzlings with the aid of DJ Pon-3's car that is the equivalent of her bass cannon but so much cooler.

Hasbro make this a toy. This would be the reaction of so many fans.

The  Dazzlings are feeding off  the  people  at the concert and The Rainbooms put up a valiant effort against the  villains  but when The Dazzlings release projectiles of  their  true forms,  The Rainbooms are knocked down.  And Sunset shimmer comes to the rescue.  Eeyup, her arc has come full circle and it is awesome!  You see her grab the mic, throw her jacket to the side and then we get to see transform, signifying that she is now a hero.

And this is where we get my  other favorite moment of the movie and my favorite Sunset Shimmer moment.

You're never gonna bring me down
You're never gonna break this part of me
My friends are here to bring me 'round
Not singing just for popularity

Perhaps the most  important parts of this song for Sunset are the first two lyrics.

 You're never gonna bring me downYou're never gonna break this part of me

These two lines show how much Sunset has changed and how determined, she is to aid her friends in their time of need.  And  the  Equestiran Magic sees this and grants her the power to transform and she does help the Rainbooms  take down The Dazzlings in a a great fashion as her Twilight lead the band.

And the power of The Humane 7 is enough to destroy the amulets that The Dazzlings  had been using to store their hate to give them their power and without it, they cannot sing and run off stage.  Thus leaving the door open for them to return and who knows, maybe they'll be better in a future installment but still not the biggest fan of them in this movie.

As the concert comes to an end,   Flash and Twilight attempt to share a kiss but kiss is stopped by  Trixie.  Sorry, Flashlight fans. (How many  are there that like that ship?)

 



And Dash offers Sunset Shimmer the opportunity to join The Rainbooms and we learn that she knows how to play guitar and  the next day, we see her writing friendship reports to Princess Twilight.  Nice touch and as the credits roll, we get an after credit scene of  this world's  Twilight Sparkle,  who seems  to have put together a diagram stating that something has weird is going on at the school referring to Canterlot High. Which by the way was cut from the Discovery Family showing of the movie and I had to find it online.  Seriously,  why would you cut a scene like this?

I really  really enjoyed this movie.  It had a great arc for Sunset Shimmer and  I was already a fan of hers but this made me a much bigger fan than before and it was such a great idea to  make her the lead but that doesn't mean the movie isn't without flaws.  The  biggest ones I noticed are  that by making Sunset, the star,  Spike didn't get much to do this time as he is Twilight's companion and with Twilight not being the star,  he doesn't really  get much to do.  And I  wasn't  so thrilled with the Rarity/AJ bickering as we've seen  that so many times before and it just feels played out.  But my biggest gripe has to be the villains.  They really didn't have much in the way of personality and just seemed rather flat, when they weren't singing.   Which is a shame because Daniel Ingram gave The Dazzlings some of the best songs, I've heard from this series but as I stated up top, you  can break them down into the ruthless leader, the dummy that talks like Pinkie and the forgettable one.  I know  everyone  loves Sonata Dusk but  I'm not fan.  Adiago  just tries to hard and I can't even remember anything that Aria  contributed to the story.  Adiago  came up with all of the plans and  Sonata  provided supposed comedy relief but what the characterization of Aria Blaze? The most I remember about her is that she seemed to be jealous of Adiago and thought that she should be leader of The Dazzlings but that was really only brought up once or twice in the entire movie. I think this movie took on too much by trying to have three villains.  Because at least from where I'm sitting,  the movie didn't seem to know what to do with them.  It's a shame too because for as good as this movie was, they were the big thing that it brought it down for me.  And that is such a huge disappointment because all of the promos made them seem like they were going to be the next best MLP villains. And not ones that have less depth than Sombra.   Again, the movie isn't bad but I have these three complaints with it but  I do want to watch it again because I do think that it will be even better with a third viewing.


Characters

Main Characters


Sunset Shimmer voiced by Rebecca  Shoichet

No doubt about it, this was Sunset's  redemption story.  Showing that she  truly feels bad for what she did and was looking to repent for her actions in the previous movie.  If  the prequel comic starring her was The Fall of Sunset Shimmer, this is The Rise of Sunset Shimmer. And you get the sense that Sunset  was once a good person/pony (what have you) and she knows that and she  knows that she has a rough road ahead of her before people truly accept her as we see in the beginning and the constant reminders from her friends as her past actions, which became a running gag in the movie.  I am honestly interested in seeing what more could be done with her character as this film shows that without a shadow of a doubt that Sunset Shimmer can make for fantastic lead character.  



Twilight Sparkle voiced by Tara Strong

In many ways,  Twilight's arc here reminds me of what she went through in the S4 finale as she didn't know what her purpose as a princess was and here,  she thinks that she is supposed to have all of the answers to fix everything and we see that she is putting so much pressure on herself to make sure that she figures out  how to write the countersepell.


Supporting Characters


Rainbow Dash voiced by Ashleigh Ball

Okay, so maybe it was just me but when I first heard the title for the sequel, I thought Dash was going to be the mane character but that wasn't the case.  Now, I've heard some people such as fellow Brony Blogger, The Creature complain about Dash in this film and how it highlights her worst traits.  That is  true, yes but  my argument to that would be is that this film highlights the worst of all of the main characters to a certain degree.  But this didn't bug me.  Now you may be wondering why I complain about the Rarity/AJ bickering but not Dash coming across as a jerk in this film. Well,  one thing we have to keep in mind is that is not the Rainbow Dash, we know from Ponyville.   She may have the same name and personality but she  most  likely has not had to go through some of the tribulations that pony Dash has. Therefore,  I am willing to let her immaturity in this movie slide as she has only had to face  really big events twice now.   So yeah,  Dash does seem a little cocky  here and there but pony Dash  can also have a pretty big ego at times.



Fluttershy  voiced by Andera Libman

Oh, that song the girls used to defeat The Dazzlings was written by Fluttershy.  That was one of the running things throughout the movie. Flutters had a song that she had written that she wanted the band to play but Dash didn't think they could win with it but boy was she wrong.  Now,  I kinda predicted this was going to happen when we saw the clip released months ahead of the movie, where Fluttershy asks if they can play her song.   I just had this thought that oh, Fluttershy's  song is going to come back into play in an important way later and it did.  That's something I noticed with this movie. The in fighting between the girls seem to have them be one on one with Flutters and Dash fighting each other. Rarity and Applejack fighting each other.  Leaving Pinkie out of it.




Rarity voiced by Tabitha St. Germain

Rarity's character was spot-on to that of her pony counterpart and  she was the Miss Rarity that I enjoy so much, even down to the fighting with Applejack.   Now, I know I am going to sound hypocritical for letting Dashie's  cocky attitude slide but not the fighting between AJ and Rarity.  To me, the big difference is that Dash's   cocky attitude is a part of her personality  and  her learning not  to be so cocky and have such a big ego  is a part of her character growing. I don't feel the same is true of the fighting between Rarity and Applejack.   I get that their personalities clash.  And sure, it was funny, the first time the show did that but at this point, it just feels played out pairing these two characters against each other. And I hate saying that being the huge Rarity fan, I am.  Guys,  either pair Rarity up with someone new or try to put a new spin on the banter between the cowgirl and the fashionista.  



Applejack also  voiced by Ashleigh Ball

^See  above for my thoughts  on Applejack.   I really don't have anything else to say about her here.   She was the same character I am not fan of and never will be.  I've always found her character insufferable and this movie made that no different.  Yeah, it's a well known fact that I don't like Applejack, like at all.  And nothing has been able to change my mind on that after 2 years of watching the show.




Pinkie Pie also  voiced by Andrea Libman

Pinkie really didn't seem to do that much in the movie.  Oh, she had her moments that had me laughing but that was Pinkie. I wouldn't expect anything less from Pinkie.  Though I will say this, this movie and the rest of season 4 have put her back in my good graces.  Though I do feel a bit bad that other than  complaining about not having fun in the band, when they started arguing,  Pinkie seemed to be all but ignored.


Spike  voiced by Cathy Weseluck

What I said about Pinkie is just as true for Spike.  They really didn't seem to know what to do with him in the movie and only seemed to have him there to fill out the cast list.  It really seemed like Spike was never given any time to shine, Sure, he had his moments but overall, he wasn't really needed in the grand scheme of the story.



Music



Rainbow Rocks









This song is just pure AWESOME and makes up for the wretched remix that happened in the first movie.  This  song  just gets  you pumped for the movie that you are about to watch and this is the one area, where the movie truly shines as the music is just awesome and I also like how the opening credits recap the events of the first to refresh the viewers that may not have seen it in a while.




Better Than Ever






This song is alright.  Nothing truly memorable about ti.  It's  not bad  but  it only seems to serve as saying, "We're friends now" and showing off the transformations of the girls while playing and singing.



Let's  Have A Battle (of The Bands)





As stated in my review and has been confirmed by the staff, this song in the anti- Equestira Girls (Cafeteria Song) in  how we see The Dazzlings turning the school  against one another and this  is where The Dazzlings truly shine.  I love these characters, when  they are singing as  they are so deceptive and destructive in singing that  you just get chills hearing them.  They are so good at this, that it's  a shame that they fall flat as characters.



Shake  Your Tail 


Man, this song is catchy  but the big thing that sells  me on this sequence is how funny it is.  Sure,  the sabotaging is kinda  cruel and I normally  don't  like watching  character embarrass themselves but I was laughing pretty hard during this number.  It's  a good song to though but not one of my favorites.



Under Our Spell






Once again,  you just see that Daniel Ingram put his all in giving The Dazzlings, fantastic  villain songs. This song is so great and just works so well with it's hypnotic trance and  it's  not hard to feel as though,that you may fall under their spell.  Sorry, sorry. Had to.  And Adiago's evil laugh at the end is one of my new favorite evil laughs.



Awesome As I Want To Be






Rainbow Dash finally got a song. Woo-hoo.   Now as I mentioned, the whole  song was not included in the movie but the soundtrack  rectified that and gives you the whole song and well.   I LOVE this song.   This song is Rainbow Dash in a nutshell, ego stroking and priding herself for being 20% cooler.  She owns her  awesomeness and wears it with pride.  Also,  as a fan I love this line.


Tricks Up My Sleeve







Trixie  got her own song.  Nice!  This  song is  just so great and powerful. Sorry, sorry.   Now like Dash's song, the whole song wasn't in the movie but hearing this song on the soundtrack made me love it and this song is just so much fun with Trixie's mocking attitude putting herself above the others because she's powerful and great.



Welcome To The Show






This is the big battle that the movie had been building up to and boy does it deliver.   Again,  this just shows how great the Dazzlings are with  singing but The Rainbooms aren't  any slouches as their song in this battle is just as awesome and the battle is one of the most intense things that we've seen since The Changeling Invasion back in season 2.  And lest we forget that this has the moment that solidifies Sunset Shimmer as a hero and it is just so satisfying.  I may have been cheering and jumping up and down during her transformation sequence as she earned that.



Shine Like Rainbows






This is such a great song to close out on as it just leaves you feeling good after the movie and  just gives you a feeling of that was an enjoyable time.




Villains


The Great and Powerful Trixie voiced by Kathleen Barr

I love Trixie, she's one of my favorite characters from the show and I should've been happy that she had an enlarged role in the sequel.   But  I am torn,  I love having more Trixie but at the same time, I'm not sure how I feel on this one as  part of it felt forced.  Don't get me wrong, it was clear that Kathleen Barr relished in getting to play Trixie but it's tough.  The movie had a hard enough time balancing The Dazzlings as three main villains,  so having Trixie as a secondary antagonist seemed like a bit of a misstep.




Adagio Dazzle,  Aria Blaze,  & Sonata Dusk  voiced by Kasumi Evans,   Diana Kaarina, & Marÿke Hendrikse

  









I really wanted to like these characters as they were great with the singing  and Adagio had some great moments as the leader but I am so over Sonata and I do not get her popularity.  She just seems to come across as an evil Pinkie and I say for realizes.   And  what exactly did Aria Blaze contribute to this movie?  I truly can't think of anything she contributed to the movie.  Sonata provided supposed comedy relief and Adagio was not a bad leader but Aria didn't contribute anything to the overall story.  Please don't get rid of these villains as there is room for improvement there to make them good villains but  this was not a good stepping stone.




My Final Thoughts



I have my issues with this movie such as the villains, not being fully realized or the banter between AJ and Rarity but for what the film delivered,  it was quite an enjoyable time and would make for a great double feature with the first movie.    If you are a fan of the first movie or the franchise in general, you've probably already seen the movie. So I'm preaching to the choir here but this movie is a blast.  And  just remember to be as awesome as you wanna be.