Generation One MLP Cartoon Roundup

@ender1200  
@Trickquestion  
Keep in mind as well that these were two stand alone specials with ponies that only appear in each, with a heavy focus on the villains and adventure in each.
 
The pony personalities are enormously improved on with the movie and following tv series too, which share the same cast of ponies throughout.  
There is a lot more time to develop characterizations for most of them, and not every episode or story is quite so ‘speedy’ a spectacle as the first two specials.
 
@boz  
I think adding a link to a good uploaded playlist of MLP Tales is a good idea.

@Amethyst_Crystal
 
Catrina would be in the slammer for years if she pulled half the crap she did onscreen in real life. It’s like a meth lab operator with several prior convictions taking a child hostage at gunpoint, and the police agreeing to let him off without charges if he just dismantles his lab.

@Kazapsky  
Most cartoon characters are at best severely irresponsible people

@Kazapsky  
You seem to assume that Dream Vally have some sort of a government or something like that.  
It doesn’t.

@ender1200
 
Just pointing out, Catrina is well past the point where anyone but a pony would forgive her.

Makes me wonder why Catrina thought ponies would make better slaves… Those thumbless creatures over there will be perfect for carrying bowls around!

@Kazapsky  
The Dream Valley ponies are forgiving, and willing to negotiate peace without vengeance, if the antagonist(s) are genuine about changing their ways, whether through therapy or a change of heart or whatever. They have a much stronger capacity for this than some modern societies. I would even argue that most of the redeemed/reformed villains don’t come across as tacky or sudden with the change, except for one arguably glaring exception we’ll see at some point.
 
However, they are not stupid about this. They do get rid of villains and monsters that don’t relent, the most vicious and power-mad creatures, and sometimes outright kill them. At least six individual antagonists are dead because of the ponies and their friends (not to mention some assorted unnamed monsters), and at least three probably wish they were.
 
Also, there’s a great deal many things fantasy/adventure heroes would go to prison for many years for doing too, if we go by real world standards and laws.
 
Besides, as ender1200 points out, there’s no government to mete out such justice. There are different forms of justice around Dream Valley and neighbouring territories, depending on who’s in power, many of them villains. It’s a wild, barbaric, dangerous world.

@Amethyst_Crystal  
I’m not sure, but I think most villain that died in g1 were those who were needing their evil acts to survive. As for Catrina I guess they forgive her out of gratitude for reb.

So… Anyone want’s to comment on the not quite subtle anti drug PSA in escape from katrina?

The ponies seem considerably cuter, somehow. Maybe something about the way they move?
 
Had to skip Let’s not take a nap!, it made me go “I can’t do this anymore.”
 
Elevator under the bush gave me pause. Don’t know why, but it seems weird that the characters didn’t even care.
 
It’s neat that they so casually imply that Katrina wasn’t all bad; feels like if this had been made today it would’ve made a big deal about the foreshadowing. nevermind they just saved the exposition for a few minutes later
 
Not so neat having the one pony that got free immediately run off without helping the others, blatantly for the sake of the plot to advance.
 
(Also is it just me or are those eye-bolts SUPER LOUD?)
 
One minute to go from depressed about own failings to being okay with them. That just ain’t enough.
 
Maybe it’s something about the animation style making the baby(?!) ponies seem more solid and tangible, but I have to say they seem even cuter than the CMC. Though clearly even younger, mentally.
 
Katrina could’ve used more facial expressions towards the end of that climax, but compared to the grimderp I’ve gotten used to seeing in that kind of situation I’m glad everything worked out okay.
 
Overall, it shows its age, and target demographic, but could certainly be worse.

@ender1200
 
Bear in mind this is from an era where having a “Drugs are bad” episode was borderline-mandatory for any series.
 
At least this show made some effort to do it semi-plausibly, unlike some series (COPS comes to mind).

^{One of these days, I am going to quite procrastinating. Just not today.}
 
Here we go, Escape from Catrina.
 
A lot of the G1 villains lack an official spelling, so you’ll see loads of guesses, although sites like this have to pick one. Tirac/Tirek/Teric has about a dozen guesses. Despite Catrina being one of the few villains to have her name spelled out in the title, people still manage to flub it. Even me, up until recently.
 
As of this post, DerpiB is still using Katrina instead of the proper spelling.
 
The adult sea ponies are still alive, but I don’t think that any of the ponies from the first special actually reappear. Don’t get too attached to any of these ponies, either.
 
This opening song is slightly different from the one the first special used. The movie is also going to have a unique variant.
 
Things start off with Sundancer stumbling into a sign welcoming Megan back. That reminds me, I still need to try writing things with my mouth at some point.
 
Sundancer follows that up with hitting the ball so that it knocks Baby Moondancer into the pond. Yeah, I can’t call that Sundancer’s fault, unless she’s supposed to be psychic, since Moondancer was already jumping along rocks in the pond.
 
Just to check, Sundancer wasn’t supposed to psychic, was she?
 
Anyway, the sea ponies are on the scene to make the save and Moondancer enjoyed her dip, so no blood, no foul, right?
 
Another loss of the ball, and it bounces into Catrina’s meth house. Neither of them knows about the other, so how long have the ponies been living there?
 
We first see the ponies living in Dream Castle, but was that their first home in Dream Valley? Were they the original occupants, or did they move in after some other guys died or ran away?
 
Catrina, at least, has definitely been in her current digs for some time, given that she’s got that witch weed refinery set up, which means that the ponies moved into Dream Castle, or moved Dream Castle in, sometime more recently.
 
I think that this is the only point in the series where someone lets a dropped item go rather than heading into the imposing passage.
 
Ah, the bushwoolies. I don’t have anything against them, although I can certainly see why other people find them annoying. They are a race of compulsive yes-men and will obey and agree with everyone that they meet. Sadly, this flaw never really gets explored, and this special is the only story with a bushwoolie that can disagree.
 
They also have the ability to roll into balls and bounce into things, which is useful as an escape if not as an attack.
 
The witch weed potion refinery machine is shaped like a cat. Classy.
 
Rather than deliver the potion himself, Rep hands the job off to one of the bushwoolies. There’s a fairly straightforward reason for that; Rep can’t stand to see Catrina like that.
 
Rep, I think, is the main character of this story. He’s the one that’s most involved with the plot, and he’s the one with the most growth. He goes from quietly enabling Catrina’s drug usage to actively opposing her, and we see his doubts along the way.
 
By contrast, the heroes are barely involved in the plot, and Catrina doesn’t change until death is staring her in the face.
 
The purple dissident spills most of the witch weed potion on the way to Catrina. In retrospect, I’m not sure if he did that on accident. The bushwoolies aren’t shown to be particularly clumsy later, and the purple dissident does want to get the bushwoolies out of there, so precipitating a conflict might have been intentional at that point.
 
Catrina, in contrast to Tirac, has an entirely human motivation; Addiction. The special never makes it clear whether the witch weed potion is actually getting her high or if she just likes the power, but the power alone would be temptation enough. In all honesty, one would expect her to go to even less pleasant lengths to secure such power.
 
After being blown out of Catrina’s room, he starts fermenting rebellion with the other bushwoolies. Catrina opts to just drop him in the raw witch weed vat, but Rep swoops in to catch him. Nice guy, that Rep, and apparently hanging around because he was a friend of Catrina’s back before she was a junkie.
 
Back with the ponies, Sundancer is still not having a good day. Megan is brought in by Skydancer. Sundancer, Skydancer, Baby Moondancer… Why are all the Whateverdancer ponies showing up this episode?
 
This is her first return, and she’s getting a party for helping defeat Tirac. This special shows her preferred method of social manipulation. She managed to get the baby ponies to fall asleep easily enough, and gave Sundancer a needed confidence boost, but not everyone that she’ll face is vulnerable to talk.
 
When Catrina takes a nap, the purple dissident urges his fellow workers to leave. Rep tries offering some concessions, but the purple dissident shouts him down, and they all run him over.
 
Just how did Catrina and Rep get hold of the bushwoolies in the first place? While Catrina was certainly capable of using force to compel them, Rep’s negotiation tactics would imply that he or Catrina just asked them to start working. Which is also possible, and would explain why they hadn’t tried just running away until now.
 
After failing to recapture the bushwoolies, Catrina catches sight of the ponies. After taking her emergency dose of witch weed potion, she’s ready to go.
 
Growing to giant size, lightning bolt eyes, weather control… That potion is powerful stuff.
 
After Catrina catches most of the ponies in a snowstorm, one escapes and fetches Megan. As powerful as Catrina is, she’s no match for LSD and the pretty colors outlast her catnip. Undaunted, she decides that she still wants the little ponies as her workforce and the Rainbow as her new drug.
 
Given that a magic item can retain a to it’s magic even after changing possession, I doubt that stealing the seemingly sentient, although (probably) not sapient Rainbow of Light would have ended well for Catrina. The ponies would have been a step up from the bushwoolies, though. The ponies are capable of doing fine work without thumbs, and are larger and stronger than the bushwoolies. Their supernatural properties would have been useful for experimentation, assuming that Catrina would go back into the lab instead of getting strung out on potion all day.
 
With the flashback, it’s vague as to whether or not Rep was actually in a romantic relationship with Catrina. Rep seemed to want it, but Catrina came across as either oblivious or outright disdainful of the idea. Every time he sang about getting close, she seemed to get annoyed, to the point that I don’t think that it was coincidence. With the ending of this special, Catrina doesn’t seem particularly comfortable with Rep’s closeness, either.
 
There’s also the question of just how much of that flashback was rose-colored glasses on the part of Rep. Was she ever really as nice as he thought?
 
That aside, it shows that Catrina developed the potion on her own and that she used to be much nicer. Was she making it for genuinely benevolent purposes, just for research, or was she just a nicer villain in the past? Whatever the case, steampunk catgirl scientist with shapeshifting minion is the sort of thing that I’d like to see more of.
 
With the song over, Catrina is out of witch weed potion. Rep isn’t displeased in the slightest by the development.
 
“Even I went through a clumsy stage.” Megan is maybe a teenager. Maybe. A lot of the little ponies are actually mothers. Is Megan actually older than the adult ponies or not?
 
Back at the castle nursery, Megan puts together a costume for Baby Moondancer, using the Rainbow Locket. Rep, disguised as nurse pony. tries to take it. Despite turning into a female pony, he keeps his own voice. Colors and sounds… he’s stuck with two tells.
 
Rep’s attempt to get the locket fails badly, but I have to wonder how much of that is because he didn’t want to hurt a child. Catrina has no such compunctions, and just grabs the kid, while Megan shows up.
 
I can’t really fault Megan for giving the locket away. Aside from the fact that she made Baby Moondancer technically the best protected pony in Dream Valley, she didn’t know that a villain was in the area. The Rainbow, as far as she knew, dealt with whatever was causing the snow storm.
 
While searching, Megan and her team stumble upon the bushwoolies. The purple dissident realizes who they’re looking for without being asked, and leads the charge into Catrina’s lair.
 
Purple Dissident, I don’t know what happens to you after this, but I miss you. Best bushwoolie in the series, and pretty smart and determined by any standard.
 
Catrina, conveniently in the potion refinery instead of her throne room, demands that the ponies, and Megan and the bushwoolies, become her slaves. When that fails to produce statements to the positive, she threatens first the Rainbow and then Baby Moondancer, which finally gets Rep to draw the line.
 
Catrina gets knocked into the vat, while Megan catches the locket and Sundancer catches Baby Moondancer. Rep and the ponies are not eager to save her, and Rep demands that she destroy the potion machine before helping her. She agrees, using the very last of the potion in the process.
 
This was actually pretty damn harsh. While the ponies and Megan are always willing to show mercy, they are rarely willing to force it upon a foe, and this won’t be the last time that they are willing to let an opponent die.
 
I really like the end song here. It’s a pity and something of a surprise that no one has made a Rarity amv using it, given that she’s a fashion designer and all. This is actually one of the few times that we’ll see the inside of Dream Castle, so enjoy the view.

@Kazapsky  
We see all of one proper police force in the entire series. They only show up in the one serial at that. Most towns seem to be their own government, and are generally too small to have really developed civil structures.
 
Also, Megan committed multiple murders and caused an ecological disaster during her first visit to the pony world. Given that the bushwoolies were not actually being confined or restricted, Catrina might actually have a shorter rap sheet than Megan at this point.
 
@boz  
I actually can’t recall any villains that needed to commit villainous acts to live. Admittedly, I can’t think of all of them off of the top of my head, but the people that I remember were killed because they were being assholes, not because they were doing something that they needed to do to survive.
 
The ponies would be more likely to make allowances if they were doing something just to survive, when you get down to it.
 
@ender1200  
It was actually fairly subtle. Subtle enough that I didn’t catch it with a kid, and anti-drug PSAs would make me roll my eyes even then.
 
The witch weed potion was shown as being totally cool, without even withdrawal symptoms or a crash after usage. The Rainbow of Light, the weapon of the good guys, was considered a substitute for it. The only negative shown was losing interest in her friends, who actually stayed around her until she crossed a moral line.
 
So, really, this special didn’t present the drug as an issue, but rather the way that you fed the habit as an issue. In all honesty, focusing on managing addictions is a lesson that could stand to be taught more often.

@Sjogre  

 
Well, real horses become adults at year 5 or so, and they were still sticking fairly close to the ponies being horses in G1, so maybe they value Megan for having plenty of years of experience? Even if they’re about the same level maturity mentally.

@Sjogre  
The smooze if you consider it a living form and I don’t think Somnambula survived long after the lost of her eternal youth even if they showed her get aways but the common path with non-redeemed villain was to have them run aways. Lavan had the most memorable death of all but he would have try to revenge if he survived.
 
If I were into crazy headcanons like in g4 I would say that the disagreeing bushwollie was the descendant of a furbob.

@Sjogre  
PSA was a bad choice of words on my part. The allusion for drags was used for dramatic purpose and not to teach kids that “drugs are bad”.
 
I sometimes wonder about the inspiration sources for the specials. The writers seemed to try and tell the stories that they wanted, regardless of weather they could find a way to connect them to MLP.

@boz  
What makes you think that the Smooze needed to attack others to live? Somnambula would have died of old age.
 
@ender1200  
There’s going to be more than one story in the series proper where it feels like the writer just dusted off a script that they had lying around and stuck pony names in it.

@Sjogre  
It was eating to grow but for most creature eating is vital. The shadow eater would have suit this point well if he had completely disappeared at the end instead of becoming tiny and harmless.

@boz  
The Smooze wasn’t actually eating anything, it was just expanding. None of the stuff that it covered was digested or anything.

@Sjogre  
Well most of the time, the smooze was trying to get stuff with one of his mouths. But for the sake of not completely destroying dream valley or the rainbow of light, it had to be recoverable at the end, so magic not destructive assimilation.

@boz  
Not really. The Smooze didn’t form the mouths that often, and we know that previous attacks just encased places in Smooze material.
 
Claiming that the Smooze was eating anything is a pretty big stretch, especially given what it was.

@Sjogre  
We could say the smooze was eating in some point because what make it stop growing was grabbing the rainbow of light (like a poison) that make it become hard and immobile. On the other side, the witches gave it some kind of “antidote” (Hydia even say drink) to make it restart. So there is a proof of a relation between smoozed things and reactions from the smooze.

@boz  
The Rainbow of Light didn’t make it stop. And given that the Smooze started expanding without consuming anything in the first place, consuming doesn’t seem related to the Smooze’s health.
 
Hydia didn’t give the Smooze an antidote, either, that was a missed ingredient that the Smooze was supposed to have in the first place.

@Sjogre  
This ingredient was probably thought to protect it from being defeated by the rainbow or other magic stuff and not really required to create it. Still it show that it can indeed absorb at least for magic power. What if the smooze had grow to flood that plant by itself instead of getting this ingredient from the witches would it had been protected?

Apologies to Sjogre for pushing ahead, but with all this talk about the Smooze, perhaps we ought to move on to
 
MY LITTLE PONY: THE MOVIE
 

 
We will be introduced to apparently a third generation of ponies, although Sundance makes a reappearance in the movie, as well as well as Posey and adult versions of Lickety Split and Surprise in the tv series.
 
It could be supposed that there is some kind of time distortion when travelling the rainbow between Earth and the world of Dream Valley, though much less extreme than the time changes between Earth and Narnia. Megan does seem noticeably older between the specials and the movie, and perhaps she starts visiting far more often so she can get to know this generation better (although one could say that it’s a new year of new toys, too).
 
Her siblings, Danny and Molly, finally get to come along and visit the incredibly dangerous fantasy world their big sister has been going on about, and they take the chaos in stride fairly well. The Williams are certainly tough kids.
 
Many of the mares from the tv series make their first appearances here:  
assertive Buttons, ditzy Fizzy, jolly Gingerbread, tough Gusty, cranky Lickety Split, quiet Lofty, commanding Magic Star, adventurous North Star, dreamer Paradise, mystical Ribbon, jaded Shady, gentle Sweet Stuff, and intelligent Wind Whistler.
 
Though not all have much screen time or lines, they gradually get the chance to develop far more than the ponies in the two specials, having 28 stories over 61 episodes to follow, as do a few more introduced in the series that become regulars.
 
Please bear with the excessive ‘cutesy’ woodland critters during first half of movie: rest assured, they get much less screen time in the second half, and next to none in the series. Perhaps the ponies grew tired of them too, and chased them off!
 
Though there is more focus on the ponies finally, there is a continuing heavy focus on the villains’ POV in the movie as well, though I confess enjoying the awkward nastiness of the witch family of the Volcano of Gloom. I suspect its mostly because George Arthur Bloom loves that sort of thing, as he’s written all the stories up to this point. At least some of the ponies get to shine in the movie.
 
It is nice to see Mr. Moochick and his assistant Habbit the Rabbit make reappearances too, along with another fun, lovely song by the talented Tony Randall.
 
Also, Danny DeVito as the leader of some friendly monst- I mean, Grundles, is just awesome, and quite possibly his friendliest role ever.