MLP Movie: Cuts, Secrets, Missing Characters & More! Be a Detective?

[WingsOfMasquerade]

I was finally able to see the MLP Movie because Netflix had it.
But, this is more of a 'mixed media message' because it involves more than just the film. I can't stand not knowing things...so will anyone else be a detective with me to root out missing mystery?

Stratus Skyranger-
Giant light up and sound toy! Hippogriff guy! Cool guy? Why does this giant toy exist of a character who isn't in the movie at all? (He actually IS, waaaay back in a background, as a merman) What happened to him, and what was his role? Why did they remove him but still make the toy? And the toy is huge! It's not some little blindbag, someone had to put big money to make this.

Skystars Sisters-
The appearance of Haven Bay proves this one, she was supposed to be triplets but her sisters got cut. There's one part where she's with 2 others (during a Song?) where they seem like 'not background mooks'. Why did they take her sisters away & make her 'stir-crazy' talking to clams & such?

Melvix's Hideout Map-
You see a big paper with this written on it & diagrams in the "movie about interviews" with I think...Tae Diggs=Capper? Who was Melvix? What was his hideout for? Why didn't we get to see it? They show the paper like a zillion times & the label is so obvious.

Custom Pony G3 on set-
Watching the 'making of' reveals the people's offices and somebody's got a G3 with what looks like a black stripe in the hair. It's dimly lit but gets real close to the camera. No G3 ever had such a dark strip, so somebody there is collecting customs.

Cameo Cuts:
There were lots of cameos, some harder to get than others. You see Soarin's feet (justifying the All About Soarin toy) Bigmac is at a table, Trixie is walking, that Carrots yellow pony they put in everything ever is there, Lyra appears, Discord is understandably abset except as a balloon animal Pinkie makes because Discord would have defeated the storm king in 1 hit, Mr & Mrs Cake show up, PartyFavor actually gets to talk & I think you see Cheese Sandwich, but who else do you see? Who do you think got scrubbed?
Bulk is in there somehow like...disproportionately a lot? For a guy who is perpetual background? I found that odd. (Also 1 of the starter Pegasus is clearly firefly)

Novo's Bigger Role:
I have read that Novo was supposed to do more which makes sense. Because if your daughter is clearly 'going stir crazy' but you're always off to get a facial or something frivolous, that's not a cool parent right there & the way they were hyping Novo toys and her palace and stuff suggested she was more.

Twilight Goes Bad:
It seemed too sudden? Suddenly she's just like 'well I will steal this from them' And then what? ALL it does is switch people from land to sea or back. What did she think she was going to do with it? Turn stormking into a fish and...? And that's super OOC for her anyway? I mean Trixie would do it, but it seemed so sudden and without real reason just "She wont give it to us so I'm taking it". What if it drowns all the hippogriffs? It seems like motivation is missing here, or explanation because 'fisherizing power' is worthless vs storm king. It's like she goes OOC and has zero endgame, if she'd had "a bad fall" character-wise before this it would have fit better like "stormking killed pinkiepie!" (she doesn't know he didn't) or "Twi couldn't save X because her magic wasn't enough and Novo was mean to everyone...like a lot...& the pearl was proven to do more than 1 trick"

Flutternothing: Fluttershy had like 3 lines & seemed babyish/underused like...she did something but it got cut. Basically she'd just cry 'oh no' and hide or cower and contribute nothing. At one point she even forgets how to fly! After she helped train with Cloudsdale? Unbelievable. Rarity too was a wilting flower where she's usually bold/take-charge/won't back down. Flutter-stare? Power-fashionista-rarity? Nowhere to be found. She's generous to capper exactly once to push the plot, otherwise all she does is nag and complain or get scared by everything.

The disk does have 1 deleted scene:
Cadence Conversion- It's the stained glass princesses getting explained by Twi (likely at the start), where they change Cadence from Princess of Love to Princess of Family. You can see why it got cut, if you saw the show you'd already know all the stuff said here.  It's not a really juicy cut.

What have you seen or heard?
I would love to see an 'original plot' how the movie USED to be with all that stuff left IN just to see what it was like. I hope we get more materials later on that clear up some of this stuff. Anything Caelano or Capper?

Aside:
(They handled Capper REALLY well I thought, he was obviously an aristo-cat who had a fall due to the storm king, real classy guy now husslin in the street but is in debt to the mole-man too & will do anything to get back his old status. He's jaded by everything but comes around when Rarity is nice to him. They don't rub any of this in your face but just looking his clothes/house/act you realize his whole story and see why he is the way he is. THAT is sophisticated story-telling which makes the sour/nonsense parts that much more "unbelievable" because Capper shows what they were capable of--the movie makers weren't bumbling--they knew how to tell a story but flopped it in areas.)

[LadyMoondancer]

Twilight basically feels like she "isn't enough" and overburdens herself with responsibility instead of letting her friends share the load.  So, I think she is aware that she is going against everything she's learned by stealing from the sea ponies, but . . . she is also desperate and she doesn't have enough confidence in herself to believe that she can find another way.  (Princess Celestia herself said to get help from the queen of the hippogriffs, who is Twilight to think that she can think of something better than her beloved mentor?)

In addition, her friends keep putting the group in danger by acting like they're still in Equestria (i.e. still in a land which is normally 'safe' and law-abiding, rather than the Badlands where anything goes and people will try to sell you into slavery);  For example:  Rainbow Dash does a sonic rainboom, everyone except Twilight trusts Capper who betrays them, Pinkie Pie nearly dies when she 'bounces' up the rope to reach the airship and does not seem to appreciate the gravity of the situation when Twilight is barely able to save her, Pinkie is also the one initially drawing attention to them in the mishmash town, etc.

This further convinces Twilight that maybe it needs to be the power of Intellect and Moral Relativity that saves the day rather than the power of Friendship.  Her pent up frustrations are also what fuel her fight with Pinkie Pie.

I think the sea pony / hippogriff scenes must have originally been intended to be much longer and got cut for time because, yeah, it's weird that Stratus has no speaking lines.  He does appear for like one second as a hippogriff, when Queen Novo arrives at the end of the movie.

One cameo I noticed was Trixie and Starlight Glimmer are setting off fireworks at the start of the movie, LOL.  Also G4 Moondancer and Twilight's other friends from unicorn school in Canterlot are standing on a bridge and waving at her as she sings that being the princess of friendship is "a promise to bring ponies together", which I thought was lovely.  Treehugger is hanging out at Fluttershy's petting zoo.  There's also a pegasus who looks a lot like Wind Whistler watching Pinkie build her cake cannon.

[Mana Minori]

Stratus Skyranger: as much of the prequel story for the movie is in chapter books and IDW comics, Stratus made his appearance on the cover of Prequel comic #2 (with Spike, Rarity and Grubber on it) https://www.hasbro.com/mylittlepony/en_US/2017/07/my-little-pony-movie-prequel-2-released.html As for why they still made his toy? They're a toy company. Why not? Even a character that wasn't in the movie much can earn them money. (case in point, the blindbags)

Skystar and her sisters got cut because of time constraints, I'm guessing. The movie was already chock full of new characters who didn't get sufficient screen time and backstory as it is.

Cameo cuts: hey, they had to play where's waldo with the cameo to attract the adult fanbase who likes them, right?

From what I heard, it was all of the seaponies who were supposed to have a bigger role and join in the final fight on the Storm King, rather than just showing up after it was over, so Novo might've rallied her troops and led the charge with them, but who knows? Yeah, she didn't really do much in the finalized version of the movie. Such a shame. She didn't get many toys, either, which sucks, because it made her rarer (especially if you didn't want to buy a $100 castle set just to get her)

Twilight goes rogue didn't happen suddenly. She had peen  putting up with her friend's "incompetence" and thoughtless actions since Klugetown, and even before that, when they wwre setting up the party in Canterlot, she was pscking herself out and putting all this pressure on herself to make things perfect and do things herself (heck, even Pinkie made it worse at the time with that "pep talk").  But yu could really  see things start to go south when they were trapped in the pirate's ship, thinking of a way to get off and away from Tempest. Twilight asks what they're going to do, RD gives some cocky and unhelpful answer, then Twilight looks at her friends who are pretty much settling in to be captured (Rarity's silently freaking out, AJ settles in, Pinkie's doing....something unhelpful in that box of Storm King merch, and Fluttershy is hiding), then Twilight sighs and shakes her head, and takes it upon HERSELF to do something without her friends knowing (even when they escape and plummeting through the air, they're still wondering what she's doing, as she's building the hot air balloon). It's that moment that you can tie into her getting stuff done alone in Seaquestria, if you want to reason on it as such.

Fluttershy, Contrary to popular belief, had plenty lines. I don't know why people are thinking otherwise. Perhaps because she didn't seem to contribute much in the way of action, like RD, Rarity, and Pinkie did, but she still talked (and made noises) quite a bit. But if you don't believe me, I'll count them for you.

Line 1: Hoo. I don't think it's the balloon that's out of control, Pinkie Pie!
Line 2: Whoa!
Line 3: You got this
Line 4: We got this together
Line 5: And music
Line 6: That means we'll have to... leave Equestria. Oh!
Line 7: Yay.
Line 8: Oh....
Line 9: Ohhhh!!!
Line 10: He's a friend
Line 11:  Oh, my!
Line 12: [squeaks]
Line 13: [sobs]
Line 14: Oh my goodness!
Line 15: [shivers]
Line 16:  [yells] I can't look!
Line 17: Ooh!
Line 18: A g-g-g-g-ghost town?!
Line 19: [gasps]
Line 20: Then [pants] who did?
Line 21: Wow!
Line 22: [giggles] Yay.
Line 23: Aw, so cute!
Line 24: (Just one small thing)
Line 25: (Don't seem apart)
Line 26: Or a sing thing
Line 27: [gasp]
Line 28:  [gasp]
Line 29:  [whimpers]
Line 30: [sighs] This whole journey was such a mistake. [gasps] All we wanted was somepony to help us.
Line 31: How? We'll never catch up!
Line 32: [sighs]
Line 33: Ooooh.
Line 34: Awww.
Line 35: [gasp]
Line 36: [cheers]
Line 37: [whimpers] Ooh!
Line 38: You seem tense. Do you wanna talk about it?
Line 39: Let it all out.
Line 40:  Oh! Sorry, our time is up. Buh-bye!
Line 50:  [yelp]
Line 51:  [screaming]
Line 52: [whimpering]
Line 53: Now what?

source: http://mlp.wikia.com/wiki/Transcripts/My_Little_Pony_The_Movie

[Ponyfan]

A lot of stuff is explained in the prequel book and comics.

Stratus

Spoiler

Is one of Novo’s guards and the gatekeeper of the Hippogriff city.  Tempest tricks him and Queen Novo into letting her and Grubber in to the city and palace by pretending to weary, lost travelers.  Tempest later tries to steal the pearl but is caught by Queen Novo which leads to the destruction of the Hippogriff city. This makes Queen Novo especially wary of newcomers seeking help.

Capper

Spoiler

Capper and his friend Chummer escaped when the Storm Ming took over their kingdom. They stowed away on Captain Cealeno’s ship which was also taken over by the Storm King forcing the pirates to work for the Storm King. Chummer and Capper escaped the pirate ship and ended up in Klugetown.  They both agreed to trade a large gem to Verko in exchange for an airship but Chummer betrayed Capper by taking the gem and throwing Capper off the airship. Verko blames Capper for tricking him and apparently had the power to make sure Capper can’t leave unril his debt is settled unt Tempest takes him prisoner.?

I also think the sea pony scene was supposed to be longer. It seemed really short.


Ponyfan

[kestral_kitsune]

Stratus Skyranger: as much of the prequel story for the movie is in chapter books and IDW comics, Stratus made his appearance on the cover of Prequel comic #2 (with Spike, Rarity and Grubber on it) https://www.hasbro.com/mylittlepony/en_US/2017/07/my-little-pony-movie-prequel-2-released.html As for why they still made his toy? They're a toy company. Why not? Even a character that wasn't in the movie much can earn them money. (case in point, the blindbags)

Skystar and her sisters got cut because of time constraints, I'm guessing. The movie was already chock full of new characters who didn't get sufficient screen time and backstory as it is.

Cameo cuts: hey, they had to play where's waldo with the cameo to attract the adult fanbase who likes them, right?

From what I heard, it was all of the seaponies who were supposed to have a bigger role and join in the final fight on the Storm King, rather than just showing up after it was over, so Novo might've rallied her troops and led the charge with them, but who knows? Yeah, she didn't really do much in the finalized version of the movie. Such a shame. She didn't get many toys, either, which sucks, because it made her rarer (especially if you didn't want to buy a $100 castle set just to get her)

Twilight goes rogue didn't happen suddenly. She had peen  putting up with her friend's "incompetence" and thoughtless actions since Klugetown, and even before that, when they wwre setting up the party in Canterlot, she was pscking herself out and putting all this pressure on herself to make things perfect and do things herself (heck, even Pinkie made it worse at the time with that "pep talk").  But yu could really  see things start to go south when they were trapped in the pirate's ship, thinking of a way to get off and away from Tempest. Twilight asks what they're going to do, RD gives some cocky and unhelpful answer, then Twilight looks at her friends who are pretty much settling in to be captured (Rarity's silently freaking out, AJ settles in, Pinkie's doing....something unhelpful in that box of Storm King merch, and Fluttershy is hiding), then Twilight sighs and shakes her head, and takes it upon HERSELF to do something without her friends knowing (even when they escape and plummeting through the air, they're still wondering what she's doing, as she's building the hot air balloon). It's that moment that you can tie into her getting stuff done alone in Seaquestria, if you want to reason on it as such.

Fluttershy, Contrary to popular belief, had plenty lines. I don't know why people are thinking otherwise. Perhaps because she didn't seem to contribute much in the way of action, like RD, Rarity, and Pinkie did, but she still talked (and made noises) quite a bit. But if you don't believe me, I'll count them for you.

Line 1: Hoo. I don't think it's the balloon that's out of control, Pinkie Pie!
Line 2: Whoa!
Line 3: You got this
Line 4: We got this together
Line 5: And music
Line 6: That means we'll have to... leave Equestria. Oh!
Line 7: Yay.
Line 8: Oh....
Line 9: Ohhhh!!!
Line 10: He's a friend
Line 11:  Oh, my!
Line 12: [squeaks]
Line 13: [sobs]
Line 14: Oh my goodness!
Line 15: [shivers]
Line 16:  [yells] I can't look!
Line 17: Ooh!
Line 18: A g-g-g-g-ghost town?!
Line 19: [gasps]
Line 20: Then [pants] who did?
Line 21: Wow!
Line 22: [giggles] Yay.
Line 23: Aw, so cute!
Line 24: (Just one small thing)
Line 25: (Don't seem apart)
Line 26: Or a sing thing
Line 27: [gasp]
Line 28:  [gasp]
Line 29:  [whimpers]
Line 30: [sighs] This whole journey was such a mistake. [gasps] All we wanted was somepony to help us.
Line 31: How? We'll never catch up!
Line 32: [sighs]
Line 33: Ooooh.
Line 34: Awww.
Line 35: [gasp]
Line 36: [cheers]
Line 37: [whimpers] Ooh!
Line 38: You seem tense. Do you wanna talk about it?
Line 39: Let it all out.
Line 40:  Oh! Sorry, our time is up. Buh-bye!
Line 50:  [yelp]
Line 51:  [screaming]
Line 52: [whimpering]
Line 53: Now what?

source: http://mlp.wikia.com/wiki/Transcripts/My_Little_Pony_The_Movie

I think part of the fluttershy issue is I was having a hard time distinguishing Flutter's voice from Rainbow's since its that same voice actress. I don't know why but it seemed like there were times where she was mixing up who she was supposed to be voicing? part of Rainbow's song I could have sworn fluttershy was singing it if I wasn't looking at who was on screen.

[tailrustedtealeaf]

I don't count making a noise as a line. Fluttershy was a very passive character in this, and could have been cut from the movie and the exact same result would have come out. Rarely did her lines have any effect on the story (aside from the storm creature), and this is part of the reason that people consider her to have nowhere near plenty. It's partially that, and partially that in comparison to nearly every other main pony in the movie, she gets hardly any lines.

I think part of the fluttershy issue is I was having a hard time distinguishing Flutter's voice from Rainbow's since its that same voice actress. I don't know why but it seemed like there were times where she was mixing up who she was supposed to be voicing? part of Rainbow's song I could have sworn fluttershy was singing it if I wasn't looking at who was on screen.

Slight correction: Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie share the same VA, Rainbow shares hers with Applejack.

[Minty_Magic]

I read in the Art of the My Little Pony Movie book that Skystar's sisters got cut because they felt her character worked better if she was lonely and looking for companionship. If you haven't given the book a read, I'd highly recommend it! It doesn't answer too many questions we don't already know the answers to, but it gives some really interesting insight to early designs (I loved a lot of the Storm King's old designs shown in the book, I would have taken literally anything else over the one he had) and ideas. It sounds like they also had the ponies in a seapony prison at one point in the story where Fluttershy would have talked to the animal prisoners and made friends to help them out.
As far as Twilight stealing the pearl, it was extreme for her, but I didn't really find it out of character, I liked that we got to see her less rational side come out as she started to run out of options and panic. I thought Queen Novo said the pearl could transform a pony into any creature? I may be remembering that wrong, but I got the impression it wasn't limited to just hippogriffs, which would explain why Twilight was so desperate to get it.
I saw someone else say the movie would have been better if a few of the mane 6 had been captured at the beginning of the movie. That would put more emotional weight on Twilight and the viewer and would help with the problem of having too big of a group where not everyone can contribute evenly. It really was disappointing Fluttershy did literally nothing for the whole movie, its not good when you have a main character that can be written out and nothing would change within the story. I get why the writers wanted to have the mane 6 all together, but I'd be really interested in a version where they get split up. Maybe then we could have also gotten  more insight into what happened to the captured ponies back in Canterlot and why it was so crucial they leave Equestria to solve this problem.

[Ponyfan]

Novo's pearl can transform ponies into other creatures besides sea/land ponies.  Twilight is exicted when she realizes they can use it to transform into creatures that are stronger than the Storm King.

As far as I could tell the captured ponies in Canterlot are kept in cages until the Storm Creatures find uses for them. I think I saw the spa ponies working on a Storm Creature.

Ponyfan

[Mana Minori]

I don't count making a noise as a line. Fluttershy was a very passive character in this, and could have been cut from the movie and the exact same result would have come out. Rarely did her lines have any effect on the story (aside from the storm creature), and this is part of the reason that people consider her to have nowhere near plenty. It's partially that, and partially that in comparison to nearly every other main pony in the movie, she gets hardly any lines.

I think part of the fluttershy issue is I was having a hard time distinguishing Flutter's voice from Rainbow's since its that same voice actress. I don't know why but it seemed like there were times where she was mixing up who she was supposed to be voicing? part of Rainbow's song I could have sworn fluttershy was singing it if I wasn't looking at who was on screen.

Slight correction: Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie share the same VA, Rainbow shares hers with Applejack.

it still requires time spent and effort on the part of the VA (if they didn't just recycle a noise from the show, but we don't know), so I consider it a line.

And Appkejack didn't say or do much, either, to be fair. It wasn't just Flutters.

[Ponyfan]

I thought the show had established that Fluttershy forgets she can fly sometimes when the ponies are falling from high places?  I think it happened in Wonder Bolt Academy when Lightning Dust made the tornado that hit Twilight's balloon causing the ponies to fall out and have to be rescued by the other Wonderbolt cadets.


Ponyfan

[tailrustedtealeaf]

And Appkejack didn't say or do much, either, to be fair. It wasn't just Flutters.

I'm hoping both AJ and Fluts will get some sort of major role in the sequel to make up for this one.

[LadyMoondancer]

Yeah, in various episodes we've seen that Fluttershy sometimes freezes up when she's scared and can't fly.  I believe the first time we see this is the episode where the gang have to confront a red dragon whose breath is polluting Ponyville.  That didn't bother me.  However, I do feel like it was a missed opportunity not to have her cooing over the 'scary' caged creatures in Klugetown, maybe having a scene where Capper gains her trust by letting them go.  That would have been cute.

[Bebopgroove]

From what I read about in the official art book, all the different scene concepts and abandoned character ideas, I'll never understand why so much was left out of the film, as I think it would have been a better, more rounded-out film overall (especially with the Storm King and Capper).

[Mana Minori]

And Appkejack didn't say or do much, either, to be fair. It wasn't just Flutters.

I'm hoping both AJ and Fluts will get some sort of major role in the sequel to make up for this one.

what sequel? The movie in 2020 (according to the leaks)  is going to be a full-on reboot.

[tailrustedtealeaf]

And Appkejack didn't say or do much, either, to be fair. It wasn't just Flutters.

I'm hoping both AJ and Fluts will get some sort of major role in the sequel to make up for this one.

what sequel? The movie in 2020 (according to the leaks)  is going to be a full-on reboot.

I thought we were going to be getting another movie to wrap up FiM, and THEN the G5 movie.