UnowPriceless hyped garbage

TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Kimball Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Karlee The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

MartinHafer Depending on your age and background, you may well be aware of what 'Bronies' are. These are, usually, adult male fans of the recent animated My Little Pony series--a series intended for very young little girls. The folks who made the shows were surprised by this phenomenon. It seems that adult men are now its most rabid fans and have begun organizing giant conventions for My Little Pony which are every bit as big as you might find for Star Trek or Anime. The purpose of Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony appears to be both to explain this fandom and to also normalize it as much as possible. Nice and very likable teenage and adult men are interviewed about their obsessions with these incredibly happy and sweet cartoon characters. And, the film features charming narration by John de Lancie (who does the voice for one of the characters on the show and is also adored by Star Trek fans for playing 'Q') and it also has many interviews including the show's creator as well as another one of the voice actors, Tara Strong. They all seem to agree that it's a benign obsession and the notion of these guy emulating the positive messages of the show isn't a bad thing at all--and the film does a great job in normalizing this fandom. However, it also seems to occasionally miss the proverbial elephant in the room. This is because two big problems really aren't addressed in the otherwise entertaining film. First, the women and children who like the show are almost completely ignored. Now I know that the film is about adult fans but the film says a Brony can be a man or a woman--yet not all that many women are interviewed and the focus clearly is on the guys. No young girls are interviewed. That is all very odd-- especially in light of the second problem. There is a far darker side of many of the Bronies. The Brony movement began on 4chan--a website often linked to some of the stranger, more militant folks lurking on the internet. In light of this, it isn't surprising that SOME of the Bronies have a much more sexualized view of My Little Pony and there are quite a few reports of inappropriate behaviors by some of the Bronies at conventions or on websites. Sexual harassment, an unnatural infatuation with children, anatomically correct pony pillows or fan art and emotional bullying are sometimes serious problems. Now I am not saying all or even most Bronies behave this way, but it IS a problem--one often addressed on the internet yet oddly missing from the documentary. Sites such as Ponies for Parents and Brony Stupidity (among others) point out many examples of inappropriate conduct that clearly indicate that not all Bronies are as nice and benign as the ones you see in the film. Try a Google search using the terms 'My Little Pony porn' and you'll come up with tons and tons of examples of amazingly twisted fan art and porn videos. Yet, inexplicably, the film never mentions any of this. When a film ignores such obvious controversies, it becomes, in a way, more like propaganda than a documentary--the big reason why I felt a little uncomfortable watching this otherwise well made movie. Watch if it you want--just be aware that there is far more to the fandom than you see in this film.

PaulSquall My biggest disappointment is that this film isn't at all funny.It's primary reason for existing seems to be to proselytize the virtues of the cartoon and justify the reasons grown men are fascinated by it. If you aren't a brony, you aren't going to find much in this film, because it doesn't have a sense of humor about itself.There is room in the market for a film like this, and because it was for a group of fans that seem a bit obsessive, it will probably make a profit. I can't really say it shouldn't have been made, simply that it does not speak to a broader audience.The one thing that I did take away from the documentary was that even simple stories, if made with quality, can find an audience. People that have trouble relating to one another and develop real world friendships find a lot to love about a show that explains why friendship is magical. At least that's what I saw as the plot of this film.Okay, now why the summary headline. . . I found this movie a bit disturbing for one main reason. Every My Little Pony obsessed man in this film felt they needed to tell us "I'm not gay." Like that makes their passion socially acceptable. They might as well be saying, "Sure, I like pink unicorns, but it's not like I like men! THAT would make me weird a pariah!" It's a rather homophobic view, in my opinion, and totally undermines the movie's supposed message of acceptance.So it's not entertaining, particularly educational, or social conscious, but if you obsessively collect everything with a pony on it, you'll probably like it.

Overcrank First, I am brony and I think this film did a very good job of showing how the "brony phenomenon" is a positive thing. And that is important in a world where people with spout off their opinions with knowing hardly anything about the subject they are talking about.The documentary highlights importance of friendship, fellowship, and all the good things the show instills in the brony community. It is a positive and uplifting film that demonstrates how the show and its fans have helped people be more comfortable with themselves and others.There is definitely more to the bronies than is presented here, but I think it is a great introduction for people seeking to learn more about the community. You can only fit so much into a 90 minute film.I highly recommend showing this to non-bronies. For bronies it may be preaching to the choir, but it helped remind me of the best qualities of the fans.

Ryan Vienneau So, I watched it, the whole thing, and let me say it was really bad. I have nothing but respect for John de Lancie, Lauren Faust and Tara Strong but this did just not work out. There was not one good part of this. Keep in mind I will probably spoiler some stuff about the documentary (But I'm pretty sure you all know how this is going to go) so if you really don't want to know about that stuff: Watch it (Or don't, it might be better that way) then come back and read. Also I'm going to be doing a lot of comparisons between this and Indie Game: The Movie, just because they were both documentaries about a niche culture that were overfunded on kickstarter, so if you haven't seen Indie Game: The Movie (Watch it, it's very good) you may not get some of the references.Anyway, the main point of why this documentary is so bad is its subject matter. It's trying to justify something that shouldn't have to be justified in the first place, it's people watching a show with the target demographic being little girls, but it's also written so that parents can watch the show too and not feel left out by asinine humour. Unfortunately, a lot of "bronies" seem to think that watching a show out of the target demo is risqué, edgy, and pushing barriers. You don't see me acting like a special snowflake for watching Girls or Adventure Time or Gravity Falls, I'm not the target demo for any of those shows. This stuff doesn't need an hour and a half to explain, nor does it need $300 000 to do it. They didn't even touch the terrible parts of the "fandom", all they did was pat bronies on the back and ignore anything bad that ever happened.The film also seems to just be all over the place, you have upwards of five people you're supposed to be following and it just cuts between them saying things about their adventures. Half the time you have no idea whats going on they take an interview with a person and then cut to the next person who is in another continent yet you still think you're at the convention shown in the previous scene because all these conventions look exactly the same. It's a very scatterbrained experience, Lauren Faust talks about something, cut to a brony talking about something completely different, cut to animation that's all in rhyme, cut to someone speaking German with no subtitles because the name is there and then the name fades out and you get a split second to read what they just said. Half the time I don't know what's going on so I just zone out. With Indie Game: The Movie you get two story lines to follow, the production of Super Meat Boy, and the production of Fez, interspersed with Jonathan Blow talking about game design and such. Every time there's a cut you know who's talking, you know what storyline you're now following, and you know what's going on. Another thing is that Indie Game: The Movie really made you care for the people involved, you got to know them and you felt their hardships as they happened to them. When Super Meat Boy isn't showing up on the store you feel disappointed and annoyed with Microsoft just like the developers do, when it finally gets put up and the game is a hit you feel happy and you feel the same way the developers do. In the Brony doc you don't really feel anything for the people, there's just this disconnect. It's like when the kid (I forget his name) is all scared about telling his parents you don't really care because there's nothing to be ashamed of, it's just a goddamn television program (Also I didn't like how everyone almost treated telling people that they were a brony like coming out as being gay, they're not even close to being the same thing so shut up about it). There was no emotional weight attached to any of it. Take away the actual subject matter then you'd think $300 000 could at least make a film that is technically well done, but no, not even close. In the non-animated segments it looked like something local news would do (The animated segments looked like the show so I won't really complain because the animation in the show is brilliant). To make another Indie Game: The Movie comparison, when you look at some of the camera work in that movie it's magnificent, even if you look at the trailer you can see how great the cinematography is, the shots were well placed and they were very unique (Especially the one of the lineup of PAX I still can't get over how great it is). With this it all just looks kinda bland, you've seen every shot in countless other documentaries and so much of the movie is just talking heads staring at the camera saying whatever. But the worst offence comes in the green screen work, it looks very unpolished and in one scene there was actually green outlines around the people talking and it was really distracting. To sum it up, this movie was really bad, I don't think there was one redeeming quality of it (It wasn't even so bad it was funny). If you really want a documentary about a niche culture just watch Indie Game: The Movie. If you want a documentary to pat you on the back because you're a special little snowflake for watching a show outside of the target demographic, then this is the movie for you. Otherwise, don't waste your time.