By Ned Jordan
If you're reading this review, then I doubt that you're a three year old girl
and won't find that my synopsis of the plot of My Little Pony: A Very Minty
Christmas ruins the story for you. Christmas time has come to the land of
the Little Ponies, a place with more pink and purple pastels than you've
probably seen in your life. A well-meaning but clumsy Minty manages to
break the magical candy cane the ponies use to guide Santa to their village, and
after a misguided attempt to pretend to be Santa and leave socks as gifts for
all of the ponies decides to travel to the North Pole to meet Santa and guide
him back to the Little Ponies' town. After all, we are told that without
Santa, there is no Christmas - a message I'm sure that we're all trying to
convey to our children.
A Very Minty Christmas is a re-release, as evidenced by the inclusion in the
package of a coupon for Chuck E. Cheese that expired over two years ago.
After watching the DVD, it's fairly obvious that the repackaging of the DVD is
an attempt to get rid of inventory that probably didn't sell very well in the
first place. A Very Minty Christmas is only about 40 minutes long, but
still manages to come across as a thin story stretched out about as long as
possible. The story feels like a half-hearted, by the numbers affair that
doesn't try to offer more entertainment to children than looking into the large
and pretty eyes of pastel-colored ponies. There are a few thoroughly
generic and completely forgettable songs in the movie that won't inspire your
child to sing along or even to remember the song five minutes later (perhaps
that's a good thing - do you really want your kid singing "Nothing Says
Christmas Like a Pair of Socks"?). Perhaps the most disappointing and
oddest thing about this movie is that Santa never makes an appearance.
Even though "with no Santa, there is no Christmas", Santa leaves two handwritten
notes behind that are read by the ponies and that's it for the jolly old elf.
Perhaps he was worried that an appearance in this movie would be damaging
to his reputation.
Even if this were an average children's story, this DVD would still not be a
very good deal. For $15 you get the Christmas show, an unrelated episode
of the My Little Pony animated series, and a couple of sing-alongs (which the
DVD refers to as sing-a-longs) for songs that are entirely forgettable.
Unless you have a three year old who lives and breathes My Little Pony, save
your child from this muck and save yourself some money.
Final Rating:
