SDCC Exclusive MLPFiM Poster

Click for full-size awesome

For this year's Comic Con, Hasbro has an exclusive My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic poster that is an absolute smorgasbord of characters, major and minor alike.  I mean, even Pinkie Pie's inanimate "guests" are in there!  And there are lots of little nods to the popular fanon, such as Bon Bon and Lyra eyeing each other, the flower sisters freaking out over the cockatrice, and Dr. Whooves being in a position to show off his cutie mark.  Though bronies may complain that Hasbro doesn't care about them, this poster definitely proves otherwise.

Sneak Peek Coloring Pages

Snagged from Equestria Daily.  It seems Hasbro has put up coloring pages of Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Twilight Sparkle, and Spike as their younger selves, giving us a little taste of the much-awaited flashback episode "The Cutie Mark Chronicles" (airing April 15th).

Hubworld is Go!

So, on Monday The Hub's site officially opened...kind of.  While going to the main page still shows the preview site, clicking the headlines takes you to a Page Not Found page on the actual site, where you can read show descriptions, watch videos, and play games.  Strangely, the character page for Berry Bitty Adventures leaves out Raspberry Torte and Plum Pudding.  Most of the games are crossovers from Hasbro's site, but there's a very fun Adventures in Ponyville game that showcases the upcoming animation style.  (It'll be more fun once you can actually save your progress.)

Speaking of My Little Pony, Hasbro updated its page on Monday as well, so that it's all G4, all the time.  The main attraction of this update, IMO, is the new opening theme, which is very catchy, and gives us our first look (listen?) at the voice actors for the main ponies.  A press release from Discovery's site already revealed the VAs:
Tara Strong as Twilight Sparkle (which we already knew)
Ashleigh Ball as Applejack and Rainbow Dash
Tabitha St. Germain as Rarity
Andrea Libman as Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie
Cathy Weseluck as Spike
There was a press release on the same site for Pound Puppies, which doesn't seem to have too much in common with its predecessors (Pound Puppies without Cooler is hardly Pound Puppies at all!), but earns points for having John Di Maggio as one of the dogs.
And while I'm talking about Hub news, faithful reader Max Jordan sent me an e-mail with the first day's (and the next day) schedule, which the Hub is calling Sneak Peek Sunday.  Despite the sneak peek starting at 10, the channel will apparently officially open at 6:00 am EST, as per the link sent by Max.

The Hub Updates

Just the other day, The Hub updated its teaser site.  It's still pretty much a teaser, but now it has some actual content, in the form of summaries of upcoming series, plus a preview video.  Here are some relevant screenshots:

The video has clips from more shows than are listed on the site, since to go along with the channel's 10/10/10 opening date, there are ten show synopsizes posted.  (Click the images below to read the whole thing, or just go to the official site.)

 Not sure how I feel about Pound Puppies joining the ranks of Updated 80's Property, but I'll give the show a shot.

Update:  A new image and slightly different synopsis for My Little Pony has been put up:

Those eyes are most definitely bigger, but props for the first look at Princess Celestia in cartoon form.

Coming Soon: The Hub

A few months ago, Hasbro announced that it and Discovery were creating a new TV channel, and recently, more definitive news has begun to leak out.  The channel is called The Hub and is launching on October 10th, but what is most relevant to my post here is that one of the announced shows is the new My Little Pony series, subtitled "Friendship is Magic."  I wasn't really going to post just for that, although I have heard that according to show runner Lauren Faust, the series will have villains and boy ponies, which has caused most of the older fans to rejoice.
The real reason I'm posting, though, is one of my readers sent me an e-mail to let me know about the channel, and included some info that's not in the article I linked, such as the channel's programming starting at 1 PM Pacific time (4 PM Eastern), and other programs including R.L. Stine's The Haunting Hour, a new version of Pound Puppies, and the CG Strawberry Shortcake, which I am assuming is Berry Bitty Adventures.  I don't know where the reader got this info, or how much of it is true, but I figured I'd pass it along.
Update: Here's an article that talks about the previously unmentioned shows, and yes, the Strawberry Shortcake series is Berry Bitty Adventures.  Also, Maryoku Yummy finally has a home!

News from the Toy Fair

Well, the big news (as far as I'm concerned) coming out of this year's Toy Fair is the debut of the new designs for My Little Pony created by Lauren Faust. I first learned of Ms. Faust a year and a half ago, or rather, I learned of her property Milky Way and the Galaxy Girls, and I've followed her blog ever since. About a month ago she announced that she was made Creative Steward of the My Little Pony line and Executive Producer of an upcoming new TV series, and judging from the image above (and more seen here), it seems that it will be a blend of the new and old MLP. I wonder what's up with the Alicorn up there, though? She gives me the impression of some kind of Pony Deity, like a Greek Goddess or something.

Strawberry Shortcake also has some things showing up that I'm interested in, such as articulated dolls. You can check out the whole thing here. And there are Sushi Pack figures! Kind of weird ones, but better than nothing.

A few other things I found interesting from browsing the galleries: Charlotte from The Princess and the Frog gets a doll (if it's already out, I haven't seen it anywhere), first look at Rapunzel dolls, these are adorable, and while the chicks are cute, the whole thing is a little disturbing, if you ask me.

Elefun and Friends?

Well, my Blockbuster blues are slightly cured, as one of my discs finally came today, the official debut of the new MLP style in animation, Twinkle Wish Adventure. I'll be blogging that one soon, but before I get to it, I'm taking a quick look at a bonus short that was included on the DVD. Titled "Elefun and Friends," it is apparently a tie-in to games like (natch) Elefun, Gator Golf, and Hungry, Hungry Hippos. At first I thought it would be your typical, run-of-the-mill, children's show, and while it does generally follow that format, it put in some scenes that surprised me.

I mean, to start off with, the short begins with Elefun and his roommate Froggio getting some breakfast, while a lighthearted tune plays in the background. Froggio gets the spoons and starts drumming along to the tune on a piece of furniture, then jumps onto Elefun's head and starts drumming on him. Elefun doesn't seem to mind, but then he suddenly trumpets, blowing the frog off his head and into a coconut bowl. While Elefun just watches, their butterfly friends pour first cereal and then milk in both bowls, right on top of Froggio. Guess Elefun wasn't so keen on being a drum after all. Shortly thereafter, Elefun goes out for a morning swim, and upon seeing the empty pond suddenly fill up with all manner of animals, he cannonballs into the pond, splashing everyone else out quite intentionally. Sheesh.

The main plot kicks off when Elefun finds a kite shaped like a dragon stuck in a tree. Rather than send Froggio or the butterflies up to get it out, he decides that following the string to its origin will help him to get it unstuck. If you say so, Elefun. As Elefun states his dedication to following the string, even through jungles and deserts, Froggio begs out, only for Elefun to fix him with a withering glare until he agrees to come along. After that, things are pretty run-of-the-mill, with Elefun following the string through different countries, picking up the occasional companion, and learning the word "friend" in different languages. It isn't until they reach the actual end of the string in China that things pick up again. That's where they encounter a purple panda trying to treebuchet using bamboo over a river to the end of the string. She only gets halfway, leading this this exchange:

Elefun: Wha'cha doing?

Pandarama: Sipping tea. What does it look like I'm doing?

Spin: Sinking.

Pandarama: Who asked you?

Elefun then goes on to introduce himself and his hangers-on to her, and when he asks if she wants to be friends, she instantly replies, "No!" although she does backtrack, as she slips toward the water, "So, let's just say I want to be friends, not saying for sure, but pretend I do. What does that get me?" That's good enough for Elefun, and he devices a plan to help her across: she can slide down Giraffalaff's neck. Giraffalaff objects to this, though not because Elefun's being awfully presumptuous here, but because he has an embarrassing secret (and amusingly, when he asks Elefun if he can keep a secret, Froggio pops up to say, "Well, no," and Giraffalaff rebukes him, "I wasn't whispering to you!"), which everyone finds out anyway: he's afraid of heights (and sure enough, he's kept his head low the entire time). He even goes off on a soliloquy about how he hates eating the brown leaves on the ground, but the green leaves are too high for him, prompting the panda, still hanging from her bamboo, to ask him to solve his lunch woes later. Eventually he sticks his neck out and rescues Pandarama. With their friendship cemented, Elefun calls her a friend, and Pandarama corrects him with "朋友", pronounced "peng you," as Froggio explains to the audience, although not to Elefun, leading to this:

Elefun: Peng You is a pretty name.

Pandarama: My name is Pandarama.

Elefun: Then who's Peng You?

Pandarama: You!

Elefun: No, I'm Elefun.

Pandarama: Of course you are.

There are a few more hijinks that ensue to finish up the episode, but that's basically the end of the good stuff. Pandarama was seriously the best part of the short, and voiced by Katie Leigh, although I really wouldn't have placed her without looking. The animation is done by Renegade Studios, who also did The Mr. Men Show, which I mention because a few of the voices also come from that show (Phil Lollar, Danny Katiana, and the previously mentioned Katie Leigh). While the animation itself is fluid, the edges on the characters are occasionally choppy, most noticably on Elefun. I don't know if I would check out a whole series of this, but I would definitely make a point to watch a few Pandarama-centric episodes, especially if the writing perks up a bit.

Revamped Strawberry Shortcake Voice Cast Confirmed

After about a month of searching various Targets, Walmarts, Toys r Us', and even a Kmart, I finally got my hands on the Strawberry Shortcake figure with DVD. Granted, I saw many of the other Strawberry Shortcake toys during my search (although most places didn't have anything at all yet), but it took until today to find the only one I was interested in (although, if I had a little more space around here, I'd probably pick up at least one of the little playsets).

The DVD just has the short that was previewed on the agpbrands website, but with the addition of end credits, which, as you know, is a boon for me. If you remember from an earlier post, I already knew that Anna Cummer is the voice of Strawberry, and Jaynse Jaud is Orange Blossom. I also guessed correctly that Ashleigh Ball is one of the Berrykins, although I didn't know that she is also Plum Pudding, and while I was right about Britt McKillip being a voice, I was incorrect in guessing she was Lemon Meringue, since she is actually Blueberry Muffin, with Andrea Libman as the real Lemon Meringue. The cast is completed with Ingrid Nilson as Raspberry Torte and a berrykin, and Brian Dummond as a berrykin. Veteran Hasbro VAs all (except for Ingrid Nilson, who has not done very much as of yet), which is what I expected.

The Latest on the 2009 SSC Revamp

The Toy Fair was last weekend, and with it came the debut of the prototypes of the upcoming Strawberry Shortcake toys from Hasbro. (You can also see the impending new look of My Little Pony, if you're so inclined.) In my opinion, half of the toys look very cute, but the other half look just plain weird. My personal favorites are the mostly plush dolls, and the figure that comes with the DVD.

To go along with the Toy Fair, Hasbro put up a bunch of press releases, including one for Strawberry Shortcake that gives descriptions of a handful of the toys debuted, and clues the reader in to a sneak peek website for the new look. There isn't too much at the moment, coloring pages of all the characters, a redesigned game from the main site, but there is a page of profiles for all the characters, which is a draw for me. I note that when I visited the site yesterday, there were two videos up, A Berry Grand Opening and the Interview, but now there's only the Interview. Hm...