Instead of sequels...

[Bruton the Iguanodon]

It's never exactly made clear how much time it took the gang to get to the great valley. Weeks? Months? Days? One thing is for certain---much must have occured offscreen. To quote what WeirdRaptor said in another topic:

I was just watching "The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island" when it dawned on me that the terrors Littlefoot, Ducky, Petrie, Spike and Cera spoke of may go deeper than just normal kid "monster under the bed" stuff. In the original film, they were separated from their parents, and lost and alone in a big harsh world filled with horrors beyond all imagination up until they found each other...so they could be constantly terrified together. We only saw a little over an hour's worth of their hardships, so knows what else they encountered other than the orignial Sharptooth, the spiney critter, and the Pachys.

Kor said:

It also seems there are some cuts in the film, one can put their own scenes there, as well as one can assume there are some unseen adventures and encounters the gang had before they got to the great valley, and some Cera and the others had when they separated from Littlefoot while he found the valley.

And then ManyCav said the most interesting thing yet:

We may never know what they actually went through that was edited out for time and rating or whatever constraints. They could have seen even more horrendous terror they we know nothing of.

So I was just now looking at the "midquels" page on tv tropes, and I suddenly got to thinking---what if they had made a midquel of them traveling to the valley together, instead of the sequels? Similar to what they've done with disney films, it would add to the story, and still keep the original happy ending. Sounds good so far, huh?

But...it would likely be lighter and softer then the actual film itself...and might not portray their journey to the valley as the original did.

Yet it's such an intriguing idea...I'd like to know your thoughts on it.

[jansenov]

Expanding the plot of the first film? Could be a double-edged sword. The first film, its shortness notwithstanding, has a well-rounded story that works on its own. Of course, expanding it with the missing scenes would have made the film better, but those scenes fit so well into it only because the whole uncut version was a vision of one artist, Don Bluth in this case. A midquel would only work if its author could reliably replicate the spirit of Don Bluth's film, or if it was made by Don Bluth himself. That being said, a lot can be added to the plot of the original, and I would be delighted if such a film were made.

[Malte279]

I believe that generally there could well be some good plots throughout the time frame of the first movie which could be told. However, I believe it is rather unlikely that such an attempte would be undertaken, not only because of the probability that there will be no further LBT movies at all, but also because the plot writers of LBT have a somewhat limited range of options to begin with; trying to make prequels to the sequels within the time frame of the first movie would cut these options further. More likely than not the result would be plots in conflict with the plot of the original movie or plots which many would see as an old story told before (young hungry dinosaurs looking for the Great Valley).
Personally I always regretted the oasis scene from the book didn't make it into the movie. All by itself it would likely be too short a story though.
There may be interesting plots about how Ducky and Petrie got to where they met the others or about what happened to Spike's parents.
If there was need to involve sequel stuff too the more detailed account of the "Pterano incident" too would be interesting.
Nevertheless I fear that it would be very tricky for the movie makers to develop imaginative plots that would also be long enough to last for some 20 minutes or so without coming across as artificially drawn out to fill a required timeframe.

[Bruton the Iguanodon]

In the original film, they were separated from their parents, and lost and alone in a big harsh world filled with horrors beyond all imagination up until they found each other...so they could be constantly terrified together.

Well, I, for one, think that being terrified together is better then being terrified alone!  

We only saw a little over an hour's worth of their hardships, so knows what else they encountered other than the orignial Sharptooth, the spiney critter, and the Pachys.

I'm greatful the spiney critter (it's called a dimetron) even made it into the final cut. I'd give anything to know what else they encountered, as long as there were no big-lipped alligators    (one thing is for sure---whatever they encountered in the original couldn't possibly compare to what we saw during "Imaginary Friends"...seriously, PEtrie's imaginary sharptooth is scarier then the real thing  

[Dr. Curzon]

^ Really? As in scary scary, or super kiddy scary?

[Bruton the Iguanodon]

I mean as in freaky as heck scary---like the big lipped gator!

[rKrizik]

That certainly is an intriguing thought. I had wondered before, as well, exactly how much time it took Littlefoot and his friends to get to the Great Valley - and not to mention what other obstacles they must have faced during their journey.
I've always sort of looked at it from a "cut-and-paste" perspective, I guess you could say. That anything and everything we didn't see in the film is, maybe purposefully, left to our imagination and that it's up to the viewers to fill in the blanks. In my opinion, it really could be taken many different ways...
For instance, as far as behind-the-scenes scenarios that might have happened to Littlefoot and his friends: how would Don Bluth have created the additional parts of the story? How would fans/viewers have created it in their minds? Or how would todays' filmmakers tell that untold part of the story?
There's so much to consider, which makes it such a compelling topic.
I'm going to have to share the others' opinions though, in that it really would be a "double-edged" sword to actually try and create a prequel/midquel. I doubt it would ever be done, but it still would be interesting if was carried out. Technically, it really could be done - not just done, but done well - it's just sadly unlikely because of the way that people tend to make prequels/sequels. I imagine, that if a Land Before Time movie was made that told about the other dangers they faced while traveling to the Great Valley, it might end up being a watered-down version of the other sequels and wouldn't have the same feeling that the first movie had.
If anything, one interesting way to get a look into the unseen dangers - at least, a version of them - would be if someone would write a good, believable story about Littlefoot and his friends' adventures in the Mysterious Beyond.
In fact maybe there already exists such a story; I don't know. (It's been a while since I last browsed the LBT section of FanFiction.net, which seems to be where most LBT fanfiction is found.)