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Sequels losing their 'feel'

Sharptooh #436

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I've noticed this ever since I watched LBT XI (the Tinysaur one). The quality of the movies are decreasing. Though the original is undisputedly the best, some of the sequels were not bad. However, in the recent movies, we've had a lack of:

- More interesting/entertaining characters, save Tricia.

- Competent antagonists

- Engaging songs and soundtracks

-Characters seem a little too kiddish and...I don't know...more 5 year old oriented (no offense to 5 year olds at all =P). Though the main personalities are the same throughout, they seem...different in a way I can't describe.

In the sequels 1-9, the sharpteeth seemed dangerous enough, and characters like Ozzy and Pterano provided a different sort of villain.

The tenth movie was somehow different. I approve of it only because of the Saurosuchus, Littlefoot's Dad, new soundtrack, the three-sharpteeth scene, and 'Bestest Friends'.

That all changed with 11. I hated the idea of 'Tinysaurs' straight away. Though TLBT had lots of plot inaccuracies in the past, this was by far the worst. They didn't even exist, and its like the creators just made them up because they ran out of ideas.

12 was OK. Guido was rather imaginative, so was Tricia and her relationship to Cera. IMO, the Mysterious Beyond scene should have been lengthened, with Guido getting lost in the Mysterious Beyond, and Littlefoot and his friends would have to brave dangers to save him. Spinosaurus was a little wimpish but cool just the same. The songs...they disgrace LBT.

Do't even mention the 13th movie! Talk about being unlucky! The idea of 'wisdoms' seemed like the creators were once again running out of plot ideas. The yellow belly guys were not well thought out, and generally, I disliked them. Too 'kiddish' and Barney like. =P The songs were as bad as the ones in the 12th movie, and the sharpteeth were the worst yet.

The TV series was somewhat an improvement. Bringing Chomper to stay at the valley is somewhat unimaginative, like the movie maker wanted a simple reason for him being back. Ruby was well thought out. I don't like the idea of Red Claw that much.

What is your opinion? Are the sequels deproving, better, or staying as they should be?






Mumbling

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My opinion is that you're right, but at the same time we shouldn't look at lbt in general. I know that it looks like it's more focused on children, well it probably should be. If I see my little brothers watching TV these days I often wonder if they have nothing better to do. The series playing on TV are rather useless and silly. I won't mention any examples since I know people like them as well, but I think they're really childish to what I'm used to.

As a kid I could only watch stuff like scooby doo and tom and jerry... After that I could sometimes watch pokemon. So now and then we watched a movie like lbt or something disney related. I guess children these days just want to see different things, which is why lbt(and all other cool stuff) changes.


DarkHououmon

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I used to like the idea of LBT songs, but around the 6th movie it just got ridiculous, in my opinion. Nowadays I refuse to listen to any LBT song except maybe If We Hold On Together. When I watched the LBT episodes on my computer, I would fastfoward past the songs.

As for the sharpteeth, I did notice they were becoming less threatening. It was around the 6th movie that sharpteeth were started to be portrayed as dumb and not very intelligent, which is quite different than how we see them in earlier movies (such as the LBT 5 sharptooth lifting the rock to expose the kids and jumping over a gorge when the log was knocked down).

I think Redclaw was a general improvement as far as sharpteeth are concerned. He seems to be portrayed with a sense of intelligence that we don't see in other sharpteeth of late movies, in my opinion. I do like Redclaw, although I don't regard him as a villain. Redclaw doesn't seem to have any real motivation apparent in the show other than hunting, which is a basic, sharptooth instinct, not a villainous act. I used to think he was after Ruby and Chomper, but now I'm not so sure; I think the only reason he chases them is because he is hungry, not because he holds any personal grudge against them. Redclaw, far as I know, has no real plot to do anything other than hunt, which is, again, normal for a sharptooth.

I did like the idea of Chomper being in the Great Valley, although they never do explain why he ended up there. I would think that there would have been a lot of opposition and some resentment against Chomper due to the fact he's a sharptooth. Mr. Threehorn himself would definitely not have approved of Chomper living there. I think there was a couple conflicts that occurred in the series as a direct result of Chomper being a sharptooth, but not as much as I would have expected.

As for Ruby, I'm not sure what I think of her. I don't hate her, but she feels more like a background character that was just stuck with the gang with little to no explaination and that we just have to accept she's "one of the gang" now. I don't think I got used to Ruby being a part of the gang. No offense or anything.

From what I've seen, the tinysauruses were actually based on a real dinosaur. They were likely modelled after Mussasaurus, which was a sauropod I believe, or a relative of a sauropod. The problem is, though, that although the Mussasaurus skeleton is tiny (about rat sized, which is about how big the tinysauruses were), this was just a juvenile I think; the fully grown adults would probably have been a decent sized dinosaur, perhaps the size of Hyp's kind.

So while there is some truth to the tinysauruses, it's still inaccurate. I would say that they are all just juveniles that got lost from their parents, but Big Daddy kills this theory, as he is actually an adult, unless he happens to be a child with a very deep voice.


Noname

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The series seems to be getting more... "homogenized" as time goes on, for all of the reasons that both of you have said. Yes, the predators are getting to be dumber, and the plots more... well... simplistic (i.e. go to one place, do something there, go back.) Still, there are a few good developments Tria and Tricia, Ruby, Chomper's return to the valley...

The problem is, they aren't developing these to their full potential. For example, we know that Chomper and Ruby moved to the Great Valley... but they never really explained how Chomper met Ruby, how he got off that island, or exactly how he and Ruby got to the valley... we see bits and pieces of their trip to the valley, but we never get a full answer.

Same thing with Tria. We know that Cera was living with her father, but we don't know what happened to Cera's mother... and Redclaw... did he just start terrorizing the areas just outside the valley all of a sudden? There is a real "in medias res" feeling to the TV series... and unless they go back and explain some things in a movie or in another TV episode, that isn't good.


f-22 "raptor" ace

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This is why I think LBT movies should be done by the fans.


DarkHououmon

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I'm not sure if that would be a good idea, if the movies were done by the fans. If the movies were done by the fans, I do see potential of some movies being made that would be believable as LBT movies, but there may be some movies that would be questionable as LBT movies (such as fics that involve a type of war), and other movies that would not fit in LBT at all (such as my Out of the Shadows fanfic). There might also be a lot of conflicting theories and ideas of how one thing would happen or why it would happen. For example, there's, so far, 2 different theories that I heard of as to how Chomper and Ruby met.

But that's just me.


Malte279

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Not really just you Kacie.
We don't have the technical means yet to make an LBT movie, but I would not be surprised if such means were to be available within a relatively short time. But apart from the technical means it can hardly be denied that there is practically no land before time fanfiction which lives up the tradition of the original movie and the early sequels. Almost every fanfiction out there is a crossing over or involves violent excesses and other stuff that doesn't belong into LBT.
We are all very ready to claim that we could do better than the makers of LBT (who I agree have done a poor job with the sequels for a while), but tell fans to write a fanfiction that could seriously be turned into a movie without any crossing overs and non-LBT elements and wait for the responses you will get (if any).


Paradise Bird

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I don't mind LBT I learn how to appreciate different movies.


Belmont2500

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they're deproving especilly with LBT13 which was the crappiest of all like I said on the LBT14 forum they should bring back the feel of the original it would be a HUGE improvment and not to mention it would be pretty nastalgic.
 

 


jedi472

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Quote from: Malte279,Jun 13 2009 on  03:10 PM
Not really just you Kacie.
We don't have the technical means yet to make an LBT movie, but I would not be surprised if such means were to be available within a relatively short time. But apart from the technical means it can hardly be denied that there is practically no land before time fanfiction which lives up the tradition of the original movie and the early sequels. Almost every fanfiction out there is a crossing over or involves violent excesses and other stuff that doesn't belong into LBT.
We are all very ready to claim that we could do better than the makers of LBT (who I agree have done a poor job with the sequels for a while), but tell fans to write a fanfiction that could seriously be turned into a movie without any crossing overs and non-LBT elements and wait for the responses you will get (if any).
Honestly, I kind of agree. I mean, I myself wouldn't mind a crossover film, but I guarantee next to no one would even think of watching it. It's just not going to happen, and even if it did, I doubt anyone would actually put enough effort into it to make it into an interesting film. And while I do agree that violence shouldn't completely dominate any story, I still feel that violence is a great plot motivator and inspires conflicts that can propel stories for a good long time before they lose momentum.

The war stories, mine included, are sort of a mixed bag. While Serris' Twilight Valley is a great read, I feel like there are definitely some out-of-character moments, and it could never really be a film (although it does have a following on tvtropes.org). I just don't feel like the LBT characters, especially the parents and grandparents of the GOF, are really fighters. Yeah, if confronted they'll try to protect their homes, families, and friends, but they don't seem like they could really wage war. That's one of the reasons I included humans in my story, so they wouldn't have to do all the fighting. Still, my story is ridiculous as it is, so I really shouldn't be talking.

By the way, what is a non-LBT element? I know a few exist, like sex, excessive gore, excessive language, and the like, but what else is there?







Daddytops2009

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I agree, I think they ran out of ideas with TLBT 11.


Belmont2500

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they really ran out of ideas making 13, I hope 14 will be much better.
 

 


Alex

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I think the sequels really go "up and down". I thought LBT 7 was unoriginal (there's like, no story hardly). Although, I did like LBT 8, I thought it was a big improvement. My favorite LBT movie is 10. That's well into the sequels. It looked better (can't forget the infamous log that Cera & Topsy were pushing in 9), had Keifer Sutherland (a very successful actor, makes $500,000 an episode working for 24 (which is like the best show ever)), the songs weren't the greastest (but then again, none of them are really that good (Except for Eggs)). So LBT 10 was a big improvement from some of the previous ones. It goes downhill from there, but the point is they were able to produce a very good movie, even though it was 9 movies after the original. I think what happened was, they looked at what they did with 13 and decided to call it quits. But I don't think that should be the end of it, I think they could get the LBT feel back. Just needs some new faces to help breathe the life back into the series. Get rid of Grovesner, find a Littlefoot voice actor that is actually decent, get some fresh writers, etc.


Belmont2500

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If I could I would tell that to universal and I'm sure they would agree with me 100% :smile
 

 


jedi472

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Quote from: Alex,Aug 6 2009 on  02:48 PM
I think the sequels really go "up and down". I thought LBT 7 was unoriginal (there's like, no story hardly). Although, I did like LBT 8, I thought it was a big improvement. My favorite LBT movie is 10. That's well into the sequels. It looked better (can't forget the infamous log that Cera & Topsy were pushing in 9), had Keifer Sutherland (a very successful actor, makes $500,000 an episode working for 24 (which is like the best show ever)), the songs weren't the greastest (but then again, none of them are really that good (Except for Eggs)). So LBT 10 was a big improvement from some of the previous ones. It goes downhill from there, but the point is they were able to produce a very good movie, even though it was 9 movies after the original. I think what happened was, they looked at what they did with 13 and decided to call it quits. But I don't think that should be the end of it, I think they could get the LBT feel back. Just needs some new faces to help breathe the life back into the series. Get rid of Grovesner, find a Littlefoot voice actor that is actually decent, get some fresh writers, etc.
I have to disagree with you about 7. I think it had a pretty cool story to it, sort of like an epic quest or something. I also thought 7 had some pretty compentent antagonists, at least compared to some of the other sequels.


Belmont2500

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Come to think of it I liked 7 too I remember the first time I watched it I loved it of course I was like 7 or 8 at time so yeah but it was good :p
 

 


jedi472

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Seriously though, other than excessive gore, language, and sex, what are non-LBT elements?


NeoGenesis005

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I feel the Vocabulary in the Sequels and Episodes was changed dramatically  For example in the song "Peaceful Valley" they said Dreams now you hear Night Stories.  There were probably other words they use to say back than but I can't remember.


By the way according to what Sharptooth #436 stated everything is practically tru.


Alex

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Well I say I don't like 7, but I do. It was good, I liked Pterano, and it had alot of Ducky. It was a good movie up until the rainbow guys flew up into space. Then it all went down the toilet. Now I say I don't like it.


jedi472

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Quote from: Alex,Aug 6 2009 on  08:47 PM
Well I say I don't like 7, but I do. It was good, I liked Pterano, and it had alot of Ducky. It was a good movie up until the rainbow guys flew up into space. Then it all went down the toilet. Now I say I don't like it.
Ah, now I get it. Yeah, I've noticed some people really hate the idea of the rainbow faces being aliens.