Nano Reviews the Land Before Time Fourteenology

[Nanotyrannus]

Alright, I'm going to jump right in because I know this isn't a very popular opinion: I think The Great Day of the Flyers is a marked improvement over the last movie and actually stands out as one of the better sequels, but not because it's dark and a breath of fresh air like VII or because it's all-around solid and thematically strong like IV - I think it gets by simply for being endearing.



The story by itself is not very good. Petrie is ostracized by his siblings for not being able to coordinate with them for a rite of passage for his species and befriends a friendly amnesiac who helps him train for a few minutes. Only for him to say " all of that" at the last minute and freestyle the whole ritual in a way that wins over the judges and the Great Valley at large. The sub-plot of Cera also feeling ostracized (though not nearly as severely) by her parents after she gets a new sister isn't too much better; the bulk of it is of Topps and Tria fawning over their new baby, Cera feeling ignored and the baby running around and making noises. All of this, combined with a 10-minute long scene of the friendly amnesiac sleep-walking (yes, really) followed by a scene of that character participating in another phoned-in trip to the Mysterious Beyond with a sharptooth chase, should be a recipe for something very bland and perhaps even annoying, but, surprisingly, I think it is executed decently (past those two egregious and frankly really boring and played-out scenes), largely thanks to the portrayal of what was ultimately the last movie's killing blow.

But, before that, I would like to mention that the humor is pretty decent in places - most of it is tied to the friendly amnesiac character, Guido. Quite possibly the highlight of the movie is a short scene of him interacting with Mr. Clubtail. The songs are also unusually strong: 'One of a Kind' is a quaint, fun song, 'Things Change' has a great first half and an alright second half and 'Flip, Flap and Fly' isn't great but is still pretty nice.



In a lot of ways, many the characters aren't too different from how they usually are in the sequels. Littlefoot is a nicey-boy (that will be the last time I describe him as such here because the next two movies go in two very, uh, unique directions with his character), Ducky is a doormat who says "yep yep yep" and Spike is a mouth with legs. But there are two interesting standouts from the Gang of Five: Petrie and Cera. I will get Petrie out of the way first because I don't think he is quite as interesting, which might be a surprise in a movie dedicated to him: the movie doesn't actually play up him being a nervous wreck too much outside of a scene of him being afraid of clouds, for one refreshing thing (he even handles being chased by a sharptooth pretty well, I'd say). His primary conflict is his lack of ability to cooperate with his siblings - he is easily distracted, he doesn't like flying through clouds and, according to him, he struggles in the wind. After Guido trains him, he improves, only for him to throw everything away after he is told to just be himself: depending on whether or not you like the sequels' definition of "Petrie", this may or may not be a bad thing (I, for one, actually prefer Petrie's portrayal in most of the sequels over how he was portrayed in the first movie, so I'm not bothered). But enough of the flyer whose day is great, I think the standout character is one of the characters who has suffered the most in the Grosvenor sequels: Cera. Though she is still prideful ("The best threehorn in the valley is me!) and a little bit mean, for the first time in a long, long time, she shows a decent level of depth; when she isn't stressing over her new baby sister, she isn't all that harsh (she has one or two snide remarks, but that's really it), and her situation is one that is sure to be relatable for a lot of kids. Even when she is raging over her parents ignoring her in favor of the new baby, she is a lot more agreeable than in the last movie - a great example of this is her unintentionally hurting Ducky a little bit while venting to her friends and profusely apologizing. And, though she doesn't particularly like being shunned by her parents, it is made clear that she still loves her baby sister. On the note of Cera, how Topps is portrayed might just be one of the most interesting things about the movie - for the first time in the entire series, he isn't a one-note grumpy jerk, and his role in the movie is as a doting father to his new daughter, Tricia; he doesn't stray too much from this outside of a few scenes where he is annoyed by Guido, but still, he isn't just a boring ball of racism and anger! Oh, and Tria's still here; she isn't too different from last time, but there is a weird scene of her goading Topps into hurling himself off of a ledge (I make it sound worse than it actually is).

There are two new characters worth mentioning. First up is Guido, a weirdly-designed Microraptor who appeared in the Great Valley day without any clue who he is, what he is or where he came from. Though the lack of explanation for any of the questions he raises is a little frustrating (chances are the canon explanation is nothing like what I was aiming for with one of the abandoned roleplays over on the wiki), he is a surprisingly fun character; he isn't annoying, he is likable enough and a decent chunk of his verbal humor is successful. Tricia, being a little baby, is not as great; she isn't nearly as annoying as Dana or Dinah (she is a lot quieter, a lot less abrasive and, because she is substantially younger, more endearing) but there's still not much to her besides her being a baby.

If the sharptooth weren't a Spinosaurus and if Nate and I didn't give him the pet name 'Sailback Jack', I probably wouldn't even bring him up because he's yet another unremarkable sharptooth, and one who tastes defeat in a downright pitiful way at that.



So, animation; I don't think it's as good as that of VII through X and it relies quite a bit on miserable-looking CGI, but it isn't as aggressively unappealing as in XI. The art is similar to the other non-XI post-art shift movies, albeit with duller colors than usual and much less impressive backgrounds.



All in all, I didn't think this was half-bad; about on par with III, which translates to a 5.5/10 in my book. Surely, the next movie will shine even brighter than this one!

• Gondwana is reassembling; the movie takes place somewhere in East Africa.
• The term "Mysterious Beyond' is, unfortunately, back.
• The pterosaurs were cartoony in their movements as early as the first movie so I won't fault them there; the other creatures come off as a lot more solid and well-crafted than last time, even if the colors are a little duller.
• Littlefoot hasn't paid too much attention to the Great Valley's bird population, and he either doesn't remember or has never seen Ichy.
• Mr. Clubtail's bopper scene is holy
• "Petrie, I can't even chew!" realistically, none of the main characters but Ducky should be able to chew.
• The "new addition" exchange is another good moment.
• Petrie's siblings are one-note jerks; Guido innocently insulting them is cute, it would have been funnier if the flyer family didn't burst into laughter.
• "Mrs. Tubehead" sounds like the name of a Parasaurolophus character.
• Cera is getting heavier, her charging is enough to cause small earthquakes.
  
  They've built up Cera being upset a lot better than in the last movie; at the very least, she's hurting Ducky unintentionally and not as some weird targeted violence like in the last movie.
• seeing the worm in the leaf stirs some ancient, primal instinct in Guido, look at his expression when he first lays eyes on it
• for reference, Guido starts sleepwalking at around 43:55 minutes in.
• "Hey! How'd he do that?" How'd he do what??
• Who left that giant field of fire and brimstone in the Great Valley?
• Ten minutes! Ten minutes! (context: that's how long the sleep-walking scene is)
• It took them six whole years to use Spinosaurus in the series following the release of Jurassic Park III.
• Ducky says "what is that thing?" when she sees him and Cera doesn't know what it is either - they've never seen a Spinosaurus before.
• "Those rocks won't stop him for long!" You're overestimating him, Littlefoot, he doesn't know how to go backwards.
• Alright, the scene was reason for there to be a threat of Petrie missing the Great Day of the Flyers, but still, that was a lot of time dedicated to belating Petrie.
• What is it with babies being distracted by dragonflies in this series?
• Topps and Tria are awoken by Tricia's cries even though they were awake during the song
• the proper climax of Petrie saving Guido saving Tricia is better than the random sharptooth scene.
  
  Also, more credit to the sleepwalking scene; I guess it sets up Guido being able to glide...
• Apparently Petrie's act of defiance has completely changed the Great Day of the Flyers.
• "Many changes had occurred on this day of changes." REALLY!>!?!?!?!?!?@>?!>@?!?!>@?!?!?>@!?@!!#11111

And that's that; up next is... something else, I'll tell you that much. Until then, stay frosty and remember: if you see a weird, teal, feathery thing sleepwalking outside your window, don't wake it up.

[LittleDas75]

I just wanna say good luck on keeping your sanity for the next one. I may love XIII but I see why it would make someone angry.

[Sneak]

C'mon, XIII is not so horrific so anybody would lose their sanity. XD

[Nanotyrannus]

C'mon, XIII is not so horrific so anybody would lose their sanity. XD

Who knows, maybe there's someone out there who did snap in the face of the yellowbellies' antics...

[Nanotyrannus]

 


I want to preface by saying that this is not the worst thing I've ever seen. I'm inclined to say that I've seen worse - Ice Age: Collision Course, a few episodes of Jurassic Fight Club, Clash of the Dinosaurs as a whole, Dingo Pictures' PlayStation 2 classic Dinosaur Adventure - but that doesn't mean that this isn't a frothing pile of Apatosaurus feces.



I'm going to start off by giving a list of the things I liked, or at least didn't strongly dislike:

• Two of the songs aren't actually bad: "Yellow Belly Bounce" is catchy with a nice beat and instrumentals and "How Do You Know?", though it has weak lyrics and is generally forgettable, at least sounds nice and has decent-enough messages of listening to your gut and understanding that not everyone sees the world in the same way as you do (that are bogged down by how the movie itself handles these messages).
• The very opening of Grandma narrowly avoiding death and Littlefoot having a nightmare over what could have happened is actually pretty decent, and a strong way to set up the story.
• The animation and art are generally not terrible - they dip into TV series quality every once in a while, but it's generally only a little worse than in XII, and there are ever-so-brief moments where the animation quality and fluidity soar.
• One joke: Cera baiting Littlefoot into listening to her, all while she has this weird seductive look on her face, and screaming "don't ever wake me up again!". Littlefoot's response to this is particularly priceless

Alright, positives out of the way, let's get to the story.



Alright, stop me if you've heard this one before: the main characters are thrust into a situation where A.) they must find a valley filled with food where they are stalked by sharpteeth that are seemingly but not actually dead, B.) where they go past a rock that looks like a certain species, C.) have a false alarm where they think they've found the valley before the "valley" is ruthlessly devoured and they realize it isn't the valley, D.) they end up in a dangerous situation where their group is split up and E.) they defeat the sharpteeth once and for all by forcing them off of a cliff before they find the valley. Because you have probably picked up on what the plot is copying by now, I will not even elaborate because I trust you, the reader, much more than those behind this movie trusted their audience. The new elements are generally very poor; in particular, the attempts at working the idea of "wisdoms" (survival knowledge passed from a guardian to a child) into the story are clumsy and irritating and, past the above example, the comedy ranges from ineffective to downright noxious. Even a could-have-been decent message is undermined by the characters that are used to convey it (they'll be described further down) being, er, the way they are; and, well, the less said about the sharptooth scenes, the better, more on them later as well. The song 'Say So' is on par with 'Imaginary Friend' in terms of sheer dreadfulness.



Most of the returning characters, including all of the members of Littlefoot's posse but the longneck himself, are their typical one-dimensional Grosvenor selves (even though this isn't a Grosvenor TLBT movie, their characterizations regrettably live on), though run through a mild stupidity filter. However, Littlefoot himself is an exception: on edge after nearly killing his grandmother, his main role in the movie is to spew "wisdoms" at other characters and patronize a flock of creatures that have existed without him just fine, which is annoying and frankly kind of frustrating. However, much more oddly and disturbingly is how his attitude during the two sharptooth scenes; in the first instance, he and his friends incapacitate them by burying them alive with rocks without giving them any chance to escape, and, after their threat to him, his friends and his pastel leeches has been nullified, he keeps crushing them under rocks before running off once they have been completely buried. Though this is something by itself, the climax offers a much better look at his feelings towards sharpteeth in this movie; after forcing the sharpteeth, who were reduced to quivering, terrified shells of themselves before the fact, off of a cliff with his new legion of abominations, instead of simply turning around and checking on everyone, he looks down and makes a joke about their deaths: "what do you know? They're still in a group!" Seeing Littlefoot being so callous after all of these sequels; especially towards creatures that are just animals at the end of the day, and especially if you still think that V's forgotten efforts to humanize sharpteeth hold water; is extremely off-putting, and makes it even harder to like him than just him being annoying did.

I don't think there's anything to say about the yellowbellies that hasn't been said before: they're very, very annoying, they make obnoxious noises, they have unappealing and inaccurate designs (they're supposed to be Beipiaosaurus but they look like bloated dodos with hands) and they aren't funny in any way. They don't even get being stupid right; at least 70% of their "stupidity" is just them forgetting things and failing to pay attention to things being said right in front of their bulbous faces. Foobie is probably the most tolerable of all of them and Doofah is effortlessly the worst character in the entire franchise. At the very least, I will admit that I see some of their appeal, especially thanks to their song - they are beings of pure hedonism that live their whole lives dancing, singing, sleeping and eating that don't ever bother to think of the future - not that I think that they're redeemable myself, but I see where some can like them.

If not for the reasons mentioned above while describing Littlefoot, the sharpteeth would be no more or less remarkable than the Tyrannosaurus trio from X or the raptors from XI; they're slow, they're stupid and they're generally lame. The only way they stand out among the rest is that, because of the aforementioned reasons, they are sympathetic, and easily the most empathetic characters in the movie - heck, I have a hunch that even the animators/artists thought this way, with some of the expressions they gave the poor things. (Fig. A, Fig. B and Fig. C - why yes, the image titles are alluding to pet names I've given the things)



Speaking of the art and animation, though I have said before that it isn't particularly bad, it is yet another downgrade from the previous movie. The animation looks like a hybrid between XII and some of the more competently-animated episodes of the TV series; it's riddled with coloring errors and movements are choppier and a little jankier than last time. The art is also a bit of a downgrade; the colors are duller than usual, the backgrounds are either TV series-looking Great Valley scenery or boring, bland deserts and none of the new designs look good - the sharpteeth in particular look like animated versions of the "Baryonyx" that grace Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (given that this movie came out almost 11 years before that movie, maybe the barys there are supposed to be hyper-realistic renditions of the ones here... hmmm).



A lot of people say that this is the worst of the Land Before Time sequels, and I wholeheartedly agree. Though I don't think it's as completely bottom-of-the-barrel-of-media bad as I made it out to be the last couple times I watched it, I still don't think it deserves anything higher than a 1.5/10.

The next movie is a spinoff of the TV series that was made to cash in on Jurassic World years after the series ended with a whimper, great...

• have a dumb theory that I made up in a few minutes without much rhyme or reason: TWoF takes place after the TV series, Red Claw was defeated offscreen (either in an epic battle that was too good for the crappy show or by hunger after being abandoned by Screech and Thud), Chomper and Ruby have returned to the Mysterious Beyond and everyone has gotten even flatter and more stale. I know that makes Journey of the Brave take place before this movie, bear with me.
  
  Either way, come on come on and dance.
• Meanwhile, in eastern Russia...
• Cera sounds a little different; higher-pitched and a little more nasally.
• apparently climbing things is a problem when you're a threehorn; are Dana and Dinah canon?
• This series is founded in the school of disobeying your parents, but here we have an entire movie of espousing the opposite mindset.
• the buildup to Loofah is a lot swifter than Guido's buildup was, but the creatures that are built up are infinitely more sinister in this case.
• Yellowberries are obligate frugivores and have negative-digit IQs.
• Well, the yellowbellies sure are good at... uh... moving.
• Loofah and Doofah had to have turned around after they climbed up to this plateau, so that joke's burnt. (context: them mistaking the Great Valley for the Mysterious Beyond - they had to have climbed in the direction facing the Mysterious Beyond after climbing their little plateau from the Great Valley, so they had to have turned back in the direction they just came from to look back at the Great Valley so they could mistake it for the Mysterious Beyond)
• being taught things and learning in general is an alien concept to yellowbellies
• mental warfare: give the yellowbellies instructions on how to breathe, let them start suffocating when they forget them and leave them to die from oxygen deprivation
• The true heroes of the movie enter the picture through Loofah's stupidity.
• You know, it's really barren out here; are the drought conditions returning?
• I want to say that they're not even bothering to run, but holy hell, (the sharpteeth are) incapacitated to the point where they can't even escape!
• and, when they are absolutely no threat, Littlefoot completely buries them alive to the sound of "WOW! HE DID THE HEROIC DEED!" music.
• disguising yourself as a bush should not be anything resembling a good survival strategy; unless you smell like a bush, anyway, maybe the yellowbellies smell like bushes.
• Spike bonding with Foobie is weirdly sweet; now that I think about it, was the rationale behind introducing the yellowbellies just to have characters that are generally stupider than Spike?
• "The yellowbellies got along just fine before they met us." Cera absolutely trashes the plot of the entire movie; in a perfect world, the movie ends there.
• This is the second time they've used that one specific audio clip of Doofah saying "Stay in a group. Sounds like fun!"
• Maybe the yellowbellies would have been less annoying if they were way more basal tetrapods and were to the dinosaurs what cattle or other livestock are to people - I say this as the kids wrangle the yellowbellies.
• The world definitely seems way more barren than usual; of all of the Grosvenor-and-onward sequels to respect the apocalyptic conditions of the original movie...
• The most advanced plants that exist out here are weeds and short grasses.
• they reuse stock tree/mountain backgrounds from the TV series/the Great Valley earlier in the movie; it's sparse enough tree cover to not really deflate the drought idea
• Understanding that different people perceive everything in different ways isn't a bad message, but maybe they shouldn't have conveyed the new world Littlefoot is being shown with a bunch of complete boofballs.
• Someone got paid to smear this weird, terrible-looking dot effect all over these otherwise-passable backgrounds.
• Real talk: with how slow the yellowbellies are, it's astounding that (the sharpteeth) can't catch them.
• These are regular post-art shift trashy lame sharpteeth (refer to Waalek (err, this wonderful fellow  ) letting Littlefoot run under his legs), but they're easy to root for because of how the protagonists are portrayed.
• Berry Valley was RIGHT OVER THERE
  
  edit: It looks tiny; a fraction the size of the Great Valley; apparently one having Spike-tier intelligence is makes them worthy of being the Wise One.
• There's a yellowbelly in the background with a thick, goofy British accent going "Oh-ho! It's berry time! Berry time! Ooooohh!"
• yes, leave them, I hope the door doesn't slam them on the way out... I hope the Indominus Rex charges in and slaughters the lot of them instead
• No, Littlefoot, they didn't have wisdoms; they had dumdoms.
• Ducky admits that she and the others have trouble staying in the Great Valley; yeah, they're never going to improve on that.

Well, that sure was a thing.

With how I chose to describe Journey of the Brave at the end of the review, I'll leave you to decide whether or not I'm going to be keen on it - regardless, there's one movie left to cover and one review left to mirror here. Stay tuned.

[LittleDas75]

Whatever you think about this film it's still better than The Last Jedi because at least this film didn't ruin any pre established characters in the most rage inducing way possible 

[Nanotyrannus]

I have no strong feelings on Star Wars either way because I haven't watched any of the movies 

Alright, that side, this is the grand finale of the review series; maybe Journey of the Brave will win me over in a way most of the other sequels didn't, who knows.


Eight years after the release of XIII came a surprise; The Land Before Time: Journey of the Brave, a new entry to the series that... you know what, I'm going to keep being blunt, it's a cheap Jurassic World cash-in, nothing more and nothing less. Nothing is going to come after this. But, how does this stand as the belated final entry in the series?



The story has a pretty decent, though derivative premise; Littlefoot's father, Bron, is thrown into peril, and Littlefoot sets off to save him alongside his... unusually begrudging friends; friends that he struggles to keep in check before he snaps and decides to leave them. It feels like something of a post-art shift rendition of Journey through the Mists, with the drive to save a family member, some similar rocky desert aesthetic in places and scenes taking place in a cave where Littlefoot only has a friendly, cool character to bounce off of. At the same time, a key story beat - Littlefoot splitting from his friends after an argument between him and Cera - is lifted directly from the first movie. The execution of the rehashed ideas is mixed; outside of a few passable but by no means great scenes involving some very unique sharpteeth, it isn't all that great, the movie has a heaping helping of scenes that contribute to absolutely nothing (cough cough the diggers cough cough) and there are some very stupid and annoying scenes in the first half of the movie, but the pacing is decent, and a few of the more emotional scenes are decent - particularly those conveyed by the new character Etta, like her retelling of how Bron was endangered and her guiding Littlefoot to him at the Fire Mountain. The songs are split right down the middle - you have the terrible 'Hot and Stinky', the middling 'Today's the Day', the okay 'Better Off Alone' (which comes off as a better version of 'On Your Own' from VI, jeez even the songs are recycled) and the great 'Look for the Light'.



Once again, I feel inclined to outright ignore Cera, Ducky, Petrie and Spike, because they are as bland as usual in Journey of the Brave - with an extra layer of them being bizarrely disinterested in saving Bron, who is frankly a blank slate - but Littlefoot, surprisingly, is anything but. Whereas most of the sequels before now have played up his positive traits; his kindness and his braveness; this one actually goes in the direction of showing him more like how he was in the first movie by juxtaposing those traits with his flaws (which, if I recall correctly, only really reared their heads in the first movie!) of being determined to the point of exhausting and enraging his friends and even being a little quick-tempered - his friends are slowing him down while he's on a mission to save his father, can you really blame him? All in all, Littlefoot's portrayal is a hightlight of the movie and an unbelievably refreshing change of pace from him being a bland-as-sand nicey-boy in most of the other sequels and especially welcome in lieu of his weird, annoying psychopath portrayal in the last movie. As for the new voice actors for established characters, they generally work: the narrator does a good job, Littlefoot's new voice fits the character well and Daddy Topps' new voice actor is decent, but I don't like Grandpa's new VA that much.

Also, Chomper and Ruby are here. They're literally just there to establish continuity with the garbage TV series. The world would be a better place if they weren't in the movie, but at least Chomper's voice actor does a really good job in his role.

The new characters are two in number and opposites in terms of quality. On one hand, Etta is a really fun new character with a great song, a great voice, some smirk-worthy jokes and some decent solemn moments. On the other hand, Wild Arms is kind of like a less annoying yellowbelly; he isn't really all that funny (his best scene, if you can even call it that, is him flaunting his superior grace and agility), but he isn't extremely annoying, and his biggest flaw is really that he comes off as really cold in a few scenes, most notably when Littlefoot asks him to help him find his father. As for the sharpteeth, the the featherheads are actually pretty cool; on the other hand, the Carnotaurus is overhyped and kind of lame, the only thing going for it is its design and blatantly Jurassic Park-ripped sound effects.



The animation has, once again, dipped in quality; it is a whole lot choppier than in the previous movies, and the movements are often really weird-looking. Same deal with the art; the character art in particular looks messier and less solid than usual. The backgrounds are good-looking, though, and convey a nice southwestern United States desert aesthetic. At the very least, the sharptooth designs are really strong - they are decent stylizations of Carnotaurus and Yutyrannus (wait, what do you mean the featherheads are supposed to be Allosaurus!?).



What score I would give the movie boiled down to one question: did I think this was better than, worse than or on par with The Land Before Time VIII: The Big Freeze? As I write this, and with my answer to this question in mind, my score is identical to that of that movie: a 5/10. It's better to end on a mediocre note than an abysmal note, I guess.

So, that is The Land Before Time fourteenology; honestly, I feel like it peaked at Journey through the Mists, lost its soul with The Mysterious Island, tried to end with The Great Longneck Migration and veered off into a pile of nothing after the fact. If I return to the series, it will probably only be to the first four movies - maybe VII and XII, too.

The series lost its way with each passing day. It went too far and threw everything away.

• (in response to how I closed the XIII review) Alright, cynicism aside, the next movie is the only TLBT movie that I actually anticipated; the copy I have is the same one I picked up at Walmart on the day of its release.
• Meanwhile, on Victoria Island in Arctic Canada...
• barely a minute in and Smasher (=the gray T. rex from X) gets destroyed by a Stegosaurus, tearing apart his family and presumably leaving a bunch of baby Tyrannosaurus orphaned
• Ducky has new siblings on the way; I guess Mama Swimmer's Stegosaurus significant other is still around.
  
  The song is a decent way of reintroducing all of the characters.
• So, uh... why are these baby saurolophi here in the first place, other than to be cute?
• It feels... wrong to not hear Kenneth Mars' voice come out of Grandpa.
• A new term has been invented! "Ice" (10+ XP for Grandma Longneck)
• What is it with creatures in this world and not wanting to help dinosaurs out of certain death?
• Bron is strong, yes, but not wise.
• the voice actors that have been retained from the older sequels sound pretty much exactly like they did in XII.
• Petrie lives in a tree, apparently; Littlefoot point-blank says that Petrie is scared of everything.
• For once, Spike eating actually leads to good things happening... okay, yes, the good thing is in the form of stinkweed so noxious that it makes Ducky's nostrils vanish, but still.
• For once, the kids decide to exploit sharpteeth's strong senses of smell.
• Extensively feathered large theropods? In my Universal dinosaur movie!?
• so, the kids stop to drink, and then Spike stupidly starts eating his own cloak, and then Littlefoot falls in because of Spike's stupidity and the rest of the kids' brains turn to goo and make them think that Littlefoot is intentionally swimming in the pond
• Fast-acting water; the yutyrannuses immediately smell the kids after they start swimming.
• there is a strange-looking panning shot that uses CGI where the gang barely even change perspective even though the shot itself does
• I'm not going to fault the featherheads because A.) that's a pretty steep slope and B.) I don't think the pale one could have seen the rope trick coming.
• they're honestly a little scarier than usual sequel sharpteeth for as weird as their designs are in places; at the same time, the kids seem to be getting sharptooth-handling down to a science.
• Ruby sounds, and kind of reads as, younger here than she did in he TV series.
• The young ones have done way worse, Topps.
• the scene of Littlefoot looking out at the fire mountain is really good, as short as it is.
• "Chomper only eats bugs!" for now, Ruby... for now...
• 'On Your Own 2: The Angrying"
• Cera is still the best singer of the Gang of Five.
• Post-post-art shift Compsognathus - they are frugivores, they're called "diggers" because they live in burrows.
• Fiddles are things in this world.
• alright, there's something mildly amusing about seeing Petrie in a position of power, but this has nothing to do with anything
• No, the cute end gag of the diggers coronating a bewildered Parasaurolophus immediately after Petrie leaves doesn't make up for all of that wasted time.
• Etta's retelling of the volcano incident is a lot better than Wild Arms'; it's a lot more dramatic and not tainted by attempts to be funny.
• "That's my dad. He wouldn't leave anyone behind." Except you, Littlefoot.
• I think this is the only time that they've gotten a musical artist on board for a movie and given them room to flex their singing muscles; suffice to say that Reba is flexing, the song is really good.
• Bovus (the horned sharptooth, one last pet name for the road) barely does anything, why do people think he's so competent and one of the ultimate sharpteeth?
• Littlefoot and Etta are the only interesting characters here; everyone else is either one-note or kind of annoying.
• okay, Bovus is back; he threatens to be a threat for a few seconds
  
  ...because of Wild Arms, he almost gets everyone killed, and they're only saved by some lazy rainbowfaces.
• It wouldn't have made a difference if Topps, Grandpa and the others didn't follow.
• I would feel insulted if I were compared to Bron.
• well that ended suddenly.
  
  Apparently Littlefoot and his friends will always be together until the end of their days, even though Chomper and Ruby are going to leave once Red Claw is out of the picture...
• There were three animation studios behind this, and I don't think they're the same ones behind the other sequels: Animation Studio Co., Brilliant Animation Studios and Tycoon Animation.

Before I cap this off, I'll provide some average scores that paint how I ultimately feel about the series as a whole:

The first four movies (1 - 4): 6.25/10

The first three sequels (2 - 4): 5.3/10

The pre-art shift sequels (2 - 6): 4.8/10

The later sequels (5 - JotB): 3.9/10

The post-art shift sequels (7 - JotB): 3.8/10

The sequels in general (2 - JotB): 4.2/10

The series as a whole (1 - JotB): 4.5/10

I think the series is bad as a whole (I must stress that I don't think it's terrible as a whole by any means; it's not that far from being middling in my book) but I still consider myself a fan; I'm sure that says something about me, but I'm not quite sure what.

Anyway, that's that - hopefully you all enjoyed this series of reviews, and if you didn't, hopefully I at least brought up a few interesting things in my notes. Goodbye for now 

[Sneak]

End of the journey.
Thank you for extended review of each movie!