Happily Ever After
Unlike Fergully, I have memories of watching Happily Ever After
as kid. It was sort of special to me because I could only watch it at my friends’ house. That being said there is no power of nostalgia or sentiment clouding this movie for me, this movie is terrible. It’s psychically hurts.
It was made by in 1988, completed in 1990 and released in 1993 by Filmation. It’s been in moratorium since October 25th 1996. It only saw actively for three years. What does that say about the quality of this movie?
Snow White and the Shadow Man
Happily Ever After is a sequel to Snow White in a general sense. It starts with the Evil Queen’s minions partying and celebrating her death. Then the Evil Lord Maliss (too subtle), the Queen’s brother, comes in and is pissed off and plots revenge on Snow White.
Snow White and her nameless prince are on route to invite the dwarves to their wedding. Why didn’t they send an invitation via mail? The Plot says so, damn it. They get attacked by Maliss in dragon form and Snow White gets away but the Prince isn’t so lucky.
Snow White runs into a dark forest and reaches the dwarves’ house but now their cousins live there, the seven Dwarfelles, chick dwarves. They all have have super powers that are based on their names, convenient isn’t it. They take Snow White to Mother Nature at Rainbow Falls (sounds likes something for a Skittles commerial) for help on how to get her Prince back. But Maliss shows up and tells Snow White that if she wants her Prince back to come to his castle in the Realm of Doom (still way too subtle). Hey movie, subverting a stereotype doesn’t really correct it. But whatever, at least Snow White has to do something.
So off they all go. Along the way, they encounter a shadow man who looks like Orko from He-Man, so I’m just going to call him Orko. The Dwarfelles don’t really trust Orko but Snow White figures out that Orko seems to be helping her. Hmmmmmmm, I wonder who Orko could really be, hmmmmmmm, it’s so hard to figure out!
Then Snow White is captured by Maliss. But what’s this, her Prince is there in castle and leads her to some place with creepy statues. Hmmmmm, he is acting lot less bland than he was a the start of the movie, hmmmmmmmmmmmmm, I wonder why that could be?
OH, because it was really Maliss in design, OH geeze, movie, how you tricked me……….
Maliss’ plan is to turn Snow White into stone with a cloak. Remember when they mentioned that Maliss has a cloak that turns this into stone earlier? Neither do I! Anyway the dwarfelles try to save her but fail and get turned to stone all except the inept Thunderella. Orko also tries to help but gets K.Oed. I do like Snow White bitch slapping Maliss but then she gets tied up.
Anyway, Thunderella gets her weather powers under control which gives Snow White the chance to throw the cloak over Maliss. And then every one is better but Orko. However Snow White’s tears or love or some BS save him but what’s this? Orko was really the Prince under Maliss’ spell. OH WHAT A TWIST, I DIDN’T SEE THAT COMING AT ALL! And yeah happy ending.
Sunburn and Scowl
This movie is a mess from start to finish. It doesn’t come across in my little write up but this movie, like the 1939 Gulliver’s Travels, focuses a lot more on the side characters, the Dwarfells and the evil minions, Scowl the Owl and Batso the Bat. Oh, the clever geniuses that thought up those names. Scowl and Batso are very annoying to the point of killing brain cells. They are heavy focused and really add nothing to anything.
Furthermore, I really dislike how bats are portrayed in children’s movies. Bats are awesome creatures who can eat mosquitoes. I know I dissed Batty from Ferngully last week but Batty is a billion times better than Batso. I mean they could have cut Scowl and Batso out but they need stupid goofiness to combat the creepiness.
The Dwarfelles (I die a little each time I type that) were also annoying especially Sunburn. I hated her saying “that really burns me up” over and over and over again and again and again. It was painful.
Snow White and her Prince
Other than the outright goofy characters we have the supposed main characters; Snow White, Mr. Prince “Orko” Shadow Man and Lord Maliss. They are all bland. Prince is more interesting in his cursed state but then it becomes a Beauty and the Beast thing.
Also I want point out that by the Prince helping Snow White at every turn doesn’t it help to subvert the damsel in distress stereotype that they were truing to go for, so this movie just plays into it.
Lord Maliss
Maliss I want to say is interesting because his motive comes from place of love for his sister. But why is he after Snow White? She didn’t kill the queen, wasn’t she like dead when that happened?
Anyway Maliss is just evil and not really delightfully so either. I wished he had done away with Scowl in a quicker fashion than that stupid candle rope thing. I mean he has the cloak, instant death. I really hate Scowl. I hate this movie………. cries
Snow White
Snow White, well she does look like Snow White, that a plus. She is fairly bland, I mean she does tries to defend herself and is nice. It’s not really her fault that she lacks interest.
The movie doesn’t care about her as character, she is a plot point for the side characters. I wished the movie had explored her more as the movie follows her but I think the movie would have rather not, it would rather been about Scowl and Batso, grrr hates.
The Shadow Man a.k.a The Prince a.k.a an Orko Knock-off
I mentioned that the Prince’s Shadow Man form looked liked Orko from He-Man but prior to that I thought the Prince in his regular form looked like something out of He-man. And I was right, Filmation is the studio who did He-Man and this abomination.
The animation is not good. It looks old even for 1988 when it was made. Snow White was clearly rotoscoped which like have said in other posts, looking jarring with clearly non-rotoscope characters exist in the same scene.
Snow White hugs Thunderella
Then were have the songs, which are also mind-numbingly painful. I just point out, NOT ONE OF THE MAIN CHARACTERS GETS A SONG! Scowl gets one as do Thunderella and Mother Nature. Snow White’s voice actress Irene Cara sings the credit song but still, only side characters get the chance to sing.
I also take issue that Thunderella’s song, which is like a hopeful self empowerment and existential song is done BEFORE HER NAME IS GIVEN. I don’t know this character yet so I can’t feel for her through this cheesy song. They are so old and dated sounding it’s insulting to my rotting mind.
Snow White bitch slapping Lord Maliss
I would bet that Happily Ever After’s budget went to hiring the voice talent, which have some heavy hitters but it neglected the animation, writing and everything else. This movie is a massive fail.
And just to insult the viewer more, Scowl gets top billing. I really loath this movie.
