MarzGurl Discusses The Land Before Time VI

(Clips of the movie are shown)

MarzGurl (vo): I'll go ahead and warn you guys ahead of time on this one; The Land Before Time numbers four and five were mediocre at best, but number six just goes right back into not being good. As I take issue with this movie, please be on the lookout for whatever might be considered the major conflict of the movie, or whatever the moral of the story may be for that matter. I can assure you, you're going to be hard pressed to find it. This movie starts with one major change. Remember that grand opening narration that would accompany the beginning of every one of the prior movies, including the first one? Well, you can forget about all that, because this one starts off with Grandpa Longneck telling all the kids about-

Grandpa Longneck (vo): The Lone Dinosaur!

MarzGurl (vo): And yes, everytime the Lone Dinosaur comes up, it's said almost exactly like that.

Grandpa Longneck: (Says the Lone Dinosaur 5x)

Ducky: The Lone Dinosaur!

Littlefoot: The Lone Dinosaur.

MarzGurl (vo): So what's up with this guy? Well, he's an old legend who saved the Great Valley long ago from a Sharptooth, and as he left the Great Valley, an earthquake happened that caused a very convenient rock formation to look exactly like a longneck, which still looks over the Great Valley to this day, bringing good luck, yadda yadda yadda. Also, during the sequence, we're introduced to two tiny twin threehorns. Now these little bastards are the bane of my existence; Not only do super young kids ruin a movie and be the future downfall of the plot, but you can't understand a word they say.

(The threehorn twins jump up and down on Cera, laughing)

Dana: Dana!

Dinah: Dinah! Threehorn twinies!

Dana: Hiya!

MarzGurl (vo): Now this is actually lampshaded throughout the movie, because after a while, Cera frequently has to ask Ducky for a translation of all their baby talk. What I can't figure out is just who these twins belong to. At first, you think the twins are just Cera's younger siblings, after all, at the end of the second movie, we see a metric ton of tiny threehorns hatch from Cera's nest, never mind where the mom has been this whole time. And even over the course of this movie, Cera's dad gets on her case about watching after the twins. But frequently, Cera tells the twins that she's their Auntie Cera.

Cera: Hush, you two, or Auntie Cera's gonna be upset!

MarzGurl (vo): So, that would mean that Cera has another sibling, right? And then that sibling had kids? That would make them her little niece and nephew, right? So, where is this other sibling Cera has, and why aren't they looking after their own kids?

Petrie: Me no know.

MarzGurl (vo): Well, the next day, the kids are playing around in the trees knocking down food, because you know, dinosaurs could climb trees just like cats, especially the Triceratops. But Cera's dad scolds them and warns them that it's the "time of the changing treestars". Translation: it's autumn. So, is the changing weather the conflict of the movie? Nope, this fact never comes up again, and yet, they spend so much time on this scene. Why?

Petrie: Me no know.

MarzGurl (vo): Anyway, Littlefoot's been obsessed with the Lone Dinosaur ever since Grandpa's story. He dreams about him and plays Lone Dinosaur games with the other kids. And wouldn't you know it, that's exactly when the Lone Dinosaur comes strolling back into the Great Valley, even saving Littlefoot after he falls off a ledge. Convenient, right? He even has a scar across his eye just like in Grandpa's stories. Now wait, this begs the question, just how old is this guy, anyway? Grandpa states that it's an old legend, and that his grandpa told it to him when he was a kid. So, the Lone Dinosaur is how old now? Not to mention, what was Great-Great Grandpa doing telling stories about anything in the Great Valley? As far as I understood from movie one, the Great Valley journey was this great pilgrimage for a lush land, and nobody knew whether or not it really existed, so how could anybody have known that there was such a place called Saurus Rock inside this legendary Great Valley, and how could anybody have heard tales about the Lone Dinosaur it's named for for that matter?

Petrie: Me no know.

MarzGurl (vo): Plot continuity aside, Littlefoot looks up to the new addition to the Great Valley, and then he sings a song about him.

Littlefoot: (singing) Dinosaur! / His tail was swift as lightning / Dinosaur! / His heart was brave and pure.

MarzGurl (vo): You know the worst thing about it? It's a Western. Unfortunately, like the tiny children they are, the twins take off to Saurus Rock, inspired by the song and dance routine, and along the way, a Sharptooth starts hunting them down! But never fear, this never gets thrilling or frightening, as the Sharptooth manages to be even dumber than the baby twins and gets his nose stuck in a tree trying to sniff after them. Okay, goodbye, conflict. Oh, right, I'm still looking for conflict in this movie. So the main character kids go out to Saurus Rock to get the twins back. Is the missing twin situation the conflict? No, that's not it, because they get them back relatively quickly, and there's still half a movie to go after that. By this point, I really didn't know what it was that they were trying to overcome. Now in the process of getting the twins down from Saurus Rock, a stone in the shape of a tooth breaks off. This, apparently starts causing a metric ton of bad luck within the Great Valley. Now hold on a second, so Saurus Rock is like a mirror, break it and you get bad luck? Apparently, that's a big part of it, so big, they have to sing about it.

Littlefoot: (singing) If the mountain starts to blow its top, that's bad luck.

Ducky: (singing) If the skywater falls and it just won't stop, that's bad luck.

MarzGurl (vo): Anyway, all this bad luck of getting stung by bees and falling into puddles of mud is nothing. Suddenly, the watering place dries up, and everybody wonders why! Well, gee, I seem to recall something like this happening a couple movies back. You know what somebody did? Ran upstream and found that the water was dammed up! Why don't you go look for the source? Nope, too hard to do! In fact, actually past this, the watering place drying up is never brought up again, much like the changing seasons. So, is the no water in the Great Valley thing the conflict of the movie? Nope, that's not it, either. The only thing you can really conclude is that the bad luck is the conflict, but really, am I the only one who thinks that silly, easily avoidable bad luck is one of the worst plot devices ever conceived? Oh, no, I just keep stubbing my toe, we'd better spend half a movie figuring out how to fix that! And anyway, let's say they do decide to fix that, which they do. They broke a friggin' natural rock formation, how do you fix that? How do you, a dinosaur, go about fixing that? Even if you could physically carry a replacement stone all the way back up Saurus Rock, how do you plan on putting it back in place? It's not like it was just sitting on top of a ledge, that piece was dangling off the side somewhere. How do you fix that?! Well, Littlefoot finds a way, singing about it the whole way through, unfortunately.

Littlefoot: (singing) When you're on your own, you can yell and laugh and holler / When you're on your own, you're feeling strong and free...

MarzGurl (vo): Remember that Sharptooth? Well, in running back from Saurus Rock, the thing chased the group away from it, and in the process, fell into a deep fissure. What does Littlefoot do now? Climb down that fissure and try to knock a tooth loose from the supposedly dead Sharptooth. Big surprise, he's not dead! Who didn't see that coming?

Petrie: Me no know.

MarzGurl (vo): Then comes the quote, unquote "exciting part of the movie". Somehow, it ends up with two adult Sharptooths in the running for fresh meat, and again, I have to ask, how did they get in the Great Valley? I know I ask this everytime, but this paradise is supposed to keep the bad out and good in. For that matter, the Lone Dinosaur should have never been able to return, or is it that Saurus Rock is just barely outside the boundaries of the Great Valley? After all, they were climbing over large rock walls, but it's never stated that Saurus Rock isn't part of the Great Valley. In fact, it's apparently what's bringing the Great Valley its good luck. But again, it's not like there's any continuity in this movie thus far, so let's just forget about it for a bit. Grandpa and Doc, the Lone Dinosaur, are fighting the two Sharptooths using their tails like appendages, wrapping them around things and throwing them like whips. Never mind the fact that there's absolutely no way a Brontosaur and a Brachiosaur tail would ever be able to do anything of the sort. They crush the two Sharptooths by causing rocks to collapse on their heads, and then conveniently...

(The kids are cheering, but pause when a tooth falls in front of them. They resume cheering)

MarzGurl (vo): Where did that fall from?! Aside from their tails, nothing of either of the Sharptooths is exposed! Where did it even fall from, and how did they put it back up on Saurus Rock?! What sort of adhesive could they possibly have come up with, and does it fix the bad luck if they're using an actual tooth rather than the rock that was originally in that place? So wait, the conflict of the movie was bad luck, right? And since the Lone Dinosaur leaves, that makes Grandpa the new hero? What was the moral of the story again? Is it to look up to your grandparents? If that was it, they sure didn't focus on it for very long.

This movie is incredibly disjointed, with tons of plot holes, a non-existent main conflict, and an unidentifiable moral to the story. The whole thing is something about luck, but that's not really something tangible or fixable. Maybe the movie was trying to tell us that you really can fix bad luck once you've started it, but how? It didn't exactly tell us whether or not the bad luck stopped. It also didn't tell us whether or not they made it through the autumn okay or if the watering hole ever got its water back. Absolutely nothing was resolved other than the replacing of a tooth onto Saurus Rock. This was just a strange series of events with no exact purpose. That is what ruins this movie, it's an hour and fifteen minutes of completely no purpose. Well, the next movie marks the halfway point in The Land Before Time series. What sort of crazy hijinks await us next time? I hear it's pretty detestable.

(Credits are shown)