Filly Funtasia

Filly Funtasia is about the adventures of Rose, a unicorn filly who attends the Royal Magic Academy in the kingdom of Funtasia. Her best friends – Bella, an elf filly, Lynn, a witchy filly, Will, a fairy filly, and Cedric, a royale filly, accompany her as they go to the extraordinary school to improve their magical skills, be it mixing unpredictable potions or casting spells. Rose also has to deal with everyday teenage school life while learning about the magical world around her.

Inside the basement of the academy lives Wranglum, an evil tree-like wizard creature who is trapped inside a "dark mirror", or a crystal prison. Battiwigs, a bat who is Will and Cedric's dorm pet, secretly works for Wranglum as his bumbling minion and carries his master around. Wranglum and Battiwigs plot various schemes to try and steal any crystals from the academy they can so that they can use their magic to rule over Funtasia.

Filly Funtasia was created by Danish brothers, Jacob and Henrik Ranis Stokholm Andersen, who also founded the Filly franchise around 2006, and serve as the directors of the series. Development began during the summer of 2012, and Tine S. Norbøll, the developer of the franchise, wrote the story bible for series. She was also an art director for the show,[9] though her work is uncredited. BRB Internacional and their animation studio Studio 21 originally did the animation work, with some outsourcing from Black Dragon Entertainment in China.

A concept art of a scene in what previously known as episode 4 (likely "The Crush"), by one of BRB's staff, Stevepeig.[10]

Some notable BRB staff who worked on the show include Stevepeig, who designed some of the concept art and how scenes would act out,[10] and Dani Canovas, who designed some of the main characters such as Rose and Will, and did the color script for some scenes, as well as the backgrounds.[11]

On October 12, 2012, plans for an animated TV series based on the Filly franchise were announced, with the working title of "Filly", and the series was set to premiere worldwide in 2014.[12] A teaser for the show was presented at MIPTV in April 2013.[13] On May 29, 2013, the show was renamed to Filly Funtasia, and some of the writers for the show were revealed; Dean Stefan, Noelle Wright, Jymn Magon, Johnny Hartmann, and Sean Derek. BRB Internacional was to distribute the show internationally, except in Germany where Dracco would handle it.[14][15][16]

A trailer for the show was uploaded officially by BRB to YouTube on October 15, 2013. Another trailer was released to Twitter on April 11, 2014, featuring clips synced to the show's ending theme, "From Now Until Forever". A third one was released on October 13, 2014 by Funtasia Daily, for BRB offered them the chance to release it to reach a wider audience. A fourth trailer for the show was presented at MIPCOM 2015 and was released on October 6, 2015, featuring clips from the show synced to the show's opening theme, "Magical World".[17]

Two 75-minute specials of the show were announced April 4, 2016 at the MIPTV Media Market titled "Filly Stars" and "Filly Butterfly". Originally produced by BRB's 3D movie division, Apolo Films, no news has surfaced about the current state of the specials and whether they have been cancelled or not as of late. They were meant to be released before the show in order to explain the characters and the world, which explains why Filly Funtasia starts off with no proper introduction.[17]

Later in 2016, BRB and Screen 21 stopped working on the show, and stopped publicly associating with it. It can be assumed that around this time, Black Dragon also quit too. Around 2018, Spanish company B-Water Animation Studios and Cantonese company Guangzhou Huamai Animation Studios joined the production of the series, and worked to complete what the previous studios had left behind. A fifth trailer for the show, which would be the first Filly Funtasia material in a few years, would be released to Vimeo on March 23, 2018 by B-Water. It would also be the last trailer of the show to be released before its premiere one year later.[17]

Filly Funtasia has gone through development hell five years prior to its release, and was delayed many times before it finally premiered in 2019. While the reasons for the delay remain unclear, it likely includes financial problems the Andersen brothers were facing, BRB and Screen 21 suddenly ceasing production of the series on their part, and Dracco initiating legal action against Simba Dickie Group.[17] In the final version of both the English and Chinese credits, nobody from either BRB and Screen 21 or Black Dragon have been credited since those companies backed out of their involvement with the series.

On January 17, 2020, the series was renewed for a second season that is expected to air in October 2020.[6][7]

The series is planned to have 26 24-minute episodes.[18]

Filly Funtasia was originally planned to be released in early 2014, but was delayed to the fourth quarter of 2014.[21] On March 30, 2014, the release date of the show was delayed again to 2015.[22] It was announced that the show would air on Clan in Spain,[23] and later on V-me in the US.[24] The show was delayed again on January 19, 2015 for a 2016 release.[25] On March 10, 2015, it was announced that Filly Funtasia would air on K2 in Italy.[1] On January 16, 2018, the Andersen brothers discussed in an interview that the series was postponed once again for a 2019 release.[26]

The series eventually premiered in the Italian language on March 11, 2019 on Frisbee in Italy.[4][27] In Ukraine, the series premiered on November 30, 2019 on PLUSPLUS with a Ukrainian dub. In Central and Eastern Europe, Filly Funtasia will premiere sometime on Minimax in Hungarian, Czech, Romanian, Serbian, and Slovene.[28] An English version of the show has not yet been aired, but various trailers were released, the latest being one uploaded by Imira Entertainment on September 12, 2019 featuring the current voices.[29]

In China, the series was released with a Mandarin Chinese dub onto iQiyi, with the title Little Filly: Colorful Wonderland, on November 28, 2019.[5] The show had reached more than 2800 viewers in under 24 hours. Later, the series would have its TV premiere on Hunan TV Golden Eagle Cartoon on January 20, 2020.[6] Each of the 13 episodes are split into two 12 to 13-minute episodes, unlike how the show was broadcast in Italy and Ukraine.

Filly Funtasia has many songs used throughout the series. Nearly all of them have served as background music at some point, playing through certain scenes, but a few of them have been sung by the characters in-universe. All of the songs are produced by Klaus Derendorf. It is unknown who sang most of them as all the singers were uncredited, but it's likely that Windy Wagner sang some of them.[3]

On October 16, 2013, one day after BRB Internacional had released the first trailer for Filly Funtasia on YouTube, Shaun Scotellaro of Equestria Daily had reported on the show's existence, calling Filly a "copycat brand".[34] What resulted after were a lot of mixed reactions to the show, with many disregarding it as a My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic rip-off before it premiered, and others claiming that it reminded them of the third generation ("G3") of My Little Pony (which isn't typically regarded as good by bronies, especially not at that time). An intern at BRB responded calmly to a lot of the YouTube comments on the trailer that arouse from the situation before the video was privated, then unlisted with comments disabled. The show was also reported on the site in 2014 and 2015 due to the new trailers that were being released.[35][36]

In the midst of the brony fandom becoming aware of the show, Funtasia Daily was created by Skundi on October 24, 2013. The intention of the site is to report on all Filly related news, much like Equestria Daily does for Friendship Is Magic. Some articles are also written by Zejgar. As a response to the 4chan and Ponychan threads on the show dying, Skundi also created Fillychan on January 24, 2015.[17] The show would gain a minimal fanbase of its own, with some taking an ironic interest in the show. Memes about the show were prevalent at the peak of its popularity, including the frequent joke that the show was the next generation ("G5") of My Little Pony.

Tine was interviewed by Skundi of Funtasia Daily in June 2015, using questions that were asked by the community. Notably, Tine noticed the Filly Funtasia fandom and acknowledged the term "Funtasian", which would be the equivalent of bronies.[37]

After a long period of silence, Equestria Daily would report on the show's comeback in 2019, and the reception to the show was notably more positive than it was before.[38] One of the earliest reuploads of the first trailer of the show has over 1 million views as of February 2020. The show currently sits at a 4.9 out of 10 rating on IMDb.[39]

• Filly Funtasia on IMDb
• Filly Funtasia on iQiyi
• Filly Funtasia on B-Water Animation Studios