My personal favourites are Nutcracker, Diamond Castle and The Prince and the Pauper, but while one of my least favourites of the Barbie movies Mariposa is not bad. The writing is rather cheesy and the bad guys are rather ugly in design and while most Barbie movies had a balance of humour, fantasy and scary moments(without being too scary) these bunch of characters alone I think will frighten very young kids, especially if it's their first Barbie movie. And while it has a good message and is cute and charming mostly, the storytelling did feel rushed, perhaps with a longer length this may have been prevented, also there are some ideas that seemed to have been taken from other Barbie movies such as the magic flower thing in Fairytopia. The animation however is quite pretty, not as stunning as Diamond Castle for instance but fluid and colourful enough, and the music is catchy. The characters apart from the bad guys are sweet and likable, the annoying Zinzy excepted, with Mariposa easy to relate to, and the voice acting is solid, I personally would've preferred Kelly Sheridan for Mariposa but her voice actress here was still good, nice and youthful. Overall, not one of the better ones but not a waste of time. 6/10 Bethany Cox
Barbie Mariposa and Her Butterfly Fairy Friends
(2008 Video)
Not bad but one of my least favourite Barbie movies
27 May 2012