Rainbow Dash in ‘My Little Pony Equestria Girls: Friendship Games’ (Discovery Family)

When I was invited to the purple carpet premiere of My Little Pony Equestria Girls: Friendship Games — which premieres Saturday on Discovery Family — I simply could not attend without my good friend, 4-year-old Brooklyn resident Charlotte.



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Charlotte shows off her press badge as she poses with Rainbow Dash

Once we had our press badges in hand, Charlotte entered the pre-screening reception on a mission: “Let’s find Rainbow Dash! Where is Rainbow Dash?” (I can hardly blame the kid for choosing the sporty character with the raspy voice and totally awesome attitude as her favorite.) Her eyes darted around the room and immediately landed on a face-painting station. “I want to get a cutie mark,” she said, and promptly sat down at one of the tables. Not surprisingly, she pointed to Rainbow Dash’s signature stamp and had it drawn onto her arm.

Related: Brony Quest: The Search for ‘My Little Pony’ Fans at Comic Con

With that complete, we took photos all around the room, attempted to shoot targets with a Nerf Rebelle bow blaster (it was a little too big for Charlotte), and played with a set of pink and purple pom-pons (Go Canterlot High!). With a little more time to kill — and completely sick of posting for pictures — Charlotte decided she needed to get Pinkie Pie’s cutie mark, too. And Fluttershy’s. She plopped down and sat still and quiet as an artist covered her arms in all the available cutie marks, completely unaware that Drea de Matteo and her daughter were waiting for her seat to become available, or that Nick Cannon and Mariah Carey’s daughter, Monroe, was getting cutie-fied right next to her. But, later, when she looked down at her arms and admired all the sparkling designs, she gushed, “Daddy’s going to love this!” After all, her daddy’s arms are covered in real tattoos.



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Look at all those cutie marks!

As we were about to go into the movie, a few nice ladies overheard Charlotte again asking where Rainbow Dash was (Hasbro had dolls on display throughout the event, but we never did find Ms. Dash’s) and turned around. “Do you like Sunset Shimmer?” one asked. “My name is Rebecca [Shoichet], and I do the voice of Sunset Shimmer. This is my friend, Ashleigh [Ball] — she does the voices of Applejack and Rainbow Dash.” The two proceeded to say a few lines in the voices of each character and Charlotte was just speechless. Her mind was blown. But a few minutes later, when Ashleigh walked past us to take her seat in the theater, Charlotte connected the dots. “That’s Rainbow Dash!” she told me.