Western Animation / Thelma the Unicorn

Thelma the Unicorn is a 2024 animated musical comedy film written by Jared Hess and Jershua Hess (Napoleon Dynamite) and directed by Jared Hess and Lynn Wang (Teen Titans Go!, Unikitty!) based upon the book by Aaron Blabey (The Bad Guys). It stars the voices of Brittany Howard, Will Forte, Jemaine Clement, Edi Patterson, Fred Armisen, Zach Galifianakis, and Jon Heder.

The film follows Thelma (Howard), a young, overlooked pony with big musical dreams. When a twist of fate leads to her being mistaken for a unicorn, she leans into the lie to make her dreams come true. Now Thelma must decide if her dream is worth the risks, both of her friendships and her life when a jealous rival comes after her. The film was released on Netflix May 17, 2024.

Previews:Trailer

Thelma the Unicorn includes examples of the following:

• Advertising by Association: The trailer promotes the film as being "from the creators of Napoleon Dynamite."
• All Girls Like Ponies: The first person who notices Thelma after she "becomes" a unicorn in the trailer, is a little girl.
• Beleaguered Assistant: Nikki Narwhal's assistant, Megan. She often suffers the wrath of her client's temper tantrums.
• Be Yourself: The lesson of the movie. Thelma ultimately gains the courage to sing in front of everyone as she is, earning the public's approval.
• Blackmail: Megan manages to get a picture of Thelma with her fake horn askew, and uses it to force Thelma to give up her career.
• Book Ends: The film starts with Thelma and her band performing on SparklePalooza, ending with her leaping onto the audience, turning out to be just a daydream all along. The last scene features Thelma actually performing on the SparklePalooza stage, having finally achieved her dream.
• Carnivore Confusion: All animals are Sapient and intelligent members of society, including the flies, except Nikki Narwhal still eats dead fish. Where these fish came from, or if they're the sole non-anthropomorphic species (Despite other marine animals like Narwhals being intelligent) is unclear.
• Coincidental Accidental Disguise: The movie's plot is kicked off when Thelma, while posing with a carrot on her forehead, gets drenched by pink paint and glitter truck passing by and hits a bump, making her look like a pink, sparkly unicorn. At the end, Otis also gets this treatment, when said truck returns and again hits a bump, this time with him getting spilled with white paint and feathers, making him look like a pegasus.
• Daydream Surprise: The trailer opens on Thelma and her band performing on a stage to adoring fans. Thelma jumps into a mosh pit... and lands on a bale of hay in an empty barn, revealing that she was just daydreaming.
• Entitled Bastard: After Thelma reveals her true self, Vic is quick to try and get Nikki back as a client (despite mocking her and tearing up their contract right in front of her). Unfortunately for him, Nikki isn't interested.
• Even Evil Has Standards: When Nikki Narwhal wants Thelma to be taken care of, her assistant Megan offers to have her killed. Nikki is openly horrified by this, and clarifies that she just wants Thelma's popularity to be destroyed.
• Fake Relationship: Vic encourages Thelma to enter into a false relationship with Internet celebrity Danny Stallion, solely for a boost to her career.
• False Teeth Tomfoolery: Vic Diamond wears big fake buck teeth, even though his real teeth are perfectly fine.
• Freudian Excuse: In his youth, Vic Diamond was dismissed as a nobody and a loser, so he did everything he could to stand out.
• Gonk: Agent Vic Diamond is considerably more unusual looking than the other humans, being skinny, with tiny eyes and long, very British-looking teeth.
• Green-Eyed Monster: Nikki Narwhal is quick to start resenting Thelma for becoming more popular than her.
• Handicapped Badass: Peggy Purvis is blind, but she is easily able to handle a group of thugs.
• Harsh Talent Show Judge: The judges handling auditions for SparklePalooza refuse to even let the Rusty Buckets start playing. They tell Thelma that she just doesn't have "it", and dismiss her out of hand.
• Ironically Disabled Artist: Peggy is a legendary record producer despite being blind - meaning she judges people by their singing talent and not by appearances.
• Internal Reveal: Thelma ultimately reveals the truth to everyone at SparklePalooza.
• Knew It All Along: When Thelma confesses to Peggy that she isn't a unicorn, Peggy reveals that she knew from the beginning (having smelled the paint on her).
• Lions and Tigers and Humans... Oh, My!: The trailer shows that movie takes place in world where Talking Animals live alongside humans as equals, and some (like Nikki Narwhal) can become celebrities.
• The Reveal: When Nikki listens to Thelma's final song, she tearfully removes her horn, revealing that she was faking being a narwhal all along.
• Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: Vic is quick to dismiss Nikki as a client and become Thelma's agent after the former's popularity begins to wane.
• Smooth-Talking Talent Agent: Vic suits this to a T. He does everything he can to separate Thelma from her friends, and manipulates her into doing whatever he wants by claiming it's what's best for her career.
• Talking Animal: The trailer establishes that animals in this universe are not only accepted as able to talk with humans, they are able to become big celebrities.
• Undying Loyalty: Megan is unshakeably loyal to Nikki, in spite of Nikki's less than stellar treatment of her.
• Unfortunate Names: Thelma's band is called "The Rusty Buckets".
• Unicorn: The premise of the film, as laid out in the trailer, is that Thelma is pretending to be a unicorn to bring attention to her music.