Hey, Rob here, just to let you know of a new show to Sponge Culture; Let's Play. For now, I'm doing Metroid Fusion, a solid game to be sure, though it's pretty easy to take the mickey out on. Of the eleven Metroid games, I've played eight, the ones I haven't played being Metroid Prime 1, 2 and 3. Of the others, five sit quite comfortably in my favourite games of all time, though this is the lowest of those. It's probably the most linear besides Other M (my views on that tripe have been made very clear in the Top 5 Good Series Gone Bad) but besides that, it's damn good. My personal fave is still Super Metroid, but again, Fusion was far easier to take the mick out of, and it's shorter too. Anyway, here's the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2UYpZGg-5Q
I'll try and make this new video thing as regular as possible, but bear with me, as I've not got the best of hardware, software or indeed ware of any kind. Sound recording didn't even work, so my voice will remain unheard until I can find a way to sort that stuff out. Sorries.
Sadly, there's no review next week due to time constraints and unforseen circumstances.
Friday, 8 October 2010
Friday, 1 October 2010
ROB STOAKES REVIEWS - The Return of Jafar
Sponge Culture Reviews
Rob Stoakes Reviews
THE RETURN OF JAFAR
1994
TAD STONES
WALT DISNEY HOME VIDEO
Prologue
Pfffft! BAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!
So, Disney, you made Lion King, a film that is widely considered to be one of the greatest animated films of all time, one of the greatest family films of all time, one of the greatest films of the 90’s, and this is what you follow it up with? A film so bad, Robin Williams turned it down? ROBIN WILLIAMS! He was in Ferngully of all things! No wonder it was direct-to-video, even you thought it was horrible! Disney thought this was too bad for cinemas! For the record, The Black Cauldron, Tarzan and frigging Lilo and Stitch all were released in cinemas. And this film was the one you said ‘no, the world does not need this’ when you released Brother Bear?
Yes, it’s pretty easy to rag on Disney sequels, but actually, they have potential for greatness. Rescuer’s Down Under wasn’t just as good as the original, it was way better. And Lion King 2 was pretty good… it certainly wasn’t as good as Lion King, but to be fair, it’s like putting George Formby in the boxing ring against George Foreman. And besides, at the time, nobody knew to stay away when the words ‘Disney sequel’ showed up, and a lot of people like the original Aladdin. I won’t say it was my favourite, however. I thought it was kind of stupid, but I was somewhat entertained, I could do a lot worse, and it certainly wasn’t bad. Besides, picking between Aladdin and any other Robin Williams film… actually, I’d go for the incredibly silly and incredibly interesting Hook, but that’s beside the point. So plenty watched, and plenty suffered. And now, we will continue this ritual, by watching The Return of Jafar and experiencing a pain not unlike castrating yourself with a corkscrew while blindfolded.
Plot
So our story begins with the classic song Arabian Knights, though after the lyrics have been changed, and instead of the original singer it’s sung by a warbling vulture choking on lemonade. During this torture, we watch some men with absurd facial hair and chins (compared to the original Aladdin, that’s saying something) ride through the night. These are robbers who have just stolen from… somewhere. They make it quite clear that they hate their bumbling and greedy leader, who decides that he gets a bigger share. However, a treasure chest they stole seems to move by itself, until they find that it’s… Aboo! Aladdin’s monkey! And here’s Aladdin himself, looking rather shabby despite becoming a prince in the last film. Him and the robbers have a standard duel, with Aladdin taking the loot for himself and beating the robbers senseless, probably breaking their bones after dropping them eighty foot onto sharp objects as he rides away with a dementedly evil expression on his face. What a hero!
We cut to see Iago, Jafar’s parrot, dig Jafar out of the sand. Just to recap, Jafar’s a genie stuck in a lamp now, and he demands that Iago release him. They get in an argument, which results in Iago turning on Jafar and dropping him into a well. Why he didn’t just let Jafar go them remind him of the whole ‘three wishes’ business and just ask for a load of shit before dropping him into a well makes no sense, but Iago has never been the smartest of God’s creatures. Oh, and he sings a dreadful song about the fact that he’s going to look out for himself and have no friends and whatever.
Aladdin flies over Agrabar, throwing his money all over the place to show just how selfless and kind and whatever else he is, though keeping the most valuable item to give to a heavily mutated Jasmine. Honestly, look it up. Her head is shaped like a squashed olive, her neck is the size of her toothpick and the artists have forgotten how to draw shoulders. Or hips. Or muscle definition. Or legs, or eyes, or indeed any body part other than her ridiculous cleavage. I didn’t know cleavages carried on past the skin and onto the clothes. She also sounds as if she’s twelve for some reason.
So, we once again cut back to Iago. MOVIE! CHOOSE A SCENE AND FOCUS ON IT! And, now we go back to Aladdin, then to Iago in the span of a minute. Stop! STOP! Anyway, Iago has the idea of befriending Aladdin and everyone else before tricking them and taking control of Agrabar himself, because everyone will be inclined to obeying a parrot. Of course, Aladdin says ‘bitch, get o’er ‘ere and get yourself a bitch slap!’ and they end up meeting the robbers from before, and there’s a fight scene where Aladdin attempts to fight off several guys with sharpened steel scimitars with a wooden stick he picked off the ground. I can see this ending well.
Rob Stoakes Reviews
THE RETURN OF JAFAR
1994
TAD STONES
WALT DISNEY HOME VIDEO
Prologue
Pfffft! BAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!
So, Disney, you made Lion King, a film that is widely considered to be one of the greatest animated films of all time, one of the greatest family films of all time, one of the greatest films of the 90’s, and this is what you follow it up with? A film so bad, Robin Williams turned it down? ROBIN WILLIAMS! He was in Ferngully of all things! No wonder it was direct-to-video, even you thought it was horrible! Disney thought this was too bad for cinemas! For the record, The Black Cauldron, Tarzan and frigging Lilo and Stitch all were released in cinemas. And this film was the one you said ‘no, the world does not need this’ when you released Brother Bear?
Yes, it’s pretty easy to rag on Disney sequels, but actually, they have potential for greatness. Rescuer’s Down Under wasn’t just as good as the original, it was way better. And Lion King 2 was pretty good… it certainly wasn’t as good as Lion King, but to be fair, it’s like putting George Formby in the boxing ring against George Foreman. And besides, at the time, nobody knew to stay away when the words ‘Disney sequel’ showed up, and a lot of people like the original Aladdin. I won’t say it was my favourite, however. I thought it was kind of stupid, but I was somewhat entertained, I could do a lot worse, and it certainly wasn’t bad. Besides, picking between Aladdin and any other Robin Williams film… actually, I’d go for the incredibly silly and incredibly interesting Hook, but that’s beside the point. So plenty watched, and plenty suffered. And now, we will continue this ritual, by watching The Return of Jafar and experiencing a pain not unlike castrating yourself with a corkscrew while blindfolded.
Plot
So our story begins with the classic song Arabian Knights, though after the lyrics have been changed, and instead of the original singer it’s sung by a warbling vulture choking on lemonade. During this torture, we watch some men with absurd facial hair and chins (compared to the original Aladdin, that’s saying something) ride through the night. These are robbers who have just stolen from… somewhere. They make it quite clear that they hate their bumbling and greedy leader, who decides that he gets a bigger share. However, a treasure chest they stole seems to move by itself, until they find that it’s… Aboo! Aladdin’s monkey! And here’s Aladdin himself, looking rather shabby despite becoming a prince in the last film. Him and the robbers have a standard duel, with Aladdin taking the loot for himself and beating the robbers senseless, probably breaking their bones after dropping them eighty foot onto sharp objects as he rides away with a dementedly evil expression on his face. What a hero!
We cut to see Iago, Jafar’s parrot, dig Jafar out of the sand. Just to recap, Jafar’s a genie stuck in a lamp now, and he demands that Iago release him. They get in an argument, which results in Iago turning on Jafar and dropping him into a well. Why he didn’t just let Jafar go them remind him of the whole ‘three wishes’ business and just ask for a load of shit before dropping him into a well makes no sense, but Iago has never been the smartest of God’s creatures. Oh, and he sings a dreadful song about the fact that he’s going to look out for himself and have no friends and whatever.
Aladdin flies over Agrabar, throwing his money all over the place to show just how selfless and kind and whatever else he is, though keeping the most valuable item to give to a heavily mutated Jasmine. Honestly, look it up. Her head is shaped like a squashed olive, her neck is the size of her toothpick and the artists have forgotten how to draw shoulders. Or hips. Or muscle definition. Or legs, or eyes, or indeed any body part other than her ridiculous cleavage. I didn’t know cleavages carried on past the skin and onto the clothes. She also sounds as if she’s twelve for some reason.
So, we once again cut back to Iago. MOVIE! CHOOSE A SCENE AND FOCUS ON IT! And, now we go back to Aladdin, then to Iago in the span of a minute. Stop! STOP! Anyway, Iago has the idea of befriending Aladdin and everyone else before tricking them and taking control of Agrabar himself, because everyone will be inclined to obeying a parrot. Of course, Aladdin says ‘bitch, get o’er ‘ere and get yourself a bitch slap!’ and they end up meeting the robbers from before, and there’s a fight scene where Aladdin attempts to fight off several guys with sharpened steel scimitars with a wooden stick he picked off the ground. I can see this ending well.
Things look bad for Aladdin, until Iago saves him from the robbers, and we discover that the robber leader’s name is ‘Abis Mal’ which is an accurate description of this movie. Aladdin rewards Iago’s selflessness by locking him up in a bird cage and saying that he’ll get a proper hearing, like any other criminal would. Aladdin! Saviour of the innocent! The diamond in the rough! An ungrateful little shit who rewards selflessness with imprisonment! OUR HERO!
Aladdin decides for some reason not to tell Jasmine that he’s found Iago for, some, reason? Of course, leading to the farce scene you’ve seen in every single film ever made. Jasmine immediately suspects something, but is interrupted by Homer Simpson, I mean Genie. He acts like… well, like he did in the first film, presenting pop culture references that wouldn’t exist in Medieval Persia, BECAUSE IT WAS SO FUCKING FUNNY IN THE FIRST FILM HA HA HA HA HA HA! This time, they actually manage to sum just about everything you could think of in one song sequence. That won’t top him from carrying this bullshit throughout the rest of the film. Anyway, they all decide to go to the dinner, except Aboo, who has to guard Iago. I SEE HIJINKS A COMING!
We aren’t even at the 15 minute mark and I already want to die.
Anyway, Abis Mal comes across Jafar’s lamp. Jafar tricks Abis Mal into wasting two of his wishes, and tells him that he wants revenge on Aladdin. Abis Mal wants revenge too, but Jafar stops him, saying that they can’t just kill Aladdin because he’s a genie, but instead make him suffer. Why Abis Mal doesn’t just say ‘I wish that Aladdin experiences crushing despair and misfortune from now until his measly, pathetic life ends’ will always escape me, but it seems Jafar and Abis Mal aren’t too clever either.
But we have no time for story, we have more of Earthworm Jim’s, I mean, Genie’s antics. Wooo! Look at him go! Oh Genie, we’ll never grow tired of you. Anyway, Aladdin becomes the Royal Vizier, or adviser, because if Aladdin has shown anything, he’s shown that he’s trustworthy, despite lying about being a prince, lying about not knowing where Iago is and lying about where he got the Jewelled Flower he gave Jasmine, but hey, baby steps.
Back to Iago and PICK A SCENE AND FOCUS ON IT!!! … Aboo lets Iago out of the cage, only to allow that tiger to try and eat him. This causes in Iago being discovered and Aladdin has to explain. Rather than give the real reason (He saved my life) he makes one up (he was tricked by Jafar into being evil). Why he doesn’t just say the real reason, seeing as it’ll probably go down better, escapes me. I guess everyone’s been hit with the stupid stick today. So, Iago is nearly killed and everyone hates Aladdin for being a lying dick-weasel. Truly, he is a worthy Royal Vizier! Aladdin begins moaning to Genie about ‘whenever I try to do good, it always goes wrong, waa waa waa’ because lying to everybody makes you a fucking Paragon of justice, right?
Iago ponders about whether he owes Aladdin for saving his hide, without considering that he saved Aladdin’s life so they’re technically square. Genie goads him on, trying to convince Iago to do good by telling him it will be a challenge. Fuelled on, Iago decides to help Aladdin and Jasmine by making things better, by first singing to Jasmine, telling that he’s a lying dick, which is a strange course of action, and Iago is obviously wrong because… wait, it isn’t. Why are we supposed to be siding with Aladdin again? He’s a compulsive liar, even when he doesn’t need to. Anyway, instead of making Aladdin and Jasmine hate each other, for some reason Iago stating the facts makes… it… all… better? Sorry, why? Imagine if Romeo and Juliet worked like that?
“Juliet, Romeo stabbed Tybalt!”
“Oh, I still love him for unexplained reasons…”
Oh, wait, that actually did happen. Even in Shakespeare, true love is unrelentingly stupid.
Aladdin decides for some reason not to tell Jasmine that he’s found Iago for, some, reason? Of course, leading to the farce scene you’ve seen in every single film ever made. Jasmine immediately suspects something, but is interrupted by Homer Simpson, I mean Genie. He acts like… well, like he did in the first film, presenting pop culture references that wouldn’t exist in Medieval Persia, BECAUSE IT WAS SO FUCKING FUNNY IN THE FIRST FILM HA HA HA HA HA HA! This time, they actually manage to sum just about everything you could think of in one song sequence. That won’t top him from carrying this bullshit throughout the rest of the film. Anyway, they all decide to go to the dinner, except Aboo, who has to guard Iago. I SEE HIJINKS A COMING!
We aren’t even at the 15 minute mark and I already want to die.
Anyway, Abis Mal comes across Jafar’s lamp. Jafar tricks Abis Mal into wasting two of his wishes, and tells him that he wants revenge on Aladdin. Abis Mal wants revenge too, but Jafar stops him, saying that they can’t just kill Aladdin because he’s a genie, but instead make him suffer. Why Abis Mal doesn’t just say ‘I wish that Aladdin experiences crushing despair and misfortune from now until his measly, pathetic life ends’ will always escape me, but it seems Jafar and Abis Mal aren’t too clever either.
But we have no time for story, we have more of Earthworm Jim’s, I mean, Genie’s antics. Wooo! Look at him go! Oh Genie, we’ll never grow tired of you. Anyway, Aladdin becomes the Royal Vizier, or adviser, because if Aladdin has shown anything, he’s shown that he’s trustworthy, despite lying about being a prince, lying about not knowing where Iago is and lying about where he got the Jewelled Flower he gave Jasmine, but hey, baby steps.
Back to Iago and PICK A SCENE AND FOCUS ON IT!!! … Aboo lets Iago out of the cage, only to allow that tiger to try and eat him. This causes in Iago being discovered and Aladdin has to explain. Rather than give the real reason (He saved my life) he makes one up (he was tricked by Jafar into being evil). Why he doesn’t just say the real reason, seeing as it’ll probably go down better, escapes me. I guess everyone’s been hit with the stupid stick today. So, Iago is nearly killed and everyone hates Aladdin for being a lying dick-weasel. Truly, he is a worthy Royal Vizier! Aladdin begins moaning to Genie about ‘whenever I try to do good, it always goes wrong, waa waa waa’ because lying to everybody makes you a fucking Paragon of justice, right?
Iago ponders about whether he owes Aladdin for saving his hide, without considering that he saved Aladdin’s life so they’re technically square. Genie goads him on, trying to convince Iago to do good by telling him it will be a challenge. Fuelled on, Iago decides to help Aladdin and Jasmine by making things better, by first singing to Jasmine, telling that he’s a lying dick, which is a strange course of action, and Iago is obviously wrong because… wait, it isn’t. Why are we supposed to be siding with Aladdin again? He’s a compulsive liar, even when he doesn’t need to. Anyway, instead of making Aladdin and Jasmine hate each other, for some reason Iago stating the facts makes… it… all… better? Sorry, why? Imagine if Romeo and Juliet worked like that?
“Juliet, Romeo stabbed Tybalt!”
“Oh, I still love him for unexplained reasons…”
Oh, wait, that actually did happen. Even in Shakespeare, true love is unrelentingly stupid.
So why is Aboo wearing a skirt?
So, Abis Mal and Jafar break into the palace, and they watch from afar as Aladdin, who has changed back into his street-rat clothes for whatever reason, and Jasmine have a romantic moment. However, villainy is afoot, for Jafar reveals that Iago will help him destroy Aladdin! MWUH HA HA HA wait, Iago doesn’t work for you anymore. Anyway, the romantic moment is interrupted by Genie’s HIGH-larious antics. Oh Genie, your humour is timeless.
Anyway, Iago’s enjoying the profits of being a good guy, talking to himself for some reason about how he’ll simply wait for Aladdin to become Sultan, then become Vizier, then his evil plan to wait until HE gets the throne will commence! AH HA HA HA wait, your lifespan isn’t as long as Aladdin’s. Anyway, Jafar comes along and tells Iago to lead Aladdin into a trap. Iago tries to warn Aladdin, but is interrupted by more of Genie’s HIIII-larious antics. AAAAAAH HA HA HAA HAAAA!!! Oh, you lovable rapscallion.
Anyway, Iago gets Aladdin to take the Sultan away from the palace, where Jafar attacks the Robot Devil, I mean Genie, and Aboo, but not AFTER SINGING A SONG! WOOO! I love my films to have more songs than actors.
Abis Mal, meanwhile, makes himself busy with capturing the Sultan. Aladdin puts two and two together and realises that Iago is a bad guy. Well, maybe you shouldn’t have locked him up, you massive gonk! He gives chase, but is batted away easily, with the carpet being captured. Aladdin gets back to the palace, only to be imprisoned for the murder of the Sultan. The evidence? A slashed up turban and a knife! Of course! The perfect evidence! I mean, there’s neither a body nor any evidence of Aladdin killing him if the Sultan actually was murdered, but dammit, we have a torn-up hat! THAT IS ALL WE NEED! I mean, I know detectives back then weren’t great, but surely they could’ve guessed that if somebody murdered the Sultan and took the body, he wouldn’t have left the hat as well.
Later, Aladdin is taken to be executed on the platform where the White Tree of Gondor used to be, but Iago releases the postman from Olive the Other Reindeer, I mean Genie, who in turn releases everybody else. Ten minutes of them being captured is immediately resolved. WHOOP DI BLOODY DOO, CAN THIS MOVIE BE OVER, PLEASE?
So, Iago and the others part ways because, um, Samus is a chick? Aladdin, Jasmine, Genie, the Sultan, Aboo and the Carpet reason that if they destroy the lamp, they destroy Jafar. Why they can’t just use Jafar to make three wishes is beyond me, but once again, the stupid stick is having a field day. So Abis Mal and Jafar are now in charge of the world, and Jafar asks Abis Mal to use his third wish to free him, but Abis Mal suddenly gains four points of wisdom by simply milking this opportunity for all its worth, demanding Jafar gives him more stuff until he makes his wish. Then Aladdin and company attempt to take the lamp and Jafar sends the lamp flying into the garden. Now it’s a race to the lamp, but seeing as Jafar can’t actually kill them due to being a genie, and nobody will kill them for him, it’s more a matter of simply impeding their progress for a while and staving off the inevitable, so there’s no real tension. And even if there was, you know Iago’s coming back in three, two, one…
So, Abis Mal and Jafar break into the palace, and they watch from afar as Aladdin, who has changed back into his street-rat clothes for whatever reason, and Jasmine have a romantic moment. However, villainy is afoot, for Jafar reveals that Iago will help him destroy Aladdin! MWUH HA HA HA wait, Iago doesn’t work for you anymore. Anyway, the romantic moment is interrupted by Genie’s HIGH-larious antics. Oh Genie, your humour is timeless.
Anyway, Iago’s enjoying the profits of being a good guy, talking to himself for some reason about how he’ll simply wait for Aladdin to become Sultan, then become Vizier, then his evil plan to wait until HE gets the throne will commence! AH HA HA HA wait, your lifespan isn’t as long as Aladdin’s. Anyway, Jafar comes along and tells Iago to lead Aladdin into a trap. Iago tries to warn Aladdin, but is interrupted by more of Genie’s HIIII-larious antics. AAAAAAH HA HA HAA HAAAA!!! Oh, you lovable rapscallion.
Anyway, Iago gets Aladdin to take the Sultan away from the palace, where Jafar attacks the Robot Devil, I mean Genie, and Aboo, but not AFTER SINGING A SONG! WOOO! I love my films to have more songs than actors.
Abis Mal, meanwhile, makes himself busy with capturing the Sultan. Aladdin puts two and two together and realises that Iago is a bad guy. Well, maybe you shouldn’t have locked him up, you massive gonk! He gives chase, but is batted away easily, with the carpet being captured. Aladdin gets back to the palace, only to be imprisoned for the murder of the Sultan. The evidence? A slashed up turban and a knife! Of course! The perfect evidence! I mean, there’s neither a body nor any evidence of Aladdin killing him if the Sultan actually was murdered, but dammit, we have a torn-up hat! THAT IS ALL WE NEED! I mean, I know detectives back then weren’t great, but surely they could’ve guessed that if somebody murdered the Sultan and took the body, he wouldn’t have left the hat as well.
Later, Aladdin is taken to be executed on the platform where the White Tree of Gondor used to be, but Iago releases the postman from Olive the Other Reindeer, I mean Genie, who in turn releases everybody else. Ten minutes of them being captured is immediately resolved. WHOOP DI BLOODY DOO, CAN THIS MOVIE BE OVER, PLEASE?
So, Iago and the others part ways because, um, Samus is a chick? Aladdin, Jasmine, Genie, the Sultan, Aboo and the Carpet reason that if they destroy the lamp, they destroy Jafar. Why they can’t just use Jafar to make three wishes is beyond me, but once again, the stupid stick is having a field day. So Abis Mal and Jafar are now in charge of the world, and Jafar asks Abis Mal to use his third wish to free him, but Abis Mal suddenly gains four points of wisdom by simply milking this opportunity for all its worth, demanding Jafar gives him more stuff until he makes his wish. Then Aladdin and company attempt to take the lamp and Jafar sends the lamp flying into the garden. Now it’s a race to the lamp, but seeing as Jafar can’t actually kill them due to being a genie, and nobody will kill them for him, it’s more a matter of simply impeding their progress for a while and staving off the inevitable, so there’s no real tension. And even if there was, you know Iago’s coming back in three, two, one…
Our courageous hero?
Oh, wow, Iago’s here. What a surprise. Though he does get zapped once, taking the tension up an incredibly tiny and insignificant notch. So the lamp is destroyed and everyone is saved from the thing that couldn’t kill them anyway and the film ends, along with my life as I hung myself around the halfway mark in sheer despair.
Acting/Characters
The acting in this film is boring. Not really too much to say, with most of the actors from the first Aladdin reprising their roles with little change. Aladdin is still played as a good-hearted if a little dim hero, Jasmine awkwardly shifting from cynical spiteful bitch to doe-eyed love-pillow and Gilbert Gottfried’s squawking squealing Iago finding new ways to rape my eardrums harshly. Then there’s Dan Castellaneta as the Genie. He’s what is often used as the whacking stick to beat this film with, and surprisingly I’ll take the film’s side, because Dan Castellaneta does a good job. I’d say a better job than Robin Williams, in fact. Sure, Robin Williams was manic and got pretty much all the jokes, but he was ANNOYING AS! Castellaneta isn’t quite as fasted paced or as loud, not like William’s kangaroo on amphetamines approach, but he certainly didn’t make me want to lynch myself.
As for the characters the actors play, that’s not so forgivable. Firstly, Aladdin isn’t a heroic character, a lying cheating scumbag who has a complete disregard for anybody’s life that isn’t directly tied to his own. Secondly, the other characters are as indistinct as a muddy blob at Glastonbury Festival. They do nothing, say nothing and contribute nothing important besides Jafar, who in all honesty has about ten minutes at best in this film. And thirdly, and the biggest dick move of all, why is Iago the main character? He gets more screen time than anybody else, does more and ultimately saves the day. But, the thing is, HE’S THE VILLAIN’S LACKEY! That’s what he was always meant to be, the comic relief. Why is he suddenly the main focus of the story? I’m all for changing the formula, but Iago? If Ridley Scott decided ‘right, I’m going to make Bladerunner 2, and the main character will be Pris, Roy Batty’s lackey’ we’d think that he had gone insane, and here we are with Disney pooping this concept awkwardly into our laps. Please kill me.
Animation
As I mentioned earlier, the character designs aren’t particularly astounding. Proportion seems to be a recurring problem, for a start. It seems Aladdin is the only person in the word with shoulders, everyone else just having their arms jut out of their chest awkwardly. But the colours… oh, boy, the colours… this film might have one of the most putrid colour schemes in a Disney film. Firstly, there’s a strange absence of shadows. It looks like a colouring book more than a feature length movie, with only block colours that are often reused in other places. For example, when near bright light, instead of the character’s shadows being made smaller but darker and having everything else made brighter, the character will turn red and yellow. I’m dead fucking serious, the characters are made of glass and paper in this film.
Oh, wow, Iago’s here. What a surprise. Though he does get zapped once, taking the tension up an incredibly tiny and insignificant notch. So the lamp is destroyed and everyone is saved from the thing that couldn’t kill them anyway and the film ends, along with my life as I hung myself around the halfway mark in sheer despair.
Acting/Characters
The acting in this film is boring. Not really too much to say, with most of the actors from the first Aladdin reprising their roles with little change. Aladdin is still played as a good-hearted if a little dim hero, Jasmine awkwardly shifting from cynical spiteful bitch to doe-eyed love-pillow and Gilbert Gottfried’s squawking squealing Iago finding new ways to rape my eardrums harshly. Then there’s Dan Castellaneta as the Genie. He’s what is often used as the whacking stick to beat this film with, and surprisingly I’ll take the film’s side, because Dan Castellaneta does a good job. I’d say a better job than Robin Williams, in fact. Sure, Robin Williams was manic and got pretty much all the jokes, but he was ANNOYING AS! Castellaneta isn’t quite as fasted paced or as loud, not like William’s kangaroo on amphetamines approach, but he certainly didn’t make me want to lynch myself.
As for the characters the actors play, that’s not so forgivable. Firstly, Aladdin isn’t a heroic character, a lying cheating scumbag who has a complete disregard for anybody’s life that isn’t directly tied to his own. Secondly, the other characters are as indistinct as a muddy blob at Glastonbury Festival. They do nothing, say nothing and contribute nothing important besides Jafar, who in all honesty has about ten minutes at best in this film. And thirdly, and the biggest dick move of all, why is Iago the main character? He gets more screen time than anybody else, does more and ultimately saves the day. But, the thing is, HE’S THE VILLAIN’S LACKEY! That’s what he was always meant to be, the comic relief. Why is he suddenly the main focus of the story? I’m all for changing the formula, but Iago? If Ridley Scott decided ‘right, I’m going to make Bladerunner 2, and the main character will be Pris, Roy Batty’s lackey’ we’d think that he had gone insane, and here we are with Disney pooping this concept awkwardly into our laps. Please kill me.
Animation
As I mentioned earlier, the character designs aren’t particularly astounding. Proportion seems to be a recurring problem, for a start. It seems Aladdin is the only person in the word with shoulders, everyone else just having their arms jut out of their chest awkwardly. But the colours… oh, boy, the colours… this film might have one of the most putrid colour schemes in a Disney film. Firstly, there’s a strange absence of shadows. It looks like a colouring book more than a feature length movie, with only block colours that are often reused in other places. For example, when near bright light, instead of the character’s shadows being made smaller but darker and having everything else made brighter, the character will turn red and yellow. I’m dead fucking serious, the characters are made of glass and paper in this film.
And as for the animation itself, well, there’s not a great deal OF it. It’s not quite on the level of PowerPoint presentations, but it’s not too much better. The animation applies to the focus of the scene and ONLY the focus of the scene. Anyone in a shot who’s in the background or sometimes simply not talking has a weird collective habit of suddenly being struck by rigor mortis, just standing blankly in the exact same position as they were before they finished their action, their eyes glazed, cold and dead, unaware of their surroundings, staring out into the void, like a rational human being after being forced to watch any anime. The animation itself is passable, though not quite on the usual level of Disney. More like one of their TV cartoons than a feature length film. A shit cartoon. Drawn by a drunken gibbon.
Final Word
Some might say this film is good for kids. These are the people who think that a diet consisting of knives is also good for kids. For the rest of us, this film will slowly melt your brain. The story is a shambling complicated mess, acting like a child with ADD on a sugar-high. The animation has about as much motion as a dead tortoise. The art is a disastrous amalgam of bizarre proportions, a complete lack of colour coordination and a desire to make the viewer vomit. It’s only real claims to fame are that Homer Simpson is in it and Square Enix stuck a level based on it in their god awful Kingdom Hearts series for reasons I will never understand. To be honest, this film spelt the format for Disney sequels, and I’d sooner recommend fellating a mechanic squid.
Final Word
Some might say this film is good for kids. These are the people who think that a diet consisting of knives is also good for kids. For the rest of us, this film will slowly melt your brain. The story is a shambling complicated mess, acting like a child with ADD on a sugar-high. The animation has about as much motion as a dead tortoise. The art is a disastrous amalgam of bizarre proportions, a complete lack of colour coordination and a desire to make the viewer vomit. It’s only real claims to fame are that Homer Simpson is in it and Square Enix stuck a level based on it in their god awful Kingdom Hearts series for reasons I will never understand. To be honest, this film spelt the format for Disney sequels, and I’d sooner recommend fellating a mechanic squid.
IT’S INDIAN SANTA CLAUS!!!
Friday, 24 September 2010
Rob Stoakes: TOP FIVE GOOD SERIES GONE BAD
Sponge Culture Reviews
Rob Stoakes Reviews
Top Five Good Series Gone Bad
Prologue
Now, if you own a Wii, know a friend who owns a Wii, stood in the same room as a Wii at some point in your life or simply have one working limb, the chances are that you have played Metroid Other M. For those of you who haven’t, you may have noticed that every single person on the earth is, for once, in agreement: Metroid Other M is not liked by a single right-minded person in the world. The general consensus is that it’s a barely mediocre game that is generally inferior to the otherwise brilliant Metroid series, a rental at best, and not really worth the price of a full-length game. Harsh words, but I’m sure you’re all saying “Well, I can think of worse.” but then you talk to the average Metroid fan and, well… wow.
I don’t think I’ve seen a fan base turn so suddenly and so quickly from loyal and obedient cash machines into slavering wild men. I personally feel that nailing your own genitalia to a train track and waiting for the 1534 to arrive is more fun than playing the festering pile of poo-poo that is Metroid Other M, but even I was gob-smacked by how many other Metroid fans agree with me. Even bonkers hardcore fanatics who actually paid £400 to read the manga and actually have an uncompleted Varia Suit in the garage have thrown their hands up and said enough was enough. The insane easiness, the lack of exploration, the idiocy of the “Can’t let you do that, Samus” rigmoral, and most of all, taking such an independent, strong, eats-nails-for-breakfast badass character like Samus Aran and turning her into a whiny, co-dependant, idiotic, fearful, lonely, I’m-such-an-innocent-flower-child, Bella Swan, can’t-shut-the-fuck-up, cowardly, I’m-just-a-little-girl-who-needs-compassion, brainless, self-doubting, worthless-without-a-man, nervous, roll-me-over-and-treat-me-like-a-bitch, stupid, moronic berk who stops every five seconds to monologue about ‘how young and naïve and afraid I was’ back when SHE SAVED THE UNIVERSE FROM MOTHER BRAIN and wonders ‘what Adam would do. Oh, if only Adam were here. Please Adam, make me your bitch! I’ve got a big cream arrow pointing down on my back. Come on Adam! Do me up the butt! Adam, oh Adam! ADAM, FUCK ME! ROCK ME LIKE A HURRICANE! ADAM! ADAAAAAMM!!!’ Oh Samus, you were once respectable.
Inspired by this, I decided to have a look at other series and franchises that started off great then suddenly became so bad, so absolutely dreary, a graph explaining how good they are resembles a graph about our current financial situation TOPICAL HUMOUR SNORT SNORT!
Number 5 – Digimon: The First Series
Most people will recall me mentioning my opinions on the first Digimon series, often called Digimon Adventure, in brief during the Digimon Adventure 02 (side-note, that’s a stupid name. Why not just ‘Digimon Adventure 2’ or ‘Digimon Adventure: The Second Series’ or even something as cheesy as ‘Digimon Adventure: A Whole New Something-or-other’, anything but that unnecessary and stupid looking zero) review, but not my full opinion. While it was true that I was more in the Pokemon camp, I did love Digimon when I was a mere stripling, and surprisingly, it’s probably aged a lot better than most shows that I watched when I was younger. I didn’t watch a lot of television back then, mostly tapes of really old shit, so there are only a few cartoons and shows I watched in the nineties then that I could tolerate now, examples being the bizarre and too-cheesy-not-to-love Pokemon (gee, what a shock) or the shamelessly innocent and old-school ChuckleVision (though I’d rather have my left foot gnawed off by badgers than watch one of the various Chuckle Brothers live shows) or the absolutely peerless game show Robot Wars (which I personally hold as the greatest television broadcast of all time and still demand an eighth series even six years after it ended), and surprisingly enough Digimon is one of them… to a point.
Firstly, I can never watch more than an episode a day because otherwise my ears might melt. The voice acting is abysmal, and I mean “The Time of The Apes” abysmal, especially later on when we get Metalseadramon (again, stupid name) shouting stuff like “Yooo have – failed, MEEE (!) again. I, wheel not tor-LERRHH-ate… FAAAAY-liure.” I would say that it’s hilarious, but my so-bad-it’s-funny appetite has been spoilt somewhat by the Finnish dub of Digimon which is just… it’s sort of like “I am Torgo. I take care of the place while the master is away.”
Secondly, I mentioned that the plot went snooker loopy half way in, but that’s slightly unfair. More, it was all well and good for the first story arc, then robotic Elvis monkey ninja showed up, and as you might have guessed, it went mental. Then a vampire came along and said “I’m going to the real world MWUH HAHA HAHA” and, while the villain himself was rubbish, the idea of Digimon rampaging around Earth was cool, then the vampire became some weird Godzilla spider man thing and just wouldn’t die. After that, these four dickheads came along to be massive dickheads, and the first one (“Yooo have – failed, MEEE (!) again.”) was crap, the middle two were so awesomely awesome that they out-awesomed the entire series, then The Joker showed up (?) and then they were attacked by a giant Rubik’s cube and it was over.
Rob Stoakes Reviews
Top Five Good Series Gone Bad
Prologue
Now, if you own a Wii, know a friend who owns a Wii, stood in the same room as a Wii at some point in your life or simply have one working limb, the chances are that you have played Metroid Other M. For those of you who haven’t, you may have noticed that every single person on the earth is, for once, in agreement: Metroid Other M is not liked by a single right-minded person in the world. The general consensus is that it’s a barely mediocre game that is generally inferior to the otherwise brilliant Metroid series, a rental at best, and not really worth the price of a full-length game. Harsh words, but I’m sure you’re all saying “Well, I can think of worse.” but then you talk to the average Metroid fan and, well… wow.
I don’t think I’ve seen a fan base turn so suddenly and so quickly from loyal and obedient cash machines into slavering wild men. I personally feel that nailing your own genitalia to a train track and waiting for the 1534 to arrive is more fun than playing the festering pile of poo-poo that is Metroid Other M, but even I was gob-smacked by how many other Metroid fans agree with me. Even bonkers hardcore fanatics who actually paid £400 to read the manga and actually have an uncompleted Varia Suit in the garage have thrown their hands up and said enough was enough. The insane easiness, the lack of exploration, the idiocy of the “Can’t let you do that, Samus” rigmoral, and most of all, taking such an independent, strong, eats-nails-for-breakfast badass character like Samus Aran and turning her into a whiny, co-dependant, idiotic, fearful, lonely, I’m-such-an-innocent-flower-child, Bella Swan, can’t-shut-the-fuck-up, cowardly, I’m-just-a-little-girl-who-needs-compassion, brainless, self-doubting, worthless-without-a-man, nervous, roll-me-over-and-treat-me-like-a-bitch, stupid, moronic berk who stops every five seconds to monologue about ‘how young and naïve and afraid I was’ back when SHE SAVED THE UNIVERSE FROM MOTHER BRAIN and wonders ‘what Adam would do. Oh, if only Adam were here. Please Adam, make me your bitch! I’ve got a big cream arrow pointing down on my back. Come on Adam! Do me up the butt! Adam, oh Adam! ADAM, FUCK ME! ROCK ME LIKE A HURRICANE! ADAM! ADAAAAAMM!!!’ Oh Samus, you were once respectable.
Inspired by this, I decided to have a look at other series and franchises that started off great then suddenly became so bad, so absolutely dreary, a graph explaining how good they are resembles a graph about our current financial situation TOPICAL HUMOUR SNORT SNORT!
Number 5 – Digimon: The First Series
Most people will recall me mentioning my opinions on the first Digimon series, often called Digimon Adventure, in brief during the Digimon Adventure 02 (side-note, that’s a stupid name. Why not just ‘Digimon Adventure 2’ or ‘Digimon Adventure: The Second Series’ or even something as cheesy as ‘Digimon Adventure: A Whole New Something-or-other’, anything but that unnecessary and stupid looking zero) review, but not my full opinion. While it was true that I was more in the Pokemon camp, I did love Digimon when I was a mere stripling, and surprisingly, it’s probably aged a lot better than most shows that I watched when I was younger. I didn’t watch a lot of television back then, mostly tapes of really old shit, so there are only a few cartoons and shows I watched in the nineties then that I could tolerate now, examples being the bizarre and too-cheesy-not-to-love Pokemon (gee, what a shock) or the shamelessly innocent and old-school ChuckleVision (though I’d rather have my left foot gnawed off by badgers than watch one of the various Chuckle Brothers live shows) or the absolutely peerless game show Robot Wars (which I personally hold as the greatest television broadcast of all time and still demand an eighth series even six years after it ended), and surprisingly enough Digimon is one of them… to a point.
Firstly, I can never watch more than an episode a day because otherwise my ears might melt. The voice acting is abysmal, and I mean “The Time of The Apes” abysmal, especially later on when we get Metalseadramon (again, stupid name) shouting stuff like “Yooo have – failed, MEEE (!) again. I, wheel not tor-LERRHH-ate… FAAAAY-liure.” I would say that it’s hilarious, but my so-bad-it’s-funny appetite has been spoilt somewhat by the Finnish dub of Digimon which is just… it’s sort of like “I am Torgo. I take care of the place while the master is away.”
Secondly, I mentioned that the plot went snooker loopy half way in, but that’s slightly unfair. More, it was all well and good for the first story arc, then robotic Elvis monkey ninja showed up, and as you might have guessed, it went mental. Then a vampire came along and said “I’m going to the real world MWUH HAHA HAHA” and, while the villain himself was rubbish, the idea of Digimon rampaging around Earth was cool, then the vampire became some weird Godzilla spider man thing and just wouldn’t die. After that, these four dickheads came along to be massive dickheads, and the first one (“Yooo have – failed, MEEE (!) again.”) was crap, the middle two were so awesomely awesome that they out-awesomed the entire series, then The Joker showed up (?) and then they were attacked by a giant Rubik’s cube and it was over.
Most people’s reaction to the plot summary.
Ok, can we please choose a story and stick with it? I know we’ve got fifty episodes to pump out, but surely we can pace it better than this! You set up these villains to be mega-badasses who can destroy the world by sneezing and make Darth Vader look like Steve Martin, and they last for bout five episodes before another one pops up and says “Aha, but I am even stronger!” with all the sincerity of a puppy telling you that it didn’t shit on the rug. And the ‘DigiDestined’ (snigger) are always bloody searching for something. They just find ways to continue searching. “We need to find a way to Digivolve, oh, now we’ve got to find the tags, now the crest, now our parents, now the TV remote, where is that TV remote, there it is, there, there, not there, there, look, see, I’m pointing at it, come on, you bastards, just look!” This is the entire series. “Where is it? Here it is. Oh, what’s that? Where is it? FIGHT SCENE!” Lather, rinse, repeat… four times!
Number 4 – Carry On Films
The Carry On films are widely considered comedy classics, but, to be honest, are they really? Out of the 31 Carry On films that were made, everybody only really remembers about four; Carry On Sergeant, Carry On Screaming, Carry On Up The Khyber and Carry On Camping, Carry On Camping being often called the best despite being unremittingly shit. Oh, and there’s also bloody Carry On Henry and fucking Carry On Dick. Turn on ITV4 right now, and I can guarantee that one of those two is on. No matter what I do, no matter what day it is or what time it is, or even how long it has been since the last showing, they’re playing these two back to back for eternity.
For those of you who don’t know what the Carry On films are, you’re probably not British. For those of you who are British and don’t know about the Carry On films, you’re probably dead. Anyway, to explain, the Carry On films were a series of low budget comedies that ran from late fifties to the late seventies (with another in 1992 as a tribute/revival that lives in infamy for being as funny as watching a child die in the trousers of a smiling bear) which all had the gimmick of having the same fucking cast playing the same fucking characters in the same fucking situations. As you might have guessed, I don’t really like the more well known Carry On films. The best known ones are just a long string of knob jokes, well-endowed girls getting their knockers out, double entendres, Barbara Windsor wearing the lowest cut top she can find…
Ok, can we please choose a story and stick with it? I know we’ve got fifty episodes to pump out, but surely we can pace it better than this! You set up these villains to be mega-badasses who can destroy the world by sneezing and make Darth Vader look like Steve Martin, and they last for bout five episodes before another one pops up and says “Aha, but I am even stronger!” with all the sincerity of a puppy telling you that it didn’t shit on the rug. And the ‘DigiDestined’ (snigger) are always bloody searching for something. They just find ways to continue searching. “We need to find a way to Digivolve, oh, now we’ve got to find the tags, now the crest, now our parents, now the TV remote, where is that TV remote, there it is, there, there, not there, there, look, see, I’m pointing at it, come on, you bastards, just look!” This is the entire series. “Where is it? Here it is. Oh, what’s that? Where is it? FIGHT SCENE!” Lather, rinse, repeat… four times!
Number 4 – Carry On Films
The Carry On films are widely considered comedy classics, but, to be honest, are they really? Out of the 31 Carry On films that were made, everybody only really remembers about four; Carry On Sergeant, Carry On Screaming, Carry On Up The Khyber and Carry On Camping, Carry On Camping being often called the best despite being unremittingly shit. Oh, and there’s also bloody Carry On Henry and fucking Carry On Dick. Turn on ITV4 right now, and I can guarantee that one of those two is on. No matter what I do, no matter what day it is or what time it is, or even how long it has been since the last showing, they’re playing these two back to back for eternity.
For those of you who don’t know what the Carry On films are, you’re probably not British. For those of you who are British and don’t know about the Carry On films, you’re probably dead. Anyway, to explain, the Carry On films were a series of low budget comedies that ran from late fifties to the late seventies (with another in 1992 as a tribute/revival that lives in infamy for being as funny as watching a child die in the trousers of a smiling bear) which all had the gimmick of having the same fucking cast playing the same fucking characters in the same fucking situations. As you might have guessed, I don’t really like the more well known Carry On films. The best known ones are just a long string of knob jokes, well-endowed girls getting their knockers out, double entendres, Barbara Windsor wearing the lowest cut top she can find…
Well, thank goodness she’s packed that nonsense in.
... and Kenneth Williams being simultaneously camp as a row of tent, straight as a metre stick, bent as a ten pound note and classy as a glass statuette of a swan. However, the first ten Carry On films are comedy gold. Particular gems are Carry On Nurse, Carry On Cleo and, my personal favourite, Carry On Teacher, probably the most un-Carry On-esque film of the franchise. While Carry On films are known generally for their ‘ooh-errr-missus’ double entendres, the earlier ones based themselves more on farce and silly puns, especially Carry On Cleo for the classic “Infamy! Infamy! They’ve all got it infamy!” That, and even in the worst, Kenneth Williams is always brilliant. Now if only it had stayed that way…
Number 3 - Spyro
Lots of people say that Final Fantasy 7 and Metal Gear Solid sold the PlayStation, but if you asked who the mascots for the PlayStation were, it would eventually break down to either Crash Bandicoot or Spyro the Dragon, and, guess what, I fucking love the original Spyro trilogy. They are all incredibly fun games, with a quirky sense of humour and sublime 3D platforming. They all rest comfortably in my favourite ever games. In fact, though I want to keep you in the dark as to my absolute favourite game, film, TV programme (though I’ve already given away that one earlier in this article) and/or book of all time, but Spyro 3 is in the top five and is also higher than Pokemon. Not a particularly complex gameplay experience (though Square to Charge, Circle to Breathe Fire, X twice to glide and Triangle to hover are all imprinted in my brain like the function to breathe) the series was challenging rather than difficult, asking for the players to hone their skills rather than get lucky with a jump like most platformers. The stories were simple and had lots of interesting characters, and then…
… and then the PS2 came out.
The PlayStation 2 Spyro games are an anomaly in terms of how bad they are, because they change little but what they do change kills the entire franchise dead. They don’t change that much in level design, though the characters are quickly separated into groups called ‘Spyro, Sparx and Hunter, so they’re staying’ and ‘Everyone else so they’re going’. And the separation is carried out by an SS officer with a Lugar, and he brings in some Disney-esque charmless dead puppets, devoid of all emotion, function or purpose, only there to simply stand around and stagnate. However, they aren’t in it very much. No, the anomaly comes in the gameplay changes. Now there are different types of fire, which makes about as much sense as eating a dead rat as one of your five-pieces-of-fruit-a-day and have the same function, to make you puke. Also, it was made by completely different people, so the whole thing feels like a complete charade. Tom Kenny, the voice of Spyro in Spyro 2 and 3, is gone, replaced by Jess Harnell, who has dropped a long way from Wakko in Animaniacs, and the voice acting never gets much better. That and that there were bugged so far up the arse that they were literally spewing small insects up as if they were in Creepshow, and it doesn’t help the already abysmal graphics.
... and Kenneth Williams being simultaneously camp as a row of tent, straight as a metre stick, bent as a ten pound note and classy as a glass statuette of a swan. However, the first ten Carry On films are comedy gold. Particular gems are Carry On Nurse, Carry On Cleo and, my personal favourite, Carry On Teacher, probably the most un-Carry On-esque film of the franchise. While Carry On films are known generally for their ‘ooh-errr-missus’ double entendres, the earlier ones based themselves more on farce and silly puns, especially Carry On Cleo for the classic “Infamy! Infamy! They’ve all got it infamy!” That, and even in the worst, Kenneth Williams is always brilliant. Now if only it had stayed that way…
Number 3 - Spyro
Lots of people say that Final Fantasy 7 and Metal Gear Solid sold the PlayStation, but if you asked who the mascots for the PlayStation were, it would eventually break down to either Crash Bandicoot or Spyro the Dragon, and, guess what, I fucking love the original Spyro trilogy. They are all incredibly fun games, with a quirky sense of humour and sublime 3D platforming. They all rest comfortably in my favourite ever games. In fact, though I want to keep you in the dark as to my absolute favourite game, film, TV programme (though I’ve already given away that one earlier in this article) and/or book of all time, but Spyro 3 is in the top five and is also higher than Pokemon. Not a particularly complex gameplay experience (though Square to Charge, Circle to Breathe Fire, X twice to glide and Triangle to hover are all imprinted in my brain like the function to breathe) the series was challenging rather than difficult, asking for the players to hone their skills rather than get lucky with a jump like most platformers. The stories were simple and had lots of interesting characters, and then…
… and then the PS2 came out.
The PlayStation 2 Spyro games are an anomaly in terms of how bad they are, because they change little but what they do change kills the entire franchise dead. They don’t change that much in level design, though the characters are quickly separated into groups called ‘Spyro, Sparx and Hunter, so they’re staying’ and ‘Everyone else so they’re going’. And the separation is carried out by an SS officer with a Lugar, and he brings in some Disney-esque charmless dead puppets, devoid of all emotion, function or purpose, only there to simply stand around and stagnate. However, they aren’t in it very much. No, the anomaly comes in the gameplay changes. Now there are different types of fire, which makes about as much sense as eating a dead rat as one of your five-pieces-of-fruit-a-day and have the same function, to make you puke. Also, it was made by completely different people, so the whole thing feels like a complete charade. Tom Kenny, the voice of Spyro in Spyro 2 and 3, is gone, replaced by Jess Harnell, who has dropped a long way from Wakko in Animaniacs, and the voice acting never gets much better. That and that there were bugged so far up the arse that they were literally spewing small insects up as if they were in Creepshow, and it doesn’t help the already abysmal graphics.
He’s single, ladies.And please, don’t start me on The Legend of Spyro reboot. Sure, Elijah Wood was literally born to play as Spyro, but the design of the new Spyro is so butt-fuck ugly I can’t look at the screen for fear of having my face burnt off by Satan. And if you’ve ever seen any terrible kid’s fantasy film made in the eighties and starring Rob Schneider, you’ve played this game before, only this is far longer and far worse. It’s so confusing and yet so stupid it deserves a reward for baffling me to the point of anger, and I managed to keep up with The Matrix trilogy.
Number 2 - Jaws
Oh dear. Oh dear oh dear.
Well, the original was great. It was a slow movie, but that’s what made it so great. It was a build up on dread, the crushing horror that at any time a shark could and would tear you apart with not a care. It was a slow movie, yes, but never calm. The tension could be cut with a knife, and it was only exasperated by the fact that the characters themselves were incredibly likable. The acting was very good, convincing us that these were real people with real lives that could at any moment be simply torn away in a second’s notice. Not forgetting Jaws himself. Michael Myers is human. Jason Voorhees is human. Max Cady, Norman Bates, Curt Duncan. All human. They can be shot, stabbed, pushed down stairs and beaten up. They may be tough or clever or evil, but they are all human. Jaws is a shark, though, and sharks are tough and nasty bastards. The idea of being eaten is a frightening one, possibly the most painful way to die, and humans aren’t exactly very fast in the water. The victims in the original Jaws don’t die because they’re stupid. They die because they’re helpless, and against Jaws they can not compete.
Cut to the next three Jaws movies: “HEY! A SHARK! LET’S POKE IT! OOOH! OOOH! COME ON, SHARKY!”
Yes, the characters are almost all retarded lepers who simply don’t care about their own lives. They send much of the movie acting like unlikeable pricks who you’ve seen before in every Jason movie made, then die because of their own idiocy, and all the other characters go “So, why did he die? Let’s do the same thing as he did to find out.” And the acting doesn’t help, making the Finnish version of Digimon look like Lawrence Olivier.
I think the biggest problem with these movies though is the shark itself, which is ironic. The original had very little of the shark, and not knowing if and when the shark would attack made the whole film tense and suspenseful while Jaws 2 through 4 can all be summed up by shouting “OH MY GOD A FUCKING SHARK DID YOU KNOW THAT THERE WAS A SHARK IN THIS MOVIE BECAUSE THERE IT FUCKING IS!!!”
So, after that atrocity, what could possibly win?
Number 1 – Star Wars
Didn’t that come out of nowhere?
I don’t think I should explain this one, but I will anyway. Because you all know Star Wars, don’t you? That homage to stories of old, revolutionising sci-fi and filmmaking forever, bringing in a whole slew of new talent including some the best actors of the late 20th century, bringing old story telling conventions back into fashion, a grand and glorious tribute to samurai, western and fantasy stories which has given us many new ideas our generation takes for granted, such as the influence for great new fantasy locations…
… or am I talking about the shoddy, poorly-conceived pile of bum fluff, revolutionising futile money spinning and easily marketable creations forever, bringing in some hideously bad actors into fashion like a giant whack-a-mole for critics, a piss poor gibbering mess. Does this at all hold a candle to the originals?
I think the biggest problem with these movies though is the shark itself, which is ironic. The original had very little of the shark, and not knowing if and when the shark would attack made the whole film tense and suspenseful while Jaws 2 through 4 can all be summed up by shouting “OH MY GOD A FUCKING SHARK DID YOU KNOW THAT THERE WAS A SHARK IN THIS MOVIE BECAUSE THERE IT FUCKING IS!!!”
So, after that atrocity, what could possibly win?
Number 1 – Star Wars
Didn’t that come out of nowhere?
I don’t think I should explain this one, but I will anyway. Because you all know Star Wars, don’t you? That homage to stories of old, revolutionising sci-fi and filmmaking forever, bringing in a whole slew of new talent including some the best actors of the late 20th century, bringing old story telling conventions back into fashion, a grand and glorious tribute to samurai, western and fantasy stories which has given us many new ideas our generation takes for granted, such as the influence for great new fantasy locations…
… or am I talking about the shoddy, poorly-conceived pile of bum fluff, revolutionising futile money spinning and easily marketable creations forever, bringing in some hideously bad actors into fashion like a giant whack-a-mole for critics, a piss poor gibbering mess. Does this at all hold a candle to the originals?
The prequels are the ultimate example of a series selling out. If the original Star Wars is a Herculean super-billionaire scientist then the prequels are when he begins endorsing for Pepsi and becomes a shallow marketing whore. The series declined into a messy, dreary, tired bollock, becoming the most generic kiddie dross of all time, solely made to sell McDonald’s toys. Here at Sponge Culture, we hate the mediocre, the safe, the lazy and the overrated above all other than the genuinely bad, and Star Wars prequels couldn’t be more safe and lazy if it tried. And that’s before we get into the individual merits:
The Gungans. Those weird fish-like China-man stereotypes. Natalie Portman. The dickhead who played as Anakin ‘Whaaaaaaaaa! Whaaaaaaaaaa! I’m not a very good Jedi! No one takes me seriously. Whaaaaaaaaaa! Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!’ Skywalker. The CGI that resembled a man throwing some drawings on paper and shouting ‘Whoosh!’ The Clone Wars movie. Jar Jar Binks! I think carrying on would be slaughter. The whole thing has been shackled down, a design-by-committee ‘weird-aliens, two three, whiny-young-adult, three four, Natalie Portman, four five. It’s made for kids, and I hate kids. Almost as much as I hate Metroid Other M. They scream, shout and shit all over the place.
Use a condom. End of review.
The Gungans. Those weird fish-like China-man stereotypes. Natalie Portman. The dickhead who played as Anakin ‘Whaaaaaaaaa! Whaaaaaaaaaa! I’m not a very good Jedi! No one takes me seriously. Whaaaaaaaaaa! Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!’ Skywalker. The CGI that resembled a man throwing some drawings on paper and shouting ‘Whoosh!’ The Clone Wars movie. Jar Jar Binks! I think carrying on would be slaughter. The whole thing has been shackled down, a design-by-committee ‘weird-aliens, two three, whiny-young-adult, three four, Natalie Portman, four five. It’s made for kids, and I hate kids. Almost as much as I hate Metroid Other M. They scream, shout and shit all over the place.
Use a condom. End of review.
Friday, 17 September 2010
Rob Stoakes: Comparing Sorcerer's Apprentice to Scott Pilgrim VS The World
Sponge Culture Reviews
Rob Stoakes Compares
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE
2010
JON TURTELTAUB
WALT DISNEY PICTURES
Rob Stoakes Compares
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE
2010
JON TURTELTAUB
WALT DISNEY PICTURES
to
SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD
2010
EDGAR WRIGHT
UNIVERSAL PICTURES
Prologue
So not too recently I saw two films on the exact same day. The family-friendly magical adventure Sorcerer’s Apprentice and the nerd-friendly adapted-from-book adventure Scott Pilgrim vs the World. Which is better? Which is worse? Which contains more bread? Here is a recommendation for the two films as to which one you should see, though I’m so far behind, you probably have already seen them both, but shut up.
SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD
2010
EDGAR WRIGHT
UNIVERSAL PICTURES
Prologue
So not too recently I saw two films on the exact same day. The family-friendly magical adventure Sorcerer’s Apprentice and the nerd-friendly adapted-from-book adventure Scott Pilgrim vs the World. Which is better? Which is worse? Which contains more bread? Here is a recommendation for the two films as to which one you should see, though I’m so far behind, you probably have already seen them both, but shut up.
No fucking shit, Sherlock. How’d you work that one out? Was it the goatee, the hat, the long coat, the cane, the thick eyebrows, the evil glint in his eyes, the army of flying cockroaches or the fact that he's the guy who played Doctor Octopus?
Plot
So, it isn’t quite difficult to choose an obvious winner. Sorcerer’s Apprentice is a complex story about a war between two different schoolings of magic; those who follow Merlin and those who follow the evil sorceress and Queen-of-Hearts-look-alike Morgana. As Merlin’s apprentice, Balthazar, played by Nicolas Cage, traps Morgana in a Russian Doll thingy along with his dead girlfriend, while traitor Maxim, played by Alfred Molina, tries to free Morgana. Then there’s Dave, the chosen one, played by Jay Baruchel, a twenty something who looks about ten with a voice that has embedded itself in my personal hell, who is destined to kill Morgana. Scott Pilgrim’s plot, by contrast is basically “Some guy has to beat his girlfriend’s seven evil exes to win her heart.” So, can you guess the winner? That’s right, it’s Scott Pilgrim.
Plot
So, it isn’t quite difficult to choose an obvious winner. Sorcerer’s Apprentice is a complex story about a war between two different schoolings of magic; those who follow Merlin and those who follow the evil sorceress and Queen-of-Hearts-look-alike Morgana. As Merlin’s apprentice, Balthazar, played by Nicolas Cage, traps Morgana in a Russian Doll thingy along with his dead girlfriend, while traitor Maxim, played by Alfred Molina, tries to free Morgana. Then there’s Dave, the chosen one, played by Jay Baruchel, a twenty something who looks about ten with a voice that has embedded itself in my personal hell, who is destined to kill Morgana. Scott Pilgrim’s plot, by contrast is basically “Some guy has to beat his girlfriend’s seven evil exes to win her heart.” So, can you guess the winner? That’s right, it’s Scott Pilgrim.
The reason for this is all the background stuff that is in the, well, background. And, frankly, Sorcerer’s Apprentice doesn’t have any depth, which is strange because half the film is Nicolas Cage banging on and on and on about Morgana and Maxim and Merlin and how his girlfriend’s dead and how Dave shouldn’t fall in love and all this fucking back-story that goes absolutely bloody nowhere. There’s no subtlety in any shape or form. We don’t learn anything about the characters and they, in turn, learn nothing. Dave doesn’t evolve. He doesn’t change. He starts in the film as a whiny nerdy socially-awkward berk, and he ends the film as a whiny nerdy socially-awkward berk. There’s some side-plot where he dates Teresa Palmer’s character Becky, who is also completely fucking useless in this film. There’s not a lot of training either, surprisingly. Dave knows fuck all about magic, then Balthazar says “Bitch I be training ya.” And then five minutes later, Dave knows all the spells he needs to survive. And, when they say there’s a whole league of Morgana’s servants, they’re lying. There’s exactly five of them: Morgana herself (who dies two minutes after arriving at the end), Maxim, Maxim’s apprentice (who doesn’t cast any spells, doesn’t have a fight scene and has two lines of dialogue, both of them 'wry' [?] comedic quips), some Chinese dude (who has one fight scene and then dies) and some woman doing an impersonation of Florence Nightingale (who doesn’t even get a line or a fight scene before she croaks). Oh, dear lord, I’m quaking in my boots, these five guys say they’re going to rule the world, yeah, you go for it. This movie has nothing to offer beyond face value, which is a labyrinthine mess of all sorts of loyalties and love triangles that don’t make a difference and all this crap. The plot stops then starts over and over and over as if it’s a Kremlin that won’t start.
Scott Pilgrim, however, is an incredibly deceptive movie. I told you what the plot was, but not what the movie is about. The movie has so many messages and subtle little side stories that it’s almost impossible to figure them all out. The major arc is about evolution. Unlike most romantic comedy underdogs, Scott Pilgrim, played by Michael Cera (stop laughing), isn’t a kind, gentle soul who tries to show the girl just how bad for her the jocks she dates usually are, oddly a role Michael Cera plays all the god damn time. In fact, Scott’s a giant prick. He’s whiny, stupid, immature, arrogant, sheltered and lazy and, though ultimately good-hearted, has not a clue on how to treat people. He treats women like dirt, uses self-pity to drag them into pitying him too and simply refuses to accept the fact that anything’s wrong with him. At the end of the film, however, he literally defeats the last evil-ex by coming to terms with just how badly he’s been treating people. His girlfriend Ramona goes through an evolution, seeing as she was the one who wronged all her evil exes and simply tries to hide from the fact by running away all the time, repeatedly making the same mistakes and letting her evil exes catch up to her over and over. Again, at the end, she finally admits to Scott that she’s not the perfect woman she’s been made out to be, and in fact she’s probably not even the best choice for him. These are just two of the many, many evolutions. You could talk about the evolutions all day, but the point is that this movie has so much depth it’s almost bursting at the reams, and yet it never becomes confusing. It’s quite clear what each character goes through, and it also never detracts from the main premise of “Seven evil exes are trying to beat the shite out of you, Scott.” It’s fast; it never seems forced and flows brilliantly. If Sorcerer’s Apprentice is a Kremlin, then Scott Pilgrim’s a Boeing 747, pulsing along like mental. One point to Scott Pilgrim.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 0 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD - 1
Acting/Characters
Now this is where it really gets unfair. While yes, comparing Nicolas Cage to Michael Cera when it comes to acting is a bit like comparing Haute Cuisine to gravel over which would be a better meal, Nicolas Cage is so badly miscast, you could’ve put a hamster in the role of Balthazar and it would’ve made more sense. Here we have an actor known to be wild and eccentric, who less chews on scenery as tear chunks out of it with his jaw, who has frequently made otherwise bad movies into barrels of fun and steals the scene in much of his work, and he’s playing such a sedate, boring old man, it feels as if you cast Lawrence Olivier to play as one of the Mr Men. His character is a dull, boring old fart who is completely uninteresting, and Nicolas Cage adds nothing to the role. The rest of the cast of Sorcerer’s Apprentice is passable, but nothing to write home about, besides Alfred Molina playing a very good Maxim, bringing a spark of cynicism and life into what could’ve been easily a very boring carbon copy of every villain in every kid’s film ever made. However… there’s also Jay Baruchel as the protagonist Dave.
Man, is this guy bad. I don’t mean ‘not that good’ or ‘bad compared to the rest of the cast’, I mean he’s fucking terrible. His nasally voice seems completely unable to express any emotion other than confusion, and his body language is almost like a cartoon character. When he seems depressed, he literally puts his face in his hands and droops his shoulders rather suddenly, taking lessons of acting from Mickey Mouse. NOBODY ACTS LIKE THIS!!! Would you like to drop your jaw to the floor while you’re at it, or turn your eyes into love hearts whenever Teresa Palmer walks by? You’re a human being, not one of the Looney Tunes.
Once again, Scott Pilgrim trumps this category with its superior casting. I mean, alright, I’ve never liked Michael Cera’s acting that much, but I actually couldn’t think of a better actor to play Scott Pilgrim, except for the fact that Scott Pilgrim in the books and the film is supposed to be twenty three, and Michael Cera himself looks nine. There’s also the fact that Anna Kendrick plays his younger sister, and looks a lot older than him, and I mean decades older. However, this doesn’t mean that she puts in a bad performance, and her and the rest of the cast is phenomenal. While each of the cast puts forward a very strong performance, two real scene stealers who I’d like to give special mention to are Kieran Culkin as Wallace Wells, Scott’s roommate and one of the best examples of deadpan comedy I’ve seen in a long time, and the relatively unknown newbie Ellen Wong as Scott’s ex-girlfriend Knives Chau, who is on fire and has to stop because she is frighteningly close to the source material. These two are in particular strong because, though not just because, their roles could’ve come across as deadly annoying, whether it’s Wallace’s smug wryness or Knives’ hyperactive schoolgirl demeanour, and instead they are on fire all the way through and get a lot of the best jokes. Point to Scott Pilgrim.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 0 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD - 2
Cinematography and/or Animation
Now here’s where it gets a bit more difficult to split, because both films have very good action sequences. While Sorcerer’s Apprentice goes for a CG-heavy zap-a-thon with lightening and spells rocketing all over the place, Scott Pilgrim goes for much more kung-fu heavy punch ups. Both do a very good job with their respective action scenes, and each action scene has a completely different feel and aesthetic attitude. The fight scenes in Sorcerer’s Apprentice draw heavy influence from the surroundings, such as statues coming to life, people throwing bins at each, while Scott Pilgrim draws influence in the fighting from the evil exes Scott is fighting. For example, the fight with the Japanese twins is full of CG animation of anime-esque monsters, while the fight with the film star is a gritty punch up with a harsher tone and next to no CG. However, in terms of action, I’m tempted to go with Sorcerer’s Apprentice, seeing as fighting is the only kind of action sequence there is in Scott Pilgrim, while in Sorcerer’s Apprentice there are car chases, fires, and all sorts of mad shit going on, almost like a fireworks display of wild speed. It’s just that the fight scenes in Scott Pilgrim are really, really good anyway. Now, because I didn’t make any jokes in that last paragraph, here’s a silly picture of Nicolas Cage and a point to both films.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 1 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 3
Once again, Scott Pilgrim trumps this category with its superior casting. I mean, alright, I’ve never liked Michael Cera’s acting that much, but I actually couldn’t think of a better actor to play Scott Pilgrim, except for the fact that Scott Pilgrim in the books and the film is supposed to be twenty three, and Michael Cera himself looks nine. There’s also the fact that Anna Kendrick plays his younger sister, and looks a lot older than him, and I mean decades older. However, this doesn’t mean that she puts in a bad performance, and her and the rest of the cast is phenomenal. While each of the cast puts forward a very strong performance, two real scene stealers who I’d like to give special mention to are Kieran Culkin as Wallace Wells, Scott’s roommate and one of the best examples of deadpan comedy I’ve seen in a long time, and the relatively unknown newbie Ellen Wong as Scott’s ex-girlfriend Knives Chau, who is on fire and has to stop because she is frighteningly close to the source material. These two are in particular strong because, though not just because, their roles could’ve come across as deadly annoying, whether it’s Wallace’s smug wryness or Knives’ hyperactive schoolgirl demeanour, and instead they are on fire all the way through and get a lot of the best jokes. Point to Scott Pilgrim.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 0 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD - 2
Cinematography and/or Animation
Now here’s where it gets a bit more difficult to split, because both films have very good action sequences. While Sorcerer’s Apprentice goes for a CG-heavy zap-a-thon with lightening and spells rocketing all over the place, Scott Pilgrim goes for much more kung-fu heavy punch ups. Both do a very good job with their respective action scenes, and each action scene has a completely different feel and aesthetic attitude. The fight scenes in Sorcerer’s Apprentice draw heavy influence from the surroundings, such as statues coming to life, people throwing bins at each, while Scott Pilgrim draws influence in the fighting from the evil exes Scott is fighting. For example, the fight with the Japanese twins is full of CG animation of anime-esque monsters, while the fight with the film star is a gritty punch up with a harsher tone and next to no CG. However, in terms of action, I’m tempted to go with Sorcerer’s Apprentice, seeing as fighting is the only kind of action sequence there is in Scott Pilgrim, while in Sorcerer’s Apprentice there are car chases, fires, and all sorts of mad shit going on, almost like a fireworks display of wild speed. It’s just that the fight scenes in Scott Pilgrim are really, really good anyway. Now, because I didn’t make any jokes in that last paragraph, here’s a silly picture of Nicolas Cage and a point to both films.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 1 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 3
In terms of the CG itself, that’s a lot easier to decide, because Scott Pilgrim cheats. The CG in Scott Pilgrim is incredibly cartoon-like and unreal, with comic panels integrated into the shots and words like “Pow” and “Biff” and “Zap” and “Morrison” whenever anybody punches somebody else. So, yes, it doesn’t look exactly realistic. So comparing this to a film that is trying to look realistic is like trying to compare bread to The Rolling Stones. It’s not particularly easy, and Mick Jagger might have a problem with you trying to spread jam on him and eat him. Despite this, with Sorcerer’s Apprentice, the effects look pretty, but you can tell what’s real and what isn’t from a mile away, a bit like how you can tell a car horn from a man shouting "HONK!". And there’s a giant metal bird that looks as if it’s made of paper. Once more, a point to Scott Pilgrim.
WELL, GIVE US A CHANCE – 1 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 4
Other Notes
So… yeah. Sorcerer’s Apprentice doesn’t exactly look too good, does it? However, I can actually think one point in its favour, and it’s a big one, because this is why Sorcerer’s Apprentice, no matter how bad or good it is, will make millions more than Scott Pilgrim. Sorcerer’s Apprentice is a family film. I know, I know. Sad, yes, but true. Scott Pilgrim doesn’t exactly have the widest of demographics. The less you know about video games, comics, children’s cartoons and just about any form of media that was around in the nineties, the more you’ll hate this movie. It’s so insanely nerdy; just about every line is a reference to a Super Nintendo game even Nintendo has never heard of. While I’ve always thought that if you have a target demographic, stick to it and don’t try to include people who definitely won’t like it, I can think of a lot more people I could recommend Sorcerer’s Apprentice to over Scott Pilgrim, which is a same because, and this might cause a little bit of controversy, but Scott Pilgrim is probably the best film of the past four years.
I’ve said it. Never expect me to give anything praise in any review ever again.
WELL, GIVE US A CHANCE – 1 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 4
Other Notes
So… yeah. Sorcerer’s Apprentice doesn’t exactly look too good, does it? However, I can actually think one point in its favour, and it’s a big one, because this is why Sorcerer’s Apprentice, no matter how bad or good it is, will make millions more than Scott Pilgrim. Sorcerer’s Apprentice is a family film. I know, I know. Sad, yes, but true. Scott Pilgrim doesn’t exactly have the widest of demographics. The less you know about video games, comics, children’s cartoons and just about any form of media that was around in the nineties, the more you’ll hate this movie. It’s so insanely nerdy; just about every line is a reference to a Super Nintendo game even Nintendo has never heard of. While I’ve always thought that if you have a target demographic, stick to it and don’t try to include people who definitely won’t like it, I can think of a lot more people I could recommend Sorcerer’s Apprentice to over Scott Pilgrim, which is a same because, and this might cause a little bit of controversy, but Scott Pilgrim is probably the best film of the past four years.
I’ve said it. Never expect me to give anything praise in any review ever again.
Scott Pilgrim elbows his way past the Invisible Man.
It boils me that Sorcerer’s Apprentice ticks all the boxes. It’s so obviously trying to be “Good” rather than “Great” because good’s easier and makes more money. Scott Pilgrim doesn’t tick the boxes, it just bites into the form and spits out the mush on the table before pulling out it’s PlayStation Portable and whooping about how badly it just ‘pwned’ Paul Phoenix in Tekken. Sorcerer’s Apprentice is just such bloody business-man-like designed-by-committee that it succeeds everywhere it needs to and only where it needs to. Let’s give a reluctant point to Sorcerer’s Apprentice and move on.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 2 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 4
Now for the soundtrack… well… I can’t actually remember a single song from Sorcerer’s Apprentice.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 2 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 5
Final Word
So the final scores are that Sorcerer’s Apprentice is quite clearly a lot worse than Scott Pilgrim. Go see that instead. End of review. Now piss off.
It boils me that Sorcerer’s Apprentice ticks all the boxes. It’s so obviously trying to be “Good” rather than “Great” because good’s easier and makes more money. Scott Pilgrim doesn’t tick the boxes, it just bites into the form and spits out the mush on the table before pulling out it’s PlayStation Portable and whooping about how badly it just ‘pwned’ Paul Phoenix in Tekken. Sorcerer’s Apprentice is just such bloody business-man-like designed-by-committee that it succeeds everywhere it needs to and only where it needs to. Let’s give a reluctant point to Sorcerer’s Apprentice and move on.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 2 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 4
Now for the soundtrack… well… I can’t actually remember a single song from Sorcerer’s Apprentice.
SORCERER’S APPRENTICE – 2 SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD – 5
Final Word
So the final scores are that Sorcerer’s Apprentice is quite clearly a lot worse than Scott Pilgrim. Go see that instead. End of review. Now piss off.
Thursday, 9 September 2010
ROB STOAKES REVIEWS: Pokemon Emerald
Sponge Culture Reviews
Rob Stoakes Reviews
POKEMON EMERALD
2004
GAME FREAK
NINTENDO
Prologue
So I say I’m off for two weeks, end up skiving for four. Whoopsie daisy. Anyway, to compensate, a review for something halfway decent.
Some things are inevitable. Taxes. Death. Hatred of Piers Morgan. So my review of a Pokemon game wasn’t entirely unforeseen. I mean, come on, it had to happen at some point, seeing as I’ve been literally dribbling at the feet of the damn franchise since the first games came out, and have kept on saying bizarre phrases such as ‘gold standard in gaming’ and ‘one of the best multi-media franchises of all time’. It’s been an odd one, seeing as Pokemon Red/Blue isn’t my favourite game of all time, the Pokemon anime isn’t my favourite TV series of all time and other than Pokemon 3 and Pokemon Chronicles: The Legend of Raikou, the movies were shit. However, that isn’t the point.
The point is that the Pokemon games are among the best of all time… or at least, Pokemon Red and Blue are. Pokemon Gold and Silver are also of an incredible standard, and are actually probably better overall, at least from a technical standpoint. Oddly enough, the more advanced the system of games, the worse the games are. And what a good place to start… where it began to go wrong.
Plot
Pfffft! BAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAA!
Well, it does pretend to have a plot, at least in the same way a dog pretends to be a cat. Basically, it’s the same damn Pokemon game as the last. In a world where people use super-powered sports mascots to fight for money, you’re a dork who wants to be the greatest Pokemon trainer in the universe and also one of the richest. It’s essentially good-hearted mugging, but with a competitive element too. However, first you have to defeat eight gym leaders, particularly powerful Pokemon trainers, and then defeat the five best trainers in the world; the Elite Four and the Champion, all in one go. Along the way you face a criminal gang who wants to do some shit, oh for god’s sake I can’t do it. Why am I talking about the plot? It’s Pokemon! IT’S ALWAYS THE SAME GODDAM PLOT!
However, plot should never be confused with writing, and I feel that the Pokemon games have actually got some surprisingly good writing….
Rob Stoakes Reviews
POKEMON EMERALD
2004
GAME FREAK
NINTENDO
Prologue
So I say I’m off for two weeks, end up skiving for four. Whoopsie daisy. Anyway, to compensate, a review for something halfway decent.
Some things are inevitable. Taxes. Death. Hatred of Piers Morgan. So my review of a Pokemon game wasn’t entirely unforeseen. I mean, come on, it had to happen at some point, seeing as I’ve been literally dribbling at the feet of the damn franchise since the first games came out, and have kept on saying bizarre phrases such as ‘gold standard in gaming’ and ‘one of the best multi-media franchises of all time’. It’s been an odd one, seeing as Pokemon Red/Blue isn’t my favourite game of all time, the Pokemon anime isn’t my favourite TV series of all time and other than Pokemon 3 and Pokemon Chronicles: The Legend of Raikou, the movies were shit. However, that isn’t the point.
The point is that the Pokemon games are among the best of all time… or at least, Pokemon Red and Blue are. Pokemon Gold and Silver are also of an incredible standard, and are actually probably better overall, at least from a technical standpoint. Oddly enough, the more advanced the system of games, the worse the games are. And what a good place to start… where it began to go wrong.
Plot
Pfffft! BAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAA!
Well, it does pretend to have a plot, at least in the same way a dog pretends to be a cat. Basically, it’s the same damn Pokemon game as the last. In a world where people use super-powered sports mascots to fight for money, you’re a dork who wants to be the greatest Pokemon trainer in the universe and also one of the richest. It’s essentially good-hearted mugging, but with a competitive element too. However, first you have to defeat eight gym leaders, particularly powerful Pokemon trainers, and then defeat the five best trainers in the world; the Elite Four and the Champion, all in one go. Along the way you face a criminal gang who wants to do some shit, oh for god’s sake I can’t do it. Why am I talking about the plot? It’s Pokemon! IT’S ALWAYS THE SAME GODDAM PLOT!
However, plot should never be confused with writing, and I feel that the Pokemon games have actually got some surprisingly good writing….
… seeing as they’re able to actually make this world seem convincing. Also, the characters themselves, even the ones you only speak to for a second or two are remarkably expressive. Is it the same here? Well, yes, but there’s less people to talk to sadly. Sure, the ones you find are as funny, quirky or dickhead-ish as in the earlier games, but the whole world seems oddly vacant. You get to a town, meet about five people, then walk for hours to the next town and meet maybe two people along the way. Aww, great, just brilliant, don’t try to give this world a personality or feeling, just leave it derelict and dead. I like to pretend that there’s been a nuclear holocaust, and the Pokemon are just the affected populace mutated beyond recall. The only people left are the villains, Team Magma and Team Aqua, two rival criminal gangs who are fighting for… what, exactly?
Oh wait, they aren’t criminals, they’re saviours of the world, because when I think of saving the world, I think of terrorism, violent wars and widespread destruction. Frankly, though, they’re trying to save the world from nothing in particular. This situation might be understandable if the world was in some form of turmoil, therefore adding to my nuclear holocaust theory, but otherwise it’s just bizarre. You see, Team Aqua are trying to flood the world, saying that the land will destroy everything and Team Magma think that the world’s sea need to be dried out because otherwise we’ll run out of land. That’s a clever concept to make a gang war for kids, but WHO THE FUCK THOUGHT THESE IDEAS MADE A LICK OF SENSE? Seriously, why would you want to cause a worldwide drought, or even a worldwide flood? What would we drink? Where would we live? Who thought of this, dip-shits? Wait, some people choke on food? WE MUST PREVENT EVERYONE FROM EATING! Damn, we’re heroic!
Pokemon
There are 132 new Pokemon in this game, and some of the others from the old games. About, I don’t know, four of them? Oh, and whoop-di-fucking-doo, the only ones that feature prominently are Geodude and Zubat, because we haven’t seen enough of them yet. They’re only more common than blades of the fucking grass. The new ones aren’t exactly brilliant. The starter Pokemon, for example, are fairly bland. Oh, except for the water starter, Mudkip, or, rather, the only starter. If you pick any other Pokemon, you are officially an idiot. It’s a Water Ground type, so it won’t be affected by Electric attacks, Water’s biggest weakness, it learns the best moves, has the best stats, has the best design, has the best ability, it can learn Blizzard, therefore meaning that it is weak to nothing, it’s… just… better. Few other Pokemon are really worth the time and effort for finding them, seeing as you can beat the entire game with just Mudkip and tower over all who dare oppose you. You are king, you are invincible. Take everything. Take all you see for yourself!
The other Pokemon are a standard affair. They mostly all take great influence from the animal and plant kingdoms respectfully. However, looking at them, I kept getting the feeling that I had seen them some place before. Most of them look not just like Pokemon from the first two games, it’s dead on exact. Case in point; here’s Pikachu and here’s Plusle. Here’s Caterpie and here’s Wurmple. Is this Pidgey, or is it Swellow? Mr and Mrs Rhyhorn, congratulations, it’s a Lairon. The list goes on and on, almost like a before and after exhibition of idiocy.
Gameplay
Gameplay is… actually, sing along with me; you can have up to six Pokemon in your current party, with reserve Pokemon in your computer. Combat is turn-based, in which your Pokemon can use up to four moves, or use an Item to help it win. You catch Pokemon using big red balls (I’d make a joke, but I’m above that… no I’m not. Tee hee, big red balls) all of which have six stats, HP (how much damage it can take), Attack (how much damage a physical attack will meat out), Defence (how much the opponent’s physical attacks are resisted), Speed (if your Pokemon’s speed is higher than the other Pokemon’s Speed, yours will go first), Special Attack (how much Special Attacks do) and Special Defence (take a guess, Sherlock).
I AM NOT GETTING ANY FORM OF DÉJÀ VU, I AM NOT GETTING ANY FORM OF DÉJÀ VU, I AM NOT GETTING ANY FORM OF DÉJÀ VU!
Oh wait, they aren’t criminals, they’re saviours of the world, because when I think of saving the world, I think of terrorism, violent wars and widespread destruction. Frankly, though, they’re trying to save the world from nothing in particular. This situation might be understandable if the world was in some form of turmoil, therefore adding to my nuclear holocaust theory, but otherwise it’s just bizarre. You see, Team Aqua are trying to flood the world, saying that the land will destroy everything and Team Magma think that the world’s sea need to be dried out because otherwise we’ll run out of land. That’s a clever concept to make a gang war for kids, but WHO THE FUCK THOUGHT THESE IDEAS MADE A LICK OF SENSE? Seriously, why would you want to cause a worldwide drought, or even a worldwide flood? What would we drink? Where would we live? Who thought of this, dip-shits? Wait, some people choke on food? WE MUST PREVENT EVERYONE FROM EATING! Damn, we’re heroic!
Pokemon
There are 132 new Pokemon in this game, and some of the others from the old games. About, I don’t know, four of them? Oh, and whoop-di-fucking-doo, the only ones that feature prominently are Geodude and Zubat, because we haven’t seen enough of them yet. They’re only more common than blades of the fucking grass. The new ones aren’t exactly brilliant. The starter Pokemon, for example, are fairly bland. Oh, except for the water starter, Mudkip, or, rather, the only starter. If you pick any other Pokemon, you are officially an idiot. It’s a Water Ground type, so it won’t be affected by Electric attacks, Water’s biggest weakness, it learns the best moves, has the best stats, has the best design, has the best ability, it can learn Blizzard, therefore meaning that it is weak to nothing, it’s… just… better. Few other Pokemon are really worth the time and effort for finding them, seeing as you can beat the entire game with just Mudkip and tower over all who dare oppose you. You are king, you are invincible. Take everything. Take all you see for yourself!
The other Pokemon are a standard affair. They mostly all take great influence from the animal and plant kingdoms respectfully. However, looking at them, I kept getting the feeling that I had seen them some place before. Most of them look not just like Pokemon from the first two games, it’s dead on exact. Case in point; here’s Pikachu and here’s Plusle. Here’s Caterpie and here’s Wurmple. Is this Pidgey, or is it Swellow? Mr and Mrs Rhyhorn, congratulations, it’s a Lairon. The list goes on and on, almost like a before and after exhibition of idiocy.
Gameplay
Gameplay is… actually, sing along with me; you can have up to six Pokemon in your current party, with reserve Pokemon in your computer. Combat is turn-based, in which your Pokemon can use up to four moves, or use an Item to help it win. You catch Pokemon using big red balls (I’d make a joke, but I’m above that… no I’m not. Tee hee, big red balls) all of which have six stats, HP (how much damage it can take), Attack (how much damage a physical attack will meat out), Defence (how much the opponent’s physical attacks are resisted), Speed (if your Pokemon’s speed is higher than the other Pokemon’s Speed, yours will go first), Special Attack (how much Special Attacks do) and Special Defence (take a guess, Sherlock).
I AM NOT GETTING ANY FORM OF DÉJÀ VU, I AM NOT GETTING ANY FORM OF DÉJÀ VU, I AM NOT GETTING ANY FORM OF DÉJÀ VU!
Brock Obama does not campaign for change.Actually, the reason I’ve always preferred Pokemon’s gameplay to other JRPGs, besides the fact that Pokemon doesn’t have random encounters, can be completed in under a year and isn’t shit, is that you’re on exactly the same level as everybody else, so you actually need to think about what Pokemon you choose. Most other JRPGs think ‘strategy’ means ‘hit it until it drops dead’. You have to compensate for the weaknesses of one of your Pokemon with the strengths of another, or else you are doomed to fail… or considering this game, you aren’t. Yes, this might be the easiest game of the lot. So long as you know about keeping your Pokemon healthy, this game is a breeze. The trainers you fight are vastly under-levelled. While this was true in the start of Pokemon Gold/Silver, they made up for it by giving the Gym Leaders some insanely strong Pokemon, and also it made sense seeing as the world was a hell of a lot bigger. Hell, Pokemon Red/Blue didn’t bother with giving you hope; the game just put you up against Godzilla with a twig and said “Go for it.” Pokemon Emerald, on the other hand, gives you a fully armed and operational Death Star from Star Wars and panics, whimpering behind your back and pointing at a hamster wailing in fright. Even the Elite Four and the Champion, the five strongest Pokemon trainers in the world, were all defeated by my totally awesome Mudkip and some of the other Pokemon I picked up for when things got hairy. I had exactly three Pokemon, Mudkip, Abra and Minun, and I still wiped the floor with this game before the bus stopped.
Actually, now there is a new feature. Personalities. See, now you can’t just look at the stats of a Pokemon and say, well, damn, this Pokemon’s damn good with its Speed. You have to look at how it feels about you and what kind of Berry it doesn’t like and whether it prefers Roast Vegetables to Salad to accompany its main course… actually, this is also a lie, the changes are minimal when it comes to the Pokemon’s strength, its only function is to add another simple non-puzzle into making your Pokemon love you. Urgh, the love system. Look, it doesn’t matter. Your Pokemon will end up loving you no matter what. The only way to make them hate you is if you suck, and even then, it does bugger all to how much damage it does, it just makes one move stronger and/or weaker. So, basically, everything new this game adds is made redundant by its lack of impact.
Oh, wait, should I talk about the Pokemon Contests?
Oh boy… the Contests. It’s like combat, only you can’t do damage, and you don’t win anything. Basically, you have to use attacks to appeal to a panel of judges. Each attack has a certain effect and a type of attack, out of Beauty, Smart, Cool, Tough, Cute, Sexy, Knitting, Snowboarding and, most exciting of them all, the Latin Essay. Ok, some of those, don’t exist, but like it matters. Basically you have to appeal to whatever category your Pokemon best fits in and win a Ribbon that does bugger all for you. YAAAAAY!!! How… redundant. How fitting for this game. I’m just beginning to realise this might be the most redundant game to ever exist. Bad games do something. Good games do something. This game does absolutely nothing for anybody in the world. It’s the equivalent of making a cup of tea and not putting the teabag in.Hardware
So now we get into the only way a Pokemon game hopes to actually advance in any way, shape or form. The hardware. And does this game improve? Despite being on a whole new system… no it doesn’t.
Well, it does in some areas. For once there are more than three colours, and the music sounds like its being played on real instruments… well, a piano and a trumpet. It doesn’t do anything else too well, but whatever. As for the graphics… well, they aren’t worse than Pokemon Gold/Silver… actually, scratch that, they are. Oh, the Pokemon designs aren’t bad. They’re a somewhat similar standard as before but with cleaner lines. No, I mean in the animation. Actually, again, scratch that, because there isn’t any. There’s a difference between animating the sprites of the Pokemon and simply moving them from left to right, Game Freak.
In fact, this game is actually smaller than before. The world’s a hell of a lot smaller than before. It takes about five minutes to walk from one side to the other, while in Pokemon Gold/Silver, hell, even Red/Blue, it took hours to get everywhere by foot. Some people might say “good, because I have stuff to do” but that’s not the point. The world in Pokemon Emerald feels small and rather insignificant. Also, we’re back to eight gym leaders rather than sixteen. Even the gameplay length is shorter. And there might be even less Pokemon than before. That’s Pokemon Emerald. Half the size as Pokemon Gold/Silver and it certainly shows. If Pokemon Gold/Silver was all of Ronnie Corbett’s unnecessary cameos in one person, then Pokemon Emerald is Ronnie Corbett himself.
Other Notes
I just have a word about the designs of the actual people in this game, because it’s a strange point nobody else has brought up. The majority are fair enough. The male protagonist looks like a total bellend, the baddies are even bigger bellends, the trainer types fit into their stereotypes, so it’s all good… then you see some of the female characters. Now, video games have never been
… but there’s always been an understandable if not justifiable reason for it. It’s Character Design 101 to make your characters appealing. That’s why almost all Final Fantasy male characters are either gay-fan-fiction-bait mega-hot lady-boys or manly-power-house muscle-bound uber-studs, and all the women make Audrey Hepburn look like Ann Widdecombe. Another good point is that uber-sexy characters are only in games targeted to the age group interested in that sort of thing, late teens to early thirties, and certainly not in a game aimed for eight year olds upwards, that’d be silly…
… and then you get to the character selection screen.
My jaw landed on the floor when I saw the female choice. I know, the whole ‘appealing character rule’ but DAMN! Who the fuck is this? Not too shabby for somebody younger than me. Her hips are wider than her shoulders. She wears hot-pants. Isn’t she ten in the anime? Seriously, Japan, what the fuck? What the hell’s up with this chick? Did she hit puberty when she was five? Frankly, this makes me both disturbed and jealous. The ladies get to be the cutest girl in school; us blokes, we get stuck with a white-haired dork in a stupid bandanna.
I might be the only person bothered by this sort of stuff, but I can’t help it. Sexiness doesn’t belong in Pokemon. Sure, there were moments in the other games, but they had context. The Beauties were sexy in the first and second games because they were, well, Beauties so it wouldn't make sense if they weren’t sexy. In Pokemon Emerald, sexiness is only here for the sake of it, like putting a live walrus in the middle of a restaurant because you’ve taken the statuette to be cleaned. Yes, it’s there, but it doesn’t compliment anything, it’s just a distraction, howling and spitting and everybody feels dirty. It’s especially distressing when the Lasses show up, wearing school uniforms with plaid mini-skirts, or the Team Aqua Executives, who proudly show you their Wonder Bras, or even the fourth gym leader Flannery or the second of the Elite Four Phoebe, the latter in particular for dressing less like the fourth most powerful person in the world and more like Samus Aran if you collect every single item in a Metroid game. It just doesn’t belong here. It’s frightening. It feels like the kind of thing that would be mentioned in a political-horror story set in a dystopian future, not the game franchise that gave us Pikachu.
Final Word
I’m being overly hateful. This is actually a really fun game. I mean, it is Pokemon. On its own merits, it’s a good game, fun and interesting. It’s certainly not bad. The problem is that it’s just so un-inspired, a complete rehashing of the old games. It’s a perfectly functional game, but it feels like a step backwards, mostly in the technical side. Eight gyms instead of sixteen, no moving animations, a smaller world map, a smaller… just smaller. The whole thing seems like a lower quality version, the Rich Tea Biscuit nadir to the Chocolate Hobnob zeniths that were the original two GameBoy games (or six, or even seven, but possibly less or more or AAARRRGGGHHH.)
The Pokemon themselves are simple rehashing of old designs, or, if not that, then incredibly stupid, the pretence of a story is a long and annoying chain of XP grinds and the game as a whole subtracts less from Pokemon Gold. This is a good game, perfectly enjoyable and I had a whale of a time playing it, but this is where everything started to go wrong for Pokemon… or was it? Maybe Diamond/Pearl would be better, right?
Next week, something that isn't Pokemon related.Thursday, 5 August 2010
ROB STOAKES REVIEWS: Street Fighter - The Movie
Sponge Culture Reviews
Rob Stoakes Reviews
STREET FIGHTER
1994
STEVEN E. DE SOUZA
COLUMBIA/UNIVERSAL
Prologue
Gaming in the mass media doesn’t have the greatest of faces. Sure, ‘games-are-art’ critics will tell you about the political criticisms prevalent in Bioshock, or the questioning of how far you go to bring a loved one back in Shadow of the Colossus, or even the addressing of the balance between the goods of the many with the rights of the few in some parts of Fallout 3, but put in front of some balding fat man who can tell you about the hidden meaning of EVERY SINGLE Donatello fresco from memory WITHOUT FAIL, MEIN FUHRER and all the well-structured arguments in gaming’s favour falls apart because the fat man dribbles and spits and shouts and rambles. “RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE VIOLENT VIDEO GAMES ARE BAD, BUT I JUST LOOOOOOVE CLOCKWORK ORANGE! RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE!” And the audience nod in agreement because they’ve heard of Clockwork Orange. They’ve seen the Mona Lisa. The last they saw of gaming was DOOM, and that was on a news report about Columbine. There’s a reason for this. Mainstream culture treats gaming like shit.
Films based on video games are the best example. I mean, did anybody actually read the script put forward for this movie? "So, yeah, this guy, he's bad, and Jean Claude Van Damme is good, and he goes 'I'll stop you' and the bad man goes 'Oh no, you won't, for I have electric suit and can fly' and he flys around going vrrrrom whoooosh neeeeeeeaaaawww!" Mind you, I would've told the scriptwriter to leave once Van Damme was mentioned, but still, did anyone actually say "This is shit! This is absolute shit! Why are we doing this?"
Rob Stoakes Reviews
STREET FIGHTER
1994
STEVEN E. DE SOUZA
COLUMBIA/UNIVERSAL
Prologue
Gaming in the mass media doesn’t have the greatest of faces. Sure, ‘games-are-art’ critics will tell you about the political criticisms prevalent in Bioshock, or the questioning of how far you go to bring a loved one back in Shadow of the Colossus, or even the addressing of the balance between the goods of the many with the rights of the few in some parts of Fallout 3, but put in front of some balding fat man who can tell you about the hidden meaning of EVERY SINGLE Donatello fresco from memory WITHOUT FAIL, MEIN FUHRER and all the well-structured arguments in gaming’s favour falls apart because the fat man dribbles and spits and shouts and rambles. “RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE VIOLENT VIDEO GAMES ARE BAD, BUT I JUST LOOOOOOVE CLOCKWORK ORANGE! RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE!” And the audience nod in agreement because they’ve heard of Clockwork Orange. They’ve seen the Mona Lisa. The last they saw of gaming was DOOM, and that was on a news report about Columbine. There’s a reason for this. Mainstream culture treats gaming like shit.
Films based on video games are the best example. I mean, did anybody actually read the script put forward for this movie? "So, yeah, this guy, he's bad, and Jean Claude Van Damme is good, and he goes 'I'll stop you' and the bad man goes 'Oh no, you won't, for I have electric suit and can fly' and he flys around going vrrrrom whoooosh neeeeeeeaaaawww!" Mind you, I would've told the scriptwriter to leave once Van Damme was mentioned, but still, did anyone actually say "This is shit! This is absolute shit! Why are we doing this?"
So why did they do this? Let's see why. Actually, let's not. I'll tell you what it's like so you don't have to watch it, because I'm nice. Seriously, don't watch it. Don't. DON'T!!!
Plot
I could simply say ‘What plot?’ but I’ll be better than that.
Our film opens with a news bulletin on the civil war in the made-up country Shadaloo, as the capital, Shadaloo City, has just fallen to the AN Forces. AN stands for Allied Nations, which raises the question of how this is a civil war if it’s a drugs lord working in the country against an invading force, but I’m distracted by the name Shadaloo. You are kidding, right? Shadaloo sounds less like a country and more like the Hebrew word for a tight squeeze. Shadaloo? Shadaloo? This proves how much Hollywood knows about what’s west of Seattle and east of New York. How about researching country names of the continent you’re going for and drawing inspiration, like Papua New Guinea… Thailand… China… Papilana! Even just reversing the name of an already existing country would do, like Aknalirs or Napaj, but Shadaloo? That’s not a country, that’s the Chinese takeaway on my street!
Anyway, we see that our main villain, M. Bison is watching the news bulletin. He has captured some AN workers (you know, the UN don’t mind if you use their name, but fine) who were in the country to fight him. I’m not sure about the UN, sorry, AN’s policy to war is but if they send workers in a war-torn area, it’s generally to hand out Aid and escort refugees to safety rather than actually fighting. Bison then tells one guy to punch him. The guy misses, without Bison actually moving. He break the dude’s neck, and then another dude, because being a power mad dictator fighting the AN wasn’t enough of an indicator to show how EVIL he is. MWUH HA HA HA HA HA!!
And, hey kids, it’s Jean Claude Van Damme! Say hi, everybody! This is Colonel Guile, the all-American apple-pie eating Uncle Sam saluting finger-licking good hero, except for the fact that he’s not American and he’s a complete berk. He calls Bison a bastard, a bitch and a narcissist on live TV, because taunting the crazy dictator will certainly improve the situation for the hostages. Also, since when did the UN, sorry, AN hire colonels? Or have an army? Officially, I’m calling the AN the American Army, because that’s who they are, even if Guile does hail from a small village outside of Bruges.
So anyway, Bison somehow turns the camera into a speaker phone and tells Guile that he has three days for America to give him twenty billion dollars which he could easily make through his drugs cartel, but whatever. Guile, like the clueless fuck-nugget he is, says ‘Charlie, hang on buddy, we’re coming!” Or rather; “Chaaaaly, harng on boody, we’re carming!” Good idea, Guile. Tell Bison that one of your friends is in there. I’m sure that won’t threaten his safety a single notch.
Plot
I could simply say ‘What plot?’ but I’ll be better than that.
Our film opens with a news bulletin on the civil war in the made-up country Shadaloo, as the capital, Shadaloo City, has just fallen to the AN Forces. AN stands for Allied Nations, which raises the question of how this is a civil war if it’s a drugs lord working in the country against an invading force, but I’m distracted by the name Shadaloo. You are kidding, right? Shadaloo sounds less like a country and more like the Hebrew word for a tight squeeze. Shadaloo? Shadaloo? This proves how much Hollywood knows about what’s west of Seattle and east of New York. How about researching country names of the continent you’re going for and drawing inspiration, like Papua New Guinea… Thailand… China… Papilana! Even just reversing the name of an already existing country would do, like Aknalirs or Napaj, but Shadaloo? That’s not a country, that’s the Chinese takeaway on my street!
Anyway, we see that our main villain, M. Bison is watching the news bulletin. He has captured some AN workers (you know, the UN don’t mind if you use their name, but fine) who were in the country to fight him. I’m not sure about the UN, sorry, AN’s policy to war is but if they send workers in a war-torn area, it’s generally to hand out Aid and escort refugees to safety rather than actually fighting. Bison then tells one guy to punch him. The guy misses, without Bison actually moving. He break the dude’s neck, and then another dude, because being a power mad dictator fighting the AN wasn’t enough of an indicator to show how EVIL he is. MWUH HA HA HA HA HA!!
And, hey kids, it’s Jean Claude Van Damme! Say hi, everybody! This is Colonel Guile, the all-American apple-pie eating Uncle Sam saluting finger-licking good hero, except for the fact that he’s not American and he’s a complete berk. He calls Bison a bastard, a bitch and a narcissist on live TV, because taunting the crazy dictator will certainly improve the situation for the hostages. Also, since when did the UN, sorry, AN hire colonels? Or have an army? Officially, I’m calling the AN the American Army, because that’s who they are, even if Guile does hail from a small village outside of Bruges.
So anyway, Bison somehow turns the camera into a speaker phone and tells Guile that he has three days for America to give him twenty billion dollars which he could easily make through his drugs cartel, but whatever. Guile, like the clueless fuck-nugget he is, says ‘Charlie, hang on buddy, we’re coming!” Or rather; “Chaaaaly, harng on boody, we’re carming!” Good idea, Guile. Tell Bison that one of your friends is in there. I’m sure that won’t threaten his safety a single notch.
Bison runs over to Charlie, or Carlos Blanka to give his full name, and tells them to take him to the lab. Why? I don’t know. Though I know that Blanka is the name of a character who was essentially the Hulk mixed with Johnny Rotten, and that he WASN’T called Charlie OR Carlos before he became Blanka. Consistency? Who needs it when you have blue camouflage?
So now we cut to two guys walking through a big fighting ring where… Machete is fighting the Shredder? Anyway, these two new guys, who are weapons dealers, meet up with Sagat, played here by Blofeld. He gives them the money and says that he already has the weapons, begging the question of why he gave them the money. He tells some dudes to kill them without guns, so of course, shit goes down. Sagat decides not to kill the two dudes, impressed by their ability to beat up people who have no martial arts training.
We then cut back to Bison, who goes up to some unwilling scientist who is turning Blanka into the ultimate soldier, by putting 3D glasses in front of his face. SCIENCE! Then we get this dialogue:
BISON: “You have the perfect soldier.”
SCIENTIST: “You mean the perfect killer!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw6ndZNLYUA
OF COURSE HE’S THE PERFECT KILLER, YOU NONCE! THAT’S WHY HE’S THE PERFECT SOLDIER! WHAT KIND OF GONK ARE YOU? HOW THE HELL DID YOU BECOME A SCIENTIST? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU? YOU TOTAL, ABSOLUTE, MORONIC GONK!
I can’t believe that we’re only ten minutes through.
So now we cut to two guys walking through a big fighting ring where… Machete is fighting the Shredder? Anyway, these two new guys, who are weapons dealers, meet up with Sagat, played here by Blofeld. He gives them the money and says that he already has the weapons, begging the question of why he gave them the money. He tells some dudes to kill them without guns, so of course, shit goes down. Sagat decides not to kill the two dudes, impressed by their ability to beat up people who have no martial arts training.
We then cut back to Bison, who goes up to some unwilling scientist who is turning Blanka into the ultimate soldier, by putting 3D glasses in front of his face. SCIENCE! Then we get this dialogue:
BISON: “You have the perfect soldier.”
SCIENTIST: “You mean the perfect killer!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw6ndZNLYUA
OF COURSE HE’S THE PERFECT KILLER, YOU NONCE! THAT’S WHY HE’S THE PERFECT SOLDIER! WHAT KIND OF GONK ARE YOU? HOW THE HELL DID YOU BECOME A SCIENTIST? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU? YOU TOTAL, ABSOLUTE, MORONIC GONK!
I can’t believe that we’re only ten minutes through.
So the weapons dealers, Ryu and Ken as they are called, are fighting the Shredder when Guile and the rest of the US army rush in, tearing shit up and arresting everyone. Guile meets up with Ryu and Ken in jail and tells them to cause a jail break and shoot him, then somehow they’ll get into Bison’s lair. Get out of jail; shoot man, teleport to Bison. SUCCESS! They don’t tell anyone else, though, so everybody goes all mopey about oh no Guile’s dead what will we do without the man who thought blue camouflage was a good idea? A reporter called Chun Li puts a tracking device onto the truck, and then tells the news that Guile’s dead. Bison sees this and decides to take over the world.
Oh fine, I give in: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8u7px_GzWQ
Anyway, Chun Li finds out about Guile’s plan, ruining all suspense this scene might have had. She tells him that she wants to kill Bison, and escapes the prison guards for some reason.
We cut to a city where M. Bison and Sagat meet up to watch a woman sit in a jar, which is considerably more entertaining than this movie. Ken runs off with some woman dancer for some hanky panky, but it’s actually Chun Li, and she has two friends, Lord Tubby and a black man wearing a turban… oopsies. Anyway, they plan to blow M. Bison up, but it doesn’t work…
Argh, we’re not half way yet? Seriously? Hasn’t it been two hours?
… not even 45 minutes. Damn it!
Oh fine, I give in: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8u7px_GzWQ
Anyway, Chun Li finds out about Guile’s plan, ruining all suspense this scene might have had. She tells him that she wants to kill Bison, and escapes the prison guards for some reason.
We cut to a city where M. Bison and Sagat meet up to watch a woman sit in a jar, which is considerably more entertaining than this movie. Ken runs off with some woman dancer for some hanky panky, but it’s actually Chun Li, and she has two friends, Lord Tubby and a black man wearing a turban… oopsies. Anyway, they plan to blow M. Bison up, but it doesn’t work…
Argh, we’re not half way yet? Seriously? Hasn’t it been two hours?
… not even 45 minutes. Damn it!
“OK Bison, there’s only one way to settle this. A Wet T Shirt Contest!”Anyway, because Ryu and Ken gave the thing away, M. Bison tells them that they can work for him, so now Guile knows where he is because of the tracking device. Finally, can we get to the end?
NO! Of course not, we have to get there, and of course, we have to have fight scene after fight scene after fight scene. The only change comes when some British prick whose obsessed with instructions and talking with a stiff upper lip says that they’re going to pay M. Bison, with the tone of voice of a man who gets sexually aroused by smelling his own farts BECAUSE ALL PEOPLE WHO WANT TO STOP NEEDLESS SLAUGHTER AND PREVENT PUTTING PEOPLE’S LIVES AT RISK ARE TIGHT ARSED BELLENDS WHO ARE WRONG!!! LET’S PUT ALL THOSE HOSTAGES LIVES AT RISK RATHER THAN PAYING BISON, THEN TAKING THE MONEY BACK FROM HIM WHEN HE LETS THE HOSTAGES GO!!! THAT’S FOR WIMPS!!! LETS GO KICK SOME PUSSY ASS!!! GO AMERICA!!! WOO WOO WOO WOO!!!
So from finding out where M. Bison is, it takes the film another 40 minutes before it finally has Guile and Bison face off. And the palace was just down the river from where the AN Base was! Surely you could have found it quicker. A look outside would tell you where the gormless madman was.
So of course we have ANOTHER fucking fight scene, and then the movie’s over. Oh, wait, no it isn’t, because M. Bison starts to fly now and starts beating Guile up while Guile decides not to fight back. This is interlaced with a fight between whats-iz-chops and Wolverine. FINALLY Guile fights back and kills Bison with one kick into a giant telly. Then the building blows up with Blanko and the scientist dude who’s blacked up since when we saw him last time still inside. By the way, thanks for showing that they were in there, they impacted the story a but-ton, didn’t they? Then the movie ends, and my eyes stop bleeding.
Acting/Characters
The acting…
… oh, boy, the acting…
Well, Jean Claude Van Damme gives his usual high standard of acting, making a foghorn being repeatedly sounded in a swimming pool sound coherent, and makes a bucket of gravel seem emotional. Oddly enough, he doesn’t fight as much as you’d think, what with him being the protagonist in a film called Street Fighter and everything. Seeing that’s all Van Damme’s good for, the casting director clearly had no clue as to what he was doing.
Then there’s Raul Julia and, wow… this is a long way from King Lear, isn’t it? I’ve heard a lot of praise for Raul Julia but here he’s just crap. I could blame bad directing, but clearly, M. Bison is supposed to be a serious villain in this film, a scheming Hitler-like figure, while Julia plays him for laughs. A slightly more professional critic would blame the casting director but I am a foolish mud-covered pleb, so I shall grunt and blame Julia for phoning in this role. Ooog ooog ooog. The other actors aren’t really of note. They are passable but not particularly convincing actors. No stand out performances or deal breakers to be found. Though that might be because they’re standing next to Van Damme and look good by comparison.
Oh, and don’t believe the poster, Jean Claude Van Damme gets barely any screen time. The main character’s really Chun-Li, the news reporter secret agent woman thingy. Seriously, what is her job? Does she work for an agency, is she a spy, or is she just some chick off the street whose career choices are based off getting at Bison? Though, back on topic, she has the most screen time, other than oddly enough Bison himself. She could’ve had the final showdown with him and it wouldn’t have changed a thing. In fact, does Guile do anything in this film? Get shot… talk silly… grunt…
Other Notes
One of the oddest things in Street Fighter is the action, or rather, lack of. Seriously, in the first half of the movie, there’s essentially no fighting, except for Ryu and Ken scrap with Wolverine. All characters just talk about “Hey, maybe we’ll fight him, though we might not, though we really should, yeah, but we might not, but if we tried really really hard we could, or could we?” Then the second half turns up, looks at the first half’s dialogue and discussing and decides to balance it out by having nothing but fighting. I seriously think only ten lines of dialogue are murmured from the moment Guile finishes his speech to when the credits roll. It doesn’t make sense!
Also, I’m very disappointed in the lack of streets. The name Street Fighter implies that there will be fighting, and it will take place in the streets. However, we don’t go to the streets. In fact, where are we? Shadaloo has some strange geography, maybe even stranger than the Digital World in Digimon, where volcanoes are slap bang next to an Arctic tundra. First we’re in an Middle Eastern urban area, then we’re in a jungle, then we’re at a camp in the desert, then we’re on the planet Naboo, and then we’re on the Death Star. I think I know why Bison wants to leave Shadaloo and take over the world. Anything to get away from this dump.
Final Word
This film is 104 minutes long. Ran is 160 minutes long. Guess which one felt longer.
Laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadies?
Whenever I think of bad video game movies, this film instantly crops to mind. Even Uwe Boll would have a hard time matching this brain draining fart. Super Mario Bros. was better, as was Alone in the Dark. I’m not even a Street Fighter fan, and I hate it enough as it is. Maybe if I were, I’d be chewing at the cassette demanding blood, howling and wailing like some wild man. I’m not sure what I’d consider worse than this movie, but cutting one of your own bollocks off wouldn’t be it. Maybe after that you could stare at the bloody ball for an hour as it dries. This movie is less entertaining than that experience, and I’d sooner recommend having an hedgehog sewn to your face by a blind man.
So, M. Bison. Is this movie bad?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3ALwKeSEYs
No reviews from me for the next two weeks. Maybe Sean will do something, and maybe I'll grow a third ear.
Whenever I think of bad video game movies, this film instantly crops to mind. Even Uwe Boll would have a hard time matching this brain draining fart. Super Mario Bros. was better, as was Alone in the Dark. I’m not even a Street Fighter fan, and I hate it enough as it is. Maybe if I were, I’d be chewing at the cassette demanding blood, howling and wailing like some wild man. I’m not sure what I’d consider worse than this movie, but cutting one of your own bollocks off wouldn’t be it. Maybe after that you could stare at the bloody ball for an hour as it dries. This movie is less entertaining than that experience, and I’d sooner recommend having an hedgehog sewn to your face by a blind man.
So, M. Bison. Is this movie bad?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3ALwKeSEYs
No reviews from me for the next two weeks. Maybe Sean will do something, and maybe I'll grow a third ear.
Thursday, 29 July 2010
ROB STOAKES' TOP FIVE: Most Overly Hated
Sponge Culture Reviews
Rob Stoakes Reviews
Top Five Most Overly Hated Films/Games/TV Shows/Books
Prologue
So you go to the cinema. You talk to the spotty boy who gives you your ticket. You buy the overpriced food and the popcorn that smells funny. You squeeze past the portly gentleman who literally wallows in his bucket of Pepsi. The gaudy adverts for stuff you don’t need roll by, uninteresting to you. You notice that guy from thingamy-whats-it talking about piracy, and you nod silently, pretending that you don’t own ANY pirate DVDs when in fact you downloaded District 9 just before you came. Then, finally, the movie begins. It stars that guy whose name always escapes you, and is directed by that guy who did that film you really liked, if only you could remember what it was. After a good while, the film’s over. It wasn’t great, you thought some of the acting was a little dodgy, but overall, you actually had some fun, and it’s more entertaining than sitting at home doing nothing, right?
Well, you’re wrong, and everyone else in the building is about to prove you wrong, as they stand up in unison, bellowing and booing and howling as if they had just witnessed their only child get pissed on by Piers Morgan. They bite the chairs, they fling their food and they chant death threats to whatever maniacal deity of evil commissioned this atrocity. You decide not to point out the futility of booing at a projector, and go back home, desperately looking for problems with that film, and you shout to yourself “This is quite clearly the worst film ever made! Everyone else said it. Say it too! Fit in! Join the herd! Say it! SAY IT!” But you can’t, because deep down, you know that you’re right. That film was not nearly as bad as everyone said it was. And now, let’s honour those films, books, games and TV programmes that undeservedly get shot in the foot by the critics and the general public. Because fuck them all, what do they know? They complain about this, that, and whatever and refuse to accept that it’s not as bad as they say. Remember, Pearl Harbour, Harry Potter and Love Actually are all well-received, so they must be wrong, right?
Rob Stoakes Reviews
Top Five Most Overly Hated Films/Games/TV Shows/Books
Prologue
So you go to the cinema. You talk to the spotty boy who gives you your ticket. You buy the overpriced food and the popcorn that smells funny. You squeeze past the portly gentleman who literally wallows in his bucket of Pepsi. The gaudy adverts for stuff you don’t need roll by, uninteresting to you. You notice that guy from thingamy-whats-it talking about piracy, and you nod silently, pretending that you don’t own ANY pirate DVDs when in fact you downloaded District 9 just before you came. Then, finally, the movie begins. It stars that guy whose name always escapes you, and is directed by that guy who did that film you really liked, if only you could remember what it was. After a good while, the film’s over. It wasn’t great, you thought some of the acting was a little dodgy, but overall, you actually had some fun, and it’s more entertaining than sitting at home doing nothing, right?
Well, you’re wrong, and everyone else in the building is about to prove you wrong, as they stand up in unison, bellowing and booing and howling as if they had just witnessed their only child get pissed on by Piers Morgan. They bite the chairs, they fling their food and they chant death threats to whatever maniacal deity of evil commissioned this atrocity. You decide not to point out the futility of booing at a projector, and go back home, desperately looking for problems with that film, and you shout to yourself “This is quite clearly the worst film ever made! Everyone else said it. Say it too! Fit in! Join the herd! Say it! SAY IT!” But you can’t, because deep down, you know that you’re right. That film was not nearly as bad as everyone said it was. And now, let’s honour those films, books, games and TV programmes that undeservedly get shot in the foot by the critics and the general public. Because fuck them all, what do they know? They complain about this, that, and whatever and refuse to accept that it’s not as bad as they say. Remember, Pearl Harbour, Harry Potter and Love Actually are all well-received, so they must be wrong, right?
The average cinema goer’s face when somebody dangles keys in front of them. Durr hurr hurr hurr hurr, shiny, durr hurr hurr, made by Michael Bay, durr hurr hurr.
Now, this list isn’t rated on how good the film is, but how hated it is. Number 5 maybe superior to Number 1, but Number 2 may be superior to Number 3. They might not be; I’m just using an example. Shut up, I’m too beautiful.
Number 5 – Maciste contro i cacciatori di teste
(More commonly known as Colossus and the Head-hunters)
(More commonly known as Colossus and the Head-hunters)
And immediately we start with what is purported to be the worst sword-and-sandal film ever made. A lot of complaints are piled up against this film, such as the insanely simple plot or the plain old nasty English dubbing, with such lines as “Itsimpossibleforyoutomissmeatthisdistancesopleasehitthatshoulderplease” which, of course, is all one word. However, a lot of people forget that almost EVERY film was like this. It was made in a time when suddenly every film had to be an epic. Sinbad the Sailor, Ali Baba, Jason and the Argonauts, all those films. Remember, these kinds of films are either remembered with great fondness or forgotten completely, but really, there’s nothing too distinct about them anymore, unless they either involved Ray Harryhausen or Raquel Welch. I really like these kinds of films, and Maciste contro i cacciatori di teste is no exception.
Today, this film is remembered as a B-Movie, but it really isn’t. Look past the poor dubbing, and you see that the actual writing is fairly standard for the time, and it’s not bad writing either. The story is fairly safe but compelling, and the action is actually very good for this time. You see, this is was back in the good old days before Paul Greengrass and the obsession with shaky cameras. A fight scene used to be where you’d put one or two cameras around and simply say to the actors “Punch each other’s brains out.” And they’d do it. In fact, compare this infamous Star Trek fight with this fight from the Clash of the Titans remake. OK, the Star Trek one sucked, but at least there was fighting rather than Louis Terrier or whatever his name is throwing the camera around while everyone shouts for a bit. This isn’t a fight scene; this is filming a mosh pit in a desert. Please, let us see the fighting and not the heroic lead’s lower left armpit.
Anyway, most of the films of the sword-and-scandal time weren’t as good as Maciste contro i cacciatori di teste, and the setting is also really interesting, too, being set in a lush forest area rather than the usual desert wilderness associated with the genre. An interesting watch, and certainly better than Clash of the Titans 2010. Though, mind you, watching a man teabag a blender would be better than Clash of the Titans 2010.
Number 4 – Antiques Roadshow
Antiques Roadshow is repeatedly the butt of jokes, and it’s not hard to see why.
“Oh boy, I can’t wait to watch Antiques Roadshow. A whole 50 minutes of people bringing vintage clocks, plates and mugs to other people to be told about those vintage clocks and the history of Hastro-glazing pots between 1203 and 2017 (note, this doesn’t exist) and how much its worth. YAAAY!”
Well, whoops-ee-daisy. I actually think that it gets a raw deal, and not only that, but I actually find it genuinely interesting. Call me boring, fusty and old, but I never really seen anything inherently bad about it, and yet it’s constantly labelled as such because of… well, most of its audience is old. In actual fact, it’s a very well made show. The editing is simplistic but sharp, giving you a new camera angle every time you start to drift off to keep your eyes on the screen, so STOP LOOKING AWAY, OVER HERE, THIS WAY, THE SHOW’S OVER HERE, DULLARD, CLICK CLICK!!! If you’re interested in antiques, it’s a reservoir of knowledge to behold, telling you all sorts of nifty little facts. If you aren’t, however, it’s interesting to experience something you’ve never known before.
“Clock’s can cost up to five thousand pounds? Really? Well, this will distract me for long enough to stave off the inevitable plummet into insignificance and depression that comes with day time television”
It’s also great background telly. If you’re waiting for something to happen, such as for a person or letter to arrive or a murderer to be caught in one of your garden traps, you can simply sit down with a nice cup of tea with Antiques Roadshow. Not as good as Come Dine With Me, but better than most prime-time telly, which I can guarantee.
Number 3 – Pokemon 3: The Movie
The Pokemon movie franchise is possibly the strangest in movie history. No matter how bad the reviews are, it still seems to come back for more, and weirder still, these aren’t just all straight-to-DVD knock offs we’re talking about like Uwe Boll’s Bloodrayne 2. The first five all got theatrical releases in the West, and even more in Japan. Why? The first was hammered by critics, even despite its financial success oh wait… Oh, wait, the second one made pittance, and was lambasted by critics who despised both films. So why’d they keep on releasing the damn films in cinemas? There’s been nine theatre released Pokemon movies and twelve altogether, with a thirteenth already out in Japan. WHY? WHY? WHY?!
As I may have said in my Top Four Reasons Why Nintendo Suck, I love Pokemon, or at least the games, and the TV series. The films can go drink liquidised hatred… except for Pokemon 3, which is by far the best of the bunch. The story is simplistic, but actually fairly intriguing, confronting the harsh issue with the loss of a child’s parents and just how far they’ll go to get them back. OK, I’m making it sound a lot like the reverse of Pet Sematary but it sort of crosses the same themes. A little girl loses her father to a mysterious species of Pokemon, only to be given the legendary Pokemon Entei, an all-powerful Pokemon that obeys her every order. Giving the recently bereaved child unmatched power wasn’t the best of moves it seems, as she kidnaps and brainwashes Ash’s mother, erects herself as the most powerful Pokemon trainer ever and near kills Ash and his buddies for getting in her path. Its one hell of a grip and at many points really is quite bleak and oppressive, making it seem as if the heroes won’t prevail. The climax is nail-bitingly tense and even scares kids, so a bonus then. Whenever people mention video game movies and say there’s no such thing as a good one (more on that one later), I always mention Pokemon 3, and I think you should too.
Number 2 – Metroid Prime Pinball
Wait, stop laughing. I know what you’re thinking. Metroid? Pinball? Surely you jest! Oh, it gets better. It’s not just pinball with graphics from Metroid. The ball is genuinely Samus Aran in her morph ball form and, get this; there are boss battles…
... and a plot.
Now you can guffaw.
“Are you serious?” Said I and many other Metroid fans. “A Metroid pinball game? With a story? What are you smoking? Cake? Is a second for us a month for you?”
Brass Eye references aside, I was understandably cynical about the game, until I played it, at any rate. It’s actually great fun. In fact, when I sit down to think about it, I can’t think of a better pinball game that isn’t on a computer or an actual pinball machine. Not much to say about it because… it’s pinball. This is just a particularly good pinball game. A lot of variety to its multiple tables, and there are many little minigames… not very good minigames, but great time passers. Like the game itself really. It’s not Super Metroid, but it’s not supposed to be. It’s just a nice time sink, like a pinball game should be.
Number 1 - Super Mario Bros. Movie
Yeah. Weren’t expecting this, were you?
The world fell out of love with the Super Mario Bros. around about five minutes after its cinematic release. Kids swarmed in their thousands to go see it only to swarm in their thousands in the toilets puking. And it is shown on television once every so often to remind kids who didn't see it first time around what it feels like to vomit out of disgust and shame…
… except me.
This film just didn’t hurt me at all. And this isn’t because I don’t like Mario. I do. I grew up with Mario. And, in all honesty, I can’t really see what the problem is with this film. It changes too much from the original game? Yeah, because the games had so much to go on. I know Super Mario World had just been released, but so fucking what? How do you make an entire movie out of Super Mario Bros? It’s essentially un-filmable in live action, and as if any big name animators would want to take on this project.
So, they changed it. They experimented. I actually think that this is one of the better dystopian futures in cinema. The soundtrack and designs were really good, and the effects, both practical and CGI, where good for the time. The acting was also very good, except for Dennis Hopper, with Bob Hoskins doing his usual great job. OK, so the writing was gobbledygook, but it was funny gobbledygook. It feels a lot like Dune for me, so bad it’s really good… oh fine, not good, but I think it’s a really underrated film. It’s original, which is more than can be said for most other films in the nineties. In fact, I’d rate it as one of the best video games movies ever made.
That’s right.
Well, can you think of a better video game movie? DOA… no. Resident Evil… no. Final Fantasy 7: Advent Children… definitely not. Street Fighter The Movie…
… Street Fighter The Movie…
… oh no…
… oh god no…
Next Week: Street Fighter: The Movie
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