The Lego Movie has very creative ideas.
It's a teamup film with cameos from Star Wars, Batman and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, not to mention product placement.
It has creative use of animation that bring out the child within oneself, really conveying ideas such as vehicle repair, and vehicle reconstruction mid animation by characters. It has an American variation of an anime feel to it. It is a demonstration of ones capabilities and creativity.
It has adults themes of creationism with man as its own God with the Master Builders, forming a sort of modernist corporate religion, while also establishing Control vs Creativitiy themes. Remember, business is conservative and art is liberal.
Butt Wars
Saturday, September 13, 2014
Friday, September 12, 2014
The Final Fantasy 6, 7, 8 Trilogy
Final Fantasy 6-8 form a trilogy regarding their main characters themes, if you consider Terra the main character of Final Fantasy 6, another debate for another time.
Terra is a half Esper, mind controlled by the Emperor's slave crown placed by Kefka, before becoming a part of the Returners.
Cloud Strife is a part of a project of SOLDIER, mind controlled by Shin-Ra propaganda into fights against Shin-Ra's enemies, as evident in opening scenes where Cloud Strife discusses his childhood desire to become a man by taking another (creature's) life. His Buster Sword is a large iconic phallic symbol representing this. He has a great knowledge of materia based on his experiences and develops a connection with a girl named Aeris, who is an Ancient, having great magical properties, much like Terra's half Esper ancestry.
Squall Leonheart lives in a school, where he is trained to become the top of the class, much like in the Neon Genesis Evangelion scenario. SEEDs are ranked based on certain assignments, including written exams. They are trained to fight throughout the world, thanks to Cid's war propaganda, where he plays both sides of Esthar, Galbadia and Balamb. From obscure reasons, Squall loses his memories, much like Cloud and Terra, travelling the world to discover them.
It's a different spin on a bit of an anti-monomyth story, despite references in the beginning of Final Fantasy 6, where Star Wars references Biggs and Wedge and bad guys, before the end of Final Fantasy 8, where Biggs and Wedge become good guys.
Terra is a half Esper, mind controlled by the Emperor's slave crown placed by Kefka, before becoming a part of the Returners.
Cloud Strife is a part of a project of SOLDIER, mind controlled by Shin-Ra propaganda into fights against Shin-Ra's enemies, as evident in opening scenes where Cloud Strife discusses his childhood desire to become a man by taking another (creature's) life. His Buster Sword is a large iconic phallic symbol representing this. He has a great knowledge of materia based on his experiences and develops a connection with a girl named Aeris, who is an Ancient, having great magical properties, much like Terra's half Esper ancestry.
Squall Leonheart lives in a school, where he is trained to become the top of the class, much like in the Neon Genesis Evangelion scenario. SEEDs are ranked based on certain assignments, including written exams. They are trained to fight throughout the world, thanks to Cid's war propaganda, where he plays both sides of Esthar, Galbadia and Balamb. From obscure reasons, Squall loses his memories, much like Cloud and Terra, travelling the world to discover them.
It's a different spin on a bit of an anti-monomyth story, despite references in the beginning of Final Fantasy 6, where Star Wars references Biggs and Wedge and bad guys, before the end of Final Fantasy 8, where Biggs and Wedge become good guys.
Monday, September 8, 2014
The beginning of the Lego Movie is the Batman and Robin of 2014
I grew up in the 90s, when Batman and Robin and The Super Mario Bros movie were dismissed.
Batman and Robin had a lot of plant and ice puns. Super Mario Bros had a lot of plumber puns.
But they were puns!
The beginning of the Lego movie is really bullshitty, isn't funny and really brings down what could've been a five star film.
"It's supposed to be for kids though."
Then why'd they make a reference to an R-rated Terminator 2 movie from 1991 in TWO THOUSAND FOURTEEN?!
Not to mention the strength of the Lego brand, particularly Legoland with FAMILIES.
Batman and Robin had a lot of plant and ice puns. Super Mario Bros had a lot of plumber puns.
But they were puns!
The beginning of the Lego movie is really bullshitty, isn't funny and really brings down what could've been a five star film.
"It's supposed to be for kids though."
Then why'd they make a reference to an R-rated Terminator 2 movie from 1991 in TWO THOUSAND FOURTEEN?!
Not to mention the strength of the Lego brand, particularly Legoland with FAMILIES.
Tuesday, September 2, 2014
25th Anniversary: Super Mario Land
Pros:
Super Mario Land was a great addition to the Game Boy's legacy. It gave fans the experience to play a Super Mario Bros-like game on a handheld. The green and brown give it a bit of a film feel.
Daisy
The levels are shorter, but it really wasn't like fans played Super Mario Bros for length. Speed, walkthroughs, etc..
It was not as well known as Super Mario Bros 3.
Sure it seemed like unsupervised Mario Bros but it represented their popularity somewhere else, strengthening the brand.
Cons:
The first stage looked really looked cheap. It has nothing to do with the black and green graphics. Even the first stage you have to be a little creative picturing how the koopa turns into a rock and flying things turn into bird skeletons. Super Mario Bros was surreal, but Super Mario Land was even more surreal. Maybe even Adam Sandler-like in terms of how the creation began.
And that stage didn't really build up much of a rhythm then. It wasn't as much of a sound masterpiece as the Super Mario Bros games, where they had koopa shells knocking around everywhere.
But again, it's a bit of a pilot game. The game was short, but still has such fun and memorable levels. So don't blame 'em.
Financing: it was a success, and the ends justified the means. It didn't sell 40+ million like Super Mario Bros did, but it sold 18 million and got video games back into an industry again. Not to mention, its excellent, excellent Super Mario Land and Wario Land games starting with having Wario in Super Mario Land 2, making it a bit of a Dark Knight-ish sequel.
Super Mario Land was a great addition to the Game Boy's legacy. It gave fans the experience to play a Super Mario Bros-like game on a handheld. The green and brown give it a bit of a film feel.
Daisy
The levels are shorter, but it really wasn't like fans played Super Mario Bros for length. Speed, walkthroughs, etc..
It was not as well known as Super Mario Bros 3.
Sure it seemed like unsupervised Mario Bros but it represented their popularity somewhere else, strengthening the brand.
Cons:
The first stage looked really looked cheap. It has nothing to do with the black and green graphics. Even the first stage you have to be a little creative picturing how the koopa turns into a rock and flying things turn into bird skeletons. Super Mario Bros was surreal, but Super Mario Land was even more surreal. Maybe even Adam Sandler-like in terms of how the creation began.
And that stage didn't really build up much of a rhythm then. It wasn't as much of a sound masterpiece as the Super Mario Bros games, where they had koopa shells knocking around everywhere.
But again, it's a bit of a pilot game. The game was short, but still has such fun and memorable levels. So don't blame 'em.
Financing: it was a success, and the ends justified the means. It didn't sell 40+ million like Super Mario Bros did, but it sold 18 million and got video games back into an industry again. Not to mention, its excellent, excellent Super Mario Land and Wario Land games starting with having Wario in Super Mario Land 2, making it a bit of a Dark Knight-ish sequel.
FF1
Final Fantasy 1 has a dear place in my heart. I actually owned an NES, but not a SNES, so Final Fantasy had a huge gap in my life prior to playing VII on my cousin's console and finally owning a piece when I bought the PS Final Fantasies after owning a PS2. I played 2-6 on emulator, completely not supporting Squaresoft's fine works, leaving a huge dent in art of society!
Back to Final Fantasy, what really got me into the franchise was this advertisement poster for a bunch of NES games. It came with a Nintendo game that I don't remember. Maybe it was the box for the Nintendo even. But anyway, I was just blown away by the graphics for the Fighter, who still hasn't had a modern Final Fantasy equivalent. (Chrono from Chrono Trigger may count!) The Black Mage was cool too. I don't think anybody knew what the Thief was for except for running.
It came with a walkthrough getting up to the airship.
I never got anywhere close to that thanks to my bullshitting of how to save the game in Square's completely convoluted manner of doing so.
It was my first instance of enjoying Final Fantasy music, and I enjoyed it so!
The bestiary had great design, albeit it would improve to be less pixelated over time.
The ineffectives became sort of this early hipsterish skill for me. It annoyed some, but I enjoyed the challenge of memorizing hps to recall how many hits it took to take out each enemy. This was before your sense materias screwing all that skill up. I remembered the exact amounts and was proud of that fact. (My pride is gone now though, alas!)
I got upset at the Dawn of Souls version for the run function and everything else that makes the game super broken without trying. The constant leveling up with part of the challenge of the game, a sense of patience, a sense of creativity from limitations, a sense of respect earned from playing such a different game in the US.
I dunno how great the plot twist was, but at least they friggin had one. It didn't annoy me nearly as much as Heavy Rain's.
So yeah. Great times with that game that I took like an entire generation to beat.
Back to Final Fantasy, what really got me into the franchise was this advertisement poster for a bunch of NES games. It came with a Nintendo game that I don't remember. Maybe it was the box for the Nintendo even. But anyway, I was just blown away by the graphics for the Fighter, who still hasn't had a modern Final Fantasy equivalent. (Chrono from Chrono Trigger may count!) The Black Mage was cool too. I don't think anybody knew what the Thief was for except for running.
It came with a walkthrough getting up to the airship.
I never got anywhere close to that thanks to my bullshitting of how to save the game in Square's completely convoluted manner of doing so.
It was my first instance of enjoying Final Fantasy music, and I enjoyed it so!
The bestiary had great design, albeit it would improve to be less pixelated over time.
The ineffectives became sort of this early hipsterish skill for me. It annoyed some, but I enjoyed the challenge of memorizing hps to recall how many hits it took to take out each enemy. This was before your sense materias screwing all that skill up. I remembered the exact amounts and was proud of that fact. (My pride is gone now though, alas!)
I got upset at the Dawn of Souls version for the run function and everything else that makes the game super broken without trying. The constant leveling up with part of the challenge of the game, a sense of patience, a sense of creativity from limitations, a sense of respect earned from playing such a different game in the US.
I dunno how great the plot twist was, but at least they friggin had one. It didn't annoy me nearly as much as Heavy Rain's.
So yeah. Great times with that game that I took like an entire generation to beat.
Wednesday, July 9, 2014
Why I wasn't pleased with this year's E3: Part 1
Nintendo is doing brand marketing again. As a job, brand marketing is great. You can do a lot of creative stuff with it.
Mario did a lot of creative stuff such as turning Donkey Kong into
However, now that they're in the lead again, I'm just not getting the same high off their games.
Like when the Advance and the DS came out, there was Phoenix Wright, Elite Beat Agents and all these different types of games for that system.
With the Wii, we had Okami and other nunchaku supported games.
I suppose I should be glad that the Wii U revived the Star Fox series, but I dunno if so many interesting things will happen from it, not to mention recent releases of Star Fox failing, even though Nintendo quality of games is pretty good!
I mean, we have to be realistic though:
Blockbusters = 5 year production cycles = Less moneys for company employees who are probably going to be laid off by the time of the next project.
However, that doesn't mean we can't support video games as something beyond commercial art.
Mario did a lot of creative stuff such as turning Donkey Kong into
- Super Mario Bros
- Super Mario Bros 3,
- Donkey Kong Country
- Super Mario 64
- Donkey Kong 64
- Super Mario RPG
- Mario & Luigi
- Paper Mario
- Super Mario Land into Wario Land
However, now that they're in the lead again, I'm just not getting the same high off their games.
Like when the Advance and the DS came out, there was Phoenix Wright, Elite Beat Agents and all these different types of games for that system.
With the Wii, we had Okami and other nunchaku supported games.
I suppose I should be glad that the Wii U revived the Star Fox series, but I dunno if so many interesting things will happen from it, not to mention recent releases of Star Fox failing, even though Nintendo quality of games is pretty good!
I mean, we have to be realistic though:
Blockbusters = 5 year production cycles = Less moneys for company employees who are probably going to be laid off by the time of the next project.
However, that doesn't mean we can't support video games as something beyond commercial art.
Tuesday, July 8, 2014
First Half 2014 Updates
There are 3 films I am considering moving into my top 10 films of all time after finally (re)viewing them this year:
The political intrigue is interesting.
If they had made the film more about Samuel L. Jackson's character, it would've been a lot more interesting, albeit controversial. Luckily, they've tested it out and notably nobody raised an eyebrow to the film, so they can more likely go all out next film.
Joel Kinnaman has an interesting robotic voice.
The film is more post-9/11, more Blade Runner-ish.
- The Shining (where I highly recommend a buy of the Rob Ager/Collative Learning DVD)
- Hoop Dreams, a film that affected people much like those in the Golden Age of Hollywood did with the indie hit, Citizen Kane. It deserves all the hype over films such as the Three Colors Trilogy and Pulp Fiction.
- Ghostbusters, something I've been working heavily on the 30th Anniversary of Ghostbusters review, but there's just a lot of notes to go through that I'm unable to make cohesive. If worse comes to worse, I'll just release them in separate chapters to help the flow of the notes.
The political intrigue is interesting.
If they had made the film more about Samuel L. Jackson's character, it would've been a lot more interesting, albeit controversial. Luckily, they've tested it out and notably nobody raised an eyebrow to the film, so they can more likely go all out next film.
Joel Kinnaman has an interesting robotic voice.
The film is more post-9/11, more Blade Runner-ish.
Wednesday, July 2, 2014
Bleach DS: Blade of Fate Review
I like this game.
Simple controls.
Decent story.
Not great.
Love use of Dual Screen power ups. How they should be used prior to the Street Fighter IV, tap special moves.
Doesn't have a great number of cutscenes to enhance the production value or story, but gets its goal across.
Like Bleach, the characters have great character design.
It's sorta retconned though and you probably have to learn moves that have nothing to do with what they did in the show.
It takes a while to beat the game. If you enjoy fighting great.
But if you can't wait to get to the story, it'll definitely be a bit of a hassle for you.
7/10
Simple controls.
Decent story.
Not great.
Love use of Dual Screen power ups. How they should be used prior to the Street Fighter IV, tap special moves.
Doesn't have a great number of cutscenes to enhance the production value or story, but gets its goal across.
Like Bleach, the characters have great character design.
It's sorta retconned though and you probably have to learn moves that have nothing to do with what they did in the show.
It takes a while to beat the game. If you enjoy fighting great.
But if you can't wait to get to the story, it'll definitely be a bit of a hassle for you.
7/10
Pretty Sailor Moon S (SNES)
This game is awful.
Pros:
The characters look like the characters on the show.
Cons:
Terrible hit detection that makes Karate Champ look like a masterpiece.
Impossible to use moves.
Terrible framerates.
Slow matches that rarely finish.
Really difficult to play, especially without an instruction manual.
The S for this game probably stands for Shaq FU.
1/10
Pros:
The characters look like the characters on the show.
Cons:
Terrible hit detection that makes Karate Champ look like a masterpiece.
Impossible to use moves.
Terrible framerates.
Slow matches that rarely finish.
Really difficult to play, especially without an instruction manual.
The S for this game probably stands for Shaq FU.
1/10
2013's Best Actors, Actresses and Directors, Before and After
Actor
Before watching"
Actress
Before 2014
Before watching:
Before watching"
- Chiwetol Eijofor
- Christian Bale
- Robert Redford All is Lost
- Michael B. Jordan
- Michael Fassbender
- Hugh Jackman
- Oscar Isaac
- Joaquin Phoenix Her
- Josh Brolin
2015:
- Leonardo DiCaprio
Before 2014
- Vanessa Hudgens, Spring Breakers
- Scarlet Johannsenn, Her
- Amy Adams, American Hustle
- Penelope Cruz, The Counselor
- Greta Gerwig, Frances Ha
- Amy Seimetz, Upstream Color
- Adele Exarchopoulos, Blue is the Warmest Color
- Olga Kurylenko, To the Wonder
- Julie Delpy, Before Midnight
- Cameron Diaz, The Counselor
- Vanessa Hudgens/Adele Exaarchopoulos
- Greta Gerwig
- Amy Seimetz
- Penelope Cruz
- Olga Kurlyenko
Before watching:
- 12 Years A Slave
- Spring Breakers Harmony Korine
- Only God Forgives Nicolas Winding Refn
- Computer Chess
- Upstream Color
- Prisoners
- To The Wonder
- Frances Ha Noah Baumbach
- Inside Llewyn Davis The Coen Brothers (Can I really give it the award, since I did not see it and probably would not understand it if I saw it?)
- Oldboy
- Fruitvale Station
- 12 Years a Slave
- Her by Spike Jonze
- The Counselor
- A Touch of Sin
- Carrie
- The Great Gatsby
- Denis Villanueve
- Spring Breakers Harmony Korine
- Only God Forgives Nicolas Winding Refn
- Computer Chess
- Upstream Color
- Prisoners
- 12 Years a Slave
- To The Wonder
- Frances Ha Noah Baumbach
- Inside Llewyn Davis The Coen Brothers (Can I really give it the award, since I did not see it and probably would not understand it if I saw it?)
- Oldboy
- The Great Gatsby
- Fruitvale Station
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