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#Where is the damn problem?! The other Actors also didn't voice their animated characters
cassiebones · 4 months
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Wish
Okay, so yesterday, as per my tradition on Black Friday, I went to see Wish. I typically try to avoid spoilers or reviews before seeing the movie myself, but that was kind of difficult this time because people seem to have a lot of strong opinions about this movie.
I don't think my opinions are that strong, but I do have them.
Spoilers below
Firstly, I would like to say that my cousin took her eight-year-old to see the movie, as well. I live in New York and they live in Texas, so we couldn't see it together. My little cousin (the 8yo) loved it. She loves animals, so the part where all the animals start speaking was the best part for her. She also really liked all the characters and all the bright colors. So it gets her stamp of approval, which is - to me - probably the most important part. Because this IS a movie for kids. The kids that surrounded my friend and I in the theater also seemed to like it.
So there's that.
Secondly, I didn't hate the movie. The storyline was solid. It had the classic Disney formula of "character wants something. character encounters a problem. character tries to fix problem. everything gets worse. character calls on friends to help. antagonist finds temporary victory. character and friends come together to defeat antagonist. happily ever after" that most kids' movies have.
I honestly don't think that it was "miscast" exactly, but they could have chosen different actors and it might have been more enjoyable. I do like Ariana DeBose and Chris Pine and I believe they did a decent job. Ariana is a Broadway girl and an Oscar winner for a movie musical, so obviously she can sing. Chris Pine has a good, solid voice, BUT the music in this movie was lacking. I agree with that criticism. I am not sure where they went wrong, but I am certain that it is more the company's fault than the people who wrote the music. The composers can only do so much when Disney is bossing them around. I think there also may have been an issue at my movie theater because the voices were so low that my hearing impaired ass was STRUGGLING to make out what they were saying half the time (did anybody else experience this?), but my cousin said she could hear everything just fine. idk.
I feel like this movie was made solely to make as many references to other Disney movies as they possibly could. Like they had Peter Pan, Asha is obviously Cinderella's Fairy Godmother, the goat speaks about making Zootopia, the king becomes the Mirror on the Wall, and Asha's friends are LITERALLY the seven dwarves. There are probably a lot more references that I didn't catch (because I couldn't hear SHIT), but this felt like a money grab.
And it was short! It was the standard 90 minute Disney movie, but DAMN. There was no short before the movie, which I found odd, and there was very little action. The musical numbers seemed out of place and more like those parodies of musicals where somebody will be speaking normally and then the next person just randomly starts singing. Like in the Central Park scene in Enchanted, but without the comedy of Patrick Dempsey's WTF face.
One thing I really enjoyed, however, was Star. The star was THE BEST CHARACTER in the entire movie. It had no lines, but it had a ton of personality, and it was fucking FUNNY. All it wanted to do throughout the movie was grant wishes and/or set them free for the people who made them. It hated the king, for obvious reasons, and how he wanted to possess all the wishes and keep them for his own selfish reasons. That star was one of the redeeming factors of the movie, but it couldn't have made that much of a different in the grand scheme of things, unfortunately. The movie still just...fell flat.
The king was also an interesting character (I cannot recall his name, nor do I care about him in the very least). He, like most major Disney villains, was a narcissistic asshole. He feeds the kingdom a story about wanting to grant their wishes and make them all happy, but he will not grant wishes if there's even the remote possibility of himself getting dethroned. There's a plot line in the movie about Asha's grandfather (who is 100yo btw) wanting to finally get his wish granted and when she asks him if that can happen, he looks at the wish (gramps playing guitar to a group of people, wishing to "inspire the next generation") and says that it's too dangerous because "what does he want to inspire them to do? rise up against me?" which is the BIGGEST REACH like???? He's so paranoid about people wanting to dethrone him even though literally everybody loves him and tells him constantly how much they love him until he shows his face in the last half hour of the movie. He even has his wife fooled.
But also, he is like a caricature of a narcissistic villain. He has very few redeeming qualities, if any. We don't have enough specific history from him to know what kind of childhood trauma he's dealing with or what is really driving him. He makes a comment that he 'lost my entire family' but not how or what it has to do with the fact that he's the only one allowed to use magic. He has a dark magic book for some reason, which ultimately leads to his villain arc. He descends into madness so quickly, too. Like one day he is this loving, lovable, generous king and then LITERALLY IN LESS THAN 24HR he is evil and consuming all the wishes, like????????? It just moves so quickly. I don't understand it.
Usually, the villains we see in Disney movies are already obviously evil, even when they're trying to hide it. Hans is one of the exceptions, but this king wasn't like Hans. They show us in the previews and the promotional material for the movie that this king is going to be evil. I feel like if we got a Hans-like reveal, then it would hold a lot more punch. But I guess that's the one reference Disney was unwilling to make because then they couldn't have shown off their sub-par, catchy villain tune. It's a shame, really.
Lastly, I am not against Asha being revealed as the "Fairy Godmother" because honestly that would have been a cool reference...if that was the only reference they made. But, like I said, they just did too much with this film. The end sequence even looks like the beginning sequence of all Disney films since Cinderella (with the arch going over the castle and all the fireworks.)
I was really excited when this film was first announced because I love Ariana DeBose and I was excited for another Latina princess (even though she and Mirabel are not technically princesses) to have her own movie, but it just fell so flat.
A lot of people have blamed Lin-Manuel Miranda for the pop music, but he had no part in this film. If he had, maybe the music would have at least been more....seasoned? idk
I give this movie a 4/10 overall. Disappointing, but not entirely bad.
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dinbeskarbaby · 2 years
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STOP👏🏻COMPARING👏🏻TEMUERA MORRISON👏🏻AND👏🏻DEE BRADLEY BAKER
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tricewithaz · 3 years
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THOTS ON SHADOW AND BONE
Hello everyone! it is I, Trice, and i come with my thoughts on the Shadow and Bone show cause ive got many
I'm gonna divide this in what i liked, what i disliked, and what i think could have been better but didn't really bother me. Feel free to send your opinions too!
As a whole, I really liked the show and I think it's a great adaptation that both fans and newcomers will enjoy. It's super well done! and every episode had me glued to the tv even though I knew what was going to happen.
Beware this is long
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To start,
What i liked
Mal and Alina
I never really liked Mal in the books, mainly cause he had like, nothing going on for him, and not having his pov made him no favors whatsoever. Alina's perception of him was everychanging, two factors that didn't make him unlikeable necessarily, but that made me not want to read about him. In the show he's way more likeable and even though he still doesn't have a lot going on for him, you can see that he's always trying to protect alina, and you also see a bit of his demeanor through Archie's acting. I think he made a great job at portraying him. And Alina! Alina who in the books was essentially a y/n sort of character (although she did get better over time), her character, likes, dislikes, her DRIVE was incredibly portrayed in the show. Also Jessie (loml, marry me) and Archie have incredible chemistry together and they sold their yearning SO WELL (and so did the kid actors portraying them as children oh my GOD)...yall...i cried when they held hands. My favourite scene was definitely when Alina took care of Mal's wounds (a favorite trope of mine). And the HURT in their eyes whenever they thought the other was in danger....i saw the show dubbed but I'm sure their voices made it beyond incredible as well, their face acting was just on. point. Overall the show rEALLY makes me root for them both individually and together which is something the books didn't manage to do.
The Darkling
AAAAA i really enjoyed the Darkling omg, incredible charisma, Ben does such a great job (and so did his voice actor in Spanish oh my GOD). His acting was just as I imagined it in the books and i loved how he could be as sweet and mysterious as he could be menacing. In fact! i liked him more than i did in the book, and i think it was a great choice to make him more human. I'm not sure if this was Ben or the writing, but i could really see his yearning for an equal, for Alina, his loneliness and his thirst for power and control too. Great love interest, even greater villain. And his wardrobe was phenomenal. I also really liked how they implied that The Darkling was a name given by other people, it was very believable that people would call someone who literally controls shade something akin to "son of the dark" or something of the sort, instead of it being a name he gives himself or his job title (both if which are incredibly pathetic and cringy to think about).
Jesper
No comments. He was just great. I love Kit.
Nina
Omg Danielle did SUCH a great job at portraying Nina, it's exactly how i imagined her in Six of Crows.
Helnik
THE. YEARNING. THE. CHEMISTRY. I didn't love their scenes at the boat but once that was over I was practically screaming at the screen to jUST KISS ALREADY. Calahan and Daniell have such good chemistry together and the few changes they made only served the story better. I did wish they had development over more time cause Matthias' change of mind felt too quick, but i get why they had to rush. Because of how good their chemistry was, their fallout also was incredibly painful.
Inej's fear of the Menagerie and her morals
Amita's portrayal of Inej's hurt, devotion and her refusal to kill (and later hurt cause she has killed) is incredibly subtle but so SO effective. She's so talented really and truly sold Inej's feelings throughout the show.
VFX
Man.....the fold, the volcra, the grisha powers.....kudos to the animators and overall artistic team cause they were incredible. Also seeing the different title animations in each episode was such a tiny detail that made me so excited and they all looked so good.
Ketterdam
Again, kudos to the artistic team, everything about Ketterdam felt so alive (and weirdly moist), truly sold a kind of aesthetic and life that is so characteristic if the Barrel, even when i didn't imagine it that way in the books.
David
He appeared like, twice, and both times were so cute and charming I can't wait to see more of him both on his own and with Genya.
The Wardrobe
So, at first i hated the keftas. I thought the looked tacky and costume, but when you see them on screen they're just perfect (although i have to say the patterns on some of the keftas were kind of...cheap looking? and the training keftas were just kinda boring. My favourite was the Darkling's. Aside from that, i really liked Kaz's and inej's clothes too. Very distinctive and recognizable (although it was kind of weird seeing Inej in teal instead of purple lmao).
And the queen's dresses. Chefs kiss.
It's...so cheesy (affectionate)
The whole show felt like the kind of movies I would watch as a kid like Harry Potter and Pirates of the Caribbean. The writing was stylized enough to make it incredibly dramatic and overall there was just so much heart behind all of it. Definetely a show to watch again and again and feel all of it, cause that's what it being so cheesy managed, to make me actually feel for it. It feels like something to watch on a rainy afternoon after a bad day....it's great okay i really enjoyed it, even (specially) the most unbelievable parts of it. And here's the thing, it's something that i think a lot of newer tv and film have lost, so this is good.
What i didn't like
Zoya
Mostly cause of the writing. Originally, in the first book, i didn't like her, neither as a character (stereotypical mean girl with no other motivation than to bang the love interests....all three of them....what's new i still think it's an incredibly sexist trope) or a person (hey at least this was intentional), but over time i grew to LOVE her (mean girl turns out to have a good heart and actually respects the mc and decides to fight alongside her cause it's what's right, without necessarily liking her or giving up her character??? AND she has strong motivations??? now THAT'S new). In the show, i hoped they would keep her mean girl nature while foreshadowing her depth, but all they did was turn her into a petty seductress with barely any screentime, and that only makes her not even a bad antagonist but just a boring character to watch. Not only that but they took away a big part of her character that needed to be developed in the next books. I wanted to watch her rivalry with Alina, her unjustified venomous tongue too, I wanted to be entertained by her and I wasn't. This was also a problem cause when she finally changed teams, and when she hugged Alina, it was incredibly unsatisfying, it would have had a way stronger effect if we had seen her being Ruthless Zoya with a big ambition. I also didn't like how we were told that she didn't like alina, or that she had a family, instead of it being shown on screen. Just from the show, all i can tell you about her is that she likes to bang people and she has a good moral code i guess. Yall, I'm so petty about this.
Kaz
So, I didn't hate him, in fact i think I would have enjoyed him if I hadn't read the books first, cause the two things that bother me about him were two essential characteristics of him in the books. FIrstly, he seems so strained, instead of the seemingly laid back, almost chill looking (even though we know he's not chill at all) Kaz we see in the books, the Kaz that always knows something that you don't. Show Kaz doesn't seem to always be in control, to always have the last word, the last laugh. Instead he seems strained, all the damn time. And I think this is mainly a writing and directing issue. And he also seems weak, something Book Kaz would never do. This is also an issue cause because he doesn't have the same presence he has in the books, the times where he is weak, don't seem as effective. Sure, Pekka Rollins has essentially reduced him and humiliated him, but I haven't seen enough of Kaz being actually dangerous for this to be shocking and for Pekka to seem even more hateable (and, i really liked Pekka, loved him as an antagonist more than i did in the books). Idk, Kaz was so charismatic and just fun and engaging to read in the books that his portrayal in the show felt lacking.
Alina's power's VFX
The little suns were cute and all but the light coming from within her was just ugly I'm sorry.
SFX
A lot of the sound design was just too stylized for the tone of the show i think. I particularly remember the sound of Mal's punches....what's that about.
What i think could have been better, but didn't particularly dislike
The Crows' storyline
And i think part of this is a consequence of Kaz not being as witty as he was in the books. Where's the incredibly complicated heist moves? the even more unbelievable C and D plans when something goes wrong? I didn't like that them getting Alina was essentially just luck, cause i didn't see enough of them being smart and quick on their feet. I also think it was unnecessary to have their storyline mixed with Alina's, i would have enjoyed watching a different heist, maybe in Ravka as well, and them incidentally crossing paths with Alina, more than i liked this storyline. ironically enough, the heist was the part i was least interested in
Genya and Alina
I just feel like her relationship with Alina wasn't strong enough, and i think it's because the show tried to make us believe they were much closer than they were without spending the necessary time in them.
Overall, I really really enjoyed the show, i will be watching it again (particularly cause i want to watch it in English) and i cannot wait for the second season omg (although i have to say, I'm scared for Nikolai)
I think that's all! I would also love to read yall's opinions and have a conversation.
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speeps-highway · 6 years
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Something I noticed about the way Sonic is portrayed nowadays is that he is pretty much All Might. Colors and Gens didn't have the plot to fully show it and Lost World put all the blame for his actions. Forces however, he keeps the same careless attitude from Unleashed to Gens, everyone looks up for him as their savior and role model and even when he makes bad jokes against the villains he still ends up recking them like trash. He went from Goku/Luffy type of shonen hero to literally All Might.
I barely watch Anime so I have hardly any idea what you’re comparing him too, but let me make it clear:
Sonic’s portrayal in games suffers in localization a lot.
Adventure -> Shadow Portrayal
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From SA1-06 there was a pretty general issue in the main series with unsatisfactory translations - SHtH messes up a lot of lines, and SA2 is almost completely broken at times (Teria, KAFOW, saying a broken version of the Japanese word for “Damn” when getting grabbed by a ghost)
On top of that I’m not sure what exactly went on and if it’s on purpose or not, but there was some kind of this obsession with giving the character cheesy one-liners, like in the 90s cartoons. Lines like this include “Something Buggin’ you”, “Come and get some Eggman” and “Crack that Eggman wide open”.
Sure, you can argue “Western sonic is different” but look at how that’s turned out in the past, not including giving Classic Sonic a mohawk. I’m sure even those people can notice how much lines like “Something Buggin’ You” are made fun of by people both in and outside of the fanbase. They might have worked well for AoStH and Satam, but they certainly don’t in the main series.
Japanese portrayals of Sonic were far less aggressive than their English counterparts. In fact, he keeps his cool pretty well but boy does he sound pissed in the rare event he actually does get angry. He’s been pretty consistent in acting this way in most, if not all of his appearances. In fact, there’s a character script from SA2 describing the character in exactly this way - you can see it here.
In some cases, this causes the games to lose subtle details like nods to other titles. For example a boy in Station Square who references Little Planet, or Sonic’s reaction to seeing Shadow in Heroes.
Secret Rings -> Black Knight Portrayal
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Sonic is a depressed lover boy in 06 IMO. I don’t really want to get into that, so let’s skip that one.
Starting around the time of Secret Rings, Sonic games finally started to get localisations that were pretty accurate in both English and Japanese. There’s a reason the storybooks and Unleashed aren’t brought up nearly as much as the other games are for Sonic saying dumb lines. I mean, there’s still word differences, but they don’t go full on adding in random one-liners.
In fact, the only concern seemed to be the voice actors. For Sonic himself, even though Griffith eventually improved he was still nowhere near what Kanemaru (and that guy who voiced the Werehog, but I guess the decision to not have a seperate VA for that in English isn’t his fault) did for the character. (Unleashed example (J) (E), Black Knight example (J) (E))
Colors -> Lost World Portrayal
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Starting with Colors though Sonic’s character took a weird turn: He was suddenly shouting cheese more than ever, and they were even showing up in the Japanese version. I think this is largely because they suddenly decided to have Sonic games be written in America by people wholly unfamiliar with the franchise. (Though in defense they’re not the entire problem)
The Japanese/English translation was back to being very different as well, mostly because the scripts included many more jokes and puns that couldn’t be translated well between the two. For instance, Cubot is a Cowboy in the English version but he’s a Ninja in the Japanese one. “Baldy Nosehair” is translated as “Mustached Egg” etc.
In the past, there weren’t a lot of lines you couldn’t easily find a way to translate. I think like, the line that got replaced with Ah Yeah This is Happenin’ is one of the only ones I can think of.
While it’s easy to shit on Colors Sonic, I think he did okay speaking for the game itself - it was lighter than the darker games that had been going on for the last 5 years. The problem isn’t that Colors Sonic existed, it’s that they kept him.
Generations got away pretty easy - there’s not much to even write for that after all. The only real change is the Time Eater scene to omit the reference to Dr. Robotnik.
Lost World is where he really falls apart, that game tried to raise the stakes with the planet draining and Tails kidnapping but in the end he just… couldn’t take himself seriously enough.
For some reason, really starting with Lost World the Japanese script took a wild turn. While Colors and Gens were relatively in the same style, Lost World’s Japanese version improved script in that everyone was generally more in-character. Remember what I said earlier about Sonic getting angry? Compare what he says to the Deadly Six when he sees Robo Tails in the English version to the Japanese one.
Even the jokes in Japanese Lost World are more suited to the character than they are in English. Eggman’s Jetpack at the end for example (J) (E). There’s lots of examples of differences in Lost World, too many to sensibly list really.
Forces Portrayal
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IMO Forces has largely the same localization problems as SA1 - the lip syncing is always synced to Japanese (though lip syncing has never been good for both languages in one game) and the English script has a bunch of dumb sounding one-liners that get made fun of.
By now I’m sure you’re probably familiar with the whole “Sonic was tortured” and “Tails went mad” thing, but there’s still a lot of bad apples in the English version that aren’t there in the Japanese version.
The scene where Zavok opens Sonic’s prison cell is very different between the two (J) (E). I mean there’s still the problem about being stuck for 6 months, but Japanese Sonic is notably less fixated on butts here. He also doesn’t mention Chilli Dogs in that scene above while fighting him, or that “It’s been Generations” comment when he meets Classic Sonic.
Forces is definitely a step in the right direction for Sonic compared to Lost World though, even in the English version he’s far less quick to make jokes as he was before.
The game even restores an aspect of Sonic that was absent in Colors and Lost World - starting (and even finishing) the game alone. He was getting kinda circlejerky with Tails in those games, whereas in pretty much every major game other than Sonic 2 and 3 he’s always shown doing his own thing separated from characters like Tails and Knuckles initially and meets up with them afterwards - even if it’s a game like Heroes where it happens all at once in the intro movie.
I don’t know how Forces’ script was made, but if Nakamura is saying that the script was passed between Pontaff and Goya with the two making changes, they need to make sure that they both end up with the same result.
Passing the script between America and Japan is fine, but at the end of the day they need to make sure that both sides have scripts that match each other as close as possible, in order to avoid these character and plot inconsistencies.
Either way, by now presumably Pontaff have had more experience with writing for and have more solid past material for this series than the people who localised the SA1-era games. Considering I’ve heard Pontac refuses to talk about Sonic and Graff’s twitter got trashed by angry fans when he announced writing for the game, surely they should be aware of this characterization issue by now, but I don’t blame them if it ends up being something beyond their control, such as a lack of communication between SoA/SoJ or being forced to write the character that way anyway.
I think ultimately what Sonic the character is dealing with right now is the rotting corpse of 90s American Sonic, who died, came back from the dead, then died and came back again - a zombie that won’t stop falling apart, and the stench is catching up.
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