Category Archives: Reviews

Shanks Review

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Oof, it’s time to check out a film that was really not very good at all. That’s an understatement as this film is quite terrible and has to be one of the weakest films overall. There are no real good things to say about it by the end and it really drags on. I haven’t seen a film with pacing this bad since 2001: A Space Odyssey. So strap in folks because we’re in for a wild ride!

So the movie starts out by introducing us to Malcolm who can’t speak. He performs puppet shows during the day to earn money but unfortunately his family is rather corrupt. His sister an brother in law are both abusive and the guy gets drunk. They take it all out on Malcolm who basically has to take care of the house, earn the money, and do his best not to go crazy. Those two don’t contribute at all but take a lot of his money every time it’s pay day. So his life is just rough and the only person who is nice to him is a girl named Celia who looks forward to his puppet show for her birthday.

Well, one day Malcolm runs into an old man named Mr. Walker who runs crazy reanimation experiments. He lets Malcolm work on them too and the guy is thrilled. Basically you can stab anyone with these needles and then you can control them with a video game controller. Not a bad invention eh? It’s certainly got its uses and then Mr. Walker dies. Malcolm decides to take over the experiments and Malcolm’s family is bumped off so Malcolm reanimates their bodies. He now has the silent family that he always wanted and parades them across the town. It’s all going good for him until a gang of evil bikers show up and decide to terrorize the place. Can he defend Celia or is it all over?

This is one of those movies that is trying to be as dark as possible. It’s also just really mean spirited as the characters make things as hard on Malcolm as possible. Seriously the guy can’t even talk so that he could speak back to the other characters and they break his stuff for no good reason. Malcolm gets beat up and then of course you have the bikers who break into his place and beat him up some more.

One of the villains also has to be a creep who goes after the kid and things don’t go well for her. That was when I knew that this film wasn’t going to go past a 0. When you make a film go that bad there is just no returning from that. The villains get away with way too much here and they’re annoying every second that they’re on screen. They’re written to be as evil as possible with no actual character development or personality beyond that. They’re just figures of evil meant to push the story along.

This movie is also really determined to get you to admire how the actors are able to act really dead and move around like zombies. These scenes are incredibly long and just keep on going without any kind of break. You can spend 5 minutes just watching one of these reanimated guys walking around. Let me tell you, 5 minutes may not sound like a whole lot but when nothing else is happening it certainly feels like a lot of time. Then you have this keep on happening throughout the movie.

Much of the movie has no plot and is just about Malcolm walking around with his dead family as he fools people into thinking that they are alive. It would never work in any real world but this place is so odd that nobody questions it. Nobody even thinks to ask why they are so silent and nobody notices how they look super dead too. It may be trying to be very surreal but it just ends up being boring.

Malcolm also come across as being rather villainous at times like when he plays around with the knife and tries to scare Celia a bit. This guy doesn’t think things through and while he may just be a fan of dark humor, it’s not something that Celia needs to see when she’s just trying to have a good birthday party. The film is unrelenting with this though and the undead battles are also not very good. Everything is super slow and dreary instead of being fun and exciting.

The end of the film even has a big twist about the whole thing but instead of being a twist that makes you gasp at how inspired and out there it was, you’ll just be shaking your head. Yet another thing for you to see how the film is just not trying to have any fun. I don’t think any ending could have saved this film mind you, but this has to be one of the weaker ways to play things out. It actually just makes Malcolm look way worse since we now know a little bit more about how he thinks.

There is no reason to see the film. There is no fun lesson to be learned, no fun fight scene to go back to, no witty dialogue, etc. Every character is just really off here and you have to suspend your disbelief a lot. The movie isn’t funny and the effects are no good. When you boil the film down to the core themes, there just isn’t anything here of substance. I wouldn’t know where to begin on trying to salvage the film since I would say it was already bad from the very premise. Just change everything from the ground up and see how that goes.

Overall, Shanks is a film that you want to avoid at all costs. There are no happy scenes here as any brief moment where things are not going bad will change in an instant. Nobody is safe here and the film’s pacing slows down to a glacial speed as nothing happens for long portions of the movie. You could easily take out 30 minutes from this film and it would flow better while you do not lose any of the plot. Now that is absolutely a bad sign for the movie. It’s been a while since I saw a film that would be a total 0 but this has to take the cake. Stay far away! It’s quite telling that googling “Shanks movie” brings up a different film that has a character named Shanks in it as opposed to bringing up the movie that is literally called “Shanks”. That has to be a sign of how people have tried to forget this one.

Overall 0/10

Violent Saturday Review

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Violent Saturday is one of those films with a rather large cast as the various plots all converge by the end for the climax. How well the climax works will likely depend on how much you like all of the characters and plots. I would say that the movie is fairly solid and the plots work well for the most part with one exception. You should have a good time with this one, it can be a bit of a slow boil for a while but the ending definitely handles things nicely.

So lets go through each of the plots here real quick. The main story tying them altogether is we have 3 crooks who have decided to hold up a bank. They’ve done their research and aim to strike at the perfect time where there aren’t too many people who can stop them. Most of the film is based around their preparation so it takes a while for them to actually do the job. That’s where we get the various sub plots to come in as the characters from all of those plots end up being at the bank.

First up is Harry who is the most annoying character. He’s a perv who always runs outside the window of Linda so that he can catch her after she has come home for the night. Unfortunately she doesn’t realize that her apartment is quite high up and so with the window open anyone can see her. Harry doesn’t have the courage to talk to her in person though and so his life keeps on falling through the gutter. Perhaps this experience will teach him some courage but I can tell you that he is easily the worst character in the film.

Then you have Boyd who gets drunk rather easily. He’s not too happy with his home life at the moment and there is a lot of tension with his wife. He is more direct than Harry though and actually does make a pass on Linda. Ultimately she doesn’t take advantage of him in this weakened state and takes him home but not before scolding the wife. The scene was rather intense as Linda dares the lady to try and fight her. We definitely know who would have won that fight.

Meanwhile Linda is a solid character. She’s certainly quite popular in this town but always handles herself with elegance. She is perhaps a little too forgiving as she could have been a lot harder on Harry but it’s a little difficult to call that a character flaw. Linda is easily one of the nicest characters here and doesn’t make any big mistakes so I can certainly appreciate that. Then you have Elsie who is a thief. It’s quite fortunate for her that Harry is the one who located her since the blackmail canceled each other out there.

Elsie comes across as a little petty. Circumstances may be tough but it’s no excuse for being a thief and she gets quite outraged at anyone calling her out. This plot felt like it had the least amount of relevance to the story but at least it’s one more dynamic to follow. We also have an Amish family that is living in a plot of land nearby and that becomes relevant later on. They follow a very peaceful way of life and so they refuse to use violence even when the need arises.

I always think this can be extreme. If that’s the way you live your life then that’s that of course but to protect your family you feel like it is the time to cross a line. Fortunately the main member made the right call when it counted. Finally we also have Shelley who I would say is the main character here. It’s an ensemble film but at least if I had to pick a lead out of them it would be this guy. He did not serve in WWII so his son isn’t taking that too well when the other kids make fun of him.

Shelley knows that it couldn’t be helped but it’s difficult to convince his son of that. When this whole bank heist occurs, it’s his chance to finally do something about this. He can be a hero but if he makes the wrong call then he may just end up being dead. So he definitely has to watch out but in the end he does a good job on all counts. Considering that the odds were really against him, Shelley had to use a lot of strategy and tactics in order to turn the tides.

I would say Violent Saturday succeeds because the characters are well developed so it adds a little more tension to the climax. Not all of the characters were good to be sure but the overall picture was on point. The writing was good as well and I enjoyed the climax. It’s definitely tough having to go up against multiple opponents when your own allies aren’t really doing anything to help you out at least for most of it. A bank robbery like this is also a lot more intense back in the day because without cameras or anything, you have to assume that the robbers will never be caught if they escape. It would just be difficult to ever catch up to them and so it became even more imperative that they be stopped here.

Overall, The character arc for Shelley was really good and I’m glad that he got to really prove himself here. The movie keeps a good pace throughout and the fight at the end is fairly long so we get to see a lot of tricks from both sides. I can’t think of many films where the climax takes place in a barn either so that was a very original location to use. If the others had been harder on Shelley for murdering the villains as he fought them then that might have hurt the film a bit but fortunately while they didn’t agree, they weren’t actively getting in Shelley’s way. Now that would have been annoying. This film ages well so I’d recommend checking it out, maybe watch it on a Saturday!

Overall 7/10

Valkyrie Elysium Review

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I remember when the first trailer for this game came out I knew that I had to get it. It looked like a really fun 3D action game with a cool plot and everything. Something just out of the blue that had a super amount of potential. Well, I got it day 1 and it was a lot of fun. I do think it could have maybe been a bit longer to really go into the tory here but all in all it was still a quality title. I could see myself going back to grab some more trophies at some point and the battle system was crafted well.

The story starts with the game introducing you to the Valkyrie Nora who is sworn to fight under the command of Odin. Odin and Fenrir had a powerful battle that nearly reduced the planet to ashes and both of them sustained absolutely massive damage. Fenrir is now returning and Odin fears that he will need to move quickly to regain the advantage. He tells Nora to go and cleanse as many souls as she can since each one will power Odin up. Additionally she needs to find the 4 artifacts of power and as a bonus, destroy Fenrir if she can. This is a really tall order but Nora will do her best.

Right from the start you can see how Odin is rather shady and he keeps on throwing more and more tasks at Nora. When he mentions that she needs to destroy Fenrir as well you can see how crazy this is. If Odin himself couldn’t defeat her, then what hope does a Valkyrie have? He gives us a trusty rope that can in theory take Fenrir down but that’s still not a whole lot to truly change the tide of battle. At best it’s a confidence booster I suppose but you still feel like that could never possibly be enough.

Fortunately Nora meets with lost souls along the way that she uses to aid her in battle. By the end of the game she has 4 souls who help her and they each try to get Nora to act more like a human. Initially Nora is virtually emotionless and just following orders but as the game goes on she starts to question things more and also show more empathy. So the character arc here is pretty solid. Nora even gets emotional to the point where she has an outburst by the end but fortunately apologizes for it.

The way the gameplay works is it’s a 3D fighter where you attack with your sword mainly. You can eventually switch weapons as well but there aren’t a ton of them and I mainly stuck with the sword since it handles so well. You can summon one of your 4 fighters for 30 seconds which then changes your weapon to that character’s element. You can summon all 4 of course and keep summoning them but they all take up some of your energy meter. When it runs out then you can no longer summon anybody so keep that in mind.

It’s actually possible to get completely stuck in the tutorial as a result since you need them to get past one of the obstacles but there is no way to replenish energy in the tutorial. It was a rather odd oversight from the devs that I fell for but it was interesting all the same. Part of the strategy in the game is constantly changing your element to deal with the enemies in front of you. Additionally you can also equip up to 4 spells and use them to back you up with the various elements. I personally would have 1 heal, fire, thunder, and holy as my 4 spells. It’s easy to switch though so feel free to experiment.

Aside from combat you can also level up your character’s stats and the weapon itself. They all use the same energy currency so choose wisely. Typically I would upgrade the character and my weapons were purely a backup option. I figure having Nora as powerful as possible was always the best bet here. I feel like the game isn’t super easy to just pick up and play because of how much is going on but it does feel good once you’ve got the whole system down. You’ll be seamlessly transitioning from opponent to opponent.

That said, the final boss is still super tough though and gave me a real tough run for my money. For a minute there I thought I was going to have to go back and train but fortunately I was able to just barely clutch it out. I didn’t run from a single enemy in the game so I like to think that I was at exactly the level the devs intended me to be at for the final boss. The challenge is real but it feels fair and I do think that I could have mastered the mechanics a bit more to make things easier. I sort of learned it to the bare minimum needed to beat the game.

The game felt a little shorter than I expected though. Not saying it’s super short but you can likely beat it in under 10 hours. Each chapter tends to be around 30 minutes or less and there are less than 20 chapters in the game. So just keep plugging away and you’ll be at the end in no time. There are trophies that you can obtain to help with the replay value though and a lot of side missions and such. So there’s still a lot to do here including getting the true ending. Now this I’m not positive about since I haven’t looked it up but the way the game ends just feels a bit odd so I suspect that I needed to do more side missions. I was certainly taken by surprise though so it was effective if this was the game’s intent.

As a main character Nora is solid enough. She doesn’t have much of a personality for most of it but that’s part of the point really. Her evil counterpart Hilde is more interesting but also more annoying because she refuses to say much of anything. What good is it to know a lot of secrets and taunt Nora about being a pawn when you won’t fill her in? I thought Hilde handled the whole situation quite poorly and was really not all that smart. For all her tough talk, she was being manipulated just as much as Nora.

As for Fenrir and Odin, I thought the game did a good job of showing them as two sides of the same coin. They both really just want absolute power to dominate the masses and show what they’ve got. Neither one of them are heroes in the slightest and in fact you could just call them villains straight up. It would certainly be accurate which is part of why the ending is a bit funny. They don’t even disguise their sinister intentions the whole time either. They just do what they want when they want and can get away with it since they’re so powerful.

Overall, Valkyrie: Elysium is a pretty good game. It may have been a bit different than I was expecting in terms of length but I was still satisfied and would be interested in a sequel. I do think it’ll end up being a game that is largely forgotten to time though as it doesn’t do anything to really stand out in a genre that is brimming with tons of games at this point. The story is fun and all though so they should just keep on going with it and eventually this will be a home run hit!

Overall 7/10

Trinity Universe Review

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Trinity Universe is a game that I had on the backlog for many years. It’s a long visual novel/rpg title so I had to wait for a good opportunity to check it out. Well, the future is now as they say and I finally got to take it out. This is definitely a game that has a high difficulty level so be prepared to grind a whole lot if you want to make it to the end. Fortunately the level ups come quickly and there are a ton of mechanics involved here so eventually you’ll be in a good spot.

There are two story modes here but I opted to play Kanata’s story. He’s known as the Demon Dog King and he has decided to rebel against his destiny. See, he was supposed to become the Demon God Gem but doing so would mean that he would lose his humanity and become…well a gem. So instead he wants to be a great adventurer and figures he can save the planet another way. Becoming the gem would have stopped the countless falling objects from obliterating the Netheruniverse but he figures he can stop them one at a time instead. Doing that would allow him to keep his humanity while also having a lot of fun. It’s the best of both worlds you could say but of course that means everyone is after him now.

It’s a fun story but the game doesn’t take it all that seriously. At its core this game is still part parody so the characters break the fourth wall and there are some jokes about the budget and everything. I wouldn’t say that any of the characters are all that great either. For the most part they’re good but if you pit them against any other RPG they’re probably getting taken out pretty easily. The humor is mainly the characters repeating their gags over and over so it doesn’t have the same energy and focus as a mainline Disgaea game. Now those would really have a lot of great dialogue throughout.

I also think they could have done a little more than the simple character portraits for all of the dialogue. A little movement or animation would have been nice but this is something that mainly comes with the genre/territory so I can’t go in too hard on that. The graphics look pretty nice once you’re actually playing the game so that’s definitely a plus. Meanwhile the soundtrack is a lot of fun too. I think they could have had more variety in the hub world though since there is only a single track that just plays on loop over and over again.

Fortunately the dungeons have a lot of solid themes. The encounter theme is good and there’s a solid rock one for the bosses. A good soundtrack is always important for these things. The game is also fairly long so when you mix in the difficulty level then you know that you will be here for quite a while. The gameplay mechanics are a bit complicated so it’ll also take you a little time to get those down. Don’t expect that you’re just going to wake up and start cranking out those wins.

So the main flow of the game is that you’ll watch a few events and then you’ll head into a dungeon. You run through the rooms as minions attack you until you get to the boss at the end. Beat him and the chapter will usually end before taking you to the next one. It’s a fairly straight forward approach but my advice is to always save when you go back to the hub world. Sometimes an event will trigger an instant boss fight instead of waiting for the dungeon and you don’t want to be caught with your guard down. Now that would be tricky.

Once the battle starts, the game becomes a turn based title. You have a certain amount of energy that you can use for different moves. Lets say you have 50 energy. Your standard attack takes up 10, special takes 12, and your power blow takes 15. You can use any variation of those until you run out of energy or skip your turn so next time you start with 100. The benefit to skipping your turn is that there are several combinations which turn into combos and deal mega damage. For example, 5 special attacks in a row would cost 60 energy but it would trigger a combo. Personally I always skipped a turn with all 4 players and then launched into big moves.

You can look up some combos on the pause menu but a lot of them don’t show up so just memorize them as you play through the game. You can also press R1 to try and launch a team combo right when you’re running out of energy. You then have to press the right button while the meter is in the green which can be surprisingly difficult. This only triggers if you’ve landed multiple solid combos already. There’s also a final smash with R3 but that one is tougher to use because it doesn’t always work. Once you’ve started one attack, the energy starts dropping automatically so make sure you don’t take too long to think.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. There’s a lot more to it but you can see how this game is really detailed the whole time. When you’re not battling you want to grab as many minerals and resources as possible. These are later used to synthesize new weapons and equipment. Those are super helpful so you’ll want to have them. The game does suffer from missing some quality of life features though like being able to directly compare the stats to something that you already have so be prepared for pausing and unpausing the game a lot.

Once you reach chapter 11 then you finally get the meteorites which is super helpful for grinding. The best thing to do is to grab a bunch of the ones that increase your souls so that you can beat one enemy and get 99 souls. Leverage that into creating a monster that will drop an AttackX3 which you can use to increase your attack power by close to 500. Rinse and repeat with every other stat until your guys are absolutely overpowered. The stat increases are way better than leveling up which is probably why the game locks them until the very end of the game.

This is a game where you will want to write a lot of notes or just look up a guide on the best places to grind and where each mineral spawns. Otherwise you’re going to have a tough time finding what you need and that can take a while. Also, be warned that the game does have a “dark” ending if you haven’t done enough. Based on the text it seems like you’re supposed to clear a bunch of side missions which I never really bothered with. It certainly makes for a unique ending though, that’s for sure. I wasn’t expecting things to play out the way that they did at all so it really took me by surprise.

As for the story, well it boils down to fighting Rizelea a bunch of times before finally uniting against a common threat. It’s a classic kind of plot that works well enough but the game is just going through the motions most of the time. As a lead Kanata is okay but rarely knows when to actually get serious. He’s also so strong that almost nobody is a threat to him. Rizelea is fun though and probably one of the highlights here. You can always count on her to steal the stage when she appears and get everyone to focus up.

Etna is always fun for just how over the top evil she is. She makes it quite clear to the others and to the audience that she is still a demon through and through. Flonne’s role here is interesting as she’s still in her more evil appearance from the end of Diagaea. I thought that was a nice nod to the continuity and it’s fitting that the guest characters would be some of the best here. Lucius is the dark hero and has a cool voice. I like the concept behind his character. He may not do a lot but he always talks tough which is appreciated it.

Tsubaki is incredibly loyal to Kanata and always takes his side even if she doesn’t agree with it. I suppose you have to admire her loyalty but sometimes it can hurt her character as I would like her to call him out more. Throughout the game she is hinting at some kind of secret plot but that doesn’t really go anywhere so either it’s in the true ending or was for a sequel. Finally you have Mizuki who tries her best to be the very hyper heroine but often falls flat. Half the time there is nothing for her to do so she’ll just make a random comment. The game’s very self aware about this and so I would say the concept behind her character was better than the execution. The script in general for the characters could be fun at times but really could have benefited from more actual animation.

Overall, Trinity Universe is a fun game. Mainly it’s solid because of the gameplay and how much effort went into that. It does come to a point where I think the game overcomplicates some things and could have gone for a more simple route but it’s still fun. The story also holds it back from taking the next step to an 8 because it can be a bit repetitive and never gets quite as emotional or intense as the average RPG. On that front it just can’t keep up but you should still find the characters amusing enough. I do give the title props for being almost fully voice acted even with so much dialogue and characters here.

Overall 7/10

My Dream is Yours Review

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Doris Day returns but this movie is considerably weaker than the other two. The romance is really bad here and while the movie has some decent moments as you’d expect from any comedy, it doesn’t land nearly as well as the other two. You’ll walk away from this film feeling like it seriously did not reach any of the potential that it could have had.

The movie starts with Doug being betrayed by Gary. See, Doug was that music star’s manager and got Gary to be one of the biggest hits in the country. The problem is that Gary now believes that he doesn’t need Doug anymore and drops him like a hat. Doug swears revenge but ultimately loses his job and has to start from scratch. That’s when he runs into a girl named Martha who has a solid singing voice. Doug is confident that he can use her to get his revenge but the problem is that Martha falls for Gary. How can Doug still turn this into a win?

I have quite a few issues with this film but the first is the whole romance with Gary. While Doug could act coy about how the entire schism with Gary started, Martha still knows enough to tell that he’s not a good guy. He acts hostile to Doug the entire time and always acts like Martha is the only person in the room. Gary is incredibly arrogant and full of himself. I just don’t get how she fell for him from the start.

The romance gets worse and worse as Gary’s bad attitude is exposed and he’s blacklisted from the entire industry. Almost literally nobody likes him and people don’t want to hire him for anything anymore. He becomes an alcoholic and just vanishes. Well, even then Martha is still writing him letters and going after the guy. Now here’s the thing, there’s nothing wrong with her not falling for Doug. He’s a great guy who helps her out a lot. He got her rich and really changed her life for the better but gratitude shouldn’t mean that you have to fall in love with that guy.

I’d totally be cool with her saying no to his confession and staying as friends. It’s rough for Doug but that’s just how it goes and it’s not like he did all of this with that in mind. Initially it was to get back at Gary and then after that he just genuinely wanted to help her out. Doug took his chance and asked her out and it didn’t work. It’s actually a bold move by the film and I’m cool with it but then we have Martha still going after Gary and it’s rather annoying.

Doug still wants to help Martha so in the end he gets Gary back on his feet and sets them up together. Very selfless behavior but the whole time Gary is acting like a jerk to both of them and straight up tells Martha to retire since he’ll be the breadwinner of the family. Only at this exaggerated moment does Martha finally realize that he’s no good…and then she grabs the rebound and slam dunks the ball back into the Doug basket. They get together and it’s probably one of the most blatant rebounds that I’ve seen in a long while.

Martha made it clear that Gary was the guy for her and she couldn’t return Doug’s feelings but now she is ready to be with him because Gary is a jerk? That’s just unacceptable and it’s the kind of romance that doesn’t feel real. Of course Doug is thrilled since it all feels nice to him but are the feelings really real? It’s something that he’ll have to think about in the back of his mind and that’s where things get a little spooky for him. It’s not a romance that I can get behind though and it does really sour the film.

If you cut out all of the scenes of her chasing after Gary then things would be better. Honestly I would remove that subplot completely because I still don’t see how she could fall for him given the circumstances. The guy never seemed like a good person so it’s not like the ending was particularly shocking. I also thought the film could have really had an interesting angle with Doug just realizing that they would always just be friends instead. The movie had a good foundation but blew it.

I also thought that while the film showed how hard it can be to break into the industry, that part could be a bit long. We spend ages with Doug trying to get Martha gigs at various places. These moments led to a lot of fun gags as well but the longer this went on, the more it felt even more personal when she went with Gary. The best gag in the movie has to be when Doug is trying to downplay Gary the whole time but it turns out that he was talking to the janitor and not the director. That was a great twist and I really liked the writing there because there was a lot of good wordplay thrown in for the insults. That was handled really well.

One of the guys that they have to try and impress is Felix because he basically owns the main music station and you need him on your side. Unfortunately he also happens to be one of the most annoying characters in the whole film. He is even more scatter brained than the characters that the actor usually plays and can’t focus on anything. He’s always just getting in the way and by the end he may as well just be another antagonist. He isn’t willing to give Martha a fair shot at all.

Martha also lags behind the previous heroines not only for the Gary stuff but because she doesn’t really seem prepared to go all out in order to complete her dreams. One scene that was iffy was when she was going to throw it all away if she couldn’t bring her son with her. She really would have had no time to raise him while auditioning and it’s not like she could drop him off at day care. Still, it was difficult to convince her and she was absolutely just going to give up. Then she also decides to perform at a very seedy bar even while overhearing a lot of the criminal behavior that the owner engages in. It’s clear that things won’t end well for her here but she goes through with it anyway before being saved by the main guy. Her decision making skills were very questionable throughout the movie.

Overall, In the end while the movie does get some laughs, it could also be a bit mean spirited at times. I felt like Gary got off way too easy and so in the end the movie isn’t nearly as good as it could and should have been. I wasn’t really impressed here and maybe it doesn’t help that I saw this one right after two other comedy films that were way better. Either way you will want to take a pass on this one. It’s not really bad or anything so you could always check it out if you really want something light to watch but you could do way better within the genre.

Overall 5/10

It’s a Great Feeling Review

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Time for another Doris Day adventure. This time we get to have two guys fighting over her as a lot of wacky shenanigans ensue. The banter tends to be the high point of the film while the actual plot can often be on the weaker side. The movie still makes for a fun watch cover to cover though even if the ending isn’t very satisfying when you think about it. It’s just a pleasant film that is easy to watch at any time.

The movie starts with everybody deciding to turn down being in a movie because Jack will be starring in it. He’s the most disliked actor in Hollywood and evidently he had to work quite hard to get that reputation. He constantly lies and is rather full of himself. That’ a really bad combination right from the jump and his only hope is to at least try to get Dennis to co-star in the film. Then at least he will have one big name with him but how to do it?

Well, Jack decides to lie to Judy, a girl who aspires to be an actress one day into guilt tripping Dennis into the role. This plot is poorly conceived from the start and goes sideways so with no other options, he’s forced to actually hire Judy and this at least gets Dennis on board as well since they have both fallen madly in love with her. They now have to fight amongst each other to see who can make her famous first and the true test will be convincing the director, Trent to sign her on. This won’t be easy since he likes to discover his own talent but they aim to have her appear wherever he goes.

Thing is, as hard as you try to make someone the next big star, it won’t always work. If anything it may even be a little forced if you’re always trying to throw her into the spotlight when it should be someone else’s turn. That’s exactly the issue that starts to pop up here. One of the side gags here is that Trent starts to think he’s going crazy because of how she appears everywhere. Judy tries to do too much to impress him and is always slamming her eyelashes together and making faces at him.

It’s a shame since she could have had a shot if she played things normally but even Jack and Dennis didn’t notice so I suppose I can’t blame her for that. It just wasn’t her moment to shine this time. By the time Trent is ready to make his move it’s just too late. The guy didn’t even seem bad, he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, every time.

As for Judy, the pressure was just a bit too much for her. At least she was very dedicated to the cause but after a while there was just too many obstacles in her way. She could only be jerked around by the two guys so many times before it was time to get out of there. She handled their endless flirting rather well and took it all in stride. If she could have handled everything with that level of calmness then she definitely would have been okay in the end.

Then we have Jack who is a rather weak character. His reputation is actually deserved which already hurts him from the jump. It would be one thing if he was misunderstood or something but he actually was lying to Judy and was trying to manipulate everyone else. So you can’t really feel bad for him because evidently this isn’t his first rodeo and people started to find that out the hard way. He’ll do whatever it takes to get to the top and so nobody could end up trusting him. Judy succeeding would turn out to be a success for him as well so that also made it difficult when you had to decide if you were rooting for them or not.

In comparison Dennis was a lot better. He actually had a good conscience which is why the guilt trip worked in the first place and after that he did his best to actually help Judy. He mostly stuck around to make sure Jack didn’t try any funny business either. Now this was a quality character. Sure, I can’t say that I was rooting for him in the romance angle since Judy kept saying that she had a boyfriend back home but at least he wasn’t trying to take advantage of her. He would shoot his shot and when it was an air ball then he would keep it moving. If both guys had been annoying that would have really been unfortunate for her.

So this is a good movie but I would say it’s not quite as funny as the last one. There isn’t a big payoff/climax like the other one either. This movie instead ends on a rather quiet note with a decent gag but one that isn’t laugh out loud funny either. I wasn’t a big fan of it personally but I will say that at least I’m glad that Judy didn’t go for a rebound or anything like that. Technically she was already with this guy off screen so it’s good that she kept it up. Falling for someone at Hollywood isn’t a good idea and any excuse would have still been unable to get away from the fact that it would have been a rebound. So we don’t want any of that!

At least we get to see Jack and Dennis fighting a lot which is always fun. I like how they aren’t even subtle about fighting over Judy right in front of her. Dennis might shove Jack down a hill so they’re alone and in another moment he invites her to a game right in front of the other guy. They aren’t holding back at all and it’s all super petty but it just works out really well as a result. That’s the kind of dynamic I have a lot of fun with.

Overall, It’s a Great Feeling is a fun movie but it almost feels like there isn’t a climax. The whole ting is building up to the two guys trying to get Judy noticed by the director so that she can become a big movie star. You’re expecting her to appear in a big movie by the end or something where the whole journey has its big moment. Then she can head home or something but instead it just keeps going until she sort of gives up and we get to the ending. It all feels bit sudden and not super fulfilling. The rest of the movie is fun enough to keep it going but it doesn’t stick the landing as well as you’d hope.

Overall 7/10

Romance on the High Seas Review

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It’s time for a movie about how the lack of trust in a relationship can really get you in trouble. After all, no relationship can exist without trust, it’s just not going to work because the endless cycle of suspicions and all will just keep you trapped. This movie is a fun comedic look at how things could play out and I’d say that it works well. The cast of characters is fairly small but you’ve got a lot of dynamics here.

The movie starts with Elvira having to cancel yet another trip because her husband Michael couldn’t make it again. At this point it’s enough of a running gag where the store even knows her. Elvira is disturbed when she sees that Michael has hired a young, flirty receptionist and decides to test his mettle. She’ll pretend to go on the cruise alone and will hire a stand-in (Georgia) to take her place and keep up the act. She’ll then watch her husband from the building next door to see if he cheats on her or makes any kind of mistake. She’s going to catch him and then…..well that would be sad for her but she’ll feel validated.

Meanwhile Michael is suspicious because at the last second he was able to cancel the work plans but when he offered to go on the cruise, Elvira said that it was too late and she had to go by herself. The whole thing was odd so he hires a detective (Peter) to go on the cruise in his place and spy on Elvira. See if she gets up to any trouble and then report back to him right away. If he catches her in the act then it’ll really wreck his day but he’ll know once and for all that his suspicions were correct. In both cases the main characters have to hope that they are wrong but just don’t have enough trust in each other to not have to attempt this in the first place.

It’s a fun plot that will definitely inspire a lot of shenanigans to be occurring on the ship. Georgia has never been on a cruise before and is typically not very well off so this is all a blast to her. She tries her best to live up to Elvira’s image but the rich lady left her so many instructions that it will be difficult to follow them all. At the end of the day Georgia is more of a free spirit and just wants to have a lot of fun. When she runs into Peter, the two of them hit it off but the tough part for her is that her cover is that of a married woman so she can’t really pursue this.

At first I would say that she doesn’t even realize that he likes her like that, it takes a bit for this to be settled. I thought Georgia was a fun heroine. She could have definitely done more to keep her cover though as resisting a romance for a little while on a cruise isn’t all that hard. She’s certainly earning enough money to just have fun by herself if you ask me. Still, Georgia means well and is one of the more entertaining characters here.

As for Peter, well the whole thing is actually a lot worse on his side. See, he actually thinks that Georgia is Elvira and yet he’s still making a play. At first it is just to test her which is dubious in itself but at least he’s not trying to go further than that. Once he actually does like her and start to make some moves then that’s really dicey since she is “married” as far as he knows. So the romance itself is one that I couldn’t root for in the slightest and it’s not a good look for him either.

The first rule of being this kind of detective is not to get involved with your client. No romances or anything like that because it’s just a conflict of interest. So he failed right out of the gate there. As a character he’s nice enough but he’s definitely not the best at his job. He’s very lucky that things tend to work out in his favor because he could have really been in a jam.

Then we have one really random character in Oscar who doesn’t add a ton to the dynamic. I’m convinced that he was just added to make things more chaotic. In which case….that’s a good idea! The character himself may not be great but the more misunderstandings the better for a film like this. The poor guy is madly in love with Georgia but you know that he is doomed right from the start. Almost every line is him feeling sorry for himself or directly confessing to Georgia but she writes it off as a joke. While it’s played for laughs, that has to be one of your worst fears when speaking out your true feelings.

The other person just laughing it up or joking with you has to be a downer. At least Oscar never lets it get him down though. Then for the main two, Elvira and Michael don’t get to do a whole lot here after the opening scenes. They’re okay but not nearly as interesting so it’s probably for the best that they were dumped to the side. Elvira certainly started this with her big scheme but Michael is also to blame for hiring that receptionist who was quite shady. That lady wasn’t exactly subtle with the flirting or in how rude she was to Elvira. That alone should have gotten her dismissed and if I was Elvira I would have insisted on it.

For the most part the humor in the film is on point which is what makes this a solid watch. The only gag that thought dragged on way too much was when Peter and Oscar get drunk at the bar. They keep on trying to drink their beers but another drunk steals it. This scene goes on for ages until it finally ends and was just stretched out too much. There are a few songs in here but fortunately they don’t take up too much time. I wouldn’t say any of the songs were great or anything but surprisingly Peter probably had the best one here. It was the most outrageous which ended up making it memorable and I got a decent chuckle out of that.

Overall, Romance on the High Seas is a good film. It doesn’t overstay its welcome and has a good amount of laughs for everyone. The characters are solid and the writing is good as well. The film has a whole lot of build up to everyone finally meeting each other and makes the most of it with the climax. I haven’t seen a climax that crazy in quite a long while and it really executes everything on point. If the climax had faltered then it would have certainly hurt the movie so I’m glad that everything worked out ideally. I’d recommend checking this one if you want to watch a comedy with some romance. The romance itself is weak but comedy is the main genre anyway so you’re all set there.

Overall 7/10

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre Review

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Now this is what I would call a very good western. We’ve got an interesting cast here with a main character who is very quickly turning crazy. Usually it’s a slow descent into madness but this guy is on a speed run and nobody’s gonna be stopping him. It shows how greed can really take you out if you don’t keep your guard up at all times. Also if you aim to be rich, be careful about making this a team sport.

The movie starts by introducing us to Fred and Bob who are really down on their luck. They’re basically penniless and just got scammed by someone. Just when it looks like they are doomed to be on the street for good, they run into a guy named Howard who says that he used to be great at gold digging and even got rich but he spent his fortune away. Fred and Bob figure they’ll take their chances with him and things go well…almost too well. Now that they are taking in all of the gold they don’t know when to stop. Can they stop?

Now this is one of those films where the conflict only happens because one of them is completely insane. If not then this would have been simple. You make enough money to last the rest of your life and go home. It’s easy and now you’re all set. Unfortunately Fred just wants more and more while also growing more paranoid. As the film goes on he basically becomes the villain here. It’s a little hard to just leave as well for most of the film because there’s always the chance you’ll get shot in the back. All 3 characters have a gun after all.

Now, I do think Bob should have just shot Fred after a point. Once he realizes that Fred is out to murder him, you have to move first. If he doesn’t want to cross the big line then he could just shoot out a leg and tip the authorities to come and find him later on. I think those would have been very safe options that would have really done the trick here without just being in harm’s way the whole time. In the end he was just a little too merciful which nearly got him several times.

Bob is a nice guy and he deals a fair hand to everyone. He likes money and gold as much as the next guy but he doesn’t let it control him or anything like that. It’s why it’s easy to root for him. Fred on the other hand is one of those guys who gets corrupted real easy. I like how he’s a total tough guy and tries to intimidate the others in every scene but it’s just too bad that he couldn’t keep this in check. Ultimately there is always someone tougher out there and so he just put himself on a path where there was absolutely no winning. Things get a little tricky for him.

Part of why the film succeeds though is because it is always tense with all of this happening without trying too far with it. A lesser film might have had Fred get tortured by the end or completely broken as commence for what he was doing but this one just stuck to the basics. I’d say Fred got his just desserts well enough without dragging things out. The movie doesn’t have any horses getting blown up or making the usual western mistakes. Instead it played things by the numbers and did well for itself.

The cast was also solid which helped a lot. Fred was a great villain and I liked Bob as a hero. Howard was a solid wild card as I can’t say that I trusted him at all as the film went on. He always seemed a little off and it was nice to have a crazy wild card like this guy. He always said the silent part out loud about how the main characters might want to double cross each other. He seemed to enjoy increasing the stakes and messing with them the whole time. He was playing with fire but the guy never seemed nervous. Howard really was an old pro.

Finally you had Cody who is not nearly as smart. The guy wanted to get rich as well and didn’t care how many times he was told off by the others, he just kept on coming and trying to shoot his shot. On one hand I do think it’s impressive just how determined the guy was but at the same time I just don’t think it was worth it. Is getting rich really worth putting yourself in the line of fire with 3 guys who all seem dangerous? Fred wasn’t exactly subtle with how he was threatening Cody after all so it’s not like this was a vague danger. It was a very specific risk that he would lose his life in this endeavor.

Additionally you also have a lot of bandits and other villains running around. It’s no exaggeration to say that there was danger around every corner. Not the safest place to be so it’s another reason why you want to grab your gold and run off. The local cops actually looked really good here by the end as well. It may not be possible to stop the bandits all of the time but once they have their sights on them, it’s only a matter of time. They run a tight ship in that town.

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by this film. It did very well for the genre and the writing was just really consistent the whole way through. If you’re looking for a tense film that also speaks to the risks of riches then this is the one for you. The characters really get to learn why getting rich can be a danger in itself. The ending also works well with the theme of the movie. It may not be the happiest ending out there but it gets the job done and you’ll feel satisfied with how the movie turned out.

Overall 7/10

Logan Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

Wolverine’s had a checkered history with his films. Most people didn’t care for the first one or even the second all that much. This was the one that finally made the books as a definitive title for the character. At least for most people because after seeing this one I can confirm that it is the weakest film in the X-Men franchise. Yes, weaker than X-Men origins. It’s a very depressing look at how the Marvel Universe could have turned out for the mutants and Wolverine never really got to have his happy ending.

The movie starts up in the future where Wolverine is even more of a drunk than usual and doesn’t have any qualms about using his claws on people now. He’s just sick of everything turning out so badly so he’s been saving up money for a while now. He’ll take Professor Xavier away and they’ll both basically die. Wolverine even got himself some adamantium bullets to finish the job. Before any of this can happen, a lady appears asking for his help. Wolverine definitely says no since his adventuring days are over but she is murdered and her daughter Laura ends up hitching a ride.

Professor Xavier insists on their helping her so Wolverine is stuck now. He’ll have to try and get her to her final destination which is supposed to be a safe haven from the mutant hunters. This won’t be easy though as something is up with Wolverine’s abilities and his healing regeneration has been greatly reduced. Meanwhile Xavier has a lot of seizures now and can barely use his abilities either. Time is not on their side so the race is on.

I definitely have a lot of issues with the film, mostly just around how depressing it all is so lets go with the positives first. The fight scenes are very solid. I think that characters with a strong regeneration ability should be used to fighting a little recklessly because any trade is actually in their favor. So they can be good with either landing hits on their own, or dealing out equal damage. It makes sense so I’m cool with that and Wolverine does get in some good combos once he gets going.

I do think he feels very nerfed but at least there is a story reason for it. Otherwise I would expect Wolverine to look much better in this film. Another positive is that Laura’s character was handled very well. She has grown up with a rather lousy life at this point and so she is doing her best to move on forward. She doesn’t dwell on the past all that much and only talks when necessary. She really just wants to complete her mission and get to safety to put this life of violence behind her. When she does fight Laura is calculated and ruthless in destroying her opponents.

She’s not some kind of super hero so she doesn’t have to worry about the mercy rule. Laura’s life has always been in a do or die scenario so if she doesn’t strike quickly then she knows that it could all be over. I thought she was definitely the highlight here and in general I always liked her character. It would be a lot of fun to see her more in some future movies.

Okay now lets talk about some of the iffy stuff. First we have to talk about Wolverine. I’m cool with a main character being reluctant to help and not wanting to get back into the hero game. So when he turns the lady down the first few times you can understand. There is no obvious threat at the moment and there are presumably others who can help. Once she asks him for help again by flagging his car (Wolverine runs an Uber type operation) and it’s obvious that she is in critical danger, he shouldn’t have left her again.

Bring her and Laura with him in the car. Abandoning her was just an awful look and I can see why Laura was so upset. Logan tries abandoning Laura several times as well later on in the film. He also puts Caliban in a rather bad spot by having him drive off with the villain. This version of Logan has absolutely 0 qualms about killing so just stab the guy a few more times to make sure that he doesn’t get up,. I’ll give him less grief about this though since he thought that the guy was dead.

Logan is just way too depressed here though to the point where he acts like a villain. It’s almost like Bruce Wayne nearly murdering Terry McGuiness back in the first episode of Batman Beyond by turning off the suit. There’s a line that you cross when you go too far into being a thorn in the way of justice. That’s just how Logan is here and it takes an extremely long time until he finally gets ready for action.

Then you throw in the fact that he’s a lot weaker here and it’s annoying to see him lose just about every fight that he’s in. Common thugs are beating him up left and right, never mind the X-24 clone who really lays him out. Even if Wolverine’s not a nice guy anymore, you hope to see him getting some wins but until his rage mode near the end he is getting thrown around a whole lot. It’s not cool and it definitely doesn’t help him as a character. I just didn’t like Logan here, his days of being the Wolverine were definitely long gone.

I can’t say that I liked how Xavier was portrayed either. The guy is half crazy and can’t even control his own abilities with the seizures now. I have a super hard time believing that this could happen to a telepath, particularly one of Xavier’s ability. The twist of how this affected the X-Men was also awful. It’s certainly a convenient way to make sure that nobody else shows up but it’s not satisfying at all. To think that this is how it would all end after so many battles and fights to achieve peace between humans and mutants.

This ending is certainly not what anyone would have hoped for. I’d have much preferred Xavier to go out in a blaze of glory or something like that. In the end, the world went from being fantastical to quite normal since the world seems like any everyday place now. At least Caliban seemed like a reasonable guy right from the start for the heroes. He was probably the only one who seemed like a nice guy with no drawbacks so of course things get really rough for him here.

As for the villains, Pierce is the main one and he’s okay I guess. There’s just not a lot to him and you could think of the guy as an average thug only he’s got some tech so he can fight a little bit. I think with a bit more screen time he could have been better as the charismatic kind of villain but the film was not able to pull that off. Dr. Zandar is your average twisted scientist villain who just likes to be as evil and cruel as possible so there’s not much to him either. Not a quality villain.

The only one who seemed solid was X-24. At first I actually thought he was Sabretooth who somehow managed to return to the main lines once more but the twist worked out rather well. I like the idea of this guy being as savage as Wolverine was in his prime so the dilemma is in how to take this guy out. He really is quite strong and made for an impressive threat. Whenever he was on screen you knew that things were going to get really tough for the heroes.

As you’d probably expect, this film gets very violent. You really have the claws in full force by both the heroes and villains with the usual human experimentation going on as well. It’s trying really hard to be the most violent of the X-Men films to live up to the Wolverine rep and it earns this but at the detriment of the film. You don’t need all of this excessive violence and it takes away from the action scenes. The movie definitely should have toned things down and it would have helped out.

At least the ending of the film is solid enough. I didn’t have any issues with it and it seemed like a classic way to end things. I absolutely would have preferred a happier ending with more room for big sequels and all that but it still wasn’t bad. It’s not a grim dark ending either, just more of a bitter sweet one so the heroes couldn’t win on all fronts and had to settle for a few.

At the end of the day, part of the problem with this film is that it’s going more for an apocalyptic future vibe rather than being a full blown comic book movie. You don’t have too many big battles with lots of super abilities and flashy CGI. Instead you usually have very dreary backgrounds with the characters fighting very ordinary humans aside from X-24. The fact that the humans do well is sad in itself. At least by the end you have them taking the Ls as the heroes finally get ready for combat.

Overall, Logan’s not a good movie. It really wrecks Logan’s character quite thoroughly and I would say that Xavier was really mishandled as well. Laura was a shining point in the movie at least. You’re better off watching Dark Phoenix as the true end point to the X-Men series as that one soared above expectations and did deliver with a lot of fun fights and cool plots going on. If Wolverine does get another film, I’d like them to just put him in a fun setting and let us see Wolverine the superhero as opposed to Logan, the jaded old timer.

Overall 4/10

PokeToon Review

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Pokemon has been getting a lot of little shows here and there. This is the latest one and it’s going for a more low key vibe as the anthology switches animation styles a lot. Some of the shorts are pretty solid while others are definitely weaker. In general I would say this one doesn’t hold up to the last few shows but you should still have some fun here. With only 8 episodes that are shorter than normal ones, it won’t take you long to blast through them all.

The first short is about Scraggy as he fights with Mikikyu in classic Looney Tunes/Mickey Mouse style. The animation is very much going for that kind of retro look and so there is a lot of battling going on. It’s very nostalgic to see this style and it’s nice enough but what I do miss about it is that there isn’t any dialogue or anything like that. So there’s barely a plot here. It works well enough since the short is….well short, but if this was full length then it would eventually drag on. This would be in the lower tier from the 8 episodes at 7th place overall.

Then next up we have an episode about Pancham and now this was a really solid one. I would put it as the 2nd best. Basically he wants to be a hero like his role model Arcanine but the problem is that the way evolution works, he can never be an Arcanine which shakes him up a bit. Still, he decides to train hard and become a respectable hero in his own right. One day there are a bunch of miners stuck behind a cave-in and it’s up to Pancham to save them.

It’s always nice seeing a Pokemon with a lot of personality and ambitions of his own. I liked Pancham right away and the story is very satisfying as he works to achieve his dream. The kid also wasn’t super annoying here although he could have let Pancham know about the situation a little sooner instead of just running around. At the end of the day Pancham is someone that you know you can count on to help save the day and take the right steps to saving the people.

Next up is a short that’s more about the human this time. Blossom wants to be a Pokemon trainer but her Mom denies the idea while her father is too nervous to do much of anything. She figures that she will just have to leave without permission and finds a nice Nidoran but unfortunately there is a misunderstanding and now his parents want to crush her. Blossom retreats to the village but with NidoKing and NidoQueen fast approaching, has she just doomed the village?

I liked the idea of the story more than the execution which is why this one has to settle for third place. I was thrilled when some Pokemon Trainers showed up right away because the idea of a village without trainers would be crazy. So that was cool and it also just made a lot of sense. The fact that they were losing is quite embarrassing but I can also get behind this especially with how the new Arceus game presents the world. If you live in a low level area then you might have weak Pokemon so when a tough wild one shows up then you’re sunk.

This does make Blossom’s dad look awful though. He just couldn’t care less and even when he hears the large explosions in the distance he doesn’t do anything. When Blossom shows up scared and desperate he coldly reminds her that his Charizard won’t listen to her. Throughout the adventure he just isn’t helpful at all even through to the climax as he lets his daughter take all of the risks. The special was trying to make him appear as the guy who appears to be rather helpless but is actually really tough. It just completely failed on that note.

The special itself is nice because of the action and Blossom is a good character but the Dad definitely makes it fall down a notch this time. I still like the idea of some Pokemon storming a village with trainers. I’d actually like to see something similar with Team Rocket someday. At this point all villages should have a bunch of trainers so that would make for a great premise to a short.

Now we can talk about the weakest special of the 8 which is about a Magikarp. This one is going for a very quiet kind of short like the first one. There is no dialogue here or anything like that. So it’s all about this one kid who plays by the lake and his music is really appealing to Magikarp. One day the kid leaves so the Pokemon has to try and find him. It’s one of those shorts that would be a lot more emotional with some dialogue and more of a full story. The abstract design of the short really doesn’t work nearly as well. It’s not all that interesting so it really couldn’t keep up with the others.

On the upper half of the 8 specials was one about Slugma at 4th place. This one is about a girl who always tries to be friends with Slugma when she stays at her grandma’s house, but the Pokemon is very shy and always hides. Still, Slugma is a nice Pokemon and does his best to make sure that she’s comfortable by always supplying a lot of heat to the house. There’s not a whole lot going on in this one but it’s a nice wholesome story. I also just like seeing all of the Pokemon just hanging around the house. They really would be a lot like having pets in the real world.

One of the longer specials was about a girl trying to survive past the Pokemon scare challenge. Basically there is a haunted spot in the school and so a bunch of guys decide to check it out. The main girl here gets spooked by a ghost and raises her hand by accident so she has to come along but then she is turned into a Gengar, one of the very Pokemon that used to frighten her. With the other kids stuck in the school, she will have to try keeping them safe from the other Pokemon and conquer her fears at the same time.

I put this one as a bit weaker than the others at 5th because while the idea is good, I don’t think the short did a whole lot with it. The kids aren’t very likable and I’m also not sure why they would all be super scared of ghost type Pokemon. I feel like if there were real ghosts here then that would make sense but in a world where Pokemon are so common place, I don’t see them being thought of as super scary or anything like that. The kids are very young so I can cut them a little slack, but only a little.

It was cool to see the girl turn into the Gengar since that’s like something out of Mystery Dungeon but the special just wasn’t all that exciting. The more emotional stories are definitely the ones that would tend to be a lot more high ranking and this one wasn’t going for those vibes. At least we got some cool effect with the whole dimension shifting.

Then there is the Snorunt episode which is one of the weaker ones at 6. Basically a few kids have a secret base which is a nice homage to the old Pokemon games. One day they come across a Snorunt that is outside but the problem is that they live in a very warm climate so it’s not good for the Pokemon. They have to decide if they should take him to the PokeCenter in which case their secret base could be exposed or just try to save him themselves. Fortunately they make the right call.

It’s a decent enough short but the animation wasn’t as good as some of the others ones and I wouldn’t say that the story was super explosive either. I also don’t think that this would necessarily expose their base’s location. I’m thinking that the rationale would be that they would have to say where they found the Snorunt but they could always hide the base for a day when the adults go to check on it and then blow it up again. Still, it was good that they made the right choice.

Finally we have the Jigglypuff short which I rank as the best out of the 8. This one is about a girl who befriends a Jigglypuff but for some reason she’s afraid to sing. What’s worse is that another girl has a Jigglypuff that loves to sing so they start blaming the Jigglypuff and even the main girl for this which leads to a lot of tear and emotional moments. This Jigglypuff may not be able to sing, but at the end of the day she still tries her best so as not to disappoint her Poke trainer.

There’s no danger or action here but it’s a pretty good story. I liked the animation and it had solid vibes here. On a technical level is probably had the highest budget and I could easily see a slice of life kind of show in this setting. It was a good way to end things and it’s easy to root for Jigglypuff. Always good to end on a high note and that’s exactly what PokeToon did.

At the end of the day, the anthology format is what really holds this one back a bit. We had some solid shorts here but also some very weak ones. Some would have good animation like the final short and others looked incredibly rough. In general this does not look as good as any of the earlier Pokemon shows and I wouldn’t say that it manages to beat any of them either. It’s still not a bad show though and it’s so short that it’s worth a watch. I would like the next series to be a little more focused though or if not, at least stay consistent in the animation instead of going for more experimental styles. Build a whole show off of the last special and that would really work well.


Overall, PokeToon is a solid online series. As a mini series it fills the bill of being entertaining and I’ll always take anything to extend a franchise even more. It ultimately won’t be making any waves or claiming any big victories but it’s a show that you can pick up and play at any time. You don’t have to try and remember a lot of characters or what’s going on. Just pop in a short episode and you’re all set.

Overall 6/10