Tag Archives: Future

The Creator Review

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It’s time for a film about the far future in which humanity may be on the brink of extinction. It’s a pretty classic look at a dark future and has some good ideas but chooses to focus on the wrong characters. There are a whole lot of interesting angles about this world where A.I. are leading the charge but instead we focus on the super A.I. who can change the world. It feels like most of the meat is left on the table here.

The film starts by explaining that the A.I. launched a giant nuclear attack that took down Los Angeles and now the planet is in a big war. The Western world led by America wants to destroy all A.I. while Asia has decided to take their side. Joshua was an undercover agent here who was tasked with finding out about the A.I. super counter weapon which could shut down the human one. If this mission is successful then humanity will win the war and otherwise we will lose. Joshua ended up falling in love with his contact Maya but handles the raid very sloppily so she runs off with the rest of the androids. Years later, Joshua is asked to go back into the field.

I do have to say that Joshua seems like a very sloppy secret agent from how he acts in the beginning. You don’t straight up yell “I’m undercover” into a walkie talkie while behind enemy lines. Did they not have any kind of secret codes and such at this point? Well the mission’s a bust and from then on Joshua doesn’t trust the government as closely which is a good thing. He ends up having to guide the A.I. kid Alphie from the humans who want to take him down. Alphie can shut down any electronic device which is naturally super dangerous at this point in time.

Joshua is a decent lead although I can’t say he’s all that likable. I can’t really get past the double agent stuff while he was married because at that point you need to choose your wife over the job. Additionally, he was working with the government for quite a while and didn’t mind the cruelty. To a certain point you are held responsible for their actions because you could have stepped away or joined the resistance. Joshua not doing that was a mistake.

As for the general war, the movie is super pro A.I. so it should be noted that there isn’t much of a debate. The film leaves little room for ambiguity as we find out the truth behind the nuke. Additionally every scene with the humans is them just murdering without a care, torturing, and doing whatever they want. Slaying the A.I. means they don’t have to worry about any moral boundaries. Meanwhile the A.I. keep promoting peace and trying to de-escalate.

I tend to be fairly pro A.I. myself as it seems like a great tool that will only continue to get better and better as it adapts. Still, you’ll be able to notice the film’s take on this extremely quick. I tend to root against the humans in these films anyway but this one certainly made it super easy. There is really no reason to root for the humans here because their world seems like it would be much worse than what the A.I. could create. After a point it’s not like the world could be much worse right?

The film does tend to be fairly violent at different points though. Get ready for quite a bit of bloodshed here as everyone gets mowed down. It can be a bit of a dreary experience with the endless fights while neither side makes much ground. You’re basically just reminded that this is a terrible future for all parties involved. Just being around is a dangerous game to be sure. The ending is sorta happy, I would say it’s a mixed bag. I think you could take it in almost more of a creepy way with the applause and the grin at the end. One thing’s for sure, I think things are going to get rougher for the West but at this point it seems deserved.

The special effects here are pretty good. The robot designs aren’t the most memorable but they are trying for pretty realistic looks. So these generally are just people who are missing ears or full on battle droids. The fights look good though. The soundtrack is definitely more subdued but there was one pretty solid track near the beginning while the characters were in the big ships getting ready to fight.

Ultimately the reason why it felt like this film was a missed opportunity is that I would have liked to have seen more of what life was like with the A.I.. We see that you can donate your likeness for them to use but what positive effects do they have in society? We see them working with the humans but with their advanced intellect I’m just expecting something a little more groundbreaking. Maybe teleportation or something. Instead they just feel more like normal people because they’re a bit underdeveloped.

It’s why I didn’t want the focus on Alphie. Alphie’s okay but she’s basically just a little kid. She may be an A.I. but still isn’t particularly smart or quick on the uptake. If you take the sci-fi plot away, a film would probably have her act in the same way. You could say that the film’s intent is to show how humans and A.I. are basically the same by this point in time. A.I. have evolved so much that they are now human and it’s a fine plot but it also means that we aren’t using the story to its fullest Generally speaking the Alphie plot wasn’t all that interesting and I wanted to get back to the main story. Except that Alphie was the main story so we were basically stuck.

Overall, I think the idea of a film talking about how the A.I. should be handled is a good idea. I can totally picture A.I. walking among us in robot bodies by 2065. They already have robotic bodies for many different uses and they are getting more and more human. That being said, the moral dilemma is the interesting part, not Joshua having to learn how to be a good dad and showing this kid the ropes. I wanted some solid ethical debates and maybe a bit of back and forth between the A.I. and the humans. That would have been a really good idea and so if you’re really into A.I. then this might not be a bad watch but honestly it just could and should have been a whole lot better.

Overall 5/10

No Guns Life

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In a world where people can manipulate robotic bodies with their minds, just about anything is possible. This includes having a gun for a head. It’s a pretty unique premise and I look forward to seeing how it plays out. The manga can certainly go in a whole lot of directions from here and isn’t afraid to really show how hopeless this dystopia is. I’ll have a review up for the series when I finish it.

Overall 6/10

The Wild Robot Review

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It’s time for a movie that is very much like Wall-E. It’s an emotional story about a robot trying to connect with an animal and along the way we even get some action scenes near the end. There’s a lot going on here and while the beginning does tend to be a little on the slow side, it picks up as the movie goes on. I would say that the movie had a good balance of good and bad things happening throughout while maintaining a positive tone. Ultimately I would recommend checking it out.

The movie starts with Roz landing in a forest area within Earth. As a proud robot belonging to a massive corporation, her mission to enrich the lives of those around her and fulfill their goals. The problem is that there was an accident and she was never supposed to land in a place like this where there are no humans. She tries to help out the animals initially but can’t understand them so she trains until he is able to do so. Roz then ends up assisting a little bird named Brightbill when hatching and so the bird thinks of her as his mother. A local fox named Fink initially appears as a tricky antagonist but quickly ends up helping her out. The two of them need to help Brightbill learn how to fly and survive on his own. This little bird was the runt of the litter and otherwise would have likely died without any help.

It’s a pretty heartwarming family story going on here with Roz and the gang. It’s got a good message the whole time with the characters all pitching in to help each other out and it has a very strong sense of community. The whole climax is about getting everyone to band together after all. Now this will never be perfect in a forest setting as the cycle of life and the food chain will force some tough realities into existing. That said, it’s still nice to at least see everyone band together against a common enemy.

I do want to underscore again that this is not an action movie. So don’t let me trick you into getting the tone wrong. This is a family movie first and foremost about the bonds of friendship. The climax at the end does give us some action but it’s not played super serious for the most part and these are hardly the strongest foes out there. The main villain A.I. is pretty impressive though. She is certainly persistent and has quite a few methods available to use in attacking the heroes. It really ended the film on a high note.

The literal ending of the film I was not a big fan of though. We got a heart warming moment but I thought Roz made the wrong call here. Hopefully a sequel would address this. Back to the characters though, Roz makes for a fun lead. She can be a little slow on the uptake initially, but then learns what it really means to look out for other people. It becomes less about the programming and more about her individually which was really nice. It was the kind of character development you like to see.

As for Fink, he brings a lot of the heart to the film. His quick wit is always a lot of fun and he brings up the film’s energy. Now it is fair to say that he does take some of the gags a little far. You get the feeling that he actually was serious about ending Brightbill for a little while in the beginning. Still, he turns over the leaf and becomes a force for good which is ultimately the important thing. The film would lose a lot if he wasn’t there because he just brings a lot of depth to it. You could argue that he definitely had the roughest upbringing among the characters.

Finally for Brightbill, well I wasn’t a big fan of his. I thought that the other two characters were considerably better. He’s earnest and means well but I didn’t like how easy it was to turn him against Roz. I felt like that plot development needed to have happened a lot sooner for it to be believable. For it to have happened so late in the game just makes him look absolutely terrible. Yeah, I was not really a fan of that at all. It was tough for him to recover, which may sound a bit harsh but I consider this to be a kind of betrayal which is never cool.

I’ll give the film props for also not making the bullying too overdone or anything. Brightbill got teased quite a bit for sure but it’s not like they were beating up on him the whole time. I guess the closest to that was when they started dunking him in the water and Roz quickly broke that up. The film just feels fairly realistic and you could substitute the animals for humans and quickly understand the message just as clearly. It is a well written film, I could stand by that 100%.

As for the animation, it looks decent. I wouldn’t say I was crazy about it but I don’t really have any big complaints. It’s not going to touch the hand drawn animation for the last 30-40 years but it can hold its own with the average CG production. I would just say it’s a film that will be relying more on the writing and story than any technical elements. There isn’t much of a soundtrack either with the exception of a song or two in there. Nothing in particular to really write home about though.

As a final note, the film also did good with the supporting characters. I liked Brightbill’s mentor who taught him how to really fly with a high level of skill. I also liked the elder who did his best to try and help Brightbill fit in. There were a real number of characters all doing their best here and the film did a good job of establishing their characters. There would probably be quite a few new characters if they ever did a sequel to this one but I’m confident that they would work out well enough.

Overall, The Wild Robot is a good movie from start to finish. Yes, it can be a little understated and I will admit that I tend to miss the humans a bit from time to time. The first half was a bit slow as Roz is getting used to things and the fox could have used one more character to help him with all the snappy quips and such but at the end of the day the positives outweigh these. You will be entertained and I would recommend checking it out if you are looking for a fun family film. It’s definitely quality content and the movie goes by quickly. The climax is also fun since you may not be expecting things to get quite as explosive as it did. Ultimately that makes for a fun film and I’d definitely check out a sequel.

Overall 6/10

Snowpiercer 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

Snowpiercer is a film that started out rather solid but got weaker as the film went on. It just wasn’t really able to handle the amount of pressure on its shoulders. The film started to go more into shock value and the whole ending starts to get annoyed. I’ll give the film props for the surprise ending since I didn’t expect it to go so dark with the bear but it works pretty well. Sometimes humanity just isn’t ready for the comeback.

The film introduces us to a world that has entered a new ice age. Humanity has been wiped out with the exception of all the people aboard one long train. This train never stops and continues to circle the planet constantly. The train cars divide the rich from the poor so the rich get an amazing life with everything that they could ever want while the poor struggle to just barely survive. They only get the scraps at best and so Curtis has been waiting a while to launch a full scale rebellion. It’s a risky plan because no rebellion has ever succeeded before. Still, he can’t just continue to live life the way he has been because there is no future to it. So he gathers everyone up and preparers to move forward. Time to see if they can pull this off.

The deck is stacked against the heroes in a lot of ways of course. They have the sheer numbers advantage by a great deal which is their only advantage. The enemies have better equipment and homefield advantage though. Curtis and the others have to learn as they go while the villains have cameras and already know the layout. So that makes things tricky and it turns out that the villains also have some of the best fighters on the ship. As the film goes on we also see just how different life on the rich side is.

The whole film really focuses on the parallels here as the poor don’t have enough food to even survive but the rich are rather wasteful. The poor are unlikely to see any fresh water while the rich have whole pools to have fun with. In general this is the poor vs the rich in a very literal way and it’s fun to watch the main characters try to get to the end of the train. So you may be thinking, what’s the problem?

Well so first up we have the backstory for Curtis that shows up later on. The film wants to show us to a really intense degree how much the main characters had to go through. This involves murder and cannibalism and it felt like a very unnecessary addition to the film. We didn’t need these extra details because their lives sucked enough as it is. Adding these details is just to make the whole movie very grim dark.

Then by the end of the film we find out what happens to the kids. Yeah here we go, the whole film you know it’s going to be something rather sinister and of course that is the case. It’s another messed up subplot and the whole thing is so traumatic that the kid gets brainwashed into this rather quickly. There wasn’t exactly anyone to help the kids out after all. Other characters get limbs chopped off, murdered, etc. The body count in the film is rather high and it’s not afraid to get rather violent at times. The movie is rather brutal and the message is basically that you can’t beat the system. At most you can try for mutually assured destruction which isn’t all that satisfying.

We see that what the main characters are forced to eat is rather gross but that’s the film’s style so you aren’t all that surprised. Basically what it boils down to is that the film overplays its hand tremendously. After a point you get it, it sucks to be poor in this setup. Every revelation after that is just to make the whole situation more and more messed up. The heroes also tend to lower their guard a whole lot during the battles which results in their getting shot. The stakes are a their absolute highest here so you really just have to keep on shooting and fighting back.

One of the most intense fights is definitely when the heroes broke into a gang car and had to start fighting each other. That was definitely real crazy and I have to say I don’t know how they survived for long once the room went dark. It felt like they should all have been immediately slaughtered at that point. It’s good that they weren’t of course but when you can’t even see the opponents that is hard to get around.

As for the villains, well they’re basically ultra evil so there isn’t much to say about them. The main villain is rather psychotic and the fact that Curtis listens to his whole speech for so long and freezes up by the end was crazy. This is the guy at the top, you have to take him down immediately. The whole climax was a bit surreal with the villain not reading the room and Curtis not really doing anything. It is easy to see how this setup worked for so long though since they have so much power. In a way the whole film shouldn’t have been as long as it was.

The only real excuse would be that the villains wanted to have some fun because they were super bored. That could work but otherwise they could have ended this at any point. I haven’t seen a situation so rigged in a while. The film definitely works best when everything was a mystery. I do think the train setting worked well and it’s a very interesting film. Ultimately it just got way too mean spirited by the end and you also start to wonder what the whole point of it all was. I don’t think that the second half really stuck the landing the way that it could have.

Overall, Snowpiercer is definitely a film that’s not for the faint of heart. You’re going to see just how intense an uprising can be and how a lot of casualties really start forming in order for the main characters to even stand a chance. A prequel could be interesting to see more about how the setup was first implemented and the original rebellions. We do know that things won’t end well which takes out some of the fun but I am curious how this started. Of course once the villains have been winning for hundreds of years it is easy to see how they have all of the power but how was this accumulated in the first place? That’s what I would really like to know.

Overall 3/10

Noein: To Your Other Self Review

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It’s time for a sci-fi title dealing with the multiverse so you know that a lot is going on here. It balances out the mystery pretty well. It actually handles the cast well since initially you might be worried that the kids will end up being annoying but there is always some kind of big event happening in each episode. So the plot moves and the main heroine barely even feels like a kid next to the others. She always saw the big picture from the start and this ends up being a pretty interesting watch.

The series starts off by introducing us to Haruka who at first glance is just your average girl trying to live her best life. Her best friend Yu has been having a tough time at home lately with his very strict mother and so he’s decided to run away. Haruka tries to lift his spirits and says she will run away with him but you get the feeling she’s also hoping to talk him out of it. They had made a promise a long time ago that if they ever ran away it would be together though. Then a portal opens up and a mysterious being in a black cloak appears. His name is Karasu and he wants Haruka to come with him.

There’s a lot of mystery in the beginning and unraveling the mysteries is part of the fun so I’ll keep this fairly vague. To just add a little more context though, the show deals with the idea of a multiverse. This planet and Haruka’s life is just one reality out of many. The characters also have to wonder if anything is truly real. Is something real because you can observe and feel it? It’s possible that life itself is an illusion and so they aren’t sure if anything really matter. For now most of the characters have to assume that this is real though and so Haruka is an important figure in the middle of all of this. Different characters need her in order to stabilize their timelines and make it the real one. Haruka doesn’t want to go anywhere but she also doesn’t want to hurt anyone and so it’s a tough balancing act.

The show goes into some of those philosophical discussions that don’t really have an end point because they become circular very quickly. For example the conversation about if anything is real. It’s interesting in the abstract but you can’t prove a negative so after a point what can you really say about it? For example lets say none of us are real and we’re all the figment of someone’s imagination. Well in that case…it shouldn’t affect how you live because everything will be over when you imagine that you’ve died anyway right? Even if there are infinite other versions of you, you can’t do anything about that so you just have to live your life as you always have. Just something that’s always good to keep in mind.

The show goes with the theory of tons of possible futures depending on the present which is definitely the way I prefer it. Even if your future is mapped out, nobody can possibly know how it will play out. If they did, then the future would automatically change with that new knowledge. Lets say someone predicted that too, well it’s a never ending chase sort of like the chicken and the egg. Just like I go with the chicken in that scenario there, I’d say that there is a future that will happen out of the infinite amount but it doesn’t become real until it hits the present which is why destiny is a fairly pointless concept.

The characters try to confuse Haruka with all of these concepts but of course you have to remember that they all have a stake in this so they aren’t the best possible sources. One of the most interesting concepts though was in how Haruka is sort of like a way point. For example, lets say there are 3 different future events, one where a bullet hits her friend, one where it misses her friend, and one where the bullet is never fired. The version that Haruka sees will become the “real” one as it then becomes a solidified point in time. She seems to have the power to choose which path will become the real one and the others will fade away like they never happened.

It’s a pretty cool power but also a high stakes one since it’s hard to know what she will see in advance. She can try to actively forget something and imagine something else but that seems tough. There’s one instance in the show where she is told not to look at someone who is dead because as long as she hasn’t seen it herself, it’s possible that the event can be overwritten with one where he is alive. It’s a very interesting way to weaponize the ability. I do enjoy theory crafting like this which is one of the show’s strengths. See this is how you handle hypotheticals, Godzilla Singular Point could learn some valuable lessons from this.

Back to the characters though, Haruka is a great lead. She doesn’t panic the way that most of the other characters do and in that way she keeps everyone on track. She tends to internalize all of her problems which obviously isn’t healthy but it shows how selfless she is. I think the heroes would be completely lose without her even if Haruka didn’t have any abilities. Haruka just gives them all a lot of inner peace. Also I really enjoyed her unique design. Her eyes are sort of like a cat’s eyes or some kind of half moon. It’s hard to describe but made for a very memorable design.

She’s the only one with this attribute which makes her stand out even more. It’s why for a while there I was expecting some kind of a twist where she’s a demon or supernatural entity or something. That’s not exactly the direction the show goes in though but it had me guessing. Then you have the main guy in Yu who starts off rather bratty the whole time. He whines a whole lot and has trouble saying what he means so he often ends up being rather rude to Haruka.

It’s lucky that she’s so mature and patient with him all of the time because I probably would have just ditched him after a while. Yu wants to be the one to protect Haruka because he likes her but tends to get shown up at every turn by Karasu. It’s just hard for this to not be the inevitable outcome as it is because Karasu is older, more powerful, and has actual powers. How do you possibly compete with that? By the end of the series Yu finally starts to realize that protecting Haruka is the important part and that it doesn’t have to be him. It’s a character arc that feels like an eternity to materialize but better than never.

I do respect the effort he puts in though and he ends up being an entertaining character. Probably not a friend you would want to have in real life, but as a character he’s not bad. He did try to defend Haruka from otherworldly fighters with a small switch blade so he gets points for courage. That’s something the other kids lack and why they are very weak characters.

You have Miho who is really interested in the supernatural but feels very annoying the whole time. In a lot of ways she is the most immature and despite being in a situation with actual crazy stuff going on, she doesn’t seem to take it all very seriously. I think she is trying her best but she’s just too young to get what’s going on. I was always ready for her scenes to end. Then you have Isami whose role never got as big as I would have expected. He’s better than Miho but I still didn’t care for him. He just doesn’t really contribute and his main memorable trait is that he has a crush on the teacher. Not exactly the thing you want to be remembered for.

The same goes for Ai who is another one of the friends hanging out but doesn’t do much. She likes Isami but can’t bring herself to tell him. There just isn’t much time for the romance among the side characters in this show so nothing much happens with that. Another character without much to do is Haruka’s mother Asuka. She gets drunk a lot but that’s really it. She isn’t able to help in any of the battles and is often completely oblivious of what’s going on. That may not be entirely her fault but it just doesn’t do her any favors as a character.

She ends up dragging down Yu’s mother Miyuki with her as well. I enjoyed Miyuki as an antagonist who was really pressuring Yu the whole time but as a hero she’s just not as interesting. The character arc went rather fast as well. Then you have Takuya who was Haruka’s father but he doesn’t do much either. You’d expect a lot out of him since he’s involved with the government group looking into the multiverse but mainly he just tries to plead his case without doing much about anything. The guy just feels very weak the whole time. I think he also could have explained things better to Asuka to get her to actually help out a bit.

Ryoko and Kyoji are the two main researchers trying to find out about the multiverse. I should say that’s Ryoko’s job. Kyoji is mainly just tagging along and helping her out but he doesn’t tend to understand any of this. In fact I would say he’s just here to give the story a way to throw some exposition at us. He always asks Ryoko to explain things so she talks more about the multiverse, the current theories on it, etc. They’re both good characters though. I liked that Ryoko actually understood what was going on and Kyoji’s just a nice guy. He seems like a really loyal ally to have who will risk his life even when he’s outmatched.

Seeing him take out a gun and try to seriously threaten the future beings who have laser blasts and super speed was also pretty funny. You can’t say that the guy didn’t at least try his best to help out at least. Now we get to the future beings. First up is Tobi who isn’t really much of a fighter but she helps out a lot on the tech side. She was easily the most reasonable member of the group who would always try to talk things out. It’s a shame that she couldn’t fight more though.

Does being a strategic genius always have to mean that you can’t fight? She ended up being one of the most likable characters in the group though so I suppose it all worked out well enough. Then you have Atori who was easily the most insane member of the group but practically got lobotomized which affects his personality for the rest of the show. He was extremely annoying as a hero so I kept waiting for him to turn evil again. The guy’s power is the real deal and he gave us one of the best early fights in the series. Atori absolutely enhances the show so he performed well in the role and he even does do some things in the climax.

Makoto barely has a reason to be in the story to be honest. Half of the time you even forget about the whole government angle here but I suppose in some ways this whole situation wouldn’t be happening without this. So fine the guy is necessary but he’s basically your average corporate villain. The guy doesn’t care about the future and can’t really fight but he has a gun and isn’t afraid to use it. I was shocked at how many shots he got off before the heroes ever did anything about it. There can be something amusing about this kind of cheesy villain but he really gets overshadowed.

Kosagi tends to be a very annoying character. She’s way too emotional and can never act logically. Unlike the other heroes and villains in the series, she never had any kind of grand master plan. I would say she doesn’t really end on a high note either and the final nail in the coffin is that she isn’t even very powerful. So mix all of that together and she’s not all that solid. The same is true for Kuina. Another really emotional guy who doesn’t take anything well and as a result makes all of the wrong decisions. I can respect a good villain who is fighting for someone who is even just evil to be evil but when you’re a villain for petty reasons then there is absolutely no hope for you.

Karasu naturally has a rather huge role in the story. He shows up early and remains a central figure in the whole adventure. He is easily the best fighter and is super durable. The guy goes through a lot to protect Noein and often goes against the council. I appreciated his loyalty and the guy just has a very cool demeanor to him. He reminds me a lot of Archer from Fate. Karasu could certainly stand to talk to the characters more and actually explain what’s going on but without him they would have certainly been doomed. You definitely can’t underestimate just how crucial he was. I also tended to enjoy any scene of him bashing Yu and rubbing in his face the difference in their abilities.

Now we can talk about Noein, the best villain in the show. This guy always had such confidence when he would appear and I really liked his design as well. When he came out with the Ray-Man spin move to knock out the characters that was brilliant. On the whole he’s more of a strategist than a fighter though. Sure, Noein can fight but he tends to break his opponents down mentally instead. He was easily my favorite character in the show. Yes, he does get just a little bit whiny at the very end of the series so he doesn’t stick the landing but for every other episode he looked great. This guy always delivers with the mystery and does a lot to help support the show’s creepy atmosphere. It would really not be the same without him. You get the feeling he probably could have ended the series rather early if he didn’t take so long to make his move.

While all of the theory crafting and concepts are a blast to engage with, I would say the show probably has less replay value than other titles as a result. This is a bit of a slow burn where you often do have a major development in each episode but they tend to be twists of sorts. So if you rewatch the show I imagine it will feel rather slow paced without a whole lot of plot progression at times. It’s similar to a mystery where it often won’t hit the same way the second time although there are some exceptions to that.

When the fight scenes occur they do tend to be a lot of fun though. I like the very exaggerated animation techniques they use for the clashes. Characters really go off model and stretch to oblivion while firing off their energy blasts. The movement is fast and the animation is pretty good there in general. I think it sort of helps to masque that this doesn’t feel like a very high budget show. It works well with the creepy atmosphere of the title in general though.

Then you have the soundtrack which actually is pretty great. There are a lot of solid battle themes and general enemy tunes here. It gives the show a very grand feeling to it and you will be remembering the tunes very well by the end. It’s not the largest OST but when your tracks are really solid then that’s all that really matters. Quality over quantity as they say.

Overall, Noein is one of those shows I had never heard of before but it definitely ended up being pretty good. The crazy plot really worked out nicely and made it so I didn’t even have to worry about the annoying kids. Haruka and Yu were really good of course but I never really got on board with the other 3 kids who just felt out of their league the whole time. If anything I think the show could have probably kept on going a little while longer with some of the plots but the abrupt ending is likely intentional. It’s not exactly the end of everything but it’s the end of what we’ll see. So if you see this show around you should definitely check it out. It has that kind of retro aesthetic that you just don’t see anymore.

Overall 7/10

Upgrade Review

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

When you think of getting an upgrade you’re probably thinking of going from cheese fries to loaded at Checkers or maybe trading in your PS2 for a PS5. Well, here we take a more violent approach to the upgrade. The film tries a little too hard with making this as edgy as possible so while it’s a pretty good premise, it’s definitely not a film that will have you singing its praises by the end. Not every film can hit the winning home run though.

The movie starts with Grey finishing a car he had been fixing and Asha returning home from work. He wants her to see the eccentric house of the guy whose car he had fixed. It’s definitely an interesting one but on the way home her electronic car malfunctions and both of them crash. Asha ends up being murdered by a group of bandits while they sever Grey’s ability to move his arms or legs. Fortunately, the guy whose car Grey fixed allows Grey to try a piece of experimental new tech. This allows him full control of his arms and legs again except that it is through the program STEM which even talks to him now. Is Grey really in control or is STEM pulling the strings? Grey doesn’t have time to think about it though because while the cops have been unable to find the guys who murdered his wife, STEM has some ideas.

The film clearly takes place in the future with all of the crazy gadgets that are everywhere. You have automatic cars that are incredibly advanced and even the buildings look high-end. Technology is moving pretty fast and Grey resents that a bit because all of the practical hands on kind of tasks have been removed. A.I. control everything now so there is really no escape. However, as Grey notes, criminals still get away with everything so it’s like the extra surveillance doesn’t even matter.

Of course the main plot of the film is about Grey trying to find the murderers and then take them down. Grey isn’t much of a fighter but that’s why STEM is here. STEM is able to temporarily take control of Grey’s body and then allow him to fight at full power. Basically Grey can go on auto pilot mode and let STEM do everything. It’s pretty handy but of course then Grey is actively surrendering his body to something else so is the price too high for this success? That’s the kind of question he has to ask himself.

STEM makes for a pretty interesting A.I. He sounds a whole lot like Hal 9000 so I think from the start everyone is meant to be wary of him. He can certainly fight well though I’ll give him that. He has absolutely no mercy for anyone who is in his way. STEM is the kind of character who figures that straight up murdering the opponents is most efficient so that’s never particularly surprising. These kind of A.I. villains are always interesting so I was on board with this.

As for Grey, he’s not quite as likable a main character. I can see why he wants to avenge his wife so going on the quest to stop these guys is a good start. He does have a habit of throwing up a whole lot though. The film has several scenes of this which is always pretty gross. While STEM does all of the hard work, Grey effectively signs off on most of it by not telling him to stop. Even when he does tell STEM to back off, it’s usually once it’s too late to do much of anything either. So he’s either all in and willing to help STEM murder the opponents or he’s not but the character can be a bit wishy washy about the whole thing.

The character cast is fairly small here as you’ve got the scientist, Grey, STEM, and the murderers. That’s pretty much it. For supporting characters you do have Grey’s mother though and the police agent Cortez. Cortez means well but she is definitely messing with forces that are a little too powerful for her at the moment. Grey is effectively a super soldier with STEM active after all and she would have died instantly upon entering if Grey wasn’t fighting back. Her options are rather limited though since how do you even know if you should take a guy down when he is being controlled?

Where Upgrade falters though is in how unrelentlessly violent the film is. We get a rather long scene of STEM torturing someone to death and all of the fights are pretty brutal as he snaps limbs and destroys everyone he comes across. Get ready for a lot of headshots and other such moments. Even the vomiting all over the place is probably another way to be rather gritty as Grey represents the audience reacting to this level of violence. The fight scene between Grey and another one of the upgraded humans was definitely good though. At least that had a lot of good choreography the whole time and made for a good back and forth battle.

It was like a comic book fight which is good. Whenever you leave that part though and get back to the murders then the film dials it up once again. That aspect definitely should have been toned down. As for the ending, I can see that one being rather mixed. It’s definitely a pretty bold way to end though and could lead the way for some sequels. After the initial shock value is over though, you may have some questions on exactly how this plays out. I think all of the questions can be answered though as you just realize that everything was a lie. With that knowledge in place, then everything does even out. After all, it just comes down to acting.

Overall, Upgrade has a pretty interesting plot. It’s a classic revenge story with Grey being willing to loosen his morals a great deal in order to secure a decisive victory. That being said, the film goes too far into edgy territory. This film could have absolutely been executed well without going so far over the top. In particular I’m never on board with the main character torturing someone to get what he wants. Grey allowing that to happen at all was definitely a shame. The film has its share of funny scenes as well although for the most part it is quite serious. If you want a film with a better blend of the two genres…then go watch Venom. You can see similarities between the two of them but Venom just handled all of this better.

Overall 3/10

Digimon Adventure Tri: Future Review

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We’ve finally made it to the final installment in the Digimon Tri series! There were quite a lot of plot threads still dangling so does this one manage to finish them off? Well, it does end the main plot, but for the most part we still don’t know a whole lot about what was going on in the back end. Perhaps it’s intentional as the Digidestined are also left in the dark for the most part. So, I wouldn’t clal this a rushed ending, but I wouldn’t say it is a super satisfactory one either. It’s ultimately a fun sequel package that will have a good amount of replay value, but I do think the next follow up will likely be far better so long as it goes back to its roots. The film does end with a nice potential cliffhanger. Whichever option it chooses should work out pretty well.

So last time Tai seemingly died when the cliff caved in due to an unnatural earthquake caused by the Digi souls and the rulers. Matt is now the temporary leader and the group decides to head back to the human world once again. They’ve basically been playing ping pong across the two worlds if you think about it. Unfortunately Meicoomon has digivolved once again and is now a cosmic being that seemingly can’t be stopped. The heroes are ready to accept their end, but if they’re going to die anyway they’ll go down fighting. Even if there is a chance for victory it may have to come at the expense of Meicoomon. Is there a way to save her or will they have to sacrifice the one for the many?

One unfortunate part about having Meicoomon be so powerful here is that fact that we can’t get any real fight scenes as a result. Meicoomon’s final form is too large to really take shots at the opponents and at the same time it’s so durable that it doesn’t need to dodge opponent strikes. This leads to a bit of a stalemate where the heroes can talk to it, but don’t do much else. There isn’t really any kind of big fight here so much as we just get a quick strike. It’s too bad since the films usually had such good fights when they did show up. I suppose as the finale the thought battles were the most important part here. So lets talk about those.

Throughout the series one of the subtle debates has been if the heroes should destroy their Digimon partners if they were to ever turn evil. Their bonds of friendship are strong, but apparently not absolute. Well, Meiko has been asking the team to destroy Meicoomon if necessary but they were confident that it wouldn’t come down to that. Well, in this film quite a few of the characters decide to go ahead and do this even while Kairi objects. Kairi’s objection is rather half hearted though as she says she’ll never forgive them, but then follows that up by saying that she won’t try to stop them or anything like that. If you really think it’s wrong then you should do something. Either way it’s not really a good look for the heroes. There wasn’t much of a choice by the end of course and mainly I would blame Meiko for not trying to stop them. For the other heroes they’re basically acknowledging that their bonds to each other are more important than Meiko. Everyone’s got to make a choice and they made theirs. Meicoomon also seemed pretty corrupt from the start so maybe he was all gone but it does feel like the villains got a bit of the last laugh here as a result.

Think about it, by the end the villains managed to murder a bunch of people, they’ve convinced the humans that all Digimon are evil, and then they convinced the heroes to destroy one of their own. Now when the factions ever decide to return, whether it be Homeostasis, The Digi King, or Gennai, they’ll have quite a lot of confidence here. Gennai also gets away with way too much here. He shows up to taunt the heroes quite often and they usually just stand in watch. Case in point, Gennai shows up in this film to reveal that he let Tai and the professor live just so they can choose which one of them gets to escape. None of them even try to attack Gennai as they just get resigned to their fate. The Digidestined seem to have lost most of their fire by the end and if that was part of the villains’ plan then they really did succeed.

With Tri over and the benefit of hindsight, I think the problem here may have been that Tri attempted too many things. The writers clearly had a bunch of ideas they wanted to throw around, but there’s just not enough time for all of them. This would have worked better if it was a full TV show. I also think some parts of the plot are swept to the side, but don’t make sense if you think about them. Think of all the kids who were kidnapped/vanished thanks to the villains? We’re talking dozens to maybe even 100+ and nobody found out? The government was covering for the villains because they’re naturally evil as well, but surely the parents would have said something. The original main characters know the 02 cast as well so it’s even more suspicious that they weren’t able to find anything out. Maybe the government got the parents as well (Can’t recall if they had a cameo) but the more people you kidnap the harder it is to hide that. The 02 cast also never actually get to appear so that’s a shame for their fans.

The animation looks nice as expected. We get some fun visuals with Omnimon’s form at the end. It’s definitely a powerful moment and for most of the film the world is covered in darkness so the colors do tend to pop out. Unfortunately for the soundtrack my favorite theme didn’t show up this time. In general the soundtrack is pretty subdued but it works well enough for the scenes it is present in.

Overall, Digimon Adventure Tri certainly won’t go down as one of my favorite parts of the franchise, it’s probably one of the weakest honestly. Still, it was an interesting experiment into what Digimon could be like if it was trying to be more Slice of Life/Cerebral instead of being more of a classic Shonen. (Honestly it probably holds up even better if you don’t think of it as a Digimon film. Think of it as standalone with no preconceived notions of what kind of fights and action should be in and you’ve got a good plot based anime film) It is a title that’ll make you think and force you to choose sides since there are usually quite a few options to choose from. Typically all you need to know is that Matt is right and Tai is wrong. I still think the first Tri film did a great job in setting up a mysterious premise and re-introducing the characters. Ultimately the follow ups just couldn’t completely cash in on this. The films fortunately do stay away from a romance angle that the various installments were hinting at. Even by the end it’s still lightly hinted at, but at the end of the day there’s a good chance we won’t see Meiko again so there’s nothing to worry about there. This is a good film to check out regardless of whether you’ve seen the other Tri titles or not, but you’ll likely be more than a little confused if you just skip to this one. I’d recommend watching them all in order.

Overall 7/10

Total Recall Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such. A review of the unedited version would likely be far harsher.

It’s time for an old action film. I mean, it’s not that old compared to some of the films that I’ve seen, but 1990 is definitely not in the current decade anymore. It’s definitely an exciting flick where the thrills never stop…but it’s not a good movie. Think of it like a classic horror film or an engaging zombie thriller where you’re entertained and invested while watching it, but afterwards you still admit it was a bad movie. This film makes far too many mistakes for it to get anywhere near a positive score, but at the very least you won’t be bored.

Doug is your classic film protagonist. He wants to leave his construction job and head to Mars. Unfortunately, there is a bit of a civil war going on there with terrorists constantly launching attacks and destroying civilians. As such, Doug’s wife rejects his request. Doug decides to do the next best thing, pretend to go to Mars. He had to a memory altering place so they can implant the fake memories. Unfortunately, the procedure doesn’t work as planned when Doug’s memories of the past come to the surface. Now everyone wants to murder Doug while he finds a recording of himself saying that he is a hero. Doug has to go to Mars for real this time and save the planet. Does Doug have what it takes to accomplish this mission?

While the film is action packed as I mentioned, it does have a very boring intro. The first 10-15 minutes feel like something out of a romance film as the characters exchange very poorly written dialogue with each other and everyone in the audience cringes. We finally move past this brutal intro and the film really starts once Doug has the procedure. You have to question what kind of guy Doug is even before it though. The memory altercation is essentially a way for him to cheat on his wife without actually doing it as he goes on a spy mission and has to do a lot of edgy things. Why do they have to make the leads so morally dubious? Couldn’t Doug have chosen the happy pizza salesman option or something instead of the double agent? It’s hard to be too sympathetic to Doug from the start.

Anyway, the fast paced nature of the film is pretty good from here on out. We get the classic chase scenes where Doug is chased by the villain organization. Fortunately for Doug, he knows how to use a gun and can handle himself pretty well. He makes use of an illusion device to get the drop on the villains and Doug is effectively a one man wrecking crew. He destroys dozens of guys on his own. He also doesn’t tend to backup from any threats as he fears no one.

I thought the soundtrack was fairly good. Not downright amazing or anything, but I recall enjoying it during the film. It wouldn’t do to have low budget themes during a big action scene right? The effects also hold up decently well for the overall landscape and gun design. There’s not much room for it to actually shine since by and large the place looks pretty realistic even though it’s the future.

Time to start looking at the negatives now. First of all, the film is incredibly violent. It tries to be grotesque whenever possible and playing the maximum grit card. Characters get burned so hard their eyes start popping out. Others have limbs getting severed or are blasted full of holes. The characters who survive get deep cuts into their skin which the film tries to show as much as possible. There’s rarely any happy scene aside from the main character as everyone has to suffer from being trapped without air or burned. There are no alternatives. If you try to help the main character, you’re probably doomed.

There’s also animal violence to look out for. Poor rats are shot for absolutely no reason and then a bunch of Goldfish meet a similarly fatal fate. There’s no reason to get the animals involved and that’s just poor writing. Speaking of poor writing though, the script is absolutely terrible and would fit in with the average horror movie. The amount of language in this film is crazy. Fortunately the TV airing I saw managed to air them all out, but with how often they had to do this you get a pretty good feeling on how much language was there. It’s a crutch that lesser writers use to make everyone sound edgy and realistic. In actuality, it just makes the film look amateur-esque compared to the big hitters. I’d expect nothing less though.

It also feels like the stories that take place in the future always focus on the wrong aspects. Instead of looking at how we’ve changed the world with science and how our weapons are better, it focuses on how society is more deprived now. We have very sketchy bars that have survived and they’re always about messing around instead of ordering a good burger. This film isn’t the only one guilty of it, but it doesn’t help to mitigate the damage either. These scenes are pretty bad and the romance in the film is laughable at best. The only thing the film was particularly good at was the action scenes and even those were wrecked by the gratuitous violence. The film should have quit while it was ahead, but then it would only be about 30 seconds long since it opened on a bad note.

The head honcho of the villains was fairly decent in his role. He just wanted to make a lot of money and keep up his success. Naturally he’s evil and all, but at least his reasoning for why he was evil was more original than some other villains. His main lackey wasn’t the greatest though and always got humiliated whenever he’d appear. Technically he is a competent fighter..it’s just that Doug is better. I didn’t like the leader of the rebellion, but his design was also pretty terrible once again just to mess with the film. The main heroine was all right I suppose but she didn’t have a lot of time to do much. At least she did well against Doug’s fake wife.

Overall, the reasons above are why the film’s just no good. It ultimately crosses the line from epic to edgy and it does this with no remorse. I certainly wouldn’t recommend this film to anyone and you’d be better off watching Jingle All The Way to see Arnold get into some good fights without worrying about the negatives. I don’t have a whole lot of hope for the remake either but surely it should be a little better than this one…..right? If not, maybe the film needs to try and focus on the whole concept of Total Recall a little more instead of everything else. Being given fake memories could be pretty cool, but that part never really happens at all. The film tries a misdirect at one point that the whole thing is fake, but I don’t think you’ll buy it at that point. I do have to give Doug some credit there though. He absolutely never believes the villains and always laughs at their attempts at a plot twist. He usually does get convinced or almost convinced once they activate their feigned outrage and start to show him videos, but he starts out on a solid note. I feel like there is a good and engaging movie hidden in here somewhere, but it just never broke out into the light.

Overall 2/10

Westworld Review

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Peter and his pal John decide to visit the world’s most popular amusement park, Westworld. It is a futuristic life simulator where you get to live your life as a farmer, king, freelancer, etc. It acts as a very expensive vacation which is ultra realistic as androids play the parts of the rest of the town. It is billed as a place where you can do anything without worrying about your conscience or morals. It’s also extremely pricey though and honestly you wouldn’t catch me checking it out even if it was real. You can still have more fun at an arcade with a roll of quarters. Back to the park though. In Westworld, you are able to play as the hero or the villain and by the end of your experience you may even learn a thing or two about yourself. There is only one rule, have fun! Unfortunately, the robots pick up on this message as well. Why let the humans get everything? Why indeed…..

If Westworld is supposed to make you dislike the humans and really root for the robots, then it succeeded quite easily. It goes out of its way to show that all of the humans are fundamentally bad people who will use any excuse to shed their boring 9-5 jobs and become full fledged villains. One guy uses his vacation to cheat on his wife, others use it to murder people and have one night stands with robots, etc. There is nobody to root for except for the robots, but I was probably going to be rooting for them anyway.

Peter is the main character and he’s pretty terrible. He’s portrayed as the average joe, someone you can sit down and have a beer with. He’s in awe of this big amusement park and can’t wait to try it. Once inside, his bad influence of a friend named John shows him how to have fun in all of the wrong ways. Peter quickly picks up on this and becomes just as corrupt. It’s a shame, but the guy had no will power. Also, it was hard to believe that these two were friends since John was basically ignoring Peter the whole time until they actually landed on the island. As bad as Peter was, John could match him step for step. He’s just a terrible collection of the worst tropes for a movie lead and I was anticipating his big duel with the android quite eagerly.

It’s a fairly small cast in this film as those two characters basically get all of the screen time. There’s also a third traveler who is the most corrupt of them all. The robots make sure to deal with him right away though via a stab straight to oblivion. The guy was a terrible fighter though as the android gave him a fighting chance for quite a while. Finally it got tired of the whole thing and just took him down for the count. The main villain was a pretty good robot. He definitely had Peter on the run for quite a while and he’s like an old fashioned terminator. He’s a pretty good shot as well which is useful when you’re in the Wild West setting. None of the other androids got particularly large roles but they were around to help finish the job when necessary.

Unfortunately, the film really stresses the pleasure part of this vacation which drags the film down quite a bit. After all, I think we get the implications of the “You can do whatever you want” message that Westworld gives out. We don’t have to constantly be reminded of it via the two main characters that this means you can have as many fake romances as you want. That’s the element that gets them the most excited along with drinking beer all day and shooting people. It’s certainly not a family friendly destination. It would have been nice if the film could have focused on the fact that you’re essentially living another life for these few days and the thrills of having safe gunfights and old styled competitions.

Also, the concept definitely doesn’t hold up if you actually think about it. The characters are using live ammunition and getting into real fights during their vacation. The guns are set to not work if you target another human, but you can still get hurt during the ballroom brawls. There’s one such fight in this film that lasts for a very long time. The heroes get lucky as they dodge most of the glass cup attacks and don’t get seriously injured, but they could have easily had some broken bones if they missed a step. I guess you may sign a waver or something before entering, but based on John’s reaction to getting bit, it seems that Westworld guarantees you will not be injured. That’s quite the stretch if you ask me.

Also, we see that in real time, a few operators juggle everything around for the various plots to ensure that every guest gets his/her desire. I guess they’ve never had conflicting goals from players since they have a 100% satisfaction rate. Hmmmm, well no need to dwell on that. Lets just say that I wasn’t buying it. The film isn’t super violent or anything. I did assume that Westworld was R to be honest and was surprised that it wasn’t, but I don’t remember any scene in particular being all that gruesome. It was fairly standard action stuff if I remember right. If anything, it’s more the shock of the situation that may get you if you weren’t expecting some big characters to die.

The ending of the film is pretty fitting though. I definitely thought that it was handled well since the humans were already in enemy territory when the androids made their move. The whole thing is pretty realistic even if the engineer who designed the room to only open from the inside should be fired instantly. Poor designs are timeless and we still get them nowadays. I always think doors should open outwards instead of inwards because it’s safer (Infamous factory fires) and more convenient yet people still make it the other way around. It is what it is I suppose.

Overall, I didn’t really care for Westworld. Good (Even if unbelievable) concept, but poor execution. The main problems all can be traced back to Peter and John. They’re just absolutely terrible main characters and the third guy didn’t help their case at all. There’s just too much of a focus on the wrong aspects of Westworld. The special effects were good though and it did have a lot of fun visuals. While I don’t see this ever happening in the real world, we are getting to the point where it could be possible through Virtual Reality. I think it’ll be easy to do such a thing someday, but there will be a ton of risks involved so I certainly wouldn’t be a beta tester. If you want a film where someone gets trapped in a cyber game, check out the new Sword Art Online film. In this case, the game comes to the real world, but it has some similar themes and it’s certainly a lot more enjoyable.

Overall 3/10

Transformers: Combiner Wars Review

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It’s time to look at the recent online miniseries that came out. Unfortunately, it would be taking the old “5 minute episodes” tactic that rarely ever works out well. The main difference between this one and Pokemon Generations is that the episodes do combine to tell one self contained story. It does have a bit of a cliffhanger to lead into the next part of the trilogy though. It’s a pretty solid mini show that could have certainly benefited from having normal length episodes instead of mini ones, but was fairly decent for its limitations.

The plot takes place in the far future, which is a nice change of pace since most of the shows and movies all take place during the war between the Autobots and Decepticons. The comics have long since passed this part in history, but the shows and movies don’t seem to ever want to leave it. I guess it makes sense since that era had a lot of interesting characters and battles to look at, but the future arcs can be a blast too. Case in point, the plot in this series is actually very interesting and epic. The series itself just fails to completely utilize it.

Both sides are now working together since there aren’t Decepticons and Autobots anymore. Rodimus Prime, Starscream, and The Mistress of Flame are the three rulers now. They use Combiners to take any pockets of villain resistance left. The world still isn’t at peace and it probably never will be, but the situation isn’t half bad at this point. Unfortunately, that’s when the heroes get the bright idea to try and use a super special item to mind control all of the Combiners to have them serve as a personal army. This will take away their autonomy and it’ll serve as the ultimate counter to evil. How can this fail? Rodimus half heartedly advises against it, but is then for it later on. All three of the members go back and forth on the issue until someone ensures that the device is used. It’s like they always say, if you have a weapon, that means you intend to use it at some point.

Windblade knows about what is going on so she recruits Optimus Prime to help her end this. She wants to destroy the device and Prime is in agreement, although he isn’t thrilled about being called back into action. He’s in retirement and nobody likes him even though he fought for peace for many centuries. People blame him for the war and that just goes to show that the average Cybertronian isn’t much smarter than the average human. I can’t believe that Prime of all people would be turned into an outcast after the many sacrifices that he made for justice. It’s pretty unreal. Prime also realizes that the two of them against an army of combiners may be a bit unrealistic so they call in Megatron. Megatron’s enjoying his retirement at a Colosseum, but he’s certainly happy to help if it means messing up Starscream and the others.

Seeing Optimus Prime and Megatron team up was probably the biggest hype moment of the mini series. Unfortunately, there really weren’t any villains for them to fight by that point. They got to shoot at the giant Starscream and at a few Combiners, but I would have liked more of a tangible threat for them to be honest. The back and forth between the two rivals was always good though and we saw their battle experience first hand. You always get the sense that Megatron and Prime are head and shoulders above the rest of the robots. Prime’s retirement was definitely pretty iffy if you ask me and seemed like another hero giving up the Luke Skywalker way. It’s a stretch to imagine Prime just deciding to give up and let others wield the torch, but at least that won’t be a problem for the next two parts of the trilogy. Megatron was definitely in character the whole time though and I can definitely see him being a big villain again someday.

Rodimus Prime didn’t look all that smart though. I don’t know how everyone just decided that it would be a good idea to let Starscream on the tribunal. If you ask me…that’s just not a smart move. Even if he claims that he’s changed….it’s Starscream that we’re talking about. He’s the shadiest Decepticon of them all. Starscream’s definitely pretty solid though. He has a good plan and considered all of the angles. You definitely can’t say that he’s not one of the smartest bots out there.

Windblade was basically the main character and she was really good. It’s nice to see her as a hardcore assassin. Robots in Disguise tried to make her really cool as well and she is decent in that show, but this one goes a little more all out. She’ll remind you of Arcee from the Transformer comics. Windblade gets the job done and while she should not have won her fight against the Combiner, (Get ready for a lot of plot hax, but this show is full of that so you won’t be surprised by the end) Windblade is definitely a character who is easy to root for and I would certainly say that she is one of the better Transformers overall.

As expected, the characters and the plot are good. Now, where did the series fail? Well, the 5 minute episodes really ensure that the show can’t do much. Now only are the episodes only around 5 minutes long, but they really waste time. One episode will have someone flying for about a minute or another will just have people talking about nothing really important for a while. I feel like the show was trying to show off its animation, but since the graphics weren’t really anything to write home about…it didn’t work. Plus, time was a big factor here so the show needed to take it into consideration.

The graphics aren’t bad though and despite getting a lot of heat, I dare say that they even look great. They have the style of a PS2 game, but with modernized graphics. The colors really stand out and since it is night time for most of the series, the contrasts make for really good visuals. The energy attacks all look sharp as well and these are graphics that I grew up with to the extent where the designs look solid. It’s hard to describe, but the robots actually look strong and menacing instead of skinny and more unassuming. It can’t hold its own to a modern hand drawn anime or anything like that, but the CGI is really good. I can’t say that I really remember the soundtrack all that well though. It’s very forgettable and it’s the kind of fare that works well while you’re in the moment, but just barely. It covers its bases and that’s about it.

Combiner Wars does end on a really epic note though. The cliff hanger for part 2 is really intense since aliens may finally be showing up to make a move. That’s one aspect of Transformers that was never handled too well. Aliens showing up could be really awesome, but usually their designs aren’t great or they just don’t get to do much. A proper Transformers vs Aliens plot for the sequel could definitely be really cool. It would certainly make for a better fight than Prime and friends against Cosmic Giant. The final fight is a little underwhelming because the villain can barely move and the heroes can’t hurt him, which leads to an unfortunate stale mate. Some good visuals make it in there, but that’s about all that you can say for it.
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Overall, Transformers: Combiner Wars is a pretty fun little show. Just treat it as a 30 minute OVA and it works well. The animation is solid and the fight scenes are a lot of fun aside from the last one. The plot is very engaging and the main character cast of Windblade, Prime, and Megatron is a good trio. It will also remind you of just how good the show could have been had it been full length though. Despite it being a series about Combiners, we didn’t get to see them do all that much here. There was simply no time since the series had to try and fit everybody in with the limited length. Hopefully the next part will either have more episodes or they will be able to extend the length of each episode. I think that would do wonders for the show. Still, I recommend it if you’re interested in the future timeline of Transformers, which is rarely explored.

Overall 7/10