Reviews

While Happy Halloween, Scooby-Doo! Didn't do much for me, this movie was really fun. I love the retro-esque animation they went for, the story is unique as it involves the Mystery Inc. Getting help from the person who made the monster costumes, and it's overall one of the most enjoyable direct-to-video Scooby-Doo movies I've seen so far.

I have to fill this review out so uhhh...

As much as I hated Scoob! For butchering the source material in favour of cashing in on recent trends, I'm still against Warner Bros. Discovery for cancelling it's prequel Holiday Haunt even though it WAS FINISHED!!!

I'm honestly surprised that I didn't mind the Brian Levant duology. It's not as good as the Gunn/Gosnell duology (mainly Monsters Unleashed), but I didn't really have much of a problem with these two films. This one is slightly weaker than The Mystery Begins, but it still captures the charm of the cartoons and the chemistry between the Mystery Inc. Is still very much intact (which Scoob failed to do for the most part). The CGI for Scooby is still crappy, but it looks a little better here too.

Yeah, I'm surprised. These films could have just been soulless cash-ins, but they honestly ain't bad.

I know this review came a little late, but I wanted to review some of the SD movies, so yeah. An SD film taking place on Halloween is a really cool idea, but this film ended up being pretty bland. A good chunk of it just has the characters travelling on the road, some of the dialogue is very cringeworthy, Fred comes across as childish here, and it kinda wastes a cool premise. I wanted to like this a lot, but I have to be honest when I rate/critique movies.

Am I asking for too much? Maybe, but I enjoyed the other DTV movies that I have seen just fine, so I guess this just didn't click with me.

The idea of a Scooby-Doo origin story movie sounds brilliant on paper, and the execution is...eh? TMB has it's moments, but is kinda underwhelming on it's own. It's a shame too because the pieces to make something amazing are there. It's just bogged down by stuff like the very predictable twist villain and horrendous CGI (yes, it's a TV movie, but still). And if you compare this to the previous live-action movies, it does feel awkward in comparision, but unlike the fourth Wimpy Kid movie, I don't think that this was supposed to be canon to those films. BTW, the new actor for Shaggy here is actually pretty solid.

Monsters Unleashed is everything I could want out of a Scooby-Doo movie. It's super entertaining, funny, has a lot of heart, and truly captures the spirit of the source material. If I have any complaints, it's that the CGI has aged pretty poorly for the most part. But regardless, it's better than the first in every other way, and is my favourite Scooby-Doo movie period.

I have to fill out the review, so I'll add a few things:

Zombie Island is a close second if you're wondering.

That potions scene is iconic. Enough said.

The tar monster looks like B. O. B. From Monsters vs. Aliens.

Your mum.

Compared to the first Planes, which is essentially just a safe, bland, worse version of Cars, Planes: Fire & Rescue is actually a slightly better film. It actually feels more like a theatrical release than a direct-to-video cash grab, the story has more to it, the characters, while still not that multi-dimensional, are a tiny bit better, there's actually some decent humour occasionally, the action scenes, especially the climax, are pretty fun and entertaining, and it actually works better as a Cars spin-off here by doing something different.

That's not to say it's good or even at least decent though. It's still pretty bland, forgettable and generic, but that can also be said for the first. You're better off watching any of the Cars movies (that includes Cars 2), but still, compared to the first Planes, it's definitely a better film. Just not one I'd watch much again.

I wasn't expecting much from Planes, and even then, I felt underwhelmed. If you want a discount version of Cars released by Disney, but with no involvement of Pixar, then Planes is the perfect movie for you.

Everything feels plain here (no pun intended). The story is predictable, the characters are one-dimensional and suspiciously similar to characters from Cars, the humour is dry, and it's also quite a boring movie too. The most interesting thing about this movie is that it was supposed to be a direct-to-video release but was released in cinemas at the last minute and boy does it feel like a direct-to-video product.

I was considering a 4/10, but that's too generous for this movie honestly. I think a 3/10 is perfect for this movie because while it isn't anywhere near the worst, it just left me feeling nothing after watching it. At least Cars 2 had something to it.

Cars on the Road is an okay enough miniseries, but I was rather underwhelmed too. Not only are the episodes surprisingly short, but I feel like they don't utilise their fullest potential (The Legend and B-Movie both come close though). The first two episodes are mostly dream sequences and one episode is mostly just about trucks singing. It's 6-minutes, so I didn't mind it too much, but it's probably the most pointless episode of the show.

I thought this miniseries would've been more to be honest. I feel like you can just edit all the episodes together as a movie, which is funny because the entire show overall is 74-minutes in length.

Overall, it's okay, but nothing groundbreaking.

Believe it or not, out of all the films this year, my most anticipated one after Sonic the Hedgehog 2 came out was Lightyear.

I just loved the concept; a film about the actual Buzz Lightyear astronaut that inspired the toy from the Toy Story universe...well, that was what I thought it was gonna be with the first announcement we got (we'll get back to that later), and when I saw each passing trailer and clip on YouTube (don't worry, I avoided spoilers BTW), I got more and more hyped, and I thought that this was gonna be one of Pixar's greatest.

However, I got cold feet after seeing that people didn't quite like it all that much. Heck, this is the only Pixar movie on IMDb that got a score below a 6/10. But hey, most of the Child's Play movies also got a score below a 6, and the only one I didn't like was Cult of Chucky (mainly just because it's the most boring one IMO), and I still wanted to go into Lightyear with an open mind, and how was it?

I'm not gonna go heavy into spoilers or write anything too detailed since it's still in cinemas and I've only seen it once, but it's pretty solid in my opinion. I enjoyed our main heroes (Sox and Darby get the best lines here), it's visually stunning, the action sequences are cool, it doesn't really get boring at any point, and it does a nice job at reimagining Buzz Lightyear as an actual human space ranger rather than just a toy.

However, it's not perfect by any means. Zurg didn't really leave too much of an impression as a villain, which is a shame since he could have been an amazing antagonist and his design here is supreme. I also wasn't a fan of the twist they did with him too (again, no spoilers, but I would have preferred him being Buzz's father over what we got). But the film's biggest issue was the framing device we got. Contrary to what the first announcement of the film told us, and what I believed for the longest time, this wasn't about a real astronaut in-universe that inspires the Buzz Lightyear toy, but is actually supposed to be a film that Andy saw that led to him getting the toy for his birthday. It's a fantastic idea on paper, but in the end, it creates a plethora of confusion within the Toy Story universe...

First of all, and this is the most minor thing since it isn't actually in the film, but there's this promotional art of Andy seeing the film at the cinema, but why are his toys with him? He was only allowed to bring one toy to Pizza Planet, and weren't the toys unfamiliar with Buzz before meeting him? Secondly, as great as Sox was, he creates some plot holes in the Toy Story universe as well. Wouldn't he have become a popular toy too, if not moreso than Buzz? If Andy's mum couldn't get a Sox toy for his birthday, wouldn't she have been able to get it anytime afterwards? And third of all, the biggest one of all, this does not AT ALL look like something that would have came out in 1995. It makes sense to make the film computer-animated since this was supposed to be a live-action film in the Toy Story universe, where everything is CGI, but you'd think that they would have made it look like a computer-animated film mimicking what a 90's live-action sci-fi film would look like (with film grain, creatures that mimick practical effects, etc.), but it looks (and also feels) more like a modern reboot that DID come out in 2022 rather than a 90's movie, and I feel that the filmmakers just forgot what that framing device was setting up and just made it look like a modern movie anyway.

And even if they neglected the whole framing device thing they set up, I feel like they could have done more with the sci-fi aspect. This is Pixar after all, and they could do wonders with a sci-fi movie (and they have done before with WALL. E in 2008). Sadly, it just feels kinda underwhelming in the end, which is a shame since they had the potential to get really creative.

But in spite of it's shortcomings, I still enjoyed Lightyear a fair bit. It's not the greatest Pixar movie and it has a terrible framing device that makes no sense in context, but it is an entertaining enough sci-fi flick and a solid watch on the big screen.

And yes, I didn't mention Buzz Lightyear of Star Command at all until now, but Disney and Pixar don't acknowledge it anymore, this movie completely ignores it, and the Beyond Infinity documentary treated it like it doesn't even exist, which is a shame since it's a pretty great show from what I've seen.

Another fantastic movie. Wreck-It Ralph has such a cool concept and it uses it to it's fullest potential, with fantastic animation and worldbuilding, likeable characters, and an engaging story, this is another must-see.

Horrid Henry: The Movie is a bad movie, but to be honest, I kinda like it?

It's predictable, looks more direct-to-video-worthy than something theatrical, has some downright bizarre moments and contains some of the worst CGI I've ever seen, but at the same time, it's got a charm to it that makes it hard to hate. Most of the characters are actually pretty likeable, mainly Henry and his friends with their comradery, the acting itself is actually not that bad, the soundtrack is alright and most of all, it's really faithful to the source material. You can tell that the people working on this film understood the source material really well.

Overall, I kinda have a soft spot for this movie. It's no masterpiece for sure, but rewatching it has given me some nostalgic vibes. There's much worse stuff out there.

Bee Movie is really enjoyable. I'm a sucker for that dumb, turn-your-brain-off style of humour that is still cleverly done in a way, and this movie is pretty much that. It's not among Dreamworks' best, but it's not trying to be a deep, artsy picture, just a fun and simple comedy, and it works really well at what it does. Give it a watch.

Disclaimer: This review may or may not be outdated. I wanna watch the original Vacation films at some point before rewatching this one.

I've not seen the older National Lampoon's Vacation films, so I'm judging this one on it's own. And how is it? Okay at best.

It has it's funny moments, mainly with the Rusty character's co-pilot sending the passengers incredibly high in the sky, Rusty witnessing a woman in another car flirting with him getting hit by a truck and accidentally running over a cow (those were dark, but I like me some good and unexpected dark comedy), the James character giving his obnoxious younger brother Kevin a taste of his own medicine, the Charlie Day scene, and Rusty not running to the side for some reason even though a truck is heading towards him. But at the end of the day, it's a pretty standard road trip movie, and honestly, there's really nothing else to say. I'd definitely watch this over the fourth Wimpy Kid movie, but I didn't really have much strong feelings towards the film if I'm gonna be honest.

This film reminds me of the 2019 Child's Play, except the robot is a good guy who doesn't kill.

It's good though, kinda wish that Locksmith Animation could stay with 20th Century Fox (or Studios as Disney renamed it) instead of Warner Bros. So they could still have an animation studio after Dreamworks moved to Universal and Blue Sky closed down around that time. Warner Bros. Still has Warner Animation Group after all.

I just came back from seeing this film in the cinema and I had a goddamn blast with it! Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is a movie that knows what it wants to be and runs with it, resulting in a more fun and enjoyable experience than the already fun and enjoyable predecessor. I won't say much else since I want people to check it out (see the first film before though for more context) for themselves.

I'll end by saying two things, bring on the third one, and please let Mario's upcoming movie be good too.

Sonic the Hedgehog is a film I really admire for how it took the trend of live-action films with a photorealistic CGI depiction of a popular character (or more than one depending on the film) finding himself with a human lead with hijinks ensuing and makes it work well within the story (though Paddington deserves that credit too).

This movie at first seems like it's doing what Alvin and the Chipmunks, Hop, The Smurfs and other films of this type did, but it manages to tell a fun and interesting story whilst also serving as a prequel/origin story showing how things came to be (in the film's own interpretation of course). The film showcases Sonic living most of his life on earth, which is where he meets the movie-exclusive Tom and gets into a cat-and-mouse chase with the games' main antagonist, the human Dr. Robotnik/Eggman.

I think that while the movie is mostly very different from the games, everything starts to come together and really make sense when you get the full context, as it builds up to becoming more in-line with the source material. And this is a very solid take on the Sonic franchise in my opinion. There's more backstory to certain things and it takes some creative liberties, but at the end of the day, it stays true to the video games whilst being a well-told prequel story.

There's also more that makes this film worthwhile. The characters and performances are stellar, the CGI on Sonic is pretty good (some parts look a little unfinished, but I can forgive this since they pretty much had to redesign his character after the backlash from the first trailer), the humour is funny, and it's just all-around a really fun experience.

Overall, I really, really like this movie. It's not the greatest movie of all time and it was definitely gonna lead to something grander in the sequel, but I appreciate this film for taking a clichéd premise and making it work within the narrative and for future instalments. To end this review off, I'm glad that this film exists and it's lead, and will continue to lead, to something better.

I'm gonna judge this as both a movie and as individual 3-parter episodes since they were originally the latter, but were edited together as a feature-length movie for it's DVD release.

As a MOVIE, it's obviously no Bigger, Longer and Uncut. That film was pretty much a perfect film adaptation. It used as many characters from the show as possible, has gags and elements you'd see on the show (such as Kenny dying), and stays true to what you'd see on the small screen whilst upping the scale to make it feel truly epic. Even after my second rewatch, it's still an experience. Imaginationland is still a really solid movie, but definitely does feel lacking in comparision. It does feel like a movie for the most part, but it becomes obvious when they transition between each episode. They show the original title cards (they also read Kyle Sucks Cartman's B**ls instead of Imaginationland, which is strange), and that confused me since Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story was also three episodes edited together as a movie, but didn't include those credits at the beginning of each part that you'd see in a normal episode. I don't know if this was the case for the actual episodes, but the movie with them combined had an original intro in the style of the 'Road to' episodes that showed the credits there.

But I don't wanna compare it to Bigger, Longer and Uncut too much since the latter was a theatrical release, while this is just something made for TV with a lower budget, so of course they can't reach the same quality as something made for cinemas. It's not really fair.

So how is it as a 3-PARTER EPISODE? Fantastic. Some of the best episodes from the show. The stakes are high, the plot is engaging, and the concept (of fictional characters like Strawberry Shortcake, gods like Zeus, and holiday icons like Santa Claus living in their own land together) is really cool. And because this is South Park, they give it an edgy twist without being too bleak, and instead, hilarious.

As a direct-to-video movie, it's an 8/10, but as a 3-part episode, it's an easy 10/10.

I got the first season on DVD from a shop in town on my birthday earlier this month. Last year was when I started to watch more adult cartoons regularly than just The Simpsons, and King of the Hill seemed like a good show to binge.

(Mike) Judging from the first season, I really liked what I saw, and while I expected it to just be decent, it managed to surprise me in a way. It's definitely much more grounded and slow-paced compared to something like The Simpsons (though the latter, especially in it's golden years, is definitely superior), but funnily enough, I was never bored (maybe except for the episode Peggy the Boggle Champ, though that may be because I felt tired watching it).

I think it's due to the balanced pacing of the show. The episodes don't go by too fast but don't drag either. It's the type of pacing I'd call relaxing, and no episode felt too short or long for it's runtime. The stories and characters also elevate this. Again, it's grounded and slice-of-life, but not boring, things do happen in this show. Hank and Bobby are the two stand-out characters, the former being put through several relatable situations, and the latter having some rather amusing moments. The animation also makes this show. It's very unique with how it looks and you won't confuse it with something like Futurama or Family Guy at all. This may be a controversial opinion, but from what clips I've seen of other episodes, I actually think the animation looks worse in the later seasons. There's just something about how the older episodes are animated that fit the art style better, it looks a tad too clean, and just rather off without the roughness of what we saw earlier in the show.

Overall, while not as good as classic Simpsons, South Park, classic Family Guy, or Futurama, King of the Hill was a pleasant surprise, and I can safely say that I have another show to binge in my spare time.

I saw this for the first time last week after re-watching the first, and while I don't think it's quite as good as the first, I don't care, I still love this movie almost as much. It retains a lot of the charm the first one had, and I love how the plot connects to the ending of the first. It even has a really good message about how kids should play nicely together.

Sadly, this film was a box-office bomb, and while it's upsetting that this was the final movie from the Lego Movie franchise, I honestly think the ending to this film wrapped everything up really well, and I'd rather we have only two absolutely fantastic movies than the franchise to overstay it's welcome, similarly to how people feel about the Ice Age franchise (I need to re-watch all five films someday). Regardless though, this movie was a really nice closure.

This is one of the best animated movies, if not films in general, that I've ever seen. It's still a surprise to see how much love and care was put into a movie based on an existing toyline. It has some of the best and most believable CGI animation I've seen period, crafts a world around Legos really well, has a well-written plot, brilliant humour, unforgettable characters, and so much more. Re-watching it recently gave me so much nostalgia and I am so glad to see this film again after so long.

South Park is one of my personal favourite shows. I've been binging random episodes in no specific order, watched the Imaginationland trilogy that was edited together as a movie on DVD, watched the COVID specials (A. K. A. Season 24), and has kept up with Season 25. With it's brilliant stories, clever satire, charming animation, fantastic humour and unforgettable characters, it's honestly been an experience watching this show. And I can thank this movie for getting me into the show.

I first saw it back in August on a Fire Stick last year and watched it again not so long ago as I got it on DVD for my birthday, and it's one of the best animated films, no, films in general that I've ever seen. It takes everything I said about the show before, but ups the ante with an epic scale story and unforgettable songs and can also be considered to be the groundwork for what direction the show would later take. This movie, just like the show, if not more, is an absolute experience and one that I'll be revisiting many times going forward.

In fact, I might even prefer this over The Simpsons Movie, and I also love that movie.