Overly Sarcastic Productions Presents: Journey to the West

Wanna hear the origin story of basically all anime ever?

So this was suggested to me by my Discord and it is, sort of a movie. Overly Sarcastic Productions(OSP) is a youtube channel that does videos about mythology, legends, and classical stories. And they have a whole video series dedicated to Journey to the West, a Chinese classic that explains a lot Eastern story telling.

Overview: Buddha wrote super holy scrolls, and needs to get them to the people of the East. But he needs someone super pure of heart and mind to get them there. So they choose the monk Tripitaka to fetch the scrolls for him. With his magical and powerful companions Monkey, Pigsy, and Sandy, (those are in fact their ancient chinese names) they embark on their Journey to the West.

I have got to say, I’ve heard of this story before, but this is the first time I actually understood what the title actually meant.

This is a little harder to tackle compared to the other movies because this isn’t exactly a movie. The book is so long that OSP are only going over the more important parts, and even then it is told more episodically so it feels more like a series than an actual movie. So basically, my review is going to be a mix of the story as well as OSP’s retelling of it. It’s only fair.

The Story

So when I said that this was the origin of basically every anime ever, I wasn’t joking. OSP also pointed it out. The story centers around our protagonist gaining allies, traveling, fighting enemies that turn to allies, then keep traveling with the hero until they accomplish their goal.

Sound familiar? Like, every shonen jump ever?

Hell, it was even mention that Goku was spot on for the Monkey King in design, skills, and behavior, as well as Dragon Ball being another retelling of Journey to the West.

Oddly enough while watching, this series actually reminded me of Inuyasha, which also had this feudal japan “monster of the week” feel to it.

In the actual story we have the kind and pure Tripitaka, the brash and impulsive Monkey, the braggart yet scared Pigsy, and the loyal but dedicated Sandy. As well has a dragon horse who is basically always a horse and never a dragon.

Personally, my favorite of the four are Monkey and Sandy. What can I say, I love the loud brash characters with only slight impulse control, and Monkey fits that bill to a tee.

And also, his golden headband that is activated by a spell to cause pain? Very Similar to the password activated magic necklace Inuyasha wears.

Sandy is a pretty chill dude. Sort of like the straight man of the group, trying to manage everyone and keep them in line.

There is also a lot of humor into this. The beginning of the story is more like a prologue than anything else, talking about Monkey’s history that the main character Tripitaka. He became immortal 5 times in different ways, basically compounding his immortality to cover the conditions of the other immortality. One ways was just getting stupidly drunk and ransacking a god’s science lab and drinking his immortality potions.

I love how Heaven is a bureaucracy, where gods can work there or just push out complaints. Like if someone was the God of Rain you don’t expect them to have a desk job.

But that’s what makes this story very interesting. The characters still feel very human. They get angry, act impulsively, become sad, or drunk, or play pranks like peeing in someone’s food. It was written 400 years ago, and it still feels very relatable.

The Narrator

I really do like OSP’s style of storytelling. Yes they are a summary/overview of what the story/fable/lore/whatever is, but it still has heart to it. Kind of like telling the plot of the movie to a friend, you won’t get to everything, but you will definitely cover the important parts with your own touch of flair.

The art is stupidly cute. Like, god look at this!

Adorable. Absolutely adorable.

But not only is it adorable, the art adds more to the story. While the narrator is speaking over, the art gives out more of the personality to the characters. Not just in body movements, but they’ll also write in lines for the characters that OPS won’t say, but it builds up the story and make you more passionate about it. Hell I’m pretty sure you can turn off the audio and you can still understand what’s going on from the visuals alone.

They’ll also throw in a lot of commentary to the story, providing some pretty cool context to the time period the story was written in, or the motifs and themes that the story has. This is pretty cool because I have no idea what 16th century china was like. I haven’t read the book. So it is nice to gain as much insight as I can without actually doing the work.

Overall, I recommend this series whole heartedly. The art is cute, the story is charming and makes me seriously want to read the entire thing on my own. The only downside is that because OSP is releasing it in parts the story isn’t finished yet. But that means you can check out their other lore videos and learn more about these amazing stories ^u^

U.S.S INDIANAPOLIS: MEN OF COURAGE

Nick Cage mixed with WW2 and sharks. What can possible go wrong?

Answer: Everything

Nick Cage has just an attraction to me. I have known him for so long since I was little, I can’t tell if he is a good actor or if it was nostalgia. All I know is if there is a Nick Cage film, it is going to have that Nick Cage charm. And BOY HOWDY, this movie has it.

Let’s go with backstory first.

This movie is based on the incredible and horrific events that happened to the U.S.S Indianapolis, a Naval Ship during World War 2. It was sent on a secret and dangerous mission to deliver parts for the construction of the Atomic Bomb. However, on their way back a Japanese Submarine sunk it with a torpedo, leaving the survivors stranded alone in the middle of the ocean for 4 days filled surrounded by sharks who would attack the dead, injured, and living. Out of the almost 12,000 sailors aboard, only 300 would survive, making this the worst naval tragedy in U.S. Navy history.

And they made this movie.

Not going to lie, I was stupidly judgy through this movie. I mean, I tried goddammit, to watch and enjoy it straight. But I couldn’t help it. I care about this history. I’m fasinated by this bit of history, the horror and pain the sailors when through. This is THE Greatest Shark Attack in history. I was judgy because I wanted this movie to respect the event and tragedy that had happened, to do the survivors justice. And they tried.

God did they tried.

The problem is that they didn’t do it well.

Let me start with the good things about this movie.

1) Nick Cage was pretty Good

He plays Captain Charles B. McVay of the Indianapolis. There is still a bit of hokiness that comes from Nick Cage being Nick Cage. One is him talking to himself while writing a letter to his wife in the weirdest way possible. Another is the fact that his sunglasses makes it look like his eyes are closer to his forehead. But he does the role well I think. He makes sure to show that Captain McVay cared for his men, put their safety ahead of his own, did everything he can to help. I thought he did a good job.

2) They were respectful in the representation of the Japanese Submarine Crew.

The movie could have just not even show the submarine until the ship sinks, but no, we actually get to see the crew. We see the Captain Hashimoto dealing with the struggles of fighting their side of the war. How he cares for his crew, and how they will lay down their lives for the fight. The ship was sunk by Kaiten Torpedoes, basically an underwater version of Kamakazi pilots. They were manned torpedoes, so you see the men loading themselves in to be launched. So while the main focus is on the Indianapolis, it is nice they tried to be empathetic to the Japanese crew as well.

3) The side-characters were interesting enough.

With a historical story like this, the best way is show the movie is to let the audience see all the possible people that were serving on the ship. You see two best friends fall in love with the same girl. Two guys who were enemies and in jail together. A guy with a gambling addiction. The lovable engineers that you see up above. The brand new green commander who is a bit of a dick. My favorite one is the writer sailor. He writes what he sees and tries to bolster people up with his stories. Like, there is a lot of characters so even if you don’t like one plot-line, there are others you can enjoy. They may act goofy/overly dramatic at times, but the actors did a good job for you to root for them.

With that out of the way, things I didn’t like.

A) The cgi was too basic and shit in places

I wish, I WISH I can find a better picture to show what I mean. When we were watching, even my sister were going back and forth on whether it was good or not. Everything that was cgi was just weirdly too smooth. Like really look at it. It looks more like graphics for a video game. Which, is passable. But you can’t have passable for a movie. This movie came out in 2016! We have the technology for a hell of a lot better images than template models. At that was the better cgi. Because when the cgi is bad, it is glaringly obvious bad.

B) The Editing Kills Me.

They have a weird sense of pacing in this movie. When you hit the middle part of the movie, it’s fine. Decent moments of the sailors goofing around, hving drmatic romance, fights, struggles. But there are some parts of the movie where someone in the editing room was like “Oh shit, the people watching this won’t understand. Quickly! Put out that exposition as fast as you can!!”

An Example: the first 3 minutes of the movie. Minute 1: BATTLE! Ok, good, see our historical men in action. Minute 2: We are in a war council room where the Indianapolis has been chosen for a secret mission. “You mean the atomic BOMB?!” -> Basically the line used. And this was BEFORE meeting ANY of our main cast. So it felt like the movie was putting more emphasis on the ship rather than the sailors. 

It also didn’t help the movie Felt like it ended when the survivors were rescued, but didn’t Actually end for another 20-30 minutes longer. I appreciate them going in for historical accuracy of showing the actual aftermath to Captain McVay, but by that point I was so done and bored that I didn’t really care.

Plus they keep using the same periscope tracking shot 7 times! Seven! In the same scene. TWICE!! When the Japanese were firing in daytime, we see the same daylight periscope 7 times before launch. Then when they fired a torpedo at night, LET’S DO THE SAME THING since it went so well the first time.

B) The ship sinks titanic style, the fuck is that?? 

Not going to lie, while I am facinated by the Indianapolis, I do not know everything about what exactly happened. One of them was how the ship sank. But I am pretty sure the ship did not sink in the Exact Same Way as the Titanic. Where one side is lifted up, then got cracked in the middle, and so it was split into two parts. It was, it was bad. Because this tied in to the whole repeating shots thing, because I saw the same man holding onto a pole trying not to drop 5 different times. The Same Exact Scene. No difference. And I’m sure he fell in the exact same way as in the Titanic Movie shots.

(Note:The jail cell sailors during this part were very good, but I still have No Idea how the hell they got out. Let me know if you figured it out)

C) The Sharks were S H I T!

This is basically where the whole meat of the story should have taken place, nd it was AWFUL! Trash! They were stupidly inaccurate, trying to go for Jaws Chomp factor instead of being anywhere near historical. The sharks were all Great Whites, which wasn’t a thing. Because the sharks that historically attacked were Oceanic Whitetips.

But ok, you could get pass. The sharks look similar enough at first glance so it would be an honest mistake. Except that sailors were specifically talking bout “Great White Sharks” with colored pictures of great whites, (which think about that for a minute) so that was bullshit. in making the audience think Great White.

But ok, so what, who cares, the sharks still does it’s things right? Why should we care if they got the type wrong or not?

^Because of Shit like This!! This movie decided to try and shittily mimic Jaws and the Jaws ripoffs by having crappy cgi sharks launch itself out of no where to stupidly chops on the nearest sailors. God you could make a drinking game out of it. Take a shot for every shark you see. Which won’t kill you, because there were NOT ENOUGH SHARKS!!

^The sharks should have been like this. The sailors literally should have been like waist deep in sharks. There were a lot of fucking sharks. And yet! There weren’t any. The sharks only decided to freaking rocket launch themselves out of the water when it’s time for a jump scare, on any old person they can fine. And maybe the reason they decide to throw themselves to the nearest pound of flesh instead of going for the closest dead body is because

D ) THERE WERE BARELY ANY SURVIVORS!!!

Seriously! When the ship sank there were 800 sailors left in the water, We only see 60. TOTAL! Not even random background sailors. It was just Nick Cage’s group, then a separate group of 30 people, and random boats here and there.  God how could they have fucked this up! I don’t know if it was just, not in the budged to hire more people or what, but you can still get somebody. Show the survivors dammit!

It pisses me off because this could have easily solved their shark problem. Because if there were more people, you can see the sharks eat/take the dead bodies. Then when there is a ton more sharks, see them go after the injured and dying. Like, having screams constantly while sharks pick people off left and right, even if it is just background characters, would build so much more tension than just “guys have a good laugh, talk, and support each other, send the shark for the jumpscare.”

I will give the movie this though: While I feel like the majority of the ending was unneeded, I do respect that they have little end-cards for what happened to the character’s historical counterparts, as well as come footage of some of the survivors describing the experience.

Overall: Don’t watch it. If you wanted to watch it for the actual historical event, watch something else. They made note of smaller historical facts while completely screwing up the actual main event with the sharks. You can find better documentaries Here, Here, Here, Here, and Here. The last one has a clip of the special that I I saw originally and while you do have to pay to see it (Here), it is very well done.

And If you want to watch a “so bad it’s good movie” then maybe it fits the bill, but I just honestly don’t think it’s worth it. The editing and pacing will give you whiplash. The CGI takes you out of the zone.  Nick Cage tried his best, but not even his enjoyable presence could save the film. They make for a great movie to rag on, but having it be on an actual historic event like this just leaves a bad taste in my mouth

Pan’s Labyrinth

Ive heard of this movie for a while and finally had a chance to watch it. I was going to see it in my Spanish Class in high school, but family had vacation so i missed that day. Which was too bad because this film was really good, in a pessimistic way.

The main plot: Ofelia is a girl who traveled with her pregnant mother to her stepfather’s military outpost during the Spanish Civil War in the 1940s. While the rest of the adults try to deal with the effects of war life, she finds herself get pulled into a fantasy world, where she must succeed in 3 dangerous tasks in order to prove herself.

Not gonna lie, it felt like I was somehow watching 2 very different movies that, somehow in way I can’t yet explain, seamlessly blend in together.

Because look, magic time in war movies is not a new thing. Narnia, Bed Knobs and Broomsticks. But I can’t really think of any other movie that actually has the magic being pushed aside for focus on the war.

I think to better explain this, i need to talk about the two prominent plots in this movie.

First is Ofelia. She is a girl who adores stories and fairy tales (like same). And her story follows that of a classic fairy tale. She meets a magical figure, the Faun, who gives her 3 tasks to accomplish. If she is successful, she can enter into their magical realm as their princess. So you see her being tested in strength, courage, kindness to see if she will get her reward. And, it really does play out like a fairy tale. In the beginning you see her fix a broken statue, and that kindness is what summons the fae. Because that is how it works in fairy tales, when you do a good deed you are rewarded.

We meet The Fawn who approached Ofelia with the tasks. He was designed like bark, so he blends to the background for an epic reveal. He’s a bit of a trickster, a flatterer, someone who you cant be to sure if you can completely trust them. Which, as fae goes, makes sense. I went back and forth throughout trying to figure if he was trustworthy enough or was trying to scam Ofelia out her soul or,something.

THEN! There’s the actual serious war movie about an assertive, serious, strict military Captain Vidal (the stepfather), who is doing battle against the last bits of Resistance that live up in the mountain. Like, its weird how these seperate things can be so closely tied together when one story does not affect the other at all.

The Captain is cruel, and a dominating prick to boot. He cares more about his legacy than his new wife/family and it shows in tiny ways to make it more realistic. Ofelia offers the left hand to shake, Captain crushes the hand instead. He puts down his wife at a dinner party saying that no one really cares about her stories. He is so sure that his wife will deliver a boy to carry on his legacy. And this is just his personal side.

Professionally, he is ruthless, sadistic, doesn’t give a shit about who he needs to kill or even cares if he kills innocent people. Like, he’s scary man, and I was on edge over what he was going to do, if he was going to catch the Resistance, if he was going to hurt Ofelia and her mother.

Doctor Ferreiro is cool. He’s there to help Ofelia’s mom during the pregnancy, and the pregnancy itself was a whole can of stressful times let me tell you. He’s just trying to do what he can to help, even at the risk of his own life. But the Doctor has one of my favorite lines in the movie, where he basically said he is unable to obey without question, because to lose your ability to question would lose your sense of judgement. Yeah, the movie went there with their commentary on “just following orders”.

Then there is the head maid Mercedes. Shes cool because you can see shes toeing the line in this place. She may be in charge of the household, but she is still at risk. So you see her do small things, subtle things, to keep ahead and keep out on top. Stuff most people wont notice during the moment, but it lingers just long enough on camera so the audience can hopefully pick it up. It..it almost feels like she’s the main character in the War Part of the film with the Captain as the villain.

The movie really does make a divide between Magic and Reality in sets. Becase while the adults are in war time here, Ofelia is in her own magic business. The sets when she does her challenges, incredible. Totally astounding. The set of the 2nd task terrifies me.

^This scene. It freaked me the fuck out. It is literally just “enter the room and dodge the monster” but the atmosphere is just FILLED with temptation and danger I just choked on stress for Ofelia’s safety. Which still falls under the fairy tale rules of “follow the advise or suffer the consequences.” But it is just filled with red and yellows, colors that you don’t see in the War portion of the film.

You can even see some of the magic being used in the war film. Ofelia uses magic to help heal her mother who’s sick. In the beginning she fixes a broken statue and garners the attention of the fae and Fawn in thr first place (a total fairy tale movie). But it is so small and subtle that it can give into doubt on “is magic real, or just all in her head?”

I think, the reason these plots can mash so well together, is because they both center around when people should trust and when people should question. Not following the rules has consequences that can cost you your life. But you shouldn’t obey everything, especially when it could cost someone their life. Del Toro did a magnificent job showing this in both a simple fairy tale and a hard war movie.

Overall I definitely recommend to watch this movie. The premise is a bit misleading, and it is pretty heavy, but if you like dark fantasy mixed in with realistic war you are going to enjoy the hell out of this.

SNOWPIERCER

Snowpiercer is an excellent movie that focuses on class warfare and I was screaming every minute of the way.

I don’t really know where to start since I want to scream about everything, so I’ll just give an overview of the plot and then go from there.

So the world is fucked. To combat global warming people shot missles into the atmosphere to fix things, which A) doesn’t and B) freezes the whole world instead into eternal antarctic. The only remembrance of humanity lives on one train, which never stops and continues to run on an eternal looping track. With each car, humanity is divided literally into sectors and sections with the poorest of the poor at the back of the train. Tired of the subjugation, Curtis stages a revolt to try and take over the train.

The set designs in this is beautiful. From the beginning all we see are drab colors, dull browns/blacks/greys. Like life was just sucked out of everything. Here we see the brutality towards the train’s back, the “freeloaders” as they are called. And then, then a woman with a fucking pristine yellow dress came and took children away and I saw red. Because of course only the rich and higher class can get colors, can be clean, can boldly wear yellow to stick out like a sore thumb and just be overall revolting. God I still hate that woman, her and her ugly yellow dress. GAH!!

This movie does not skimp of the brutality here. You see people bleed, injured, suffering, all in like the first 15 minutes of the movie.

Yall, I had to pause the movie and take a break when this scene came up. I was so fucking angry over what they did I had to take a break. This is a completely different woman than before, but I hated her for different reasons. It was a torture scene. They did a fucking torture scene while this woman stands there in her color and basically scolds them as if they were children!! It was horrendous. HORRIBLE! Ohhhhh we still get gruesome scenes in the future, but this one is probably my most hated. Fuck You lady!

Then after the introduction of the two most hated women in the movie, we finally get justice. The revolution starts! Viva la caboose people!

To help them, they picked up a prisoner named Namgoong, who can open the doors to the rest of the train. I love international movies like this, because they did the same style of translation like in Animal World. They speak in the device, and they have the device translate, so you still have people talk naturally in their own language. It is just a clever way to have communication without overdubbing everything.

Plus, Namgoong and his daughter Yona are my two favorites characters. They literally don’t give a shit, just try to do their own thing and just shit talk to everyone. Hearing an AI say “dumb fuck” is still a joy to me.

This movie is so brilliant in how it can both amaze and horrify me. It feels like an alternate version of “Stakes and Torches“ by Aurelio Voltaire.

Because there was obviously a lot of effort put into the logistics of how the hell would a train like this function. How would humanity keep getting food, water, heat, supplies, all while being trapped in a moving tube. It feels a little like Mad Max: Fury Road, where the movie doesn’t really need to explain everything, but gives us enough to fill in the pieces. And because the train-end people never saw any of this before, we are experiencing the same things at the same time. Hell they never even had any windows back there, so seeing the outside world is still a shock to us all.

But on the flip side, this train had all this wonderful, peaceful, enjoyable thing. And the rich couldn’t share? They couldn’t help? They fucking chose not to while the people in the back were suffering?? The antagonists talk about maintaining balance, which I get why. This train is a closed system. If equilibrium isn’t met, then it could kill the supply for everyone. But they use this idea as justification for the pain it causes, and it is honestly leaves a bad taste in your mouth.

As it should, since the entire theme of this movie is class warfare.

This is a serious movie, but there is I think just enough lighthearted moments to keep it from being too depressing. Like during the horrible speech scene, you have people trying to translate the speech as she is giving it in real time. Or you see a conductor just keep clicking his counter thing during a fight to count how many are killed. Not to mention everything dealing with Namgoong and Yona. They are perfection throughout this entire film.

It’s going to be a tv series soon and honestly I can see why. Like there is soooo much that they can explore here. The train is supposed to be 1000 carts, and we only saw like, 10-20 different areas. They can dive deeper into what the movie touched on, hell what I touched on. I barely made a dent in describing the things things this movie has, and like hell am I going to ruin/spoil the ending of this movie for you guys.

Because at the very end, when I just so overcome with despair and sadness over what happened, the movie gave me a glimmer of hope, that one moment of feeling that no matter what, there is still a way, and I think that’s beautiful.

So 100% percent would absolutely recommend! This is such a great movie and I am absolutely tuning in to see the tv show when it airs. 

Movie #1: Free Willy

Week One and I start out with a Family Friendly picture from the 90s. Free Willy, the story about a troubled child (teen?) bonding with a captive orca. This movie is chocked full of Whimsy and Magical moments of whales swimming which to be honest, didn’t really think it diserved a Victory Score.

Because the movie REALLY wants to hammer in that Willy is a majestic creature because there is a LOT of nature Orca shots. I timed it, the end credits has 5 uninterrupted minutes of orcas swimming. Double that for the beginning and you have 10 minutes of an orca documentary. Plus, they have this weird inspirational music going on in the background to I guess make you Feel with Wonder and Aw! Except the footage was the same thing over and over, and I watch nature documentaries all my life I’m immune to this.

The movie also wants to hammer in that Willy is sad because as the evil redneck fishmen capture Willy with nets, you see the other orca longingly look at each other from the other side. And like..I get the intent, but try looking at an orca’s face and see if it’s sad. It felt more scripted than natural for “orca crying”.

So while Willy is being shipped to Not Sea World, we meet Jesse, a boy who I don’t know his age living on the streets and who I didn’t know his name until he gets into his new foster family. I want to point out that Jesse was stealing food and he literally grabbed the breadsticks and run. Anyway, while running from the cops he got caught graffiti-ing the whale pool (pen? Tank?) and as punishment has to clean it up.

Insert Orca bonding time here. Which, is pretty good. Granted I’m terrified for the child actor being that close to an animal like that, but in the movie it was nice. Jesse talks to Willy, buys him fish with his own allowance, plays with him. Like they are some genuinely nice moments here and you care that the kid cares. Which is good when you center a movie around an animal, the audience needs to care for said animal.

I still have concerns for the well being of this kid though, potential whale injury aside. This kid is left alone constantly. Seriously, his foster dad drops him off at the entrance of the Not Sea World and expects the kid to search around the park for the guy he needs to go himself? No one is watching him as he cleans the tank?? I get giving Jesse like space and respect, but what happens if Jesse decides to just decides to run out again or, I don’t know, gets fucking injured while on the job (Which, guess what guys! It happens!)

The 90s were a wild time.

Then there’s the other adults of this movie. First is Randolph, a guy who works at the sea world park who is from the Haida Tribe. Originally, I wasn’t sure about the character, because I was afraid they were going into the “Native Tribe Mentor To Protag” trope. And while it does play a little into it, it wasn’t anything disrespectful. He shares stories about whales to Jesse who loves them so much. He’s a good guy who takes a little bit to warm up to, just like Jess and Willy (you see the theme here yet?)

Then there are the foster parents and Jesse’s mom. Jesse’s birth mom, not his foster mom. Foster mom is cool and listens to Jesse. Jesse’s birth mom never appears in the movie, and it is made a big deal that she basically abandoned Jesse to Foster Care. But Jesse doesn’t give up hope for her. And everyone else is basically telling him to give up hope for her. Like??? The fuck??? Who tells a kid that??? Point blank aggressively that his mom isn’t fucking coming back and abandoned him?? You ass you’re a case worker you Don’t talk to a child like that! The kid was abandoned when he was 4-6, of course he is still going to be attached to the idea she is coming back! You don’t just push away trauma like that!

And then we get Glen. Fucking Glen. The Foster-mom, Annie, she’s chill and fun, but I do not like Glen. When the social worker came to drop off the paperwork for Jesse to stay in their care, Glen said it was more like “leasing” instead of “buying.” And yeah, Glen did try to bond with Jesse, like play catch and junk, but not good enough. In one full scene he implied that Jesse’s mom is never coming back (you don’t say casual shit like that to the kid), then got mad when Jesse came home late (gee I wonder fucking why), incorrectly told his wife why the hell Jesse was made (“I don’t know why the kid doesn’t like me” bullshit he got scared because of what you said), then they start fucking fighting about Jesse while Jesse overhears upstairs, and to add the nail to the coffin Jesse hears that Glen wished it was just back to him and his wife without Jesse. Like Fuck Off. I get you may be new at parenting, but the fact that you said so many bad shit so fast in one go, god you are such an asshole.

Back to the plot, of you know, protecting the whale. I thought that it would be, you know, environmental reasons or “protect the whales” reason. Not to say that the Other Sea World was perfect, they kept the orca in a dolphin tank for crying out loud. So it would be reasonable to think that they need to free Willy because he was slowly dying of depression or need to reunite with his family or something.

But nope, insurance fraud.

They need to save the Orca, and have their bond tested, because of Insurance Fraud.

Which weird, but also realistic?

I have no complains about the climatic end. It was fun, stressful, had heartfelt moments. My favorite line is the fact that there is no Theft Insurance on Willy, because it is something I specifically asked about literally 2 minutes before I got the answer.

And…this might be a moot point, but the movie cover is a pretty big fucking spoiler, if you think about it.

Final Thoughts: I liked the movie. Granted I was eyeing some of the tropes they did with caution and just Glen overall, but it was pretty wholesome. The kid is a troubled kid trying to find acceptance, there are good whale bonding moments which, while sometimes over-dramatic as hell, can pull at your heartstrings, and there was some decent emotions and acting here. It’s a good family film and something that I would recommend checking out. 

2020 Movie Year

Hi Guys!! It’s another start of a brand new year and I got some new resulutions for me to try out.

Last year, I made a resolution to try and blog Homestuck every day. And I feel I did that pretty damn well if I do say so myself. So now this year I’m going to do things slightly different.

My goal for this year is to watch one new movie each week for this year. With the help of my lovely Discord, I have a list of movies that I have NOT seen before. So each week, I am going to be gushing (or bashing) the movie in a blog post.

Given how that’s going to be a lot of movies, I’m gonna make stick them under “dafuking films” tags, so you can follow or ignore it however you please.

If you have suggests for any movies (and my Any I Mean ANY) join the Discord and throw it out there!

I can’t wait to get started! ^u^

Cats 2019

Hey. Did you realize that there is a trailer for Cats The Musical The Movie? Well I just found out!

PK

Hey Guys! I got another movie that I want to share with everyone!

PK! This is a hilarious Bollywood film that I highly recommend. It is about an alien who comes to Earth to explore, but he basically lost the keys to his spaceship and is now trapped here with us. When he asks for help, people respond with “idk, God only knows” so now he is on a quest to find God and ask him for his remote back.

This is such a funny movie. Because for the most part, you are just seeing him trying to navigate through different customs and religions. Example, when he first arrived on Earth, he was naked.

So then to blend in, he stole some clothes from “dancing cars” (I will not give that one away, that shit is hilarious)

But because he has no concept of fashion, you get him walking around like this:

It is the small things that make this moment. Because he is just trying to figure out how society works.

He sees a Hindu Woman dressed in White, and when trying to approach her he gets yelled at for bothering a widow in mourning (in Hinduism you wear white at a funeral). So he then saw a western bride in a white wedding gown, and expressed sympathy for her dead husband.

He learns that you give offerings at a Hindu temple, so he tries to give food to God at a Christian Church. The Church yells at him that it should be wine, so he then brings wine to a Muslim Mosque. WE get that there is difference, but he doesn’t. Which usually results in him getting chased.

When he finally does understand there are different religions, it becomes his mission to learn all about them so he might finally be able to reach God and get his remote. It is honestly his innocence that makes this movie.

He sees that Taxis are yellow to get people’s attention, so he wears a yellow helmet to get God’s attention. He follows every custom of every religion down to a T, even some religions you might not have known about (there are a ton of customs in India). He chased down a guy dressed as Vishnu (Hindu God) because he thought he was the god. He wears religious stickers on his face to prevent being punched, people people won’t “strike God’s image”. What PK does is he manages to take the information given to him, and apply it in clever ways.

Now while this movie does tackle religion, it does not insult or degrade them.

When I say to a T, I mean to T. There is a lovely montage in the movie where you see him trying to reach God by doing ALL of the religions. You see him in the middle of people praying, of different festivals, it is very beautiful to watch.

(Trigger Warning: In the montage there is a festival where men whip themselves with long knives - yes it is a thing - so if you want to watch it timestamp for that scene is 1:06:57-1:07:10 )

This movie is so fucking respectful of religion, even while poking fun at some of the unnecessary traditions it has, is amazing. Because the movie isn’t really focused on the religions, but how people treat and abuse it.

You know televangelists, where they ask people to give them money and basically con people in the name of religion? Yeah, that is the main target. Because PK never intentionally means to try and take down an Indian Televangelist, he just keep asking questions like “If my wife is sick why do I need to go to  different church to pray instead of being by her side” “if god really loves me, why does he tell me to give up money so he can love me more” and these are questions that undermine the Televangelist’s authority.

The pic above comes from my favorite scene in the movie. It is so charming and clever I dare not ruin it. But it go along with the asking “why” to the necessity of certain religions.

PK isn’t the only story being told. We also follow a woman named Jaggu who is a reporter trying to catch her Big Break when she meets PK. You see her life finding love while abroad in the cutest way possible.

Just look at that guy! I would love him too!

But there are family drama because she is Hindu (specifically that Televangelist group) and he is Palestinian. TL; DR on Indian history - family is prejudice on him for being Muslim (there is a lot more to India/Palestine than that, but that should be enough to understand the movie).

So you see her meeting up with PK, trying to guide him through human culture, but also answer his innocent yet hard questions about it.

Along with the comedy there are so many heart wrenching moments in here. Her being heartbroken. PK losing hope/faith for ever going home. I swear the biggest tear jerker is at the end, I could not stop crying over the emotional climax this movie had. Because it isn’t a battle of strength, it is a clash of religious ideologies on what faith really means.

For people who have not seen Bollywood before, you might get a little bit of culture shock from it, so I’ll give you the run down.

First, it is in Hindi. No getting around that. Luckily there are English subtitles so you can still get the jokes and what they are saying.

Second, Bollywood movies are LONG! Like, average 3 hours per movie. This movie is on the shorter side with it being 2.5 hours, but it is still a great watch. If you managed to watch Infinity War, you can sit through this.

Third, there are musical numbers. Bollywood movies really focus on the musical numbers. They can Literally make or break a movie if they are good/bad. Modern Bollywood movies can sometimes get away with musical montages (like the religious montage I mentioned before) but there ARE going to be song numbers. I think in total there were 4 in PK, and they do have a purpose in the movie for understanding the characters. Just keep that in mind so you won’t get too surprised.

Sum Up, I highly recommend this movie. It has so much innocence and care put into it, it is well worth the watch. You can find it on Netflix or Youtube with no problems so definitely check it out

Animal World

I have always wanted to talk about this movie. And since I am going to branch out, I have decided, “hey! Why not!” So I am going to make a super long post on why you guys should watch this movie

I found this movie while trolling though Netflix Foreign films. It is a Chinese movie I just clicked on it because, I was bored and had nothing else better to watch. 

And it is by far one of the strangest and most addicting movie I have ever seen.

So the basic plot is as follows: Young Adult Kaisi works an unfulfilling job trying to support his comatose mother in the hospital while having this on/off relationship with one of the nurses there. His friend gets into trouble with a debt he owed to a evil shadow organization, which is transferred over to Kaisi. To eliminate the debt, he has to play in a high stakes gambling game where you can win millions, get all debts cleared, but losers will die (or worse)

Sounds interesting/basic…but then it gets weird

First, here is the other cover for the movie

Kaisi’s job? He works as a part time clown at an arcade. But the clown is MORE than that. See, he correlates all of his anger (raw unadulterated rage) to be “one with the clown”. He seriously sees himself become a clown whenever he fucking rages and beats the shit out of someone.

And the movie definitely leans in on that.

The first 5-10 minutes of the film you see Shinobi McDonald running on rooftops and trains. You know, being as angsty and dramatic as a clown can get. But the clown has so much anger and frustration, just running around isn’t going to help.

That’s why the movie has this:

LOOK AT IT! It’s basically Sid if he reproduced in space. And he has friends.

There is a ton of these monsters on the train which our Mr. Anger-Pants here has no problem laying waste. I mean he flat out murders then, kills them off one by one in a strange, yet highly engaging battle sequence.

Too bad we never see them again.

No joke guys. We LITERALLY never see this clown/monster battle ever again. Kaisi makes references to the clown in the movie (cause again, that is the representation for his anger issues), but we never see the clown or anything like this ever again.

Instead we jump into Kaisi trying to deal with “containing the clown” while trying to survive and just pay his mother’s medical bills. His childhood friend is a nurse and his not-yet girlfriend. And it isn’t not-yet because any female-friend is the obvious love interest eventually. She does in fact love the guy, and wants to be with him. But he doesn’t want to marry because working as an arcade clown and 3+ other minimal wage jobs doesn’t really make a decent living here. So he wants to wait to be more financially stable before they marry. Something I don’t usually see, and totally appreciate.

But let’s get to the meat of this movie. The Gambling Game.

So after his friend couldn’t pay back evil shadow organization, Kaisi gets taken to the big boss here.

Micheal Douglas.

This is a movie made in China. I did not expect any white person to be in it, let alone Micheal Douglas.

And honestly? He is a great villain. He is in command, in control, not afraid to get his hands dirty (as shown above), and has the resources to support any/every fucked up sadistic desire he has.

He gives Kaisi 2 options. Pay back his friend’s stupidly large 6 billion dollar debt (I may be exaggerating, but the debt was in the billions), or join on his stupidly evil cruise ship of horror to play a life/death game where winners go free and losers die.

But see,this guy, for being a sadistic classical evil guy, is actually a smart villain. And it leads to some clever plot devices. Game on Boat? It makes sure that the “contestants” are completely isolated. No outside help. But my favorite are the ear pieces. Micheal Douglas does not speak Chinese, so how to get away with this? Everyone on the boat has an earpiece that acts as a translator. How cool is that? There are people all over the world on this boat, you can see an Arabic man and an Italian man speak their own languages and still hold a conversation. Netflix provides subtitles for all languages, so there is no need to miss out on anything. It just makes it seem more realistic instead of “everyone speaks the same language”

So on the boat, there is at east 100 other people there. Time to learn the rules of the gambling they are risking their lives on.

You ready for this?

Rock Paper Scissors

I am not joking. The entire movie is them risking their lives playing Rock Paper Scissors. I thought that it was going to be “Phase one” or a next round. But no, in this 2 hour movie, OVER HALF is dedicated to Rock Paper Scissors.

And honestly, it fucking worked. It is weird to say, but I was hooked on people playing rock paper scissors.

The specific rules are as followed.

They start with 3 Star Chips, and 12 cards (4 cards per R/P/S)

You need to get rid of all of your cards, while keeping at least 3 stars.

If you still have cards, or not enough stars, you lose.

There is also a handy counter to keep track of all used cards, and a timer to let people suffer about how much time is left.

So with these rules in place, Kaisi fight to survive in a savage rock paper scissors competition

This is a gambling anime. I swear to god this movie works like a gambling anime.

What makes gambling anime interesting? The strategies. You have so many people playing this game.

Some there to help, others not so much.

To win you need to have a plan in action for any situation. And Holy Shit does this movie deliver. I swear there is at least 10 different strategies used by our protagonist team ALONE! Counting cards, stacking cards, using signals, using statistics. It is amazing how they can adapt and change battle strategies when the next problem comes up.

This isn’t including the different ways the competitors play. Some use luck/random, but a lot play dirty. They also trick, cheat, whatever to get those Star Chips. 

But as long as it doesn’t break the rules, anything goes.

You need three to survive. But you can trade the stars for money, so many people go for the kill. And this screws over Kaisi big time, forcing him to start at the bottom of the heap and crawl his way back up.

Seriously, check this movie out! There are a bunch of other stuff I haven’t even mentions yet. The fact that Douglas’s henchmen look like default matrix men. The out of place car chase that goes ABSOLUTELY no where, but is shot beautifully and fucking entertaining to watch. The fact that it isn’t just death to worry about, since there the losers MAYBE be used in human experimentation. MAYBE. And this is just the TIP people! JUST THE TIP!!!

If you love strategy games, high stakes gambling, and weird ass action scenes, trust me. You want to check this movie out. It will not disappoint. 

Monte Cristo Kid Edition: Overall

It’s ok. Like the animation is really just do the least amount to get away with everything. So you would see them reuse the same scenes and animations over and over again. That was obvious from the beginning.

I don’t know why they want to make Monte Cristo for kids, but story wise it wasn’t bad. They took out plot elements to get to the core story that a kid could understand. Though I doubt kids would understand or care about stocks. So the differences, they took out one guy that got rid of Dantes, I’m pretty sure Mercedes had a son, and Montego was a hell of a lot more faithful to his family than the original. Guess they didn’t want to show that to kids.

this gets like a 5/10. It’s just there. The dialogue wasn’t bad, but the animation was trash. It was ok for me to watch, but I would not show it to kids. There is just a lot better movies to show them than this.

Movie 2: Count of Monte Cristo for kids

So this is just to blow off steam and watch shit movies for the hell of it. This one is an animated version of the Count of Monte Cristo I found on youtube. Its from the Collection for Children, or Fairy Tales for Kids (i’m not entirely sure). But if the thumbnail tells me anything is that this has the animation quality of a potato.So lets do this

Deep Blue Sea: Overall

This is a pretty entertaining movie, ‘cause it feels like a b-movie mash up of other movies. Jurassic parks/science monster films for the research labs. Poseidon Adventure for trying to navigate through the building underwater. And let’s not forget Jaws, the original Bruce itself.

In my opinion the side characters were the best, but most of them were always going to be shark food. For the main characters, they were trying to play on the mystery and danger, but honestly that felt really forced trying to make them fight against each other. Especially this bs “will they/won’t they” drama from Charter and Susie.

Sherman by far was my favorite, it could be because they gave him a personality outside of always brood or always sunny. Plus seeing him surviving by himself was incredible. He had two shark kills at the end of it all

Science wise the sharks looked really good. Outside movie plot science, they kept using true shark facts. While yes they do look CGI, it was as pretty close to a shark as they were going to get, especially for a 1999 movie.

And the scenic ocean shots, my god they were so well done. I mean, they just showed everything about this movie

So yeah, I would give this a 7.5/10 for being a fun B-rated action movie. Clever battle scenes, interesting explosions, and some fun side characters too

Movie: Deep Blue Sea

flamingfoxninja:

K so time for me to start this thing, because I’m bored, finals are coming up, and I need a break damn it.

So this first movie is called Deep Blue Sea, where sharks become monsters due to alzheimer research. Why, well we’ll find out

Great, first time doing this and I put it on the wrong blog