I am watching The Karate Kid Part II. It has not aged well.
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Posted by Daltons chin dimple on Saturday, March 6, 2010
I hadn't heard of Turtles Forever, but I checked it out just now and it sounds pretty awesome. I watched the first season of the 2003 animated series and thought it was pretty good, but I haven't had time to watch the rest of the show.
From the poster art it looks like the ninja turtles from the other dimension are the turtles from the original cartoon series. Is this true?
It is indeed true. The other dimension is the 80's dimension. Shredder, Krang, Bebop, Rocksteady, and the TechnoDrome all get pulled into the new Turtle-verse along with the 4 80's turtles. Later they go back for a bit and see April. They also go to the original Turtle-verse and meet the original black and white noir comic book turtles. There's even shots of other turtle dimensions, including the live action and CGI movie turtles! For fans of the original cartoon, it's a hoot! Highly recommend watching it on Youtube for fans of the original cartoon.
Here's the trailer. Seriously considering buying the DVD if it exists!
Two versions are on YouTube--a standard cut and an "uncut" version. I just watched the first twenty minutes. So far, they are overselling the goofiness of the original cartoon. They make numerous jokes at the expense of the original show and portray the original Turtles to be incompetent, careless, and unwaveringly light-hearted. The new Turtles are, of course, Super Extra Bad Asses, and the only one among the new Turtles who seems to be on their wavelength is the newer Michelangelo, whom they seem to be portraying as mentally retarded.
I'll keep watching, I guess. I need to find some way to occupy my mind while I copy drives and run Windows updates.
In short, the message so far seems to be:
"Look how lame that show was! Look how cool ours is in comparison!"
* * *
Get ready for some weapon spinning. Nothing says bad ass like swords, sais, staffs spinning improbably in people's hands.
So, not a fan?
I used to be a huge Ninja Turtles fan back in the day (I know, who wasn't?), so I downloaded the entire 80s series when I was in college with the intention of watching all 180+ episodes of it. To my utter disappointment, it was extremely difficult to watch a show I remember liking a lot and seeing my memory of it destroyed episode by episode. Needless to say, I stopped watching after about 20 episodes in.
The 2003 series was more bearable, but it was full of the teenage angst that "serious" cartoons try to sell to kids these days. I just kept waiting for Raphael to crank up his Linkin Park CD and curl up in his bunk with his headphones on. This annoyed me. Baxter Stockman played himself up as the misunderstood genius a bit too much for my taste, since he was just another mad scientist in the end. This also annoyed me. The weapon spinning that Goiter mentioned (I think he still has an axe to grind with the weapon spinning of the He-Man reboot from 2002) was also annoying, but not as much as the first point I mentioned.
What worked better in the new series than in the old one was the kind of plots that were presented. They often seemed to make more sense than the plots from the 80s series and the motivations for why certain characters did certain things seemed more plausible most of the time. The Turtles also seemed to have more defined personalities in 2003 than they did in the original series, in which they didn't get much characterization beyond the descriptions we hear in the theme song (What I'm saying is that there are actual attempts at character development in the new series). Even Raphael eventually deals with his teenage rage and grows up a bit, even during the first season.
I still haven't seen Turtles Forever, but judging by Goiter's response to it I think I'd be annoyed by it, too. I absolutely can't stand when a reboot/remake disses its source material. For example, I didn't care for it when the new Clash of the Titans dismissed Bubo by throwing him into the garbage heap. Even if the new movie were better than the 1981 version, openly claiming that the new movie is better than its source material is just arrogant and disrespects the source. The original Ninja Turtles were a product of their time - there's no need to give them shit for it. If you do that, you just set yourself up for the same kind of treatment twenty years from now. In my opinion, nobody involved with the 2003 series should have a reason to believe that the show they created is going to age any better than the original Ninja Turtles.
Meh, I got a kick out of it. I remember the original cartoon being goofy, so I wasn't really bothered by it. It was just great seeing all the old characters and vehicles on-screen again. And hey, even the new Turtles get their asses handed to them by the original comic-book versions.
I'm about halfway through the movie, and I think I've heard "What the shell?" three or four times. I'm certain I've heard "shell" used in "Hell"'s place at least three. Is this a hallmark of the 2003 series?
I'm sixty percent of the way through. The "shell" for "Hell" replacements are up to six. The Super Extra Bad Ass turtles just made fun of the Old School Turtles' April O'Neil for wearing a yellow jumpsuit. I figured that meant the Super Extra Bad Ass April O'Neil would be wearing a black leather jacket and bluejeans. When she shows up, though, she's wearing . . . a yellow fucking jumpsuit that was clearly inspired by Kiddo's Kill Bill: Vol. 1 suit (which itself was clearly inspired by Bruce Lee's Game of Death outfit).
And apparently, the Old School Turtles are so goofy, they're even annoying Super Extra Bad Add Ass Michelangelo, now.
Finished it. Final shell/Hell count: 7.
Some impressions:
They rag on the Old School Turtles for breaking the fourth wall (which they do a total of three times), but the entire movie is built around a fourth-wall-breaking conceit. At one point, they have to "outrun" their environment as it is being drained of color and turned into blue pencil sketches. It's an odd combination of Duck Amuck and the scene in The Day After Tomorrow where they outrun the big freeze.
There is a scene or two where the Super Extra Bad Ass Turtles do something they learned from the Old School Turtles as a kind of trade off for the constant ribbing, but it's pretty hackneyed.
When they visit the black-and-white world of the original Eastman/Laird Turtles, they go so far as to call it "grim, gritty," thereby perpetuating the longstanding myth that the original comic was "grim and gritty." Lots of weapon spinning. Lots of Frank Miller-like voice-overing. Of course, just like Super Extra Bad Ass Michelangelo loved the Old School Turtles, Super Extra Bad Ass Raphael loves the Eastman/Laird Turtles.
In the final battle, Super Extra Bad Ass Shredder pulls out two Sith quotes/paraphrases. 1.) "All too easy!" 2.) "Only now, in the end, do you truly understand!" (The first is a direct Darth Vader quote. The second is a paraphrase of the Emperor's "Only now, at the end, do you understand!") He also quotes the main villain from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Donovan) when he asks, "What is happening to me?" at the very end of the fight. Jumping franchises for references highlights, I think, the biggest problem with the writing for the new stuff. (I acknowledge I'm stepping out of my area of expertise, here, since I've seen very little of the 2003-era show.) The people writing this stuff are, I'm guessing, from my generation, or not far removed from it. They grew up in a Star Wars world that encourages hyper-referencing. I suppose I can appreciate the work that went into bridging gaps and paying homage, but it comes across more as paying lip service.
Most of the references are played for laughs, which compromises the sense of danger required to take it seriously. Of course, I don't think they intend to be taken seriously, so it's all fine and good. At the same time, this gives me nothing to hold on to, and little to enjoy. My Turtles (both the Eastman/Laird comic versions and the original cartoon versions) are misrepresented, which already has my feathers ruffled. The modern Turtles are pretty unappealing to me (in much the same way as the 2002 Masters of the Universe reboot was unappealing to me).
I think I have a higher tolerance for the original show than Mal Shot First. I can still watch it and enjoy it. It's harder to watch and enjoy them being misrepresented, even if it is for a laugh. (And it's easy to laugh at the original show without amplifying what was laughable about it.)
I'm zero percent of the way through it.
My thoughts at this point: none.
I probably should have explained that I'm not completely incapable of watching the 80s show. I still like it, but I think it would be very difficult to watch more than one episode at a time. In fact, at some point I might try again to watch the entire series from start to finish but keep my watching limited to one episode per day.
Mortal Kombat:Annihilation. Holy mother of christ. This is so much worse than I remember. The first Mortal Kombat was pretty bad, but had a few cool fight scenes and kept some of the charm of the game. This shitstorm has nothing to save it. The acting is horrible, the costumes and makeup- tacky and 20 years behind the times, and the fight scenes are PATHETIC. Half of them you can actually tell the actors haven't touched each other. I mean, wow. I like crappy movies, but seriously. This isn't even so good it's bad. It's just plain worthless. And the music isn't even cool. Which is clearly what Mortal Kombat is all about- sweet finishing moves and trippy house music.
I'm watching Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Super funny, but a little bit too much Jason Segal dick for my liking thus far.
Just finished watching Clue.
Adam54 wrote:
I'm watching Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Super funny, but a little bit too much Jason Segal dick for my liking thus far.
Mental Note:
Adam54 wishes Jason Segel had a smaller dick.
The Swollen Goi... wrote:
Mental Note:Adam54 wishes Adam54's dick could someday wind up in Mila Kunis and/or/especially Kristen Bell.
Fixed.
Don't get Goiter started on Kristen Bell!
Beyond Reanimator
Meh. Wasn't blown away by it, nowhere near as good as the first two. The pillow talk between the doctor and the reporter was annoyingly awful. There were a few good effects (I loved the druggie who shoots up with the reagent, explodes, then continues asking for more drugs), but not enough to hold up the rest of the film.
KingVoyeur
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Posted: 13 years 29 weeks ago
The original House on Haunted Hill
Eddie Izzard: Live at Wimbley
Dracula: A.D. 1972
Nosferatu (original silent film)
The Cat and the Canary (original silent film)
The awesomely 80's-ish Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles Forever
The House on Sorority Row
I think that's all I watched this weekend.