Reaction & Review | Justice League: The New Frontier

 

Welcome, one and all, to "Tales of the Longbox", here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, we're closing out this themed marathon by taking a look at an animated movie from 2008. That movie is "Justice League: The New Frontier".

The only thing that I can tell you that I do know about this movie is that it's an adaptation of Darwyn Cooke's mini-series from 2004. Not only did he write that story, but he also had a hand in writing additional material for this movie adaptation. Now, exactly what kind of material, I don't really know. But since I've never read that comic book, I'm basically going into this thing blind, and I'm going to judge this thing on it's own standards. So even if I knew what that additional material was, that's not going to stop me from giving my thoughts on the movie. I also know that this is only the second film that DC released in their line of direct-to-video animated films. So I'm gonna get a chance to see how they were able to handle their second attempt at this.

Now, I'm going into this movie with the highest of hopes. However, thanks to earlier this month, I have been proven that DC can stumble with these movies. Granted, it hasn't happened often, but "Teen Titans: The Judas Contract" certainly did just that. Because that movie sucked. So, there is a chance that "Justice League: The New Frontier" could also suffer the same fate. But I am still hoping for this movie to be amazing. And the only way I'm gonna find the answer to that, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Justice League: The New Frontier."

11 minutes later

OK, guys, I really like how Martian Manhunter is turning into whatever he's watching on TV. And one of the things he just turned into was Bugs Bunny. That was a really awesome reference.

19 minutes later

You know, guys...in the short time I have seen Batman on screen, the fact that he's being voiced by Jeremy Sisto is becoming, at least to me, one of the greatest casting choices I have ever seen play as Batman. This really is awesome.

1 minute later

So the government created a robot version of Gorilla Grodd as a distraction, just so that they could capture the Flash...OK. You know, even though it wasn't the real Grodd, it was kinda nice to see him being utilized here. Oh...and the Flash just escaped...still, my point about Grodd still stands.

9 minutes later

OK, I have a rather stupid question, and I know I'm probably not going to get an answer to it. So Hal Jordan is catching fire while he and his friend are entering Earth's atmosphere. I don't claim to be an astronaut, but if you're catching fire while entering Earth's atmosphere, wouldn't you be already dead from the horrible burning that's going on throughout your body? I understand that I'm probably asking a trivial question, but I am rather curious.

18 minutes later

You know, guys, I'm really sorry I haven't been saying a whole lot, but I'm really getting sucked into the story right now. This movie has been really fucking good, guys.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Justice League: The New Frontier". Let me shut the movie off...OK. Wow. That was a lot better than what I had anticipated. Guys, I'm gonna tell you this now, before I even get into this review. This is quite possibly one of the best Justice League movies I've ever seen. Now, do I think it's my favorite film out of DC's direct-to-video animated features? Well...I'll get more into that later. Right now, I need to talk about this movie.

The writing here is incredibly strong. Now, as I mentioned before, I have never read the New Frontier mini-series, but after seeing this, I am genuinely interested to know what they kept out in order to turn this thing into a movie. And I'm also curious to know what was added in here for additional material by Darwyn Cooke. Because if there is any one real flaw that I had with this movie, and I'm gonna use the term 'flaw' as loosely as possible, it would have to be the runtime. This movie clocks in an hour and 15 minutes. And in most cases, I don't mind that when it comes to these direct-to-video DC animated films. Because they usually do a solid job with the limited runtime that most of these movies have to work with. Unless you're "Batman: The Killing Joke", where the first 30 minutes had nothing to do with the actual Killing Joke story, and was just there to show an unnecessary sex scene involving Batman and Batgirl. But that's neither here nor there. Anyway, when it comes to "Justice League: The New Frontier", it's able to tell a really solid story, even with the short runtime. However, I do feel that some of it was either condensed, or had to be cut in order get the movie made.

As with our story, it's basically an origin story for the Martian Manhunter, the Flash, and Hal Jordan. In fact, the movie focuses a lot of time on Hal Jordan, because he gets the most development out of the three names I mentioned. It is a little bit weird seeing this, because I remember watching "Green Lantern: First Flight", another DC animated movie, where it basically told the origin of Hal Jordan becoming the Green Lantern. And I felt like I was watching the same movie here. However, I don't want you to take that as a negative, because that movie came out a year after this film did, so maybe this movie was sort of a testing ground to see what they could do with a Green Lantern animated film. Who knows? But anyway, it's still some really solid development. Then we have the Martian Manhunter, who spends 2 years in hiding as a detective, while trying to get accustomed to Earth and it's human inhabitants. And, oddly enough, the Flash is the one character who gets the least development. Because we mostly get to see him use his powers in action, but he doesn't really get involved until after the government tries to capture him, and then announces that he is retiring. It is kinda weird seeing this, because when I was thinking of watching an origin story with these 3 characters in particular, I was kinda thinking maybe we would get to see how Barry Allen became the Flash. Instead, we just see him in action as the Flash while the origin stories for Hal Jordan and Martian Manhunter get the spotlight. I guess maybe it was suppose be a set-up for when his girlfriend finds out that Barry Allen is the Flash through his announcement of his retirement. But still, I would've preferred seeing a bit of his origin story coming into play. Now perhaps maybe it was in the original New Frontier comic, and they had to cut out his origin story from the comic in order to get the movie made. I don't know. Maybe it wasn't even in the original story. Either way, it was still something I noticed. But, as I said before, none of these "flaws" are going to take you out of the movie, because you're going to get sucked into the story when the movie starts playing. Our characters here fleshed out, and even though Barry Allen doesn't get a ton of development, he is still used here very well, especially towards the final act in the movie.

There is one other minor flaw, and this is just me nitpicking here, but it was something that I brought up during the movie. So, we see Hal Jordan and his friend, Morgan, entering Earth's atmosphere in the rocket that they are in. Because it was originally being sent to Mars, along with a ton of nuclear weapons and bombs that were made to destroy all life on Mars. And it becomes, sort of, a fight between Hal and Morgan, as Hal wants to fly the rocket towards Earth, while Morgan insists otherwise, because he feels that they won't be able to make it, so he tries to commit suicide by activating the bombs and killing them both. And during this struggle, we see Hal Jordan being ejected out of the rocket, while still trying to hang on to it. Now from here, they enter Earth's atmosphere and Hal's suit begins to catch fire. My question in all of this is how the hell is Hal Jordan still alive? Again, I don't claim to be an astronaut, so maybe the suit is more flame retardant than I thought, but I would think that maybe catching fire for the amount of time Hal was on, he would be on the verge of death by that point. At least, until he is saved by Superman. I totally understand that I might be bringing up a trivial point, but I did think that it was kinda worth bringing up, so maybe I'm just complaining for the sake of it. Now, in terms with the rest of the writing, when it comes to the origin stories of Green Lantern, the Flash, and Martian Manhunter, we don't get a lot of screen time involving Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman. When I say that, I'm more leaning towards their backstories. However, I do believe this was intentional, because the story is not focused on them. You already know their backstories. Though in the case of Wonder Woman, her backstory changes from writer to writer. But in this movie, it looks as though they are focusing on the original Wonder Woman, so I'm totally fine with that. Anyway, the story is more focused on them coming together with these new heroes to take on a threat known as the Centre, which wants to eradicate all of human life, because it fears them. And as I said, you're going to be sucked into this story, because the writing is just incredibly strong, that any minor faults that this movie may have is not going to be an issue for you in the long run.

Now let's talk about the acting. The acting here is fantastic. And I want to give a special mention to Jeremy Sisto as Batman. Guys, I mentioned it back in my review of "Superman: Red Son" that I wanted to see other actors, specifically voice actors, do their own take on Batman that doesn't mimic Kevin Conroy's take on him. And while I enjoy Jason O'Mara's performance as Batman, as well as Roger Craig Smith, Jeremy Sisto as Batman is slowly becoming one of my favorite casting choices to play as Batman. He nails this performance perfectly. And if this is the only movie where he's voicing Batman, then that is a real shame, because I would love to see what else he could do as Batman. Maybe if DC wanted to take an older story from Batman's earliest days and turn it into an animated film, then I think giving Jeremy Sisto another shot as Batman would be amazing. But this is just me fanboying about possibilities that may or may not end up happening. Anyway, setting Sisto's amazing performance aside, everyone else turns in awesome showings, too. But then again, I have been watching these DC animated movies for the better part of several years now, and they've always had top-notch voice acting. Even in the bad ones that I watched such as "Justice League Dark" and "Teen Titans: The Judas Contract", the acting was still incredibly good. And this movie is no exception. So the acting is guaranteed to be generally amazing, and everyone in this movie did a fantastic job.

The animation in this movie is great. The character designs are really unique. And to some people who may have seen other direct-to-video DC animated films and have never seen this one, are going to notice the stark contrast with these character designs. However, you have to understand that this was during a time when DC was transitioning over from the Golden Age era of comics to the Silver Age. So, in the case of Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman, their characters designs are based off of their Golden Age counterparts. While with the Flash, Martian Manhunter, and Green Lantern, their designs are a part of the Silver Age. There are other DC heroes in this movie, but I couldn't tell you if they were a part of the Golden or Silver Age era of DC Comics. But regardless of which era they come from, all of them look uniquely designed, and the rest of the movie has some fantastic 2D animation. There is very little usage of CG in this movie. However, unlike my complaints I have had with other DC animated films that utilized CG terribly, it's not as noticeable here. So, I am willing to give DC a bit of a pass here with CG, because it's not as bad as it could've been.

The music here is really good. The sound-mix is mixed well. Ultimately, guys, can I recommend "Justice League: The New Frontier"? Oh, hell yes. This movie is amazing. And, as I stated before, this is one of my favorite Justice League movies that DC has put out in their direct-to-video lineup of movies. I would say it's almost as good as "Justice League: War" and Justice League: Throne of Atlantis". Now, I don't necessarily think it's better than those two movies, considering how good those movies are. But it's still an amazing film in it's own right. And if you are a fan of these animated films that DC has put out, then I would say go ahead and check it out. It's certainly worth your time, and I'm happy that I have finally gotten to watch this thing. Now, I should mention that the copy of this movie that I own is the two disc Special Edition. And on the second disc, it comes with 3 bonus episodes of "Justice League". So, I'm gonna go ahead and watch those, because I never got around to watching the Justice League cartoon. I only watched "Justice League: Unlimited". So, I'm gonna get a chance to see what these episodes are like, because the movie itself was worth the purchase. And I'm pretty sure these 3 episodes are only going to solidify that.

And, with that, guys, we come to the end of "Tales of the Longbox" for Reaction & Review. And I'm pretty fucking happy that I got to cover two months worth of comic book related movies for this series. And I do hope I get to do another one of these marathons sooner rather than later. But anyway, with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Captain America

Welcome, one and all, to "Tales of the Longbox", here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be covering a film from 1990. That movie is "Captain America".

I'm gonna be straight up with you guys, I'm not really the biggest fan of Captain America. I just never found the character, himself, to be very appealing to me. I mean, OK, punching Hitler in the face sounds awesome, and it totally is. But that's not really enough for me to get invested into the character. In fact, out of the entire Avengers team, I find both he, and the Hulk to be the most boring heroes. However, I am going to give Cap a chance here by taking a look at his outing from 1990.

Now, I've only seen one Captain America movie. And I mentioned it before when I covered "Iron Man 2" a month ago, but the only one that I watched was "Captain America: Civil War". Which was OK, but definitely not as great as everyone made it out to be. Now, you're probably wondering why I'm not covering the Captain America movie from 2011, or that really obscure made-for-television movie from 1979? Well, this one I actually had some mild interest in checking out for about several years now, because I have seen footage from this movie, and it looked like it might be a campy, sorta cheesy film. And I do kinda like those movies. Now, the difficult part about watching this movie was trying to find a physical copy of it. I looked at all of my local video stores, and not a single one of them was carrying it. However, I did discover some time ago that this movie is on YouTube, so I'm gonna be watching it off of there. Mainly because, this is the only copy of it I could find online.

So, I'm gonna be hoping for the best on this one. And who knows? If I end up liking it, I may end up watching more Captain America movies. But the only way I'm gonna know if I will end up liking this thing or not, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Captain America".

12 minutes later

So, wait a moment here. So this cafe has a secret entrance to an underground laboratory? I'm not even gonna question how that makes any sense, but I would never expect a cafe of all places to have a secret underground laboratory, where it looks as though they are conducting the Super Soldier experiment onto Steve Rogers. That is just kinda odd.

12 minutes later

So, let me see if I understand this. Cap had a tight grip on the Red Skull's arm. Instead of just cutting Cap's hand off with the knife that he pulled out, he instead uses it to cut his own hand off, just so he wouldn't be caught with Cap as soon as the rocket launches...OK. I have a question. Why didn't the Red Skull just cut off Cap's hand? I totally understand that it probably wouldn't affect Cap, because he was injected with the Super Soldier serum, but I still would've at least tried to do that, instead of just cutting off his own hand first. That, to me, just comes across as a little bit stupid on the Red Skull's part.

8 minutes later

OK, I have a bit of a stupid question. Are they gonna attempt to explain, at all, about why the Red Skull's makeup looks different than how he did back when he had cut his own hand off during Captain America's launch? I understand it's still kinda early in the movie, but just seeing the Red Skull's makeup look different than how he did decades ago looks a little bit off-putting to me.

7 minutes later

OK, I know that this is a trivial point to be bitching about, but who the fuck rides motor bikes in the woods? It just looks very unsafe what with all of the trees in the way. Plus, Cap's not very fast and is probably still feeling the effects of being frozen for many decades. I think you could find something less dangerous to pursue him with. Oh...and they're already out of the woods. Well anyway, I understand that I was, probably, complaining about nothing. But I still would use a little bit of common sense before resorting to using motor bikes, you know?

4 minutes later

OK, that was kinda funny. Cap just pretended to be sick so that the guy could pull over and let him out of the car. Which, in turn, Cap steals his car and drives off with it. It was sort of a dick move, but it was still kinda funny.

16 minutes later

Wait, wait, wait! So, the diner Steve Rogers went to all these decades ago still has the underground laboratory? I mean, OK, it looks pretty much desolated, but you mean to tell me that NOBODY else discovered this hidden laboratory within the time Captain America was frozen in Alaska? What sense does that make?! I'm sorry, guys, but that's just incredibly mind-boggling to me that nobody else discovered this hidden laboratory that Steve Rogers knows about. That's just...wow, that's incredibly stupid.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Captain America". Let me shut the movie off...all right. Well, I can start by saying that the movie was actually pretty good. Mind you, now, the movie isn't great, but it's still watchable. I may as well start with writing.

You may have noticed that I asked a lot of questions that went on in this movie, and some of it is going to stick out at you, if you go into it like I did. For instance, and perhaps the biggest one for me is, how the hell did nobody discover this secret laboratory that was, apparently, hidden at this diner all of these decades while Captain America was frozen in Alaska? You would think that, during that time, someone would discover it and ask a ton of questions. Or perhaps when the cafe was being remodeled, nobody decided to take down the coat hangers that were used to reveal the secret entrance to this underground laboratory and just decided to cover it with a women's bathroom. I'm sorry, guys, but I'm pretty sure that if you're trying to remodel an establishment, such as a diner, then I don't think covering something up that would seem as trivial as a coat hanger would be necessary. The most logical thing to do when remodeling is you want take this stuff apart and start from scratch. I understand that I'm putting way too much thought into that, but that's something that kinda bothered me a bit.

Now, the other question I had, well two technically, involves the Red Skull, the main villain of the movie. First thing I wondered was that when Captain America was strapped to a rocket and the Red Skull got close to him, Cap was able to grab his arm and keep the grip tightened so that he and the Red Skull would fly together as the rocket launched. Instead, Red Skull just decides to cut his own arm so that he wouldn't be a potential victim along with Cap. I was wondering why exactly he didn't think of cutting Cap's arm off in the first place. And I did admit that it probably wasn't going to work because of the Super Soldier serum that was in Captain America, and that it would just bounce off him like rubber. At least, that's my theory on that, anyway. But that's really just a minor issue that didn't affect me too much. But the bigger issue involving the Red Skull has to do with his face. Now, right at the beginning of the movie, we get to see Red Skull's origin, as he was taken as a young boy by the Nazis, who end up killing his entire family. In which, they use him to turn into their own Super Soldier. Then, as an adult, we get to see his face as the Red Skull. But then later, after he cuts his hand from Captain America's grip, we don't get to see him again until the 1990's, in which we get to see him lose most of the redness on his face, which makes him look less like the Red Skull and more like he has some horrible skin disease on his face. Why exactly does he look more like he has a skin disease and not like the Red Skull? My original thought was that because he cut his hand off, that somehow affected his skin and made his face lose the redness that makes the Red Skull's look iconic. But we later see him with a second hand, so he must've gotten it replaced at some point. By the way, that point is never brought up again about his cut-off hand. Which leads me back to my point about hoping that the movie would explain why Red Skull's face looked different after the years that Captain America got frozen in time, but shockingly, the movie doesn't really explain that. Instead it's just more about him and his plan involving to become the next President of the United States by kidnapping the President, and using some sort of drug to be able to control him to do it. Now admittedly, since I'm not a fan of Captain America, I don't really have a ton of knowledge on the Red Skull. So I don't know if this has happened in any of the comics, TV shows, or movies that he was in. But if not, then it was kind of a strange way to keep the Red Skull like this throughout the entire movie.

So, as you can tell, the writing here is a little bit clumsily written. And I will say that if you think about those issues involving the Red Skull or why no one ever discovered the hidden laboratory during the many decades of Captain America being frozen in time for too long, then you might end up despising this movie. But really, those issues are still very minor in the long run, because the movie is still pretty good. Our characters here are developed very well. And I'm happy to say that Captain America isn't just some generic-looking super hero. He does have a very solid backstory, and his character is really likable, for the most part. There are a couple of moments where he is somewhat dickish in where he ends up asking whoever is driving to pull over because he pretends to feel sick. And when they do, he ends up running towards their car and stealing it. The first time, I didn't mind it as much, because it was kinda funny. Though the second time where he abandons the daughter of Bernie, his lover from back when. Now that, to me, seems a bit lazy and kinda stupid, because I never would imagine Cap stealing someone's car in that kind of fashion. Especially twice, for that matter. But aside from those moments, his character is still rather likable, so I'm not gonna harp on the movie too much on those points.

Now let's get to the acting. The acting here is OK. Nothing about it is going to be memorable in any way. But for what it is, the acting here is decent. I do need to talk about Scott Paulin's performance as the Red Skull for a moment. Because honestly, he's the only actor that I can recall that turned in somewhat of a flimsy showing. Because it sounds like he was trying to put up a German accent, but for whatever reason, it seems to keep disappearing at times. And it's kinda noticeable, especially when you consider that the actor who played the Red Skull is American. Now, I'm not saying that he couldn't pull off another accent simply because he's American. I even mentioned Roger Craig Smith's performance as Batman, when I covered "Superman: Red Son" last month, and he was able to pull off a Russian accent very well. Here though, Scott's German accent doesn't seem to work all that well, and I honestly think he could've polished that accent better to make it sound like he was German. As I already mentioned, the acting here is OK. None of it is great, but it's certainly nowhere near the worst thing I've heard. In fact, I could even say that some of the acting could be seen as laughable. But even so, the acting here is passable, so I'm not gonna keep beating on the same point too much there.

Now we get to the special effects. In terms of makeup effects, they're great. And I'm mainly talking about the makeup on the Red Skull. Because when you first see him, he looks amazing, and I still don't know why the movie went away from that design later on, but again, I'm not gonna touch that point any longer. But anyway, he looks really intimidating, and that was some awesome stuff. Speaking of which, there was also one point in the movie where there was a mutated rat that had the Red Skull's look, and it was also in stop-motion. And the stop motion on the rat looked really good, for like, the one shot that it was in. But anyway, the design on the rat looked awesome, too. So, makeup effects are awesome. Most of the special effects in this movie are rather decent, save for one shot, where we get to see the President as a kid, as he's taking a shot of the White House with his camera. And after he takes a shot, we get to see him looking up at the rocket where Captain America is strapped onto. And when Captain America's jerks the missile with his feet, it flies over the kid, and the White House, too. And that effect looked really poor, even for the standards set by 1990. But aside from that, the special effects are pretty decent. More-so for the makeup effects and than the actual effects. I want to touch upon Captain America's costume for a moment, and say that the costume itself looks mostly good, save for the little white wings on the head of the costume, because it looks as though as it's made out of really cheap rubber. And I totally understand that this was the classic Captain America costume, but it still looked a little bit off to me here. But aside from that, the costume looks really good, especially for 1990 standards.

Camerawork here is pretty good. I will say that the editing is a little bit sketchy at times, but since it's very minor, I'm not going to dwell on it too much. The lighting is well lit. Sound-mix is mixed mostly well. Music is sort of a mixed bag. The score had, like, one music track that repeated several times, and it was kinda noticeable. The songs mostly suck. But then again, I'm not a fan of most sappy sounding music. So it's just something that you have to take for granted. But otherwise, the score is, at least, serviceable.

Ultimately, guys, can I recommend "Captain America"? Kind of, yes. The movie is flawed in a couple of areas with it's writing, but the story is still interesting enough to warrant viewing at least once. I'm not totally sure if I could recommend a purchase, but if you are a fan of Captain America, and you've never had the chance to see this movie, go ahead and check it out. It's on YouTube right now, at least at the time I'm writing this Reaction & Review. And if you enjoy it enough, then go ahead and buy it. As long as it's cheap. I'm not totally sure if I would buy it myself, after watching this. But I will say that the movie was still entertaining, and it certainly made me a little bit more interested in the Captain America character. So I can give the movie that much.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.

Reaction & Review | City Hunter

 

Welcome, one and all, to "Tales of the Longbox", here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm taking a look at a Hong Kong action comedy from 1993. That movie is "City Hunter".

Now, I saw a clip of this movie on YouTube last year. And the clip involved Jackie Chan and some other guy, as they were both dressed up as Chun-Li and Ken from Street Fighter, while fighting each other in the style of Street Fighter. And ever since I saw that clip, I was interested in checking out this movie just to see what the context was behind that scene. And since this movie is based on a Japanese comic strip, I can count it as part of "Tales of the Longbox".

Now aside from that one clip that I watched, the only other thing that I can tell you about this movie is that it stars Jackie Chan. And I can also tell you that I've never read any of the books, or seen the anime of "City Hunter". So, I don't even know if this movie is loyal to the source material it's adapting from. I can also tell you that 20th Century Fox published this movie. And the only other time that I can recall Fox putting out a movie based off of an anime was "Dragonball Evolution". And most people know how that turned out. Now, mind you, I did watch "Dragonball Evolution", and I thought it was OK. It wasn't great, but it certainly wasn't as horrible as everyone made it out to be. Then again, I'm not a huge fan of "Dragon Ball" to begin with, so I went into it with low expectations.

But unlike my experience with "Dragon Ball", I literally have no idea what to expect from this movie, outside of that one clip I watched. And if this movie turns out to be any good, I may have to check out the books and find some episodes of the anime. But the only way I'm gonna know how good or bad this can be, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "City Hunter".

5 minutes later

So, our main character, City Hunter, is still asleep, all the while laying on top of the car that his partner is driving. I totally understand that having a dream where he's in a pool, while surrounded by a bunch of beautiful women sounds awesome, but dude, there's a time to wake up and realize where you are. That, to me, guys, just takes over-sleeping to the extreme.

9 minutes later

You know, guys, even though the dub for this movie is a little bit lacking right now, I will say that the stunt work in this movie is awesome. This is some really creative stunt work. And I am certainly hoping that the dub will improve as the movie goes on.

13 minutes later

So, upon seeing one of our female detectives, whom was trying to flirt with City Hunter, mind you, he sees her breasts as hamburgers, and her arms and legs as pieces of chicken. I get that he's still feeling the effects of the ship horn from earlier, but it's still kinda messed up, especially when he was actually trying to get a bite out of her hamburger breasts.

4 minutes later

OK...we're in a musical now...? And it would probably sound better, if this singing, and the song in general, didn't flat out suck balls. You guys can't hear this for obvious reasons, but this song really sucks. Mind you now, the music in this movie has been fantastic. But this song here is kinda bringing it down slightly.

15 minutes later

Well, guys, I just learned something new today. City Hunter really sucks as a physical fighter. But unless he sees a Bruce Lee movie playing, then he starts kicking ass...sure. Why not? I'm willing to roll with that.

4 minutes later

Wait a second here. So it took this long for Shizuko to recognize that it was City Hunter who was with her, despite the fact that she saw him earlier after she was approached by him at a park, and again, after she was taken hostage by one of the terrorists. How dumb is this bitch? You mean to tell me that she didn't recognize his face, despite seeing him twice beforehand? I'm sorry, guys, but that just comes across as really stupid to me.

15 minutes later

All right, that was fucking hilarious. Instead of falling for this female detective's looks, this random terrorist literally beats the shit out of her. I understand that it makes me sound like a terrible person, but the fact that it just came out of nowhere makes this scene all the more funny. It was dark, but funny as hell.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "City Hunter". Let me shut the movie off...OK. Where do I even start? Well, as I have stated earlier, I have never read any of the "City Hunter" books, or even seen any of the anime movies or TV shows. And because I haven't, I don't even know if this thing was even half loyal to whatever it was adapting from. But I will say that the movie was pretty good. It has it's problems, but I'm gonna explain why some of it can be overlooked.

The first thing I need to talk about is the humor. Since this movie was advertised as a comedy, it would be beneficial if I talked about the comedy in this movie. Because this movie does not, if rarely, ever takes itself seriously. And the few bits of serious moments are more played for laughs. Some of it is pretty funny, other times it kinda falls flat. And then there a couple of moments where the jokes have some level of context. And I'm not just talking about the scene where City Hunter is fighting some of the bad guys in the style of Street Fighter. One of them I mentioned is way late in the film, where some of our side characters are trying to out-maneuver one of the terrorists. And, I believe, one of the female detectives tries to seduce him with her looks, but it ends up backfiring as he physically beats the shit out of her. Now, by itself, it was funny as hell. At least, to me, it was, because I am a fan of dark humor. But there is a reason why he did that. And I'm not gonna go too deep into it, on the off chance you want to go and see this movie for yourself. But I will say that the end result is a moment of clarity, where you will know what the context was and understand why the terrorist beat the shit out of one of the female detectives.

While I'm on the subject of humor, it's a little bit all over the place. Because there are a ton of jokes involving sex, food, and lots of physical and slapstick humor. And this movie makes it clear to the viewer that you're basically watching a live action cartoon. And if you're expecting this movie to have one serious moment, it doesn't have very many of those. Because this movie knows what it wants to be, and it stays that way throughout the 99 minute runtime. This movie always has something different going on with it's comedy, and it doesn't let up on it. That being said, this movie does have it's problems. The biggest one has to do with it's pacing. Because this movie drags on at certain points. One of the biggest examples I can think of is the final showdown between City Hunter and the movie's villain, MacDonald. The fight itself drags on for far too long. Partially because the movie was trying a bit too hard to space the comedy out during the fight. Now, some of it was kinda funny, but the movie did not need to drag it's final fight for that long. And I totally understand that you want to have a big final showdown between the main hero and the main villain, especially in an action movie, but still, you could've totally shortened the fight some and it would've been a little bit better.

As for our characters, a lot of them are not ultra deep. But as I mentioned before, you don't necessarily need it when making an action movie. The only ones I can recall by name are City Hunter, which is Jackie Chan's character in this movie. I want to touch upon that for a moment. Because as I was reading the back of the DVD case for this movie, it states the main character's name as Ryu Saeba. But for whatever reason, the movie decides to call him City Hunter. So why bother even mentioning a different name for our main character if you're not gonna call him that throughout the movie? I don't know if it was because of a translation issue, or an issue involving the dub, but whatever the case may be, it just seems weird to me that the movie just kept calling him City Hunter instead of just Ryu. But that's honestly a minor issue, so I'm not gonna get too deep into that. Then we have Kaori, who is City Hunter's partner and has a love interest for him. It's a little bit weird there, because she was being taken care of as a child by him from his former partner, so to see her having a love interest for him, even as an adult, just comes across as a little bit off-putting to me. And then we have Shizuko, who ran away, and her father, who is the head of a Japanese newspaper, assigns City Hunter to look for her and bring her home to safety. One point I want to bring up regarding that is when City Hunter first finds her at a park, and when he tells her to come with her, she goes to one of the skateboarders and tells him that City Hunter was trying to molest her. Now, that's not the issue I had. Yeah sure, lying to him that City Hunter was trying to molest her was kinda stupid on her part, but that's not really much of an issue. The issue comes later when she encounters him again in the cruise ship after being held hostage by one of the terrorists, whom was disguised as one of the boat captains. After City Hunter rescues her from him, she asks who he is. And she doesn't recognize him until after a scene where City Hunter shows her a mini-computer that can scan for fingerprints and knows who it came from. And after he demonstrates it, she then finally recognizes who he is and slaps him. Mind you, she saw his face when he first encounters her. How the hell did she not pick up on that fact after being saved by him the first time? The very fact that she didn't recognize him then comes across as really stupid, and she should've picked up on who he was just by facial recognition alone.

But beyond those problems, the writing here is still pretty good. It's really the humor that is going to be the deciding factor here. And I'll talk more about that when I get to recommendations. Now we get to the acting. Now, I went into this movie, not knowing that this movie had two different dubs. There's the English dub, which is the one I watched, and the Chinese dub. And the English dub here is almost laughably bad. Now, when I initially when into this movie, not knowing that this was an English dub, I was wondering why Jackie Chan's lines were dubbed over? Because I know that Jackie Chan can speak pretty good English, so I was curious as to why his lines needed to be dubbed. Well, when I was watching the movie, I did remember that the movie was made in Hong Kong, and you had a good mixture of both Asian and European actors who, probably, didn't natively speak English. So I can give the movie some leeway there. I kinda wish that they had picked some better voice actors who could've done a better job, but as I said, the dub here is almost laughably bad, that you could go into this movie and have a fun time laughing at some of the kooky acting. For example, I didn't like Jackie Chan's voice actor at first, but as time went on in the movie, I kinda got use to the sorta shitty acting. The one actor who I thought did phone it in badly was whoever voiced Shizuko's father. Because the delivery of all of his lines are so wooden, that it actually makes him the worst actor in the entire movie. However, he only appears during the beginning of the movie, and again right towards the very end. So you won't have to put up with his wooden performance for too long. Overall, guys, the dub acting kinda sucks, but it actually makes the movie a little bit charming to watch. However, if you're not into movies with kinda bad dubs, then this movie does offer an option where you can watch the movie with the Chinese dub, so there is that.

There isn't a whole lot of special effects in this movie. I did notice one small thing, and you would really have to stretch it if you were to notice it. But it's during the scene where the characters are dressed up and are fighting as characters from Street Fighter. I'm not totally sure who it was, but I think it was E. Honda, where he was flown towards a wall by the guy dressed as Ken. The thing is though is that, during that quick moment, you can tell that it was just a dummy that they used. However, you would really have to stretch it to notice something as trivial as that, so I'm not gonna count it as a negative. Most of the special effects, outside of gun blanks, came from this Street Fighter scene, and most of them looked really decent, especially for a movie made in 1993, so I can say that the special effects, what few there are, are rather well done.

Camerawork here is pretty good, save for a couple shots that looked a little bit poor. And those come in during when one of the terrorists is chasing after Shizuko. She ends up on a tightrope, and as the terrorist is trying to pull down the rope to get her down, we get to see Shizuko doing some flips, but for a couple of these shots, the camera looks really blurred out. And I don't know if that was just for a visual effect, or if it was filmed poorly, but either way, it was kinda noticeable. The lighting is well lit. The sound-mix is mixed well. I do need to touch upon sound effects, though. Since I mentioned that this movie has a lot physical and slapstick humor, there are a ton of sounds effects that you will hear as though they came from a cartoon, and it can be seen as sorta distracting. But then again, since this movie is basically a live action cartoon, it kinda works here. Music, for the most part, is really good, except for one scene, and I touched upon it during the reaction portion of the movie. There's this one song that plays during the movie, and it's sort of a musical number, and the song is complete shit. Not just the song, but the singing as well. I'm not totally sure if it was Chinese, or Korean, or Japanese, but whatever the case, the song sucked, and it really stands out, when you consider that the rest of the music is rather good. But that one song was just awful, and it dragged on for about 2 and half minutes. So I can probably add that song to the pile of pacing problems the movie had. But everything else, in terms of music, is really good.

So, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "City Hunter"? If you are able to go into this movie, knowing that the comedy is nonstop, then yes, I can totally recommend it. However, if that isn't your thing when it comes to comedies, then I can't recommend it, especially knowing that the comedy in this movie can be seen as rather odd. But for everyone else, I would say go ahead and check it out. And after watching this, I kinda want to go and check out the books. I'm not totally sure which ones I should start with, but I'll worry about that once I eventually find them. Right now, I kinda want to go and watch another comedy. And seeing as how I got into this thing because of the Street Fighter scene, I think I'm gonna go and watch the "Street Fighter" movie from 1994, because I absolutely adore that thing.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Teen Titans: The Judas Contract

 

Welcome, one and all, to "Tales of the Longbox", here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, we continue the 2nd month of this themed marathon by taking a look at an animated movie from 2017. That movie is "Teen Titans: The Judas Contract".

Normally, guys, whenever I go into these sorts of movies put out by DC, I usually have some level of optimism. Because I generally do like a majority of these direct-to-video animated films that DC puts out. There are a few exceptions to this, but for the most part, I do enjoy most of these movies. But this one I'm having a little bit of doubts on, and there's a couple reasons behind it.

The first one is that I'm not a huge fan of the Teen Titans. I tried to watch the TV show from the early to mid-2000's, and I just could not get into it. I never found the Titans, themselves, to be interesting, with the one lone exception being Cyborg. Everyone else I just thought were a bit shallow and lifeless. Now, mind you, I'm basing my thoughts on the cartoon. I'm pretty sure they were much different in the comics, so who knows? I also watched a little bit of "Teen Titans: Go!" on Cartoon Network. And the few episodes I watched were OK, but again, it wasn't really my thing. I have noticed, however, most people seem to bitch about that show because it wasn't what they wanted. It wasn't like the show that they grew up with from back then and still don't seem to grasp the concept that the show is aimed for younger children. But then again, those are just man-children bitching about a cartoon show. So, I don't have to deal with their bullshit here. And, on the off chance anybody asks me, no, I'm not gonna be covering the two "Teen Titans: Go!" movies. Because, as I just said, I'm not gonna be wasting time with fanboys who continue their bullshit crusade against a cartoon show that wasn't meant to be taken seriously.

The second reason I'm not looking forward to this movie as much as I should is because this movie is, technically, a sequel to another DC animated film known as "Justice League vs. Teen Titans". A movie that I thought was OK, but it certainly was a huge downgrade in quality from the other DC animated films that I've watched. Now, I wouldn't call it the worst DC animated film. That honor, at least to me, goes to "Justice League Dark". But still, it's definitely not as good as it should've been.

Anyway, I'm hoping that this movie will be a step-up from the previous film. And considering that the Titans are not saddled with the Justice League this time around, maybe having their own movie will benefit them. But the only way I'm gonna know the answer to that, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Teen Titans: The Judas Contract".

12 minutes later

You know, guys, I totally get that they're trying to make Beast Boy's jokes about posting stuff online funny, but it really isn't working. And I kinda wish this movie would knock that shit off, because it's getting a little old at this point.

12 minutes later

So, wait a minute here. So this machine that Brother Blood created was able to make this guy supposedly immortal. Yet, just a few seconds later, he gets shot in the head by this woman and ends up being killed. So...why was he killed? Were the other captured people that were used to be absorbed into him not worthy enough to stop him from being shot in the head by a bullet? I'm gonna be honest, guys, I'm a little bit lost here.

14 minutes later

You know, guys, it's really weird to see Terra having some sort of a love interest for Deathstroke like this. And what makes it more weird is that Terra looks to be, what, 15? 16 years old? Whatever the case, Terra potentially being under-aged for someone who's about 3 decades older than her just comes off as really creepy to me.

18 minutes later

You know, guys, I was just thinking about something. So, we're seeing members of the Titans being kidnapped as part of Deathstroke's plan to get them together for Brother Blood. So what I want to know is, where is Cyborg in all of this? Didn't he join the Titans at the end of "Justice League vs. Teen Titans"? If so, then where the hell has he been during all this? I'm really curious, guys, and I don't think this movie is going to attempt to explain that, at this point.

15 minutes later

So...Brother Blood, after absorbing the powers of the Titans, also gains some of the physical attributes of each of them? It looks...kinda stupid. But...wait a minute, Damian Wayne has no powers, so how is Brother Blood able to absorb anything from him? Guys, the more I'm looking at this stupid transformation of Brother Blood's, the less sense it makes.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Teen Titans: The Judas Contract". Let me shut the movie off...OK. Well...I guess I should say that, going into this movie, I was really hoping for this movie to be better than "Justice League vs. Teen Titans", but it really isn't. In fact, I would dare say that this movie actually makes "Justice League vs. Teen Titans" even better. While "Justice League vs. Teen Titans" had it's fair share of problems, this movie makes those problems look incredibly minor, compared to what I just watched. So, let's start by talking about this movie, shall we?

As I mentioned before, I'm not a huge fan of the Teen Titans. And part of the reason is that their personalities were all shallow and kinda lifeless. And I was hoping that, because the Justice League were not in this movie, the Titans would be more properly focused. Well, unfortunately, that doesn't really happen. In fact, this movie carries on the same dull and lifeless personalities that were in the previous movie. The only small differences here is that Beast Boy is obsessed with the internet, because he makes constant references to shit like Twitter and YouTube, because he posts stuff there regularly. The only other character that kinda does something is the Blue Beetle, because we see him volunteering to be a cook for the homeless shelter, while also dealing with not being able to see his family because of his time with the Titans. I kinda wish the movie would've gone a little more into that, but it kinda just ends up being forgotten about, because we focus a lot on Terra. I'll talk about her in a moment. Then we have Raven, who doesn't have any kind of character development in this movie. But considering that she had her development in "Justice League vs. Teen Titans", I'm gonna give her a bit of a pass. Then there's Damian Wayne, who had barely changed since his time with the Titans, and is still the same pompous, annoying character he was in the previous film. Which again, makes his character development in "Batman: Bad Blood" almost non-existent, but I'm not gonna dwell on that here. And finally, we have Dick Grayson, AKA Nightwing, and Starfire. Now I know she was called something else in this movie, but since her name was completely forgettable, I'm just gonna stick with Starfire. And those two are living together. And that's about it. It's the same kind of characters, with the same dull and lifeless personalities as before. And I know that this may be seen as me being kinda biased against the Titans, since I'm not a fan of them, but I was still hoping for this movie to give me a reason to care about them. But unfortunately, this movie couldn't accomplish that.

Speaking of characters, let's talk about the only character that has any kind of development. Which would be Terra. Now, aside from Deathstroke, she's really the only character who does anything of substance, because she's brought in as a member of the Titans. But she's also working as a double agent for Deathstroke. I want to touch upon that for a moment, because I still can't get this out of my mind. So, we see her coming on to Deathstroke, while wearing a rather revealing dress. And it's so weird seeing her do this, because it looks as though she's about 16 or so, and she's coming on to Deathstroke, who's about 3 or 4 decades older than her. It's just knowing the age gap between the two is so incredibly off-putting. And what it makes it even creepier is that we get to a flashback to where Deathstroke saves her as a little girl. Now, mind you, we get to see about several flashbacks with Terra, as she's being branded a witch because she has all these strange powers, and that's fine. But in this flashback, after Deathstroke saves her from being shot at, he takes off his mask, and it looks as though he hasn't aged a fucking day since the time he rescued Terra as a little girl. And to see Terra having some sort of love interest for someone who is clearly much older than her is just fucking creepy, and it could take someone out of the movie, because of this creepy relationship. Seeing this, it actually reminds of a scene in "Batman: The Killing Joke", where Batman has sex with Barbara Gordon on a rooftop. And no, I'm not kidding about that. It was pointless then, and it's unnecessary here. Now, to this movie's credit, at least they didn't go down the route that "Batman: The Killing Joke" took. But that still doesn't stop this scene from being creepy and unnecessary as hell.

Now, aside from the characters, this movie doesn't attempt to explain shit. For example, we get a prologue at the beginning of the movie where it takes place 5 years before the events of this movie. And during this prologue, we get to see Dick Grayson, who was the Teen Titans leader at the time, Beast Boy, Kid Flash, and two other Teen Titans characters who I've never seen or heard of, rescue Starfire from monsters that attempt to take her back to her home world. Of course, after they save her, she eventually joins the Titans. I should mention that, after this prologue, we never see Kid Flash, or the other two nameless Titans characters again in this movie. Why? I don't know. Why would they introduce a batch of characters who are, probably, making their first appearances in this line-up of DC animated films, and not have them mentioned, or make another appearance for the rest of the movie? I certainly would've like to have seen more of Kid Flash, but no, we only have them to serve a purpose in the prologue and never have them mentioned or seen again, afterwards. And I probably would not have minded them not showing up again in this movie, if Dick Grayson or Beast Boy explained what happened to them after they saved Starfire. But no, they show up, and they're gone after the prologue because fuck you, that's why.

Another character that is missing from this movie is Cyborg. Now, I will admit that it has been well over a year since I last watched "Justice League vs. Teen Titans", but I could've sworn that Cyborg joined the Titans after the ending of that movie. Where the fuck has he been during all this? Because, I know he is a very prominent member of the Titans. Did he just suddenly go back to being a member of the Justice League without any explanation? You would think that maybe this movie would come up with some sort of explanation as to why Cyborg is absent from this movie, but no, there is absolutely NO mention of Cyborg at all in this movie. Guys, that would be like if you had a Justice League movie without Superman, and he was not mentioned, or brought up, at all during that time. If I were trying to come up with an explanation as to why Cyborg was not in this movie, I would say the Justice League called him up on a mission of sorts and requested his help on something. Granted, it's not much of an explanation, but I at least tried to give some sort of an idea as to Cyborg's disappearance from this movie. Now, I totally understand that I might keep banging on a trivial point, but I still think it's worth mentioning, because Cyborg's sudden disappearance just bothered the shit out of me.

One more thing I want to mention, in terms of writing, is when Brother Blood has the Titans captured. He has this machine that is able to absorb their powers and transfer them over to him, so he can become some sort of god, or some shit like that. And I mentioned it very late during the reaction portion that one of the members that he captured was Damian Wayne, AKA Robin. And as I recall, Robin does not have any kind of powers. So...what exactly did Brother Blood get out of him? If he got his martial arts skills, then that is stupid as hell, because he barely, if at all, uses them. And I was just thinking about this, as well. So, when Brother Blood had Deathstroke hunting down the Titans to kidnap them, one of them that was left out was Nightwing, because Deathstroke shot him in the water and left Dick Grayson for dead. So, and this is going to be a slight spoiler, they end up using Terra as a replacement. But what I was wondering was what would happen if Nightwing had been captured, along with the other Titans? Does that mean that Brother Blood would end up getting more martial arts skills, or something, from Nightwing? Guys, the more I think about it, the more that this plan of Brother Blood's sounds fucking stupid, and it kinda makes Brother Blood seem incompetent, especially when you consider that he's had this plan for centuries.

So, overall, guys, the writing in this movie is a fucking mess. And, mind you, some of the stuff I mentioned, such as Cyborg's disappearance, or the disappearance of the Titan members at the beginning of the movie, could be seen as overly trivial in the long run. So I will say that if you can turn your brain off, and watch the movie as is, then you might end up liking it. But seeing as how these details bothered me, I just couldn't find any enjoyment out of the movie's writing. Now, even though the writing here is incredibly flawed, the acting is great. Every actor was able to turn in some really awesome showings, especially when you consider the script that they were given was mostly shit. So, I have to give praise to all of the actors that were able to make this bad script work.

The animation here is stellar. In terms of the hand drawn animation, this is one of the better looking animated films from DC that I've seen in quite a while. And it really is one of the biggest highlights of this movie. That being said, there is another problem that I noticed when I covered "Superman: Red Son" last month. And that is the usage of CG. Now, when I mention the CG, I'm referring to anything involving cars. The cars in this movie look fucking awful when rendered in CG. And as I mentioned before when I covered "Superman: Red Son", it really stands out, especially when you consider the fact that the rest of the 2D animation looks amazing. And I really wish DC would actually render these vehicles better, because every time I see them in CG, it just shows laziness on DC's part. Now, beyond the problems involving the CG cars, the rest of the animation looks great. And I also really like the art style, too. But then again, most of it is what was carried over from "Justice League vs. Teen Titans", so it's to be expected.

The sound-mix is mixed well. The music is passable. There's one song that I remembered listening to during a small montage where the Titans were throwing a surprise party for Terra's 1 year anniversary of being with the Titans, and it kinda sucked, but seeing as how it was really short, I'm not going to knock on the movie's music too much.

So, when all is said and done, can I recommend "Teen Titans: The Judas Contract"? Personally no, seeing as how I'm not a fan of the Teen Titans. But, like I said earlier, if you're able to turn your brain off and just watch this movie for what it is, then you might find some enjoyment out of it. However, if you're not a fan of the Teen Titans, then I would just avoid this thing all together. This movie was just bad. In fact, I mentioned at the start of this that the worst movie out of DC's direct-to-video animated films that I watched was "Justice League Dark". Well, behold the movie that was able to surpass that. This movie, at least to me, is the worst animated film from DC that I've ever watched. And I know that it could be because I'm not a fan of the Teen Titans, but like I said earlier, I wanted to give this thing a fair shot. And unfortunately, due to all of the problems that I had with it, it was just too much for me to not overlook it, and it wound up just being a pretty bad movie in the end. Now...I'm gonna go watch a better DC animated movie. And you know what? I see my copy of "Batman: Mask of the Phantasm". I'm gonna go watch that, because I want to forget that this terrible movie ever existed.

Anyway, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all in the near future. Peace.