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Schizm said:
Ursula's vocal performance is one of the best animated character voices ever.
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I definitely have no beef with the talent behind the performance.
It’s kinda like MCU Tony Stark for me: I can appreciate the talent and effort of the performer and still think the character is effluent.
 
joshsquash729 said:
My biggest amusement with "historical inaccuracies" often comes from the hyper-masculinization of things and the downplaying of women to housewives or temptresses. Were soldiers back in X time period super masculine and terrifying? Of course, undoubtedly. But like Damien said- oftentimes they were also kinda notoriously big softies very in tune with their emotions, and a lot of times were hella gay, but that's something you won't see portrayed (or if you do, it's played or laughs or to telegraph to the audience that said character is villainous). In places like ancient Sparta, women often held just as much power, if not moreso, than men to some degree. A lot of societies back then would be considered "woke" by some folks today, and you know that if those places were ever portrayed accurately in a movie we'd never hear the end of it with some folks. As much as I enjoy stories like 300, I do have to wonder how much damage it's done by contributing to the toxic hyper-masculinity craze. That's part of why I'm excited for the Odyssey; I have no doubt we'll see plenty of buff dudes bein' cool, but I have faith in Nolan to at least accurately portray women as capable and well-rounded.
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I have, my guys, SO many thoughts on how we view masculinity through the historical lens. Basically everyone that looks to history through this ideal of AI-generated professional wrestlers with full sleeve tribal tattoos carrying massive axes is a fucking moron (or deeply uneducated at best). I think MOST people not living within the 'history book' sphere would actually be floored by what men were like historically in virtually every period and place they know about.

Blow someone's mind; tell them the (as far as we can tell) absolute truth that Spartan men did not actually do ANY training for warfare.
 
Personally, it's the difference between, say, The Spartans/300, versus the likes of The Odyssey or the tales of Jason, Theseus, or Perseus: the fantastical element. The former has basis in reality whereas the latter are legends, fantasies, so absolute historical accuracy just does not factor to me. Odysseus encounters gods and nymphs, he blinds a Cyclops! Meets Circe! Loses some of his crew to Scylla while trying to avoid Charybdis!

If someone wanted to do a film on the Peloponnesian wars then sure, I'd prefer a faithful depiction, however odd the true armour may look, and goofy painted statues in the towns and all. But a Greek fantasy flick, a war that ultimately happens because the goddess of strife and discord was barred from attending a wedding? Hell yeah, Rule of Cool.
 
Revox said:
Personally, it's the difference between, say, The Spartans/300, versus the likes of The Odyssey or the tales of Jason, Theseus, or Perseus: the fantastical element. The former has basis in reality whereas the latter are legends, fantasies, so absolute historical accuracy just does not factor to me. Odysseus encounters gods and nymphs, he blinds a Cyclops! Meets Circe! Loses some of his crew to Scylla while trying to avoid Charybdis!

If someone wanted to do a film on the Peloponnesian wars then sure, I'd prefer a faithful depiction, however odd the true armour may look, and goofy painted statues in the towns and all. But a Greek fantasy flick, a war that ultimately happens because the goddess of strife and discord was barred from attending a wedding? Hell yeah, Rule of Cool.
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Rule of Cool is very subjective. That's the issue. People say the same thing with the Vikings show. The problem is, I think the costuming in Vikings looks stupid as fuck at least 75% of the time. Maybe more. The real clothing/armour, in that case, would actually look better/cooler than what they ended up using.

This is also true of The Last Kingdom, which is one of my favorite TV shows ever. So again, I'm hating on the costuming but not as a way of saying 'that ruins the whole project and now it's just bad.'

There's plenty of very cool armour from actual history that actual Greeks used. I think the 'history crowd' would be a lot more forgiving if Nolan was like 'I'm going with Classical period armour instead of Archaic period armour because I think it looks better and most surviving depictions of mythological events are from the Classical period and actually show the characters wearing Classical-era equipment.' That's actually a totally valid and reasonable approach that I think would actually satisfy both sides. It's still ancient Greek armour, but it's also got a lot more pop culture appeal compared to the more obscure and therefore less 'accepted' in pop culture Archaic stuff.

A great example of this in action is Assassin's Creed: Odyssey (ironic?). It's FILLED with armour skins to choose from, which range all over the timeline of ancient Greece (and some pure fantasy stuff and some sci-fi stuff, but I'd ignore the latter for this point since that stuff is directly related to the AC storyline). There's legitimately a bunch of -awesome- armour sets in that game that would be fairly inappropriate for the time period the game is actually set and in some cases inappropriate to history generally because they're more of a fantasy-ized version of Greek armour. But it's beloved by history enthusiasts.

Edit: All this isn't to say 'you are objectively wrong if you are fine with the costuming as-is. It's more of a refutation of the idea, sometimes approached a little sideways, that the 'history crowd' that complains about this stuff is basically impossible to please unless you do 100% historically authentic material culture. Which just is not true at all.
 
AceofKnaves said:
I’m honestly mostly just concerned that Nolan gets the story right. The Odyssey is *important* to me. I was a Greek mythology nerd before I ever even knew what a comic book was. I just want to love this movie.
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I'm concerned, too. While I think Chris Nolan is immensely talented, he's another director I wish wouldn't write his own movies. He has exactly one screenwriting trick, and we're well past the point of diminishing returns.
joshsquash729 said:
I have faith in Nolan to at least accurately portray women as capable and well-rounded.
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Oh, do you have any examples of him doing that? 😄
Schizm said:
Wicked's first act is some of the greatest storytelling there is. Act Two has always been a mess. Timelines, character motivations, character endings - ugh.

I *really* had hope the second act getting to stand-alone would give them the opportunity to finesse, add and make it make sense. It does not. In fact, it kinda does the opposite - more time, less depth. Once Act Three of this movie kicks in, it's all characters being yanked to pre-existing character beats that make NO SENSE for these characters as already established in this story.
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I was a good husband and saw Wicked 2 tonight. I despised it. I despised the first movie, too, so don't let me sway you.

I have the same story critiques, in addition to 100 filmmaking critiques.
 
Awww I liked Wicked: For Good.
Not as good as the first one, waaaaaaaaaaay too much Glinda and she came of like a real jerk, my wife agreed.
But I actually like the songs in Act 2 and I dug it in general.
And Elphaba is absolute goth excellence, so
🤷‍♂️
Also Jonathan Bailey is so great.
 
AceofKnaves said:
Awww I liked Wicked: For Good.
Not as good as the first one, waaaaaaaaaaay too much Glinda and she came of like a real jerk, my wife agreed.
But I actually like the songs in Act 2 and I dug it in general.
And Elphaba is absolute goth excellence, so
🤷‍♂️
Also Jonathan Bailey is so great.
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Despite what it may seem from my rant, I didn't hate part 2. All Oz-related things hold a very special place in my and my family's hearts; I was just hoping it would better address the issues I, and many, have had with it from the beginning. There's just a lot that doesn't necessarily hold up to much questioning and scrutiny, but I know, I know- it's not really that kind of movie.

I'm glad they added things in general, but it still felt like there was plenty else they could've fleshed out too. But my qualms aren't with Ariana and Cynthia- both absolutely killed it in almost every conceivable measure. I've been on the Erivo Express for the better part of a decade now, and I'm so glad she's finally getting her flowers with the general public. It's a charming movie/story if nothing else.
 
I'm very late to this particular party, but on a whim I watched TMNT: Mutant Mayhem the other day. I had a great time with it. I'm trying to recall the last time I saw turtles media that focused that hard on the teenager aspect of them. I have a feeling there are purists out there that probably disliked a lot of the lore changes, but for my money they worked. Though the art style is obviously taking some queues from Spiderverse, I think the movie does manage to establish an adjacent style that works for its world. Once again I'm wondering why we bother to do live action superhero stuff when animation of almost any sort is just flat better for those adaptations.

I don't really know what the consensus was on this movie, but I enjoyed myself.
 
JakeEkiss said:
I'm very late to this particular party, but on a whim I watched TMNT: Mutant Mayhem the other day. I had a great time with it. I'm trying to recall the last time I saw turtles media that focused that hard on the teenager aspect of them. I have a feeling there are purists out there that probably disliked a lot of the lore changes, but for my money they worked. Though the art style is obviously taking some queues from Spiderverse, I think the movie does manage to establish an adjacent style that works for its world. Once again I'm wondering why we bother to do live action superhero stuff when animation of almost any sort is just flat better for those adaptations.

I don't really know what the consensus was on this movie, but I enjoyed myself.
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Oh yeah, that movie - and the follow up show - are fantastic. It's definitely not 'my' TMNT with the style and the lore changes and the focusing in on them being teenagers in an almost stereotypical way. But my TMNT never went anywhere, and I love seeing different versions of properties I love.
My son loved it too, which I imagine is the real test.
 
Absolutely adored TMNT: Mutant Mayhem.

I’m a weird mark for TMNT, though: I loved the early Mirage comics, loved the first live-action movie . . . fucking HATE the old cartoon. Like HATE HATE. Have tried to watch it many times and I just . . . can’t. Maybe I was too old? I remember being like 11-12 when I was “aware” of the cartoon, but I was watching tons of other cartoons at that time so I just don’t know.
That said: Mutant Mayhem is just wonderful. Love the younger read on April, LOVE the fun teen personalities of the turtles. This is one of the few iterations of the Turtles where I actually like Leonardo, and even Michelangelo who is always my least favorite. The fact that I love a TMNT thing where the Shredder doesn’t even show up is HUGE.
 
joshsquash729 said:
There's just a lot that doesn't necessarily hold up to much questioning and scrutiny, but I know, I know- it's not really that kind of movie.
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Nah, that is a very fair point and I don’t think *any* movie should get the excuse of “it’s not really that kind of movie”. There were absolutely a lot of narrative problems, and I personally believe that any film (especially a film with a hefty budget) has an obligation to give the most polished narrative possible, along with the best possible script and cast. I don’t think any structural part of a film gets a “pass” for anything but a massive lack of budget. There are things I will forgive in an indie film that are utterly unforgivable in, say, Avatar.

With Wicked FG, I was glad they fixed *some* things about Act 2. This one mostly ran on the strength of Erivo’s Oscar-worthy performance. I don’t “follow” performers so I didn’t know much about her before the Wicked hype started, but she’s easily the best performer of the role I have ever heard, and she was amazing in Jesus Christ Superstar as well. Like yes, her voice is excellent, but more importantly she allows herself to move past the mechanics and into actually ACTING THE SONG, which is something Grande is not so great at beyond strained faces and manufactured tears. That said: Grande is solid with comedy, which unfortunately for her was in short supply in this chapter. That’s where a lot of my complaints about the movie stem from: there were a lot of added Glinda moments that I felt were unnecessary, especially at the end. Also “The Girl in the Bubble” felt like a negotiated contract item (“Ariana must have a new solo if Cynthia gets one!!”) more than anything that actually expands the story/theme (like “No Place Like Home”, which I thought was great). There were some questionable high notes at several places as well that just didn’t sound great to me. Also: the poor girl looks like she is *dying*, her extreme emaciation scares the hell out of me. She’s obviously unwell, or at least did very sad things to herself to achieve that skeletal frame for the film, and I just worry about her.

And anyway, I just love Jonathan Bailey. From the content in the “Last Series Watched” thread, I’m guessing a lot of folks here aren’t watching stuff like Bridgerton, but I love it and I love him and it’s awesome to see him popping up in movies.
 
I thought Bailey looked like he didn't want to be there in this film. Yes, the character is in an unhappy place, but he just looked miserable to be there. He and Erivo have no romantic chemistry so that song didn't work. People were fist-pumping near me and I could not figure out for what. Speaking of Bridgerton, there's more heat in some of the glances in that show than this entire relationship generated.

I did like his performance of "it's UP that I fell" - 20 years, never knew that was the lyric. He could have used a new song, or maybe some added lyrics somewhere.

However, the to and from her hideout makes no sense - they never had a *conversation* before getting intimate and they could have done that while flying/walking. This was an area I really hoped would get more attention and it makes *less* sense onscreen. Her "wicked" at the end has zero passion - fell completely flat. I see people blaming the PG rating for the lack of heat, but this was just... nothing.

I despise Fiyero's "twist" and always have - why didn't the monkeys grab him like they later do Dorothy and carry him away? And then the guards could shoot him and he falls and Elphaba casts her spell? Watching his face, excited to fly for the first time - BAM - crash. That's enough to set her off. The audience would have been crushed along with her - and the lyrics of her spell make more sense - "Let his bones never break" - fits really well with someone falling from the sky. And she can't go back because since it's an ambush, there are bigger cannons firing after her.

Because of the lack of passion, "No Good Deed" feels particularly unmotivated. I did appreciate the switch of the opening "Fiyero!" scream to Glinda - that worked quite nicely. Also, these monkeys just got their freedom - why the hell do they immediately become subservient to another human, lighting (dangerous) fires, changing her clothes? Where did the clothes come from? And she's flipping and flipping and just - why? I don't feel particularly acrobatic in the midst of sudden grief (oh yeah - times two because Nessa also just died - I guess one flip for each?). Her performance felt like a performance - not like a psychotic break.

Also, the ending - his Scarecrow makeup was fine but they removed the blue contacts he's been wearing both movies. I hate contacts in movies (Elphaba's thankfully work because it's part of the whole look) and his have been such a minor change for no payoff - and then when she needs to recognize his EYES they have CHANGED. Utterly baffling decision.
 
More of a general comment, but as someone who works in musical theatre, I am frequently annoyed by how bad the plotting and character motivation is in most of them, and also that frequently the singers hired do not have the acting skills required. I go into most musicals just accepting that I’m going to be pissed about the libretto.
 
The only good musical I've ever seen was Galavant. Everything else can fuck off into the sun. But I also don't think the type of story generally crafted into musicals are the types of stories I get any enjoyment from.
 
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