Lurker > PrinceKaro

Garnet

Eiko

Outlier:

Inviso: 139
Evillord: 104
Plasma: 103
Ermine: 96
Johnbobb: 86
Suprak: 86
Mythiot: 79
Karo: 74
Red: 70

17. The Girl Without Hands

Plasma: 5
Evillord: 7
Suprak: 10
Johnbobb: 11
Mythiot: 12
Karo: 19
Red: 20
Inviso: 29
Ermine: 30

Total: 143

Plasma: Aside from some pacing issues, I loved this one. The art style lends a surreal atmosphere to the story, which is simple yet captivating. I love how the girl faces harsh obstacles, yet she perseveres and strives to protect her family. And despite all the horrible things done to her by her father and the devil, at the end she gives her husband a chance to explain himself and gets rewarded for maintaining faith in humanity. This movie has charm, sincerity, and heart. B

Evillord: A French adaptation of a tale by The Brothers Grimm with only a few minor tweaks. It's undoubtedly one of the most visually stunning movies on the list with its hand-painted outline look, to the point where even stills are striking to look at. I didn't know about this story before I saw the film, and it surprised me with how bleak it wasn't, after an opening that could have been a set-up for misery porn and its medieval unscrupulousness toward violence, excrement, and nudity. I mean the first scene has the devil take the form of a large man wearing only a cloak on his back, and he then crouches to speak to the girl's father giving the audience a clear view of his fat, swinging devil cock.
The girl without hands mostly gets by alright and there is a lot of good detail about just *how* she manages. This lends the movie some decent emotional range after how horrific the girl's treatment by her father was in the early scenes (he accidentally sells her to the devil but doubles down on that choice after many chances to back out), but the film remains tense throughout because the devil's promise to reclaim her is always in the back of the viewer's mind. I kept waiting for the final cruel twist of fate to seal her doom and wound up feeling pleasantly surprised when that wasn't what happened.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Johnbobb: I really love the distinct art style; it strikes me as a filmmaker/animator making the most of what was probably a very limited budget and really emphasizes the "old folk tale" feeling of the film. I was really into it early on as I'm kind of a sucker for sneaky devil deal fantasy stories. It very distinctly slows done quite a bit as it goes though, kind of dragging in the 3rd quarter in a way that a <80 minute movie shouldn't have time to. If a movie this short has this much time to dedicate to mundanity of daily life while waiting for the husband to come back, then there just needed to be more plot. Still, it's a very pretty film and one I'm glad I watched.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Karo: There's this woodcutter who is living in the idyllic countryside with his daughter, yet he still wants more. So when a mysterious stranger offers him riches, he does what any good father would do: he lovingly chops off his daughter's arms so she can be raped by the devil, and thus our story begins.
The first thing you notice is the unique visual style, which is astounding and beautiful. Now, in a short film, the style alone would be enough to carry it, but this is feature length. When you look at an animation technique for over an hour it loses some of its novelty if there is nothing behind it to back it up. Unfortunately, that is largely the case here.
Most of the characters are bizarre and hard to relate to, and the movie plods along with not a whole lot happening for large sections of the film. Not to mention there were so many scenes that were, for lack of a better word, fetishistic. Would you believe that projectile squirting of breast milk was something that happened on multiple occasions?
It just feels like the film is missing something more than a pair of upper body appendages, and I'm not sure I'd really ever want to see it again.

Red: When I saw the title of this movie I wasn't sure it would be quite so literal. But in the theme of horrible parents being prevalent on this list, she got one of the short sticks. Inadvertently sold by her father, her fathers says screw it and isn't content just to have her sold, but is willing to do whatever to make her an acceptable sale to a literal demon, including having her hands cut off. Its brutal, its horrible, and we get a whole movie of terrible things happening to her as a devil decides she just needs to die instead of being made unclean. Its horrible, but she does meet up with a couple good people and get an oddly happy ending.

Inviso: This wasnt grossly objectionable, but this was absolutely the kind of movie that was never going to do well for me as a viewer. At 75 minutes, it still feels WAY too long, because the pacing is SO slow. Every event in the film takes for-goddamn-ever to happen, and its not even told in an interesting art style. The whole movie is animated in this artistic sketchpad style, and the end result is characters that I cant invest in as a viewer, because I can barely envision them, given the choppiness of their designs in this animation. Also, the movie is called Girl Without Hands, but because of the animation, the back half of the film both treats her physical capabilities like she has hands, and the animation doesnt take away from that assessment. Hell, when she suddenly grows her hands back at the end of the film, its likeshe already had those, pretty much. Finally, the plot was just dull. This felt like a straight telling of a fairy tale, whichtheres a reason Disney had to add a lot of flashy music and animation, and happy endings. Fairy tales are not conducive to full feature-length animated films, and this movie proves it.

Ermine: Annnnnd now we get to the worst film on this list.
I'll just go ahead and say it. The animation sucks. Oftentimes it's difficult to even tell or see what's going on but that's not even the biggest problem with the film. I just hated the Young Girl. I don't even know how it was possible for a film like this, but god I hated her. And who the hell on the direction team thought it was a good idea to get their breast-squeezing fetish into the film. GOTTA SEE THE GIRL SQUEEZE HER BREASTS A BUNCH SO WE CAN SEE THE MILK SQUIRT OUT EVERYWHERE! Love that! Yeah yeah yeah love that so much. Seriously, go fuck yourself movie.
Also what the fuck was the point of the fawn? The girl has a baby with the prince and the prince goes off to war... and the girl can't give her baby milk because she struggles to hold it with her hands... okay... I mean there are ways to work around that, but sure.
But she REALLY wants to give milk so they get her a baby fawn to feed from her breasts... okay... that's fucking weird, but sure.
Oh! But now the other guy needs to come in and STAB the fawn to death... for absolutely no reason at all! OK? COOL!
Oh! And now the girl can feed her baby from her breasts.
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
What the actual...
???
HUH?
Why?!
Also why does this devil have such a hard-on for ruining this girl's life, it wasn't her who made the deal, it was her dad. Ruin his life instead. Because she's so pure! Yeah no.
Oh yeah, did we really need to see her and her son shitting? Why do these movies have such a hard on for nudity and showing this kind of crap (literally)?
One of the worst movies I've ever seen, and I've seen Flushed Away and Paranorman.

Outlier:

Inviso: 127
Evillord: 94
Plasma: 91
Ermine: 83
Johnbobb: 80
Suprak: 79
Mythiot: 74
Karo: 72
Red: 67

Ermine: I'm so so so incredibly disappointed that this is what we got for a red panda film. They are my favorite animals of all time and THIS is the shit we get with them? LIKE COME THE FUCK ON MAN! WHY IS MY LUCK SO INCREDIBLY BAD! Now we'll never get a cool animated movie with red pandas because it's "Already been done."
I'M PISSED!
*Cry*
Ugh, whatever. All of the kids suck and are unrelatable. It's ANOTHER generational conflict film because god we gotta have more of those. The mom was actually the best character in the film. Another positive, I enjoyed the throwbacks to late 90s early 2000s Canada, that was fun to see.
But yeah, I hate every single one of the kids, including Mei. They are all unbearable and completely unfunny in very way. I also... really hate the art style, it borders on revolting. The red panda design is disgusting. How do you take red pandas, who are so incredibly cute and ruin them like that. Sing 2 did the same fucking thing! They took red pandas and made them look awful. HOW?! HOW DO YOU RUIN RED PANDAS!?
Man whatever, I'm over it. This movie sucks.

Johnbobb: I get that a lot of people like this movie. I guess I even get some people thinking it's great. I am not in even the slghtest extent the intended target audience of this movie, and just truly did not care for it.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

18. Turning Red

Mythiot: 1
Karo: 5
Inviso: 6
Red: 11
Plasma: 15
Evillord: 25
Ermine: 26
Johnbobb: 28
Suprak: 28

Total: 145

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Karo: A young girl suddenly finds she transforms into a red panda whenever she gets worked up, which is a metaphor for either puberty or being a furry.
So her mom is this horrible Karen who obsessively manipulates, gaslights, and stalks poor Mei through every aspect of her life, leading to an especially atrocious moment where she has some sort of psychotic breakdown and very publicly humiliates her daughter for having a crush on a boy. This is the kind of thing that can scar a child for life so good job with mothering, bitch.
They try to make her sympathetic by showing how her abuse stems from the way her own mother treated her, and of course she has a complete turnaound into an undeserved reconciliation because this is Disney. I'm sorry, but this woman needs fucking professional help and I do not buy her suddenly becoming a calm and well balanced individual.
Anyway, more of her mother's bullshit leads to Mei panda-ing out in the middle of school and the other kids are surprisingly ok with this. I'm serious, everyone single person who goes to her school are complete and utter furries who desperately want to be her friend now and like everyone runs around wearing panda ear and tail paraphernalia in order to look just like her. Rad.
The plot is so simple, but that doesnt mean it is bad. Indeed just watching these girls living their everyday lives while they save up to see their favorite band and deal with spontaneous animal shapeshifting is infinitely wholesome and cute.
There is a joyful nostalgic happiness to the film that makes me enjoy it immensely, not to mention a main character who I identify with way more than I probably should. Even the soundtrack, which I thought was going to be obnoxious, is perfectly ok.
Turing Red is a return to the quirky charm that make Pixar dominate the 2000s animation scene, but without just copying the themes and characters the way Onward did. It is a very rare occurrence of a major animated feature being directed by a woman, and I hope this can break some ground because there is some mad female talent in the animation industry especially on the TV side of things.

Inviso: This movie is cringe as fuck, and I LOVE it for that. I cannot claim to have the life experience of a tween girl hitting puberty and dealing with all the changes (both physically and socially) that come with that, but I can at least say there are some similarities between growing up as a boy, and how growing up as a girl were portrayed in this film. It takes an extremely over-the-top story and plot, and manages to bring the characters to the forefront. Ironically enough, it humanizes Mei-Mei by taking what could be a universal experience and kind of tying it to this mystical curse she faces. And I think thats what makes the cringe work, because why its rough watching someone get humiliated, the fact that she kind of ends up owning it makes it a bit more palatable. Also, I love her mom turning intonot the big badbut A big bad, just in terms of furthering the metaphor. Its all just really well-told in a fun fashion that manages to blend more childish tones with growing up themes, and I think this sort of movie is much needed, since it seems there arent enough coming-of-age stories about characters who kind of in that transition period between carefree kids and got their shit together teenagers.

Vis Cry Count 14: That whole ending sequence when Mei-Mei meets her mothers younger self in the red panda realm, and shes experiencing the same sadness and anxiety Mei-Mei felt, but obviously to a larger extent, since Mings transformation isMUCH bigger.

Red: Disney and Pixar both go real hard on the "family comes to terms with each other" movies this list. So lets just get this out there, this all could have been avoided if someone just told their daughter the very important fact that one day they'd turn into a potentially murderous dangerous red panda that needed to be contained at all cost. But we need plot convenience so this just isn't going to be on anyone's mind until it becomes necessary. We get some fun panda antics and teenage girl experiences in between a story of the standard "family comes to an understanding" plotline.

Plasma: A good story hiding inside a bad one.
The first act of Turning Red was pure cringe. I dont even like using the word cringe, but I have to here, because the movie went out of its way to characterize everyone in the main cast as either obnoxious or loathsome. Early on, I thought this one was doomed for a Bottom 5 finish.
Then things picked up in the second act. The characters got humanized, and I started sympathizing with Mei as she dealt with puberty and her supernatural panda bear curse. Seeing her endure embarrassment while learning to control her emotions was engaging to watch, and the way her friends supported her through it all was refreshing. There were also several poignant moments along the way, like the cool kids demanding she show up in panda form for their selfish enjoyment. Very real, very sincere.
Then at the end, things got cringe again when Momzilla attacked the concert. It led to some hideous dialogue exchanges, and in the end we were left with a hammy moral about embracing your emotions rather than suppressing them. Thats not to say its a bad message, but I thought it strayed from the sincere approach to emotional control and maturity that we got earlier.

Evillord: Pixar's first movie to be set in Canada, complete with references to Toonies and Tim Hortons. This is what you have to do to create a recognizable setting out of a country with no unique architecture and barely any culture.
I don't really have a lot to say about this film, it just kind of felt like Pixar going through the motions. The idea of a mother-daughter kaiju battle at a boy band concert, which serves as this film's climax, could be really funny, but the way it goes down in the movie just lacks the kind of energy and humor it takes to capitalize. I liked the idea of Mei's friends giving her the emotional stability to control her feelings-based panda transformation, but this cast of characters aren't that likable or interesting, partially because of their (admittedly realistic) annoying 13-year old Canadian girl mannerisms. Since the conflict is between a young girl and an overbearing matriarch she can never impress, it's kind of like a more irreverent version of Encanto, but again I wish it committed harder to being wacky. The best part is the imagery and sound of the Chinese mythology based sections like the ritual scene. I'm a little unsure why I feel so underwhelmed by Turning Red when I liked Luca so much, since they both have this vibe of low-stakes Pixar movie, but I think I appreciated how Luca was more chill, felt the characters just had a lot more charm, and the summery Italian landscape definitely made a much more captivating atmosphere than the dismal, almost brutalist cityscape of Toronto, a place I never wish to see again.

Poor Sigewinne, ignored yet again.

Garnet

Eiko

Outlier:

Inviso: 115
Plasma: 88
Evillord: 87
Ermine: 75
Johnbobb: 70
Suprak: 69
Karo: 59
Mythiot: 57
Red: 60

Evillord: This was the first time I can remember hearing the word "Kinkajou" and each time it was said my brain really wanted to correct it to "Pikachu." Seeing both the Netflix and Sony idents at the start of a film is one of the most ominous feelings in the world, but Sony animation in particular does a little better with the style it has been developing ever since the success of Spiderverse. For Vivo, there is an alternate art style that's used in a couple of the musical sections, which is great because it's a break from the "we want to be Pixar but we're really not" look the movie normally has. In general, it comes alive during *some* of the songs (I went back and re-watched the opening musical number after the 15-minute credits rolled, but on the other hand that little girl character's song is not pleasing to the aural senses, to say the least), but the rest of the movie feels kind of directionless, or rather it feels like its core story was enough for a half-hour short film and some contrived episodic conflicts were needed to pad it out to a feature-length adventure.
A Cuban street performer with a rapping pet monkey voiced by The Hamilton Guy receives a letter from a famous musician who he used to work with 60 years ago, asking him to come to Miami to play with her at her farewell concert. That sounds nice, but there's no conflict in this premise to base a narrative upon. So his monkey decides he REALLY doesn't want to go and they have to stay in Cuba, which comes off as very unwarranted, I mean it's a plane ride to the States for one concert, I spent this whole section wondering what the fuck Pikachu's problem was. But then he gets over it in like five minutes ... so then the musician just kinda dies of unspecified causes in his sleep ... then the monkey meets an annoying little girl character who lives in Florida and will help him get to the concert and deliver the sheet music for the last song his mentor wrote which expresses his decades-old confession of love... but her mom wants her to go to a girl scout meeting instead ... but then they run away from home to go to the concert ... but then the girl scouts start chasing them on bikes because their leader is a Mean Girl ... but then the monkey beats up a cobra in the jungle and they become friends with the mean girls ... also there are some awkward birds to whom the monkey must teach the art of romance. It's normal for adventure stories to be built on these kinds of little episodes, so I guess my real problem is that these storylines aren't interesting and I don't like any of the side characters. All of these little arcs are so short and under-developed that there's nothing to latch onto or take away from them. Even the storyline about the annoying little girl's relationship with her mother is basically all just handled by like two minutes of forced dialog at the end where they solve all their problems. This in turn leads to all the emotional scenes falling completely flat. Oh well, I've seen worse movies, at least a couple of those singing scenes were fun. I wish the monkey vs. snake fight scene one had been longer.

Plasma: Out of all the movies on our list, this one pissed me off the most. In the first ten minutes, I thought I was being treated to Casablanca: The Animated Musical, and I couldnt wait to see how the old man and his monkey would return to his long-lost love.
Then the old man abruptly died and was replaced by the human-cancer known as Gabriella, a self-proclaimed wild girl who poisons every remaining moment of screen time. The main problem with her is that the movie isnt self-aware enough to acknowledge that shes an annoying narcissistic brat, and instead it thrusts her into the spotlight like shes charismatic or something. The story never recovers, and its brainless plot developments only drive this one farther down my rankings board.

19. Vivo

Suprak: 6
Red: 8
Ermine: 10
Inviso: 13
Karo: 16
Johnbobb: 23
Mythiot: 23
Evillord: 24
Plasma: 30

Total: 153

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Red: We don't necessarily have a parent to kill off here, but we start with a heartbreaking death because we've set that up as formula to hook people early in animated movies. I'm torn on this because there is a decent story in here, some songs that are definitely above average. And then at times things like Gabi trying to sing come up and her characters doesn't quite walk a great line between annoying and misunderstood.

Ermine: We're getting to the point in the list where I started losing interest in these films...
And I have this at 10th place. So take this as my benchmark. Vivo and everything I have under this is considered MEH or worse.
The bulk of this list really isn't all that good if VIVO gets 10th for me.
Not to say this film is all that bad. I think it has a really strong opening, and I do quite enjoy Vivo as a character. Lin-Manuel is just over here trying to earn his paycheck, alright?
There were actually a bunch of songs that I enjoyed in the film!
And then there was Gabi! Gabi is terrible awful no no bad! And god her songs... WHY?! Why do this to me?!
I'm picturing a film where they replace Gabi with an actual good character and it's like... wow! Maybe this could have been something special!
The movie is FINE, it's amusing at times but I feel like there was a lot of lost potential here sadly.

Inviso: This was the most emotional Ive gotten over a film through 2021 on this list (granted, there are still 12 more movies left after this one), and yet, it doesnt entirely work for me the way that some of the higher-ranking films do. On the one hand, this is the most musical movie I can remember watching in a long time. Like, there are plenty of animated musicals out there, but they dont follow a stage musical formula the way this one does, and I kept finding myself entranced by the fact that Lin Manuel Miranda was able to blend his musical stylings into an animated format so expertly (keeping in mind he did Moana and Encanto, which are musical, but dont follow the stage musical format). That, to me, was interesting. I also loved Vivos story in general, trying to make good on his dearest friends final dream. It made for a solid, emotional throughline to the film.
There are negatives though, and they all revolve around Gabi. Gabi is annoying. She is over-the-top obnoxious, and her introductory song is the most irritating song to listen to in the entire film. But shes just this hyperactive brat all movie long, and while she does eventually chill out, once she realizes how important Andres song is to Vivo...shes just a little bit too much for me to deal with as the deuteragonist of the movie. Plus, her entire presence leads to the middle of the film, where we have an ultimately pointless girl scout subplot, and a trip into the Everglades that feels like its only in the film to fill time and add more animal characters beyond the titular Vivo. If wasnt for that chunk of the film (or if Gabi was toned down like, 75%), I could see myself ranking this higher than I did.

Vis Cry Count 10: When Andres dies and his music page gets swept up by the wind, and Vivo is desperately chasing after it, since its the last thing he has of his best friend.

Vis Cry Count 11: When Gabi is singing the lyrics of the destroyed song, and Vivo starts playing the melody, only for them both to realize that they each know half the song, and its not really gone.

Vis Cry Count 12: This one wasnt earned, but I cried anyway. Just Gabi revealing to her mom that she wanted to deliver Andres music, because he never got to tell Marta he loved her, just like she never got to tell her dad she loved him.

Vis Cry Count 13: The performance of Andres song, specifically when Vivo started envisioning him getting to play alongside Marta, and be with her, fulfilling the dream he died before he could accomplish it.

Karo: A pet monkey tries to honor the wishes of his late master and deliver a piece of sheet music to the dark and noisome land known as Florida. It hits both the emotional and musical beats very well, but something feels scuffed and unfinished about the whole thing.
Front and center for the problems is animation that feels a decade old at the very least. I feel the acceptable bar in the 2020s for a CGI movie from a major studio is 'it has to at least look as good as Illumination' and this does not at all come close to the mark. The film is rife with questionable character modeling and putrid texture work that make it feel like a PS3 game in places.
Though the movie starts out very strong, it loses its way with an arbitrary journey through the everglades full of useless side characters that doesnt add anything to the story. Like seriously these fucking spoonbills have got to be the most unfunny and irrelevant animated comic relief characters since the two moose in Brother Bear.
It is cute and touching in places, but the rocky production really hampered its potential, not to mention delaying it into a most unfortunate year headlined by that OTHER animated Lin-Manuel Miranda musical.
Quite a shame.

Johnbobb: Vivo does what a lot of "pretty good but not amazing" animated movies do. Starts really strong and emotional, has some goofy time filler in the middle, and then ends strong and emotional again. As much as I'm used to father figures dying in the first act of animated movies, the death of Andres still hit hard. Gabi definitely gets annoying at times, but overall I liked her friendship with Vivo (she does get the worst song in the movie though, which gets an EXTENDED version in the credits). It's not a movie that I think will stick with me but I enjoyed it

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Smash
Bros
Odyssey

Outlier:

Inviso: 109
Evillord: 82
Plasma: 77
Johnbobb: 66
Ermine: 66
Mythiot: 53
Karo: 56
Suprak: 56
Red: 49

20. Early Man

Inviso: 5
Ermine: 11
Plasma: 13
Red: 16
Evillord: 17
Johnbobb: 19
Mythiot: 22
Karo: 28
Suprak: 29

Total: 160

Inviso: I know he hasnt been everyones cup of tea throughout these rankings, but for me, Nick Aardman has yet to make a film that is so abjectly terrible that I felt compelled to rank it low on a list. Hes just got that quirky, British sense of humor that you know is going to at least produce something FUNNY, even if its not the most hilarious film of all time. Early Man is a weird concept about Cavemen versus Bronze Age humans in a soccer match, complete with weirdly anachronistic treatment of the sport and of modern society in general (instant replay just being a puppet show, for example). It was still cute and fun though, and its weird that weve had multiple instances of weird, cartoonish soccer matches in movies in the rankings, but weirder that the last film I saw in theaters (as of this write-up) was Dungeons & Dragons, which also featured a similar tinge to its ending. But yeah, I liked this, and it had a good heart overall.

Ermine: I actually enjoyed this a lot more than I thought I was going to. Not to say I love it or even really like it that much, but for the most part, it's just inoffensive fun with some awful jokes every so often. I did like the pig, and the section where he and the boy caveman were sneaking in to get another soccer ball was probably the best part of the film. That was some pretty good comedy there.
Overall though, very predictable film in every way, a few fun jokes and sequences but ultimately just not my thing.
BUT! It could have been so so much worse!

Plasma: Completely stupid, yet oddly enjoyable. The claymation does a great job at selling the goofy prehistoric atmosphere, the characters are silly yet fun, and the whole prehistoric soccer match scenario is so dumb that I cant help but love it. This is like a Mario Party minigame that somehow got green-lighted as a feature-length movie.

Red: Can't say I expected the concept of a bunch of stone age idiots getting overrun by a more advanced society to actually be an underdog soccer story. But this is about as standard a sports underdog story as it gets. Its tropey as heck. They face a far superior team of individuals that cant teamwork, they bring back a girl the main character likes who is actually a great motivational coach, teacher, and player herself, and she trains them to work as a team and see their potential to beat the super team. Oh and they have a revelation that yes, despite all their hopes and dreams, they really were a bunch of losers this whole time. This is so by the book standard underdog sports story I am internally laughing quite a bit at it. It isn't horrible, and masking a typical underdog sports story like this has some cleverness to it, but it still is safe and unremarkable.

Evillord: Aardman with another lovingly-crafted stop motion film, this time some sort of animated documentary about life in modern Britain.

Johnbobb: I mean it's no Ted Lasso, but it's pretty good. Might honestly be my favorite Nick Park movie, though that's not really a high bar as I've never really been a fan of Wallace and Gromit.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Karo: A bunch of cavemen challenge bronze age people to a soccer match and much predictability ensues in this highly unmemorable and extremely standard sports underdog story.
They do actually give some real stakes here instead of the usual shallow sport 'glory', but that doesn't change the fact that the story or the people who inhabit it are not interesting or likable and I just do not care if they end up being beat to death in the bronze mines or whatever.
Much of the film is just a bunch of ugly Aardman people being stupid and/or uncoordinated because cavemen, and a lot of 'prehistoric versions of modern things' gags that are not as clever or funny as the Flintstones.
There's a funny quip or two of British humor here and there, but it is largely dull, low-brow physical comedy that is only a few steps removed from being a Minions movie.
Aardman is just a highly overrated studio that has made like two good animated features in their lifetime and this certainly isn't one of them.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Garnet

Outlier:

Inviso: 94
Evillord: 79
Plasma: 70
Johnbobb: 65
Ermine: 57
Mythiot: 51
Karo: 48
Suprak: 47
Red: 45

21. DC League of Super-Pets

Plasma: 6
Inviso: 9
Red: 9
Ermine: 12
Suprak: 16
Johnbobb: 25
Karo: 29
Mythiot: 29
Evillord: 30

Total: 165

Plasma: Wait, did I just watch a fun, breezy movie involving the Justice League? This must be a miracle. I never thought Id see the day when a DC movie made me smile so muchhell, even Batman was genuinely hilarious (And hes voiced by Keanu Reeves, of all people! How is this possible?).
Super-Pets had to have been made in an alternate universe. Its the only explanation. But you know what? Ill take it. I love how this movie utilizes a straightforward plot and makes everything fun with the pet gimmick. The guinea pig villain was legitimately great, and that final battle had me gripped. Pure fun, and the clever dialogue and meta-jokes are icing on the cake.

Inviso: I appreciated the number of in-jokes and DC comics references from this movie that I didnt know I wanted. Its a comedy film, so of course theyre able to play up the absurdity of, say, Superman putting on a pair of glasses and somehow going undetected, when in reality, everyone would know exactly who he is. Also, the Bruce Wayne/Batman humor was on the nose JUST the right amount to keep it light and funny throughout the film. But ultimately, I just found it to be a really cute film about a dog learning to be a dog from other pets that didnt necessarily have the same vaunted upbringing as him, and I think the end result was happy endings for everyone, including the villain. It was an inspired choice to make the kitten a murderous psychopath, by the way, because yeahthats whatd happen if you gave a cat those kinds of superpowers. This was a fun movie, and even though it was pretty standard in terms of non-Disney/Pixar animation (plotlines and whatnot), Im not going to criticize it too much for that, since at least the execution worked well.

Red: Super hero origin story, but with pets. A bunch of unwanted pets accidentally get superpowered and with an overpowered but very much typical good dog who has to be nerfed for the movie to work save the world from an evil guinea pig. It really isnt all that complicated beyond that, but it is a fun little story and all of the animals finding their homes and identities at the end was fairly satisfying.

Ermine: It's astounding how incredibly MID this film is. I don't really get why they decided to make Lex Luthor a complete joke but sure. Not to mention the actual villain is terrible and unfunny in every way.
Thankfully the whole thing is mostly inoffensive with a little bit of fun.
I would have liked to see the characters grow alongside Krypto throughout the movie instead of y'know, all of a sudden being able to control their powers after like a 5 second pep talk. 5 second pep talk does not character growth, but y'know what, sure. Who needs actual character growth in a movie where every voice actor is just doing their regular voice so each character doesn't even feel like a character and just sounds like said voice actor. Terrible, god awful casting of basically every animal character here.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Johnbobb: I went into League of Super Pets with extremely low expectations, and to its credit it did manage to succeed them! It's kind of like the Secret Life of Pets movies if they were less terrible. But like Secret Life of Pets, it gives way too much time to Kevin Hart playing an animal that feels less like a character in its own right and more like a vehicle for Kevin Hart. I'm getting really, really burnt out on the Dwayne Johnson/Kevin Hart dynamic. It was funny in Jumanji but by now it's just done to death and feels the exact same the entire time, which particularly doesn't work in a movie like this. The main super-pets kind of dragged it down, but the side characters made me laugh a couple times.

Karo: Did you ever wonder what would happen if you take the most generic kids CGI movie template ever and cross it with the most generic superhero story template ever, then populate it with the most unlikeable group of fuzzy cartoon animals to grace the silver screen since Open Season? Oh dear.
So what happens is that a chunk of kryptonite lands in the pound and gives the animals superpowers, one of which is an evil guinea pig who simps for Lex Luthor and wants to take over the world. The good animals have to stop her because the real heroes cant for arbitrary reasons and that's really all there is to the movie.
Its honestly just Secret Life of Pets with terrible characters and random DC fanservice. Also, what the hell they did do to poor Jessica Cruz? I am just left wondering which super villain cut off all the hair on one side of her head and fused her with a dreamworks troll prior to the movie.
Should just call it the BS League of Super Pets because you will need an industrial strength pooper scooper to deal with this mess.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Evillord: Dog shit

Eiko

Smash
Odyssey
World

Outlier:

Inviso: 82
Evillord: 70
Johnbobb: 61
Plasma: 55
Ermine: 48
Mythiot: 43
Suprak: 42
Karo: 40
Red: 33

22. The Willoughbys

Johnbobb: 6
Inviso: 17
Plasma: 17
Mythiot: 18
Suprak: 18
Evillord: 22
Karo: 23
Ermine: 24
Red: 24

Total: 169

Johnbobb: man this movie like absolutely nailed my taste in dark humor

Inviso: This one is really tough to rank, or even discuss, because Im not entirely sure how I feel about it. The whole thing has this weird, surreal reality setting where only the main characters live outside the parameters of normal lifewell, them and the Candy Commander and the Men in Black of Orphanages. Honestly, its funny that they mention James and the Giant Peach, because this feels like its part of the same vein as James and the Giant Peach, right down to the horrible parental figures that treat the kids like garbage for extremely stupid and exaggerated reasons. I mean, Ive gotta say that the over-the-top actions of the Willoughby parents is kinda hilarious, especially since they manage to avoid death time and time again. But ultimately, I didnt QUITE feel a connection with this movie? I mean, it wasnt BAD. I laughed a few times. But ultimately, the plot and characters felt a little bit forgettable? Like, this kinda felt like a filler movie, almost. Not bad, but just the sort of thing that doesnt necessarily NEED to follow a cohesive plot structure, for kids to enjoy. At least it had a happy ending, which was nice.

Plasma: Im convinced this movie was written by a hundred different people, each of whom possesses a split personality and the memory span of a dead goldfish. The plot goes in 8,473 different directions, morphing into Home Alone then Rugrats then Uncle Buck before the heroes are captured by an army of Matrix Agents who disappear after two scenes so the heroes can ride a sugar-rainbow airship to the summit of Animated Mount Everest and defrost their frozen parents, who repay the favor by playing Grand Theft Airship until they crash, and then the story ends with a candy-making robot and rent-a-nanny rescuing the kids in the name of found family. God, I hated this movie.
Dumb as the plot was, the characters were even worse. I feel like each one was designed in a Disney torture lab before being sold off to Netflix. This cast checks every bad box I can think of. Obnoxious self-pitying brother? Check. Little-miss-perfect sister? Check. Shallow comic relief twins? Check. Smug nanny with ballsack-shaped hair? Check. Inconsequential British Cat Narrator? Check. Plot-device infant? Check. Check. Check. Check. Check.
At least the evil parents got a comeuppance. That was about the only thing this shitshow got rightthat and the fact that this movie was somehow very watchable and never boring.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Evillord: A quartet of siblings go on wacky misadventures to try and cope with their hilariously awful parents. All the places the narrative is going are blindingly obvious from the very start, but there is an overall sense of fun and energy that keeps it watchable enough. The terrible parents kicking ass on their own adventure because they at least love each other, the Ricky Gervais cat who narrates and then unceremoniously joins up with the kids, and the found parents the kids get who decide to adopt them and start a relationship with one another at the drop of a hat all add at least some amount of entertainment value to things.

Karo: The story starts with the young members of the storied Willoughby clan who live with their neglectful parents and they get a baby dropped off at their door and a great deal of child abuse later, the kids hatch a plot to murder their parents by sending them on vacation to the most dangerous locations in the world and then they get a whimsical nanny and then meet willy wonka and run from a version of child protective services taken straight out of some conspiratorial fever dream of a right-wing blogger. Did you get all that?
There is just too many random things going on that are largely an unfocused bunch of elements stitched together from other stories, and filled with people who are all way too weird and dont act in a manner that is believable in the slightest. What was a promising start soon spirals way out of control into nonsense and stupidity as the plot flails around trying to find enough things to fit an hour of time and enough deus ex machina to explain why the world just lets these parents abuse their kids without consequence (cant call CPS because they are eeeeevil, so too bad waluigi time). I do appreciate that they did not give the parents an undeserved redemption (like Pixar does way too much), but the fact that they even tried to save these two psychopaths just so they could brutalize their kids some more leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
The animation seems very cheap, the backgrounds in particular feel washed out and cardboard like they were going for some minimalist stylization, but in reality it just looks like shit. It is just a forgettable and unremarkable movie overall and I wager I'll remember nothing about this film in a few months other than how everyone had pink hair.

Ermine: I struggle to find anything positive to say about this film. Did they think that anything they did was funny? The parents are so disgusting and revolting in every way possible, I wanted them to die over and over. But the movie WANTS you to hate them, that's fine, so you can root for the children... except they all suck too. Except maybe the girl, she's fine, I guess. And then you have this random thing with a weird alien baby that serves no purpose but to introduce a character that'll come back in the last act for like 5 minutes? Okaaaaay.
Yeah this movie sucks. I guess I liked the cat, yeah, he was cute. Just give me a movie with him instead, thanks!

Red: Remember, no matter how bad life at home might be for some kids, don't call any authorities because the big bad people will take the kids and somehow make it even worse for them. To call this film a bit dangerous in that regard would be an understatement. Again, bad messaging, one of quite a few guilty films on this list. But this one might be one of the most directly dangerous to its target audience and that bothers me quite a bit. There are some fun antics with the kids growing into a family and being quite ignorant, but this movie never evolves beyond childish fun hidden behind some really terrible messaging.

Chrono
Odyssey
World

Freya

Garnet

Eiko

Outlier:

Inviso: 77
Evillord: 70
Plasma: 50
Ermine: 46
Johnbobb: 45
Mythiot: 39
Karo: 39
Suprak: 38
Red: 31

23. Sing 2

Inviso: 4
Suprak: 13
Red: 13
Karo: 14
Ermine: 21
Plasma: 25
Johnbobb: 27
Mythiot: 28
Evillord: 29

Total: 174

Inviso: Im sure this wont rank anywhere near as high as I ranked it for the rest of the rankers, but Im Vis, and Im not gonna apologize for what I like or dont like. I feel like this movie took the formula from Sing 1 (juke box musical revolving around the stories of six main characters as theyre trying to put on a good show), and it gave some actual conflict in the form of a villain who had a sense of power over the protagonists (rather than a looming and very reasonable bank loan defaulting).
Johnny having his little dance lesson with Nooshy was adorable, and I thought him and Ash wouldve made a good couple last movie, but now I think he and Nooshy make a better couple this time. Mina falling in love and getting over a different kind of anxiety was really sweet and lovely. Rositas fear of heights felt like the weakest story overall, but she had a bigger role in the original film, so Im okay with her getting toned back. Porsche being a spoiled brat who actually got told no for once, and then got her moment of getting back up on the horse to try and do better was well-handled. And Moon is the heart of the movie as always, keeping the cast moving forward at all times.
But ultimately, more than anything, this movie turned out to be all about Clay Calloway. With everything else going on, hes part of the ensemble cast, but his storyline is the most emotionally resonate of them all. This retired rock star who lost his wife and cant bring himself to perform again because of just how much she meant to him and inspired himits sad. Its not Up sad, but its touching. And him finally getting pulled back into the spotlight, having those fans cheer him on while the ghost of his wife gives him the okayit was far more nuanced and well-written than an Illumination movie had any business being. I really liked it for what it was, even if I can acknowledge the Illumination movies arent always amazing.

Vis Cry Count 9: The movie almost got me with the mini-montage of Clay Calloways house, and the pictures of his wife and her wheelchair. But the cry moment came with him getting scared of performing, and getting the encouragement of the audience and Ash, finally getting him to come back to music.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Red: The cast of sing has gotten over their heads and through sheer determination and with a bunch recognizable music will get themselves out of the jam. Thats it. Thats the plot. Its straightforward. If you liked the characters of Sing, you get more of them here, they all get their little plotlines, you get a mostly standard fulfilling ending where they all come together and everthing works out. Honestly, its not the worst, its pretty standard sequel fair.

Karo: In this followup to Illuminations furry talent show movie, Buster has now gone from being a reality TV host to dabbling in musical theater, and all the previous finalists are part of the show. Well, except for the Frank Sinatra mouse who just... doesn't exist anymore.
Anyway, a misunderstanding gets them roped into including a reclusive rock star in their performance without his permission and hijinks ensue.
It is a safe sequel and it works as much as can be expected, though I honestly would have preferred a whole new cast of performers this time around. None of the previous movie's characters were that exceptional that they absolutely needed to return, and most of them had already resolved the most compelling part of their storylines during the reality show. The old cast are now saddled with arbitrary sources of conflict like the pig girl suddenly being afraid of heights, and none of it feels natural or organic.
The two new characters, Porsha and Clay, have the strongest development and serves to remind what could have been if the producers had the balls to wipe the character slate clean and start fresh.
Basically it is Illumination at its finest(?). Not too good, not too bad, and completely inoffensive to anyone who might be watching.

Ermine: This movie exists... I guess. It has the same problems that the first movie had in that there is zero reason for these characters to be animals. Not to mention nearly all of them look weird, and off. I think a huge problem with this film as well as the first is that I just don't like any of the characters, none of them appeal to me in any fashion. They really just feel and sound like a human voicing an animal character and it really doesn't help that the main character, Buster, is the worst of the bunch.
Really, they just all suck, and the paper-thin plot and story doesn't do anything to lift it up.

Plamsa: Now I know how Suprak felt while watching Popstar.
Sing 2 is an empty, soulless abomination. Everything is surface-level excess. Nothing but noise, melodrama, unnecessary subplots, idiotic plans, and annoying characters. The movie runs about 30 minutes longer than it should because it has to develop its bloated cast and give everyone big moments, particularly during the finale sequence, which felt like the storytelling equivalent of an assembly line: Grab another character, put them on-stage, complete their arc, repeat. Everything played out predictably, and there was zero tension because Wolfman was a non-threat except for one moment when he threw Koala McConaughey overboard into the arms of Diving Pig Lady.
What an awful movie. And of course, theyre making a Sing 3.

Johnbobb: The Sing series is pretty notorious for mind-numbing pop covers. That continues here. But I did legitimately like the space musical.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Evillord: The first Sing is the kind of movie that passes out of memory the second it's over. I recall the koala working at a car wash using his fur as a sponge, and I think the gorilla had father issues? This sequel lives up to the same standard of quality. Since the first movie basically wrapped up all its character conflicts, for the sake of a new plot the koala decides that selling out shows in his hometown isn't good enough and harasses a talent scout dog, then breaks into an audition held by her wolf boss in the greedy pursuit of more wealth and fame. The wolf decides to give him a shot because he name-drops a celebrity Lion who he doesn't actually have contact with. The rest of the movie has the koala going through various tribulations to put on a new show where he casts all the other characters from the first Sing in roles that don't suit them, but they get over it and put on an amazing show including getting the lion to perform by singing on his front porch and giving him a speech about how he needs to get over his wife's death (I laughed at how point-blank that dialog was, the porcupine just comes straight out with "you're grumpy because your wife died huh?") For a while I was hoping they would go with a storyline about the koala and company accepting that they couldn't cut it in Furry LA and realizing that what they had at the start of the film was enough, but that would be too thoughtful for an Illumination movie. Oh also halfway through the film the wolf starts trying to murder the koala and sends goons to hunt him down but they just put on the show anyway using a plan that involves the mother pig sending all her children to distract these violent thugs. Great parenting!
This is also a furry movie with, from what I can recall, zero gags or story moments that make use of the characters being animals in any way, and a musical movie that relies almost entirely on licensed songs and covers of pop music, including in the climax where the lion and porcupine cover U2. It's just such a void of anything resembling creativity, effort, or entertainment value - which is to say it's an Illumination movie.

Smash
Odyssey
World

Outlier:

Evillord: 64
Inviso: 58
Plasma: 48
Ermine: 44
Johnbobb: 41
Mythiot: 34
Karo: 30
Suprak: 28
Red: 21

24. Yellow Submarine

Evillord: 1
Mythiot: 8
Johnbobb: 16
Ermine: 22
Suprak: 23
Karo: 25
Inviso: 27
Plasma: 28
Red: 29

Total: 179

Evillord: The chronology of our somewhat rough-looking list of films begins with one bona-fide classic I should probably have watched like 15 years ago. With its grey depiction of England and the ugly, even disturbing figures that populate it, not to mention music from a famous British rock band, this put me in mind of The Wall, but while that film has the solid throughline of the album's track listing and Pink's mental degeneration, Yellow Sub is a phantasmagoric odyssey through the Fab Four's entire catalog - including some previously unreleased tracks - and through strange seas full of strange beings. This is an insane movie. The way John Lennon is introduced is that the submariner Young Fred goes into a house with Ringo Starr where they have the hallway setup from Scooby Doo, except instead of a chase scene there's a stampede of random images - some kind of velociraptor in a party hat, a floating bowler cap, a giant hand emerging from a portal, and a boiled egg in a jewelled cup. Then they find Frankenstein's monster, which Ringo brings to life, whereupon it takes a pill, transforms into Lennon and says "Hey Ringo, I've just had the strangest dream." I'm sure it's all essentially non-sequitur and you're probably intended to take LSD before you watch it, but the way the Beatles respond to all the bizarre happenings with stereotypically stiff upper lips and dry wordplay ("Perhaps time has gone on strike. What for? Shorter hours,") makes for a perfectly transcendental experience even sober. The cast's non reactions leave the viewer free to make what they want of everything. When the band do finally reach their destination, a paradise named Pepper Land invaded by Blue Meanies, and the villains' greatest weapon "The Glove" is utterly impotent against a rendition of "All You Need is Love", it feels like such a profound depiction of the kind of psychedelic, all-accepting spiritualism The Beatles were trying to convey at this point in time (though I do find myself wishing that scene were the ending as a result...) Of course, it's all made even better thanks to music from the greatest band in the history of rock.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Johnbobb: I had brownies available to me and I didn't think to eat them before watching this and I deeply regret it

Ermine: This film probably would have faired a good amount better if it just stuck to slapping Beatles songs on and having weird and interesting stuff happening in the background. Any time they tried to have any sort of plot, things fell apart and it became so much less interesting. I'll even go as far and say that the whole final act was complete garbage and uninteresting in every way. If I was basing this off the final third of the movie, it'd be bottom 5 for SURE.
Just give me good Beatles songs and trippy stuff to look at and I'll be fine, I don't need these shit blue meanies, please put them back in the trash.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Karo: When a magical kingdom under the sea is taken over by the evil blueberry people, the only ones who can save the day are the Beatles for some reason. So they set sail on an extradimensional submarine of a certain color and then do an astounding amount of drugs.
The plot is a mite thin, and dialogue mostly consists of the Beatles saying things that are supposed to be humorous or something. Like, I don't think I have ever heard so many terrible jokes in a single movie before. It's like nobody can go a full minute without mumbling out some cringey quips that call to mind something your dad would say that youd have to pretend was funny before running out of the room to bang your head against a wall.
There are some interesting things going on with regards to the style, but it never fully gets realized due to how low the production quality in most places. Worse, there is a tendency to resort to garish flashing light effects in a truly awful decision that renders some scenes nearly unwatchable. Seriously, don't watch this film if you have any sort of photosensitivity or epilepsy because you will die.
Are there bright spots? Certainly. What they did with the stylization was visionary, especially for the time, and a wonderful love filled ending featuring a magic of friendship villain reform which was unheard of in an industry dominated by Disney and their black and white moral dichotomy.
The group's songs of course remain stellar and unlike with 'Help!' actually do have a token relevance to things going on in the movie.
Its influence in undeniable, yet just like Toy Story it has become incredibly dated and left far in the dust by an animation industry that has long since surpassed it.

Inviso: I feel like theres a specific timeframe from like, the late sixties to the early seventies where there are just a ton of movies being put out that are fucking WEIRD drug trips. This isnt the first such film weve seen over the years of our ranking topics, or even the first chaotic Beatles movie, for that matter. Its justits definitely a musical, and its a case of making just a complete nonsense movie about goofy shenanigans (that arent especially funny or interesting, instead focusing on being psychedelic or something) in order to fit the Beatles weird musical catalogue at the time. But theres no real plot, and the stakes feel completely pointless because theres no real plot. I wound up really REALLY bored watching this as a result.

Plasma: First movie on our list is a clunker. The story is nonsensical, and the humor and trippy animations barely offset the narrative shortcomings. Had I grown up worshiping the Beatles instead of Guns N Roses, I mightve been more receptive to this one, but it just didnt work for me.

Red: If you just want Beatles music, I'm sure this is fine. If you want any sort of a plot, any sort of value beyond the music, sorry you got to look somewhere else. Unfortunately this was a ranking of animated movies, not just music set to a bunch of nonsense. There just isn't anything to invest in here, everything is nonsense for the convenience of stuffing in a bunch of Beatles music set to an animation of someones experiences on various drugs.

Outlier:

Inviso: 55
Plasma: 44
Ermine: 42
Evillord: 41
Johnbobb: 33
Karo: 29
Suprak: 27
Mythiot: 18
Red: 16

Inviso: I cant believe this fucking bullshit was almost two hours long. I hated EVERY fucking minute of this. This hearkened back to classic Disney bullshit, with a bratty, obnoxious lead character who made the film utterly unwatchable. Ne Zha is created as a result of some spiritual treachery that leads to a baby being infused with a demon spirit instead of a heavenly spirit, and as a result, the main character of the film becomes an obnoxious piece of shit (as babies/children often are), cranked up to fucking eleven.
For like, the first eighty percent of the film, he is portrayed as uncaring, bratty, and just generally mean-spirited to everyone around him. The village he lives in hates him, yet its NEVER portrayed like their hatred is irrational. Even when they mistakenly blame him for something, he goes out of his way to behave far worse than what theyre accusing him of. This attitude continues, until a random flashback hits and shows the audience a deleted scene showing Ne Zhas dad willing to sacrifice himself to protect his son from a curse. I would willing to tolerate this this kind of purposeful withholding of information, if it didnt feel forced onto the plot to makes us give a shit about this character.
And wouldnt you know it, after being a piece of shit the whole movie up to that point, and throwing a fucking tantrum as his birthday party when he learned that he actually IS a demonits like a switch flips, and suddenly every action he takes is unequivocally heroic. Theres no character growthits literally just a switch flipping. And what makes it more frustrating is that he becomes the hero, fighting Ao Bing, after Ao Bing ALSO makes a completely stupid heel turn and tries to murder an entire villagebecause the bad guy justtells him to? Oh, but then both he and Ne Zha (who are friends because theyre both outcasts), BOTH turn good and help each other save everyone.
I feel like this would have been more enjoyable if Ao Bing was the main character, growing up in solitude as a dragon, even though he was given the heavenly pearl, because him going from villain to hero could feel like legitimate character growth, plus Ne Zha might be more tolerable as a side character in Ao Bings story. Itd feel like Ao Bing, a dragon, having to prove himself a hero by tempering the demon child raised in the human world. But alas, instead they decided to just go hard with Ne Zha as their overbearing brat, and Ao Bing barely makes an appearance until over half the movie was over, at which point his plot points get rushed along extremely fast. The whole plot, tone, and pacing just made this unbearable to watch; especially for such a long runtime

25. Ne Zha

Plasma: 8
Suprak: 12
Johnbobb: 14
Evillord: 19
Mythiot: 25
Red: 25
Karo: 26
Ermine: 29
Inviso: 30

Total: 188

Plasma: When Ne Zha opened with a lengthy info-dump, I feared the worst, but this one kept getting better and better. If this were an RPG, Id play it. Loved seeing a child demon-hero as the main character, and his arc kept me guessing. The animation effects were fun and engaging to watch. Bonus points for the battle scene where bubbles turn characters body parts to stone.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Johnbobb: This is probably the movie I was the most torn on. It's almost like two movies combined into one. One movie, about 2/3 of the runtime, is an incredible folklore driven epic with thrilling fantasy combat and interesting lore and humor and hart. Kind of like Kung Fu Panda. The other movie is a sloppy direct-to-video animation with ugly, cheap characters and fart and snot jokes. It legitimately gave me whiplash, because there's often not a transition from one to the other. But man, the good stuff here is good enough that I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and would watch it again, even if the less good stuff means I probably won't recommend it to people.

Evillord: This is the first film in some sort of planned Chinese Mythology Cinematic Universe, complete with a post-credits stinger advertising the next movie. It's loosely based on the story of a protection deity who appears in two chapters of the Investiture of the Gods and is also described in Journey to the West, but here the figure of Ne Zha is reinterpreted as Naruto. A child container for a demonic power who is prejudicially hated by his village and grows up as a prankster when really he just wants to be loved, gives all the villains pep talks and turns them into better people and defies his fate in extremely Shnen anime style. From my Wikipedia synopisis-based understanding of the original myth, he originally kills the dragon Ao Bing (who is just some dragon who gets sent after him) and then carves himself up and sends his flesh to his mother and bones to his father to prevent retribution from the dragons. In this version Ao Bing is his prettyboy friend and they have the dynamic of pals fated to be enemies until they defy that fate and make up, essentially the Sasuke in this analogy. They even do the rigmarole from early Naruto where Sasuke loses to the bad guy, but the bad guy needs to reveal his greatest trick in the process, allowing Naruto to come in and beat him. At least it gives both characters some conflicting motivations, there's a sequence where Ao Bing is torn between helping Ne Zha and going along with the schemes his dad and teacher have raised him for. It gives him a little nuance. I've seen enough anime to be tired of Shnen story tropes and the animation itself is incredibly so-so, but I at least found it funny how distinct the Naruto vibe ended up being.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Red: A few of these films have some pretty bad messaging, Ne Zha is up there with the worst. Remember, life isn't about enjoying it, being good for some sense of fulfillment, or even doing good because its good for you personally. No no no, its all about doing good because that is how people are going to see you when you are dead. Even if you are going to die, you don't get to enjoy life at all because that would shame your living relatives. The motives here are dubious at best. The random villagers are all horrible. Ne Zha's parents are horrible. But the most outlandish thing that stands out to me here. In the process of the climactic fight of the film, everyone gets dragged into the paintint world. Kind of a cool concept, you think we're going to get some cool setpiece or whatever and it might be kind of interesting. Nope we're just there for a fart joke. It might be the single worst scene on this list.

Karo: So there's this weird crystal head floating in the sky and the forces of heaven split it into two orbs one of which is so evil the it must be smote by God's lightning, but only in three years time because that would be more dangerous and irresponsible. They decide to implant the good orb into a pregnant woman for some reason but use the evil orb by mistake and the good orb ends up raised by dragons. Thus, Chinese Bart Simpson is born to a family of kung fu demon hunters and our story begins. Are you with me so far? No?
Confusing narrative aside, this is something that has no fucking clue what kind of film it wants to be, and the tone shifts wildly from dark inner turmoil to characters being propelled by flatulence. I have a hard time understanding what the movie is trying to make me feel at any given point other than utter bewilderment. It is honestly like someone marathoned a bunch of really dubious western CGI films and said 'this is what I want my artistic vision to be'.
Regardless, the film is a mess of substandard animation, complete lack of understanding of basic story structure, and full to the brim with unlikable and unpleasant characters with incomprehensible motives.
Ne Zha is the highest grossing animated movie in Chinese box office history, and though it horrifies me to say it, I fear the Chinese masses might actually have even worse taste than the American ones.

Ermine: I don't know if the dub for this film is just so god-awful, but I'm going to chalk it up to the movie just being trash as well. The movie has moments of looking cool, mostly during some of the fight sequences, and then during any other period of the film, it looks ugly as sin.
The character, Ne Zha, is one of the most unlikable and unrelatable characters of ALL TIME. And that's saying something. I do not understand in any fashion why this movie has good reviews and several times I stopped the movie to make sure I had the right version. I honestly thought I had downloaded the wrong film and was watching a terrible parody or something.
I hated Ne Zha SO fucking much. His stupid shit-eating grin every single time, I wanted to punch him in the face over and over. Nothing was funny. Nothing was even remotely interesting. Oh god, and the stupid fat ass mentor, don't even get me started. Was he somehow even more unlikable than Ne Zha? I dunno, that's a tough line to beat.
Then you have the other "child?"... For a character that was born from a dragon, it really would have been cool if we could have seen his dragon form for more than like 20 seconds.
I could honestly go on and on about how trash this film is but it's not worth my time. I still cannot believe how highly rated this film is?! Even now... did I watch the right film? Did I download the wrong thing? I must have. Right? This can't be real... This movie can't be THIS bad? Can it? Something is wrong...

Garnet

Outlier:

Inviso: 50
Ermine: 38
Evillord: 35
Karo: 28
Plasma: 27
Johnbobb: 22
Mythiot: 18
Red: 16
Suprak: 14

Ermine: GENERATIONAL CONFLICT!
DO YOU LIKE GENERATIONAL CONFLICT? BECAUSE HOO BOY DO WE GOT IT FOR YOU HERE!
Fuck this movie, man. It's so trash. None of the main characters are interesting or likable in any way at all. I hate all of them and I wanted all of them to die. There was zero sense of danger because apparently, Disney doesn't do villains anymore so guess what? Now you get nothing. You get nothing interesting at all, ever, because that's Disney now, Yay!
Even the plot twist of them actually being on the back of some creature is lost because it's so completely nonsensical. I don't believe for a second that they couldn't see past a couple of mountains to see the ocean and also that they couldn't travel past or through the mountains in some way. THERE WERE LIKE A FEW MOUNTAINS in the way. None of it made any sense.
Maybe just everyone that exists on the back of the creature are just all complete idiots. I mean, I already believe that so it's not too far-fetched. 0 laughs. Unfunny movie with 0 jokes that hit. The stupid "OHHH I WANNA MERCHANDISE IT." Guy? If anyone actually laughed at that, I hate you as a person.
Trash movie. Belongs in a dumpster fire.

Evillord: The Disney Animation Studios film no one knows exists. Maybe they didn't advertise it because the main character's son is explicitly gay and they were worried about marketing issues in less accepting regions such as China or Texas, or maybe it's because they knew the film is garbage. I thought it was cool that the family's pet dog had a missing leg, and the setting has some potentially interesting aspects, most notably that the entire world is on the back of a giant turtle, which is only revealed near the end and hardly explored. That's all it has going for it. The reject Wreck-It Ralph character designs are disconcerting and the writing is godawful. None of the characters ever shut up, it's just this constant deluge of forced faux-charismatic dialog hammering in the most trite and obvious story beats imaginable. The opening scene has the main character and his dad trying to climb a mountain until the son sees a random plant and decides for no reason that it's so important he has to stop the expedition and study it, leading to an incredibly contrived argument after which the dad disappears for 25 years. The random plant turned out to be a miraculous all-purpose power source, but then one of the other members of the old expedition shows up to inform the main character that the plant is under threat and they have to go on an adventure to save it, where, surprise surprise, they find the dad again and sort out their family issues after like 50 minutes of tiresome, obvious, petty arguments. The environmentalism theme that comes in later on is also way too simplistic to be worth a damn. The film basically imagines that you could solve The Climate Emergency by shooting at a big bad guy. Oh yes, and regarding the gay son, he has a bf with about 30 seconds of screentime so the film doesn't explore their relationship at all, they just keep having painfully awkward dialog where all the other characters remind the audience that the son has a crush on a boy. This is Disney's superficial approach to representation and about as lazy as the rest of the writing in this shithouse movie.

26. Strange World

Inviso: 7
Karo: 12
Johnbobb: 17
Mythiot: 24
Suprak: 24
Plasma: 26
Red: 26
Ermine: 27
Evillord: 28

Total: 191

Inviso: Im honestly disappointed in Disney for not advertising this more (and seeming to leave it to die in theaters), because this was a genuinely solid movie. I liked Atlantis and I LOVED Treasure Planet, and this felt right in-line with those two as just a fun adventure movie. It had that 1950s serial adventure tone to it, complete with the Clade theme song, but I love the fact that you start of with the adventurer and his less-adventurous son, the son finds success on his own, only to hear the call of adventure once more as all of his hard work is in jeopardy. But more than that, I love the idea of this film exploring a strange, bright and colorful world, only to realize that its more Fantastic Voyage than anything else. All of the visuals you saw throughout the film come back in a completely different light when you realize the movie is taking place inside this giant organism. That, to me, really helped sell the film. Im also always a sucker for father/son relationships in Disney films, and this is that twice over, so thats a big deal.
I just feel the need to add one more note though, regarding the movies performance at the box office. I hate the fact that Disney has had so many movies that brag the first gay X, when its some background character that they can easily cut out of the film to appease hatemongers. But this film has not just a gay main character, but also a loving interracial couple as another pair of main characters. It manages to be woke without coming across as heavy-handed, or just trying to pander or anything like that. The characters are who they are, and things are shown, not told, and the end result is a likable cast overall. Its just really disappointing that Disney had so little faith in this one and threw it to the wolves the way they did. Its not a bad movie. Not the best, but definitely not bad. I mean, its pretty high on MY list, and I have only 5 films left.

Karo: The legendary Claude family, known both for their knack for adventure and being ignorant boomers, set out on an expedition into a mysterious system of underground caverns in order to protect their way of life.
Conflict soon arises between the grandpa (who wants to set fire to everything he doesn't understand), the father (who wants his son to be just like him, and is also afraid of everything he doesnt understand), and the son, who is thoughtful, independent and frustrated that nobody seems to understand his generation.
This heavy handed approach goes for the low hanging fruit and tries to make me hate the patriarchs of the Claude family for laughs, but they succeed far too well and I am just annoyed by these two characters throughout the whole runtime of the movie due to their egomaniacal arrogance and their seeming inability to comprehend any of Ethan's mouth noises.
So the world they live turns out to actually be a giant creature, something they shamelessly stole from Xenoblade while hoping people wouldnt realize and would think they were being super cool and original. The three generations of Claudes then patch things up in a very standard feel good kind of ending. Yay.
In many ways the movie reminds me of the adventure movies of the Disney dark era (Atlantis, Treasure Planet), and though Strange World is vastly superior to those films it still steps into some of the same pitfalls. Namely, too heavy of focus on the setting, and subsequent neglect of the cast of characters, because I honestly can't think of a more forgettable group of people in the whole modern Disney era than the Claude family. I mean its cool we got our first openly gay Disney protagonist, but why does he have to be just so... boring?
Strange World is a perfectly 'fine' movie with a good message about keeping an open mind, but in terms of the Disney revival era that is actually quite low and I can't help see this as a misstep from the studio.

Johnbobb: This film would've benefitted a LOT by losing about a solid 20 or so minutes. I enjoyed it a decent but, but it absoluitely dragged at times in the middle, despite almost always being visually interesting to look at. I enjoyed the characters and the intergenerational struggles they presented. What the film did best was in how it handled that dynamic, with each generation (while usually being well-intentioned) usually refusing to acknowledge the perspective of the generations to come after. I rolled my eyes at the opening "I'm not you, dad" scene but thought to myself that at least we got it out of the way early instead of having it be the peak of the conflict like so many movies before it. And then it does it again at the peak of the conflict anyway. Not the most original story but far from the worst and overall an enjoyable time

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Plasma: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, minus the charm, conflict, and suspense. Aside from a poignant father-son moment near the end, Strange World plays everything ridiculously safe and delivers little beyond its vivid visuals.
Also Did I really watch a scene where a blob creature escapes a locked closet, unlocks the door, and then returns back inside so a dog can open the door instead? Seriously?

Red: I really don't want to get into it too deeply, but I'm kind of sad this movie bombed so hard because this is absolutely being used for nefarious means. The movie is just bad, it shouldn't be blamed on inclusion or anything like that. I tried to rewatch this film for this list, I just couldn't do it. Its boring, every attempt pretty much resulted in immediate sleep. I'm not sure what they thought they were selling, but with how animation has advanced and with so many different "strange world" movies already out there, the world itself needed to be interesting to be a draw. Instead the world just has a giant wall and generic weird creatures; they don't bring much to the table. It is being explored, also not bringing much to the table. But at the core we're just getting doubled up on the parent/child conflict, which if you look at this list animation is already full up on that regard. We know how this story ends before it begins, none of the family is a villain so they are all going to come to understand each others differences and get along hurray. So we're rehashing what everyone else has already been doing in a world that never amounts to more than strangely boring. Oh and it was all just an allegory for fossil fuels or some sort of climate change thing. I'm sure this was well intentioned but it feels shoehorned in to give the film a larger purpose that also never amounts to being particularly interesting. Strange World was very well-intentioned but also doesn't dispel doubts that Disney's creative juices are currently running on empty.

Eiko

Fun fact: the Hobbit was the final movie on the list that didn't get a top 10 from someone.

ashe

Outlier:

Ermine: 37
Evillord: 33
Inviso: 31
Plasma: 27
Red: 16
Mythiot: 16
Karo: 14
Johnbobb: 13
Suprak: 12

27. The Hobbit

Ermine: 15
Evillord: 16
Mythiot: 20
Suprak: 21
Inviso: 23
Karo: 24
Johnbobb: 24
Plasma: 24
Red: 27

Total: 194

Ermine: Wow the pacing of this is breakneck speed. We barely get time to enjoy or laugh at any single moment because within seconds we're fast-forwarded off to another one.
I did enjoy Gollum's design in this though, I liked that he looked more creatureish in this.
I dunno, I don't have too much to say about this one. It's fine. Has some funny and charming moments.

Evillord: This is the opposite end of the spectrum to Peter Jackson's adaptation. Instead of a bloated trilogy it's definitely a detrimentally stripped down version that almost feels like a synopsis of Tolkien's book rather than an adaptation. There is no introduction to Bilbo's life before his adventure or to any of the dwarves - they're out of the Shire within something like two minutes. Fantasy stories are almost entirely about the little details and escapades this film omits, so it barely feels like an adventure anymore when it's pared down this much. The best parts are the few scenes - Bilbo's encounters with Gollum (whose frog-like design in this version is a nice change of pace considering how the CGI Andy Serkis version of the character has dominated all visual depictions of him for the last two decades), and Smaug - that are actually given enough time to build and release tension. It mostly survives on the charm its old-fashioned animation and the fact it directly adapts the main source material bring to the table in an age where American animation is almost entirely poor-man's Pixar CGI and the LotR universe has been milked almost as ruthlessly as Star Wars.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Inviso: I�d certainly HEARD of this movie before, largely in comparison to the bloated Peter Jackson Hobbit trilogy. This has defenders as the superior film, but I�m sorry, I just can�t agree. Don�t get me wrong�the live-action film really didn�t need to be THREE films long, and it got to the point where the overuse of CGI felt completely pointless and stupid�but at least it had enough time to be a MOVIE. Too much time, sure, but enough time all the same. This movie tries to cram an entire book�s worth of plot into a runtime less than an hour and a half. As a result, you wind up with just a series of action scenes that are rather disconnected and incohesive. The overall plot still exists, but it�s not necessarily served but what�s on the screen most of the time. Don�t get me wrong�those scenes COULD be kept in�if they served the plot and furthered the character development. But instead, you just have characters making choices, and then completely changing their choices with little rationale. It�s still a story though, and at least the plot moves from a beginning to an end, so that�s a positive?

Karo: The old hokey animated version of Tolkien's beloved tale of the ggggggreatest advennnntrrrre thhhat liiiies ahhhead that is famously parodied in one of the best episodes of South Park.
From a story standpoint this is a remarkably faithful adaptation, all things considered. Certainly moreso than Peter Jackson's bloated overblown travesty. The characters even sing all of Tolkien's poetry from the book throughout the film which is cute I guess.
It is kind of what you'd expect from a 1970s made-for-tv movie, the animation is extremely poor and there are commercial break transitions everywhere. The character designs are very weird and unpleasant, with everyone being a distorted mound of wrinkled and folded flesh that would feel more at home in a Lovecraft story rather than a Tolkien one.
Still, there is a whimsical charm to its cheapness, harkening back to a simpler time before the series got polluted by mainstream pop culture acceptance where if someone knew what a hobbit was you knew they were cool.

Johnbobb: for the entire runtime I could not get over how much more detailed bilbo's hands were than his face

Plasma: I read the book several years ago, and this movie seemed like a faithful adaptation. Too bad I found the book to be a suspenseless slog.

Red: There are some interesting tidbits here and there but for the most part this movie is old and quite rough to watch. The music feels very "old television special" in the worst of ways and few of the characters ever advance beyond annoying, rarely ever memorable. The best I could say of this is that I managed to watch it without falling asleep, something I could not say of the more recent modern Hobbit film, which I could argue as more of a borefest than this thing, which was definitely pretty boring.

Eiko

Mario

Its funny because there are just so many dreamworks characters that are ill equipped to drive a kart becasue of weird anatomy or minuscule size.
I don't think they own the rights to any of the aardman colab characters, and much as I would like to see Moses driving around on an a camel with wheels, it is not gonna happen.

I'd expect to see Alex, Eep and Diane Foxington, probably Ruby Gilman too as I'm betting the roster was finalized way before that movie bombed.

Outlier:

Inviso: 27
Ermine: 25
Plasma: 24
Evillord: 22
Red: 16
Karo: 11
Johnbobb: 10
Mythiot: 9
Suprak: 6

28. Lightyear

Inviso: 12
Ermine: 20
Plasma: 20
Karo: 21
Red: 22
Evillord: 26
Johnbobb: 26
Mythiot: 27
Suprak: 27

Total: 201

Inviso: I still have eight movies left on this list, but it crazy to me that Lightyear is currently as high in my ranking as I have it. Its not that its badits just that the movie is kind of average, and doesnt really hit any of the high notes youd expect from Pixar. But then again, I feel like Pixar has kind of fallen into a bit of a rut in recent years, where theyre not pumping out as high-quality of films as they used to. Lightyear is an enjoyable film though. Im not the hugest fan of Buzz in the movie, because it takes a while for him to overcome the whole stubborn jackass who thinks hes the best ever and can do everything persona thats established in the opening. But once he kind of hits that obvious turning point, and especially once you get the twist villain, the movie gets stronger. Its just a shame how rapidly the climax of the film goes, because its a long journey to get there. At least Sox is adorable. Good catto. And the ragtag group of misfits Buzz teams up with serve their roles well in contrast to his wannabe badass attitude.

Ermine: This film is so incredibly lucky it had Sox the Cat in it because he is the only thing saving it from a bottom 5 placement. This unfunny, serious piece of garbage is what Andy grew up with and made Buzz Lightyear toys so popular? Give me a fucking break. This is just the next slap in the face to the Toy Story franchise and I'm sure Toy Story 5 will be another slap.
Every character, sans for Sox, is terrible and I hate them all. The story and PLOT TWIST is awful and I don't even want to bother thinking about it. What were they thinking?!

Plasma: No 90s kid would want a Buzz Lightyear action figure after watching this movie.
There are some interesting ideas here, like the rapid passage of time and Buzzs stubbornness causing him to fast-forward through his friends lives, but the execution here is dismal. I mustve checked the clock at least two-dozen times while watching this movie. It blows my mind that Pixar couldnt come up with a more charming cast of characters or a better sci-fi gag than sandwiches with bread in the middle. This whole movie felt like a generic cash-in.

Karo: As the greed of Disney executives goes to infinity and beyond, we get this spinoff movie of the Toy Story franchise starring Buzz Lightyear. No, not the Buzz that everyone knows and loves and who would actually give a damn about, but rather the in-universe inspiration for the toy.
I mean, is there literally anyone who watches Toy Story and says 'aw gee whiz, I wonder what the movie that Buzz Lightyear was a toy of is like and can I watch it?' Well, as the film's opening text states, 'this is that movie', so lets find out, shall we?
Missing in action is the trademark Pixar imagination and in its place is a standard sci-fi film with dreary and generic visual design. Even in Pixar's old movies when their animation was shit everything still felt vibrant and alive, here it barely feels like an animated movie.
There are certainly some bright spots, the story is solid, and the little robot cat thing steals every scene he is in.
I mean, I prefer this to trying to force a Toy Story 5 out of the ol' creative rectum, but apparently they are doing that anyway so what is even the fucking point of this.

Red: Toy Story was a franchise with a perfectly fine send off, after the third one. Then we got a 4th one, it also got a less good but also perfectly fine send off. Pixar has been trying to kill this series and yet still they insist on making more(And more after this one). No one wanted the live action film within a film of a way more cartoony more real life universe. I don't even know how to describe this, but no one asked for. This isn't even a particularly great children's story that would spawn a following among fictional kids. Conceptually this thing is already a mess. It would have been better as some sort of standalone concept instead of making it toy story. Hell if this were a film within a Toy Story universe, that Toy Story universe would end up with Sox merchandise plastered all over it. But no, we didn't think this shit through, we just wanted to try to profit off another Toy Story movie, except it wasn't a Toy Story movie. Amidst the mess of a franchise we have here is a slightly more heartfelt story with the messiness of solo one-way time travel. Again, maybe more interesting as a solo concept. But this is a franchise that Disney and Pixar just refuse to let die and they need to stop. Except they aren't because since we didn't like their attempt to be creative with reviving the series it just means what people actually wanted was Toy Story 5, right? Because Pixar definitely has never found success making original films.

Evillord: Man, what happened to Pixar? It's so insane to think this movie comes from the same studio as Ratatouille or The Incredibles. Hell even Luca feels like it's on a completely different level to this. The whole movie would be over in like 15 minutes if Buzz just learned the obvious lesson about trust the first time something that's ham-fistedly intended to teach it happens. I guess you can't say the plot twist is meaningless, it's a pretty in your face reiteration of the movie's lesson, but it's just kind of...lame. I appreciated the retro-futurism of Buzz having an AI loaded on a SNES cartridge, since this film is "supposed" to have been made in 1995, and there are a couple of half-decent space scenes with muted audio, but neither is used nearly often enough to create a consistently interesting sci-fi film. The opening section where Buzz is going through time dilation due to FTL travel and the rest of the world ages four years for every day he lives is the best part, it at least makes some use of a specific idea (though my friend who has seen Interstellar says they ripped it off from that movie). Once these parts are over it's just a clich team bonding film with the insufferable Marvel-esque Disney writing aesthetic where every line has to be a quip, though at least it's not nearly as bad as Strange Planet in this regard. That cat was kind of creepy and had a lot of sussy features.

Johnbobb: It was okay and entirely unnecessary. I have very little to say about it. It exists.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Good King Moggle Mog