LogFAQs > #962158640

15. Onward

Karo: 10
Inviso: 14
Red: 17
Johnbobb: 21
Evillord: 22
Ermine: 29

Total: 113

Karo: So basically the whole thing is that this movie used to take place in a cool fantasy rpg world, but everyone became lazy and forgot how to do magic, and Dungeons & Dragons material is basically history books now.
These two elf brothers acquire some old magic shit and use it to try and bring their dead dad back to life, but they resurrect their father's ass and nothing else. This leads to a race against time to find the magcuffin they need to complete the spell before papa needs to use the restroom.
Sure it is the same old two dudes who end up on an arbitrary journey shtick, and the protagonists immediately scream out Buzz and Woody's high school years, but it is how they use the scenario and characters that really make this film shine.
The two brothers are the heart and soul of this movie, and seeing their relationship deepen over the course of the story is what really makes this movie special.
There are plenty of nerdy visual gags peppered about, including an epic encounter with a Gelatinous Cube that will certainly make D&D fans cheer.
It just goes to show that Pixar is still a talented studio when they aren't making uninspired sequels, and while in this film they may have rolled a natural 1 on an imagination check, they still scored a critical hit upon my heart.

Inviso: First off, is Chris Pratt just in EVERYTHING now? Not only do we have the news about Mario and Garfield, but Id forgotten just how prominent he is in several films on this list that have already come out. Second, while Onward is low tier by Pixar standards, thats still pretty solid overall. Its a film that at least FEELS like a unique concept (road trip movie about two brothers trying to spend one last day with their dead dad), and on paper, the main character gets a decent growth arc over the course of the film (gaining confidence as he embraces his wizard status, and general learning to appreciate his brother). The film is a BIT heavy-handed at times, or at least its a bit on the nose in a few instances, but overall, I feel like it nails the emotional element, and the ending feels deserved (getting to see his dad was never Ians reward, but rather Barleys for helping Ian grow as a person over the years). Its definitely not a masterpiece, but I appreciate it for trying to be different and unique.

Red: An original movie from Pixar? This is going to be great, right. This might be the most disappointing movie on the list. I don't even really want to call it bad, but it really feels like a very generic brother roadtrip movie. They wanted to try to do the pixar tug at your heart with the dad but on that front it was telegraphed fairly hard and ends up as mostly a miss. A unique world thats a mix of fantasy and reality ends up mostly underutilized, being used for plot convenience but with very little expansion beyond that. You are left with characters that just aren't very memorable and while I appreciate an original movie on a list like this, can't help but feel like the movie was a big miss and wasted potential.

Johnbobb: I remember seeing the initial trailer for this a couple years ago and thinking... "meh." It looked pretty uninspired, tbh. Things like the unicorns in place of raccoons, the people replaced by orcs or whatever, but it otherwise looked like a generic coming-of-age tween movie with a light fantasy skin on top. Once I actually saw it though-- yeah, ok, it still is kinda mostly just that, but it's not all bad. The relationship between the two brothers was surprisingly moving, with the different experiences of loss being the focus, delving into the not-insignificant difference between losing a parent you loved dearly and losing a parent you never got the chance to know. It's a dichotomy I've rarely if ever seen in movies, and the type of emotional chord I expect from a Pixar film, even if the rest of the movie didn't quite live up to it.

Evillord: This movie gets a lot of justifiable flak for having a formulaic plot, but it was fun to watch and pretty good in the fine details. I liked the dragon fight and the dad being only legs was used really well.

Ermine: I just gave a huuuuuge ass yawn before starting the write up for this.

I think that's all I need to say.