LogFAQs > #975502609

5. The Bad Guys

Plasma: 1
Inviso: 3
Suprak: 3
Red: 4
Karo: 6
Ermine: 6
Mythiot: 16
Evillord: 21
Johnbobb: 29

Total: 89

Plasma: Now were talking! This one grabbed me right upfront with stylish characters, slick humor, and charming animation (Wolfs eye/facial expressions never get old). From there, the story kept me guessing with clever plot developments, satisfying twists, and dynamic characters that were worth caring about.
Much like the Shrek movies, The Bad Guys knows how to balance satire and emotion. The meta-jokes and references made me smile while the story itself had me genuinely rooting for Wolf not to push the button at the midpoint and then to turn back and rescue Snake at the end. I loved the twists with Innocent Professor Gerbil being the baddie and Governor Fox Lady being a legendary thief. The story pulses with energy, and every member of the cast contributes in meaningful ways. Such a fantastic movie. Hope we get sequels.

Inviso: Its so weird to think that within the same one-year span, Dreamworks put out two separate anthropomorphic animal heist movies. And yet, because Im me, perhaps I rank this a little higher than it otherwise deserves. But I dont care, because this was a fun movie throughout. I enjoy heist films, and I enjoy the general feeling associated with having a large cast of distinct characters who all play a role in the overarching plot. Plus, the film itself feels like a loving send-up to classic, live-action heist movies. Youve got the non sequitur discussions between Mr. Wolf and Mr. Snake that feel like a loving homage to Quentin Tarantinos crime movie conversations from Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. Youve got the general heist planning, with everyone playing a role and the complications that the characters have to think their way out of, a la the Oceans franchise. Heck, they even use Clooney as a verb, putting a fine point right on the nose. Throw in Diane Foxington as a gorgeous furry icon (who, admittedly, couldve done with a bit more hair, since I tend to prefer my furries with hairstyles), and this was a great watch.

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Red: Oddly not the only movie on this list with an evil guinea pig. A fun heist movie of animals trying to sort of subvert their typical stereotypes. Falters a bit with some of the character turns not feeling completely natural, characters feeling a bit dickish to each other at times, tbh. But mostly just a fun movie and it was nice to see a more experimental animation style, taking a bit of the technique from spider-verse but not wholly being a carbon copy. With 3D animation we'd really been stuck with the "Disney proven safe" thing for awhile and Dreamworks of all studios moving away from that was quite surprising and refreshing.

Karo: When a heist goes wrong, the city's most notorious criminal gang must try and reform to avoid a lengthy jail sentence (or at least pretend to).
They really made an effort to shrug off the usual 'Dreamworks style' here and create something that is very unique and visually stunning that almost brings to mind Lupin the Third in its exaggerated character motions and I really like it.
The principal characters of the story (Wolf, Snake and Foxington) are among the best Dreamworks has ever created, but unfortunately the company has the tendency to fill their movies with side characters that are both useless and awful, and here it is no different. You'd think after hearing the phrase 'Awkwafina as a talking spider' things couldn't get any worse, but let me introduce you to Mr. Piranha. Piranha is this stereotypical 'crazy Mexican' character who is easily enraged, lacks all self control and shouts out random phrases in Spanish. He is also incredibly flatulent because of course he is.
One thing I found weird is like most of the main characters are anthropomorphic animals, but all the background mooks are human for some reason. Also there's a non-talking cat who they rescue from a tree. Professor Marmalade is a talking sapient creature, but all the other guinea pigs are just normal animals... who are experimented on en masse in an animal testing lab. Yikes.
It is confusing, and a little bit disturbing. It would have been much better to just make everyone talking animals like in Zootopia.
All in all it was an incredibly enjoyable experience that felt fresh in a way few modern CGI films do. There are nods to Tarantino, hot foxy ladies *rimshot*, and a level of character development you rarely see in these kinds of kids movies. It is the best Dreamworks movie since the original HTTYD, a distinction it held for all of a mere seven months because, well, you know.

Ermine: I had this film a few places higher up but I think it is starting to sour ever so slightly with me. Not that I don't still really enjoy it, but when I think about this film now, I just think about how I really enjoy Mr. Snake and then don't care about any of the other characters. Wolf is alright, a pretty decent and enjoyable character, but I can't say I really like any of the others.
The animation and art style are fantastic, that's another positive and I will say I LOVED the ending sequence where Mr. Snake reveals what actually ended up going down.
I think Mr. Snake and Mr. Wolf's relationship throughout the film is what lands this still fairly high for me. Without it, I don't think this film could really stand and walk.
Either way though, it's a fun, exciting, but somewhat predictable film.
Also, please stop casting Awkwafina in any roles, thank you! Thankfully she's not TOO offensive here.

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Evillord: Besides 20 year old memories of the Hobbit, so decayed they were unrecognizable, this was the only movie on the list I had seen when I started. I gave it a shot when the ads were circulating because the characters look so charmingly smug on posters, especially Mr. Snake winding his way through his Hawaiian shirt. There are some cute scenes of these charismatic characters just interacting near the start, like the opening riff on Reservoir Dogs where the snake and wolf argue about birthdays or the car chase squad intro that follows, but it also has a farting piranha as one of the main characters. It starts to get tiresome as the story progresses and the superficial charm gives way to juvenile Dreamworks-brand comedy, a rote narrative about the crew breaking good with the obligatory midsection plot point where they have a fight for five minutes, and an incredibly predictable twist villain played by Moss from IT Crowd (though it is, probably unintentionally, hilarious to hear this obviously evil character's goodness described as "second only to that of Mother Theresa"). A big disappointment. The Sam Rockwell wolf is pretty hot though ngl.

Johnbobb: Movie starts out, some rude but friendly banter between conmen at a restaurant, pretty cool. They turn to reveal the rest of the building is terrified, not because they're criminals but because they're a wolf and a snake dressed up like people in a world of humans, legitimately funny (that later turned out to not be true). The movie goes into a "yep, this is just my crazy life" self-narration character introduction, and I couldn't help but groan. Then 5 minutes in we get our first (not last) giant fart joke, and that pretty much set the direction of the film. Some funny lines, some fun moments, and some great voice acting, but it's dragged down by a Minions-level sense of lazy humor. One nice thing I can say about it: animation has been doing a cool thing lately where it utilizes a combination of fluid and choppy animation to give a comic-y snap to action scenes. You see a lot of it in Mitchells vs. the Machines, and there's a couple moments of it here