Alter-native's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[batman eat picachu PARODY]

In Short, A Parody of a Parody of a Parody I Think.

Newgrounds has become dumping ground for parody parodies of popular comic/cartoon/anime/manga/videogame/t elevision/movie franchises. I think it gotten to the point where simply adding a popular character in a flash toon will rack up your score enough to get it front paged.

For instance, I remember the day I saw Batman Eat Pikachu. I was in somewhat shock and in disbelief at what had been front paged because there's no way it should have been front paged. It was poorly animated(certain inconsistencies like batman holding a fork in left hand, and yet holding the same fork in his left hand at the end scene), not to well drawn(batman had a freakishly long tongue for some reason when he was supposed to be doing that cliche licking lips thing all characters do), and most of all, there was no joke. The only reason Batman was eating pikachu, was because Batman was eating Pikachu. Something like this would surely remain in the backwaters of NG's hardrive...

... but there it was, against all odds, front paged. I guess it could be this generation's "B" perhaps. I feel it must been either a deliberate dadaist masterpiece aimed at site's userbase that is too absorbed in pop culture, or a genuine amateur.

...But back to this movie here.

This parody, or should I say remake, is a new and improved, marginally better drawn, marginally better animated version, of the aforementioned movie. There's still no joke, so this is but a well polished turd. I can not bring myself to rate this higher than 3 stars. On the other hand, the author does show some moderate skill so I wish him good luck on his next entry.

[All illWillPress Episodes]

Ah ha ha ha.

I remember the days when the Star Syndicate, The Barney Bunch, and the UCFD railed against this nonsense, and risked getting banned for it.

But seriously, Illwillpress and his Neurotically Yours series has been satirized to death. It's common knowledge by now that JIM puts no effort into his movies and to this day, has not improved one aspect of his writing, his animation, or his artwork. Every episode from here on out boils down to
1. Foamy rants at something

2. Germaine has something weird done to her(breast implants, shaves head, gets fat, wears floral dresses, etc.), and despite this, she still serves as back drop weird sexual object and not a fully fleshed out character.

3. Lazy, minimalistic animation utilizing frames and art since 2004 and filtered photograph backgrounds.

The best compliment I can give to him now, is that at least he finally got around to fixing his line work by smoothing it out(Foam always had a jagged iris until recently). Though now it just looks like bland. That, and maybe he experiments more visual creativity in his art portal offerings.

The most damning thing about it is that this series back in the day, was that it was overrated to the point where it would easily win awards and get front paged, shunning more talented and hardworking animators and artists.

Neurotically Yours , for a short time for Illwillpress, made NG into a merchandising vehicle for himself, as well as a wannabe gothic, hot topic brand angst hive. Sometimes it got so bad, that Illwillpress could get front paged for posting a single scene, single frame picture, opinionated audio rant on Hurricane Katrina as a movie, and have his legions of fans praising it without a single thought.

But those days are now over. I know this because I lived through them. I've seen this site change in magnificent and frightening ways.

Nowadays Illwillpress and his ilk have faded into obscurity. The cloud over shrouding his fame is Egorapter, his Awesome series, and his many clones.

Newgrounds is now a haven for an endless after endless avalanche of generic video game parodies.

But I feel fine, because even so most of these current movies aren't completely original, they are at least, for the most part, far more visually creative and done by authors who love their work and subject material, care for their fans, and put far much effort into their movies then Illwillpress ever did with his Foamy cartoons.

It's not the perfect slice of heaven, but it's manageable, and occasionally, occasionally, I still as always find something truly remarkable and awe-inspiring that truly proves that the 10% according to Sturgeon's law is still worth dying for.

But anyway, this movie perfectly emulates Neurotically Yours to a T. I honestly cannot give this higher then 3.5/5 stars because of this. It doesn't take that much effort to make Foamy cartoons. It's gotten to the point where making fun of Illwillpress and his social-political squirrel sock puppet is old hat. This guy no longer wins easy awards like he used to do. Some Foam-heads have moved on to better and brighter things, whereas the ones that still remain will do as they always do, and nothing will change their opinion. This series, for all intents and purposes, is dead, and we can let it stay dead. Still, you're kind of funny and I give you credit for that. I like your choice of posters on the wall in the background.

Good luck on your next entry as always.

BoobMarley responds:

I had never seen an IWP animation until last week. This short animation wasn't the product of years of annoyance and frustration. I was seriously just that urgently compelled after having watched his stuff to put another project on hold for the afternoon and crank this out to get it all off my chest.
It only took 4 hours.

I really do appreciate your thoughts on the whole matter, and am glad there are folks in the community who don't have a stick up their ass about seeing their beloved Foamy and Germaine get mocked. It means a lot to have the understanding and support of a member who has seen much in his time here. Thank you.

[BeyBlade Was F'n Dumb]

This Is Why I Never Got Into Beyblade

Out of all the anime in the "Mon" genre, Beyblade comes off to me as the dumbest, and it's all due to the implementation of "strategy", that is, the lack thereof.

To contrast, in Digimon, Pokemon, and Monster Rancher, we have some kids and monster companions. The monster companion has certain skill set. Some skills are better then others. In the case of Pokemon, we have elemental attacks and defenses, and levels to grind. The kids have an active role in battles because they have to point their fingers and command their monster companion to attack the opposing kid's monster companion with one of their memorized attacks from their six or two move skill set.

With Yu-Gi-Oh, Duel Masters, and Magic the Gathering, we have card games, with a well established set of rules. There are two players, each has an amount of hit points. They put down monster cards to attack and drain the other player's hit points, serving as both an offense and a defense. The monsters have their own hit points, and spell cards can be used to multiply the offensive and defensive capabilities of the monsters.

With Beyblade... They're tops. Just tops. Spinning tops. Glorified dreidals. Kids launch spinning tops, the spinning tops bump each other a bit, and then one of the tops stops spinning.

I admit, the tops look very stylish, with customizable plastic fin blades and their launchers are top notch, but it's a slight modification of this light up UFO-style spinning top toy I used play with when I was 5 and most damning of all, well, to quote wikipedia:

"Beyblade is largely a game of chance, although some players believe a particular launch style can influence the outcome of a game."

In other words, pure luck. A game of 50/50!

Sometimes I hear people rattle off Pokemon battles as "glorified rock, paper, scissors matches", but like I wrote earlier, "some skills are better than others", plus you can train your Pokemon to higher levels and use the bulbapedia to determine the best skill sets and method of level grinding. So all the tournaments and gym leaders are easily comprehended, because the tournaments are contests to determine whose training methods are the best. The Gym leaders and the Elite Four are determined to be the best trainers in the world because they have high level monsters. So in the end Pokemon battles take, patience, determination, knowledge, and just a "little" luck.

With Beyblade, your only strategy is to yank the zipper and pray the other top falls down first.
I dunno what else, maybe tilting the launcher when you "let it rip" might do something.

It's hard to see a tounament style game, let alone an anime based on these spinning tops.

I just can't see a bunch of people would take time out their lives to fund a ton of cash to pay for and sponsor a stadium that houses a tournament of spinning tops. I don't see why and audience would be excited by it, let alone be there. In real life, as demonstrated, this thing would not go on beyond two kids with the same plastic tops saying "Hey, let's launch our tops at the same time, and let 'em bump each other just for kicks. lol!" I don't see a reason to offer the victor of such tournaments a trophy or medal that costs more than the $1 plastic crap you buy at the Party City.

It's absolutely ridiculous to see archetypical Shonen get worked up over a game of spinning tops. It'd be like getting all feisty over a coin toss. There is no accumulated skill that can dictate the out come of coin toss.

This is because it takes about as much effort to win as it does to lose. Zero.

Anyway four and a half stars for a great quality animation. It was another generic parody of something blindingly obvious out of a numerous parodies of things that are blindingly obvious, but it was well drawn, crisply painted, fairly well animated, and I got a good chuckle. Good luck with your next entry SpeedoSausage.

[A Tale Of Woe]

A Tale of Woe in The Middle East

This 3 minute short has a unique animation style and a very interesting one at that. It is like the characters were animated using cutouts from a sketchbook and the backgrounds were cut and pasted together from photographs of real life war sites. The the closest things I could compare to the character animation would be the character animation from Nintendo's Hotel Dusk and A-Ha's music video, "Take On Me" from the 80's. The results are very impressive, since a lot of the action in this looked hard to animate.

The story is very grim. The story mostly consists of all the horrible stuff you hear and read about in the news regarding the United State's War on Terror. The violence against women, the bombings, the collateral damage on behalf the U.S. Military, the civilian and US causalities... All through the eyes of a young orphan(?) dodging hellfire and what not. The short ends with the kid waking up in a hospital bed from a recap of everything witnessed, looking out the window, and giving a smile. I interpret this to mean the kid becoming desensitized to the violence and general horror, to the point of accepting it as if it were a natural thing.

So I ask the author, what country does this animation take place? I assume it's Afghanistan because of the early scene where the kid kicks a heroin needle on the ground.

For those who don't know Afghanistan has a problem with heroin due to the oppressive regime of the Taliban which outlawed all forms of entertainment and media, in addition to women's rights. A lot of adults in Afghanistan get high from heroin and zone out in the streets since there is nothing else to do besides praise Allah.

TaraGraphika responds:

I LOOOOOVVEEE DEDUCTIONS!

Have you seen Sherlock BBC? He asked Watson if he was posted from Afghanistan or from Iraq just by telling it from small details of his features. The same goes for your observant on the heroin needle. Amazing and Fantastic. You are right. This whole animation is taken place in Afghanistan.

Thank you for your wonderful review. I bet everyone could tell it's from Afghanistan, but to prove it, small details should be observed.

[Transit]

Two Paths Were Laid Before Him...

He took the "Psycho"-path.

[Flash Teaches you Flash!]

Short, Sweet, and Pretty Accurate at Times.

The slow and outdated nature of my computer is the bane of my life.

Great animation and acting on behalf of that flash icon guy.

[little boat]

Cute.

This one kind reminds me of this real life story in where some technicians sent some small robotic automaton, with a smilely face drawn on it or something like that, on a linear path through a big city. As it went along its path, I think the technicians decided to record it to see how the average citizens would react to it, and surprisingly, most stopped to help get back on it's track whenever it fell down or went wayward.

[Paraphernalia]

A Breathtakingly Animated, Simple Lighthearted Steampunk Story.

There isn't anything too remotely complex about the plot(judging from my first of possible multiple viewings), but that does not matter too much, because a simple plot works, it just depends on how you tell it. This author had that knowledge in spades.

On average, the output I see on this site has mostly been Pony parodies, Minecraft parodies, Skyrim parodies, Pokemon parodies, and parodies of PonyMinecraftSkyrimPokemon parodies. In the past few months almost everything I've been remotely enjoying has been glorified reports of popular media stuff and glorified reports of reports of popular media stuff. Regardless of whether those works were well animated or not. suffice to say, I have not been compelled to write a long review expressing my grattitude let alone even criticism in quite awhile... Until now, with this one work posted.

Here, is where I come across a work that is something new, that is somewhat original at least for the most part, and it is not out to get cheap laughs from people who watch a certain TV show, and play a certain videogame . This short, about a shut-in who comes across a visitor who crashes into her bedroom ceiling, is told in an interesting way as there is no dialogue that is heard so we mostly read personalities and emotions from the characters' gestures. This gives the movie an almost timeless antique kind of feeling, like that of a silent movie, sans the speech cards, and in vibrant color. This "antique" feel syncs the story according to the supposed Steampunk 1800s-ish era it took place.

Finally, this short is masterfully and painstakingly animated and detailed. The bedroom is full of all this assorted junk you would typically find in a girl's bedroom. Toys, drawers, family pictures, etc. and all this stuff gets scattered about when the flying bicycle rider crashes into her room. There is directional grace present(an opening shot of a gate covered in thorns, establishing the characterization of a girl who does not go out much. Shot of certain objects in the room, hinting at the girl's past). That, and a generally uplifting mood.

I could imagine another critic other than me who might say that this short might purport the destructive idea of "waiting for good things to come, rather than pursuing them" just because the girl and the boy met completely on accident as the boy crashed into the girl's ceiling unexpectedly, and continuing from that, that other critic would claim that the story was "force feeding the girl a happy ending and a friend"... To which I would disagree with both potential claims because the bicycle boy is an outgoing person, who seems to pursue knowledge/adventure/discovery and all that and actually urged the girl to help him get his flying moterped out of the ceiling to fly off into the sky. The girl, while curious, initially refuses, but manages to convince herself to leave her sheltered life to fly off with the boy into the brave new world, thus, while not giving a psychological profile per se, these events show ample character development.

To the rest of NG, please check out this short as I have given it 5 stars, and I rarely give stuff 5 stars.

To the author of this work. A fantastic and outstanding job well done. Good luck on your next entry.