#negative review

I saw a review saying the humor would be make or break for you, and I think for me it was break.

This is the kind of movie that can't sit still with itself. For the bulk of its runtime, it's incapable of having an earnest, straightforward moment without interrupting itself with an attempt at a cheap joke. This movie never misses the chance for a cheap, obvious joke.

There are moments of earnestness in this that the movie allows itself, there's stuff to like here, but there would be a lot more if the movie wasn't desperately jangling keys in front of the audience like 'haha, he-man's a goofy franchise, isn't it? isn't? please laugh. please laugh. please. we're desperate for you to laugh.'

It's also very long and there are some issues with Skeletor's audio - his dialogue is often hard to make out. It's embarrassed by itself and is trying to be too many things at once and is tonally inconsistent as a result.

SPOILERS BEGIN

-Quick overview of plot - I'm going to use spoiler tags since it's a recent release - After Skeletor conquers Eternos, six-year old Adam is sent to Earth as an exile and is raised as Adam Glenn on Earth from there on. As an adult, he goes back, discovers the Power of Grayskull, and resolves to defeat Skeletor with Teela and Man-At-Arms, whom he remembers from his childhood.

-The movie takes advantage of its PG-13 rating, they say shit and ass and so on, there's a joke where they call Cringor a pussy.

The thing that really stuck out at me re: the tonal inconsistency was this scene where Teela is showing Adam the ruins of Eternos, they're flying over this bombed out husk of a city, and Adam asks why Skeletor would do this. And she responds with 'he's the bad guy' or something to that effect. Adam says 'but surely there's more to it than that' and Teela responds with 'he has a skull for his face, what do you expect?'

And that's kind of a big reason the movie doesn't work for me - Teela is flying over the burnt out husk of her home city, Skeletor is explicitly said to be killing people arbitrarily for his own amusement, they have him and Evil-Lyn pointlessly kill off Moss Man for shock value and a cheap joke.

And so this moment where you could build Skeletor up as a threat is wasted because the movie has to make a joke about how his name is Skeletor and he has a skull for a face. I would not be complaining if this movie had committed in either direction - if it had gone with 'shamelessly goofy He-Man' or 'we're serious now He-Man.' But it tries and fails to do both.

-What really gives this movie a ceiling of a B- for me is the fact that the characters in universe aren't actually called Ram-Man, Fisto, or Mekaneck, for example. Those were nicknames Adam gave them as a six year old because he didn't know their actual names. Man that pissed me off, dude. Have some balls, movie!

That single decision is illustrative of so much of what is wrong with this movie. It's embarrassed of itself!

It can't just have a character be called Fisto or Mekaneck. It has to have Fisto go 'uh, what did you just call me?!?' and the movie has to Surf Dracula those characters going by Fisto or Mekaneck. People will defend this movie by saying 'well, they call themselves those names by the end' but the fact that the movie thought the charade was necessary or a good idea is itself an indictment of the creative process behind it.

(Apparently no one in universe had a problem with being called 'Skeletor' or 'Evil-Lyn'. :shrug:)

-I like the idea of Sorceress choosing Adam because he was compassionate and would try to reach out to everyone, a Superman/Wonder Woman sort of deal, where he would do more with the Power of Grayskull than just punch things. But I would prefer that concept have been executed in a movie that doesn't have a ninety second sequence solely devoted to making fun of how stupid a name everyone thinks 'He-Man' is.

-There's a scene where Adam stages a prison break with his fellow warriors and he asks, smirking, raised eyebrow 'How much can you bench?' and Fisto confusedly replies 'Bench? What's bench?' because he doesn't know what that word is. Cheap, obvious joke, they couldn't resist it.

But like ten minutes later, there's a scene where Fisto and Ram-Man are fighting Skeletor's guys and Fisto's like 'ok Ram-Man, give them head!' and Ram-Man gives him an annoyed look. So what Earth slang does and doesn't exist on Eternia? I know that sounds like a strange thing to harp on, but it's emblematic of the movie's wider problem - that it throws everything else aside for the sake of dangling a cheap joke in the audience's face.

-Skeletor did look very cool in this, I have to praise the movie for that. He was very expressive. Idris Elba was great as Man-At-Arms, although, again, movie's attempts at humor cut against that.

-He-Man isn't in that movie all that often, they spend a lot of time on the (admittedly cartoon accurate) joke that Adam is pretty pathetic and so we spend most of the movie with Adam stuttering and tripping and so on. It got old for me so fast.

EDIT: There's a scene in MOTU2026 that I only just now remembered - where Man-At-Arms and Roboto destroy a statue of an ancient Eternian hero to kill Skeletor's guys, and they just sort of applaud and hi five after doing that. That's an ancient relic of your culture - you don't have any feelings on destroying it? It's like if someone from NYC dynamited the Statue of Liberty to fall on a Nazi-controlled ship, after the Nazis had been occupying NYC for 15 years.

The lines are delivered terribly ESPECIALLY in the romantic flight prelude, extra lines are added that are just. god theyre so bad. I've only seen Test Drive and Romantic Flight and it's preluding scenes, but they are enough for me to think this movie is utterly insulting.

In Test Drive, Hiccup does this weird silly giggle in the middle of the scene and Toothless smiles in response. It completely kills the tone of the scene they're trying to go for. Don't even get me started on the way the music breaks in the middle of the crash, and transitions into choir singing. I can't explain why I hate it, but I do. And it's edited terribly on top of that, the music doesn't line up properly and the camera is way too shaky in a ton of the shots. It works for the fall but it does not in the previous shots, where it is present still.

In romantic flight prelude, theyre so phoned in, the actors! Theres so many silly lines added too, like Hiccup saying he's a copilot [or whatever he said]. And then... oh my god. Astrid apologizes to Toothless. TOOTHLESS! In the original, I always took it as Astrid apologizing to Hiccup for how she threatened him, and Toothless accepts that and grows calm. She has 0 reason to apologize to toothless! shes terrified of him, she hates dragons in that moment [not to mention he barely even acted crazy like in the original, he just flies around a little fast.] Hiccup delivers the spinning line before he even starts spinning.

and then the designs. They are ALL godawful. I dont care ! All of them! Even toothless with his ugly neon green eyes and shark teeth and weird wings. And hes so clunky. They are ALL way too clunky in movement.

This all culminates into a movie I hope to god I never force myself to suffer through the entirety of. It hurts my soul. They shit all over the legacy of one of the most important franchises in my entire life. Sure its good, if youve never seen the original. If you have its utter garbage, tasteless and gutting to witness.

Short review:

It’s an 8/10 movie buried underneath a 6/10 movie. When it’s doing something new, it’s good. When it’s just rehashing the first two movies, it’s pretty bad.

Long review:

To start this off, I’m one of the people who thought Way of Water was mediocre at best. There were some interesting ideas in that movie, but the plot was just too thin to really explore any of those ideas. So going into Fire and Ash, I was worried it’d be more of the same. What surprised me then about Fire and Ash is that my issues with the movie is different from Way of Water. When it’s good, it’s REALLY good. But when it’s bad, it’s honestly frustrating to watch. So unlike the 2nd one which was just flat, this one has high highs and low lows.

I can actually pinpoint where this movie fell off. Fire and Ash’s first act, amazing. It is one of the most exciting sequences in this series. The Wagwan tribe (that’s not their name, but that’s what I heard in the theaters lol) are an amazing addition to the series. They’re terrifying, their lore is interesting, the idea that there is a Na’vi tribe that’s loyal to the humans is interesting and based on real life, and Varang is already one of the best characters introduced in the Avatar world.

And then there’s the Quaritches. I’ll say it now, Fire and Ash is FUCKING CARRIED by the Colonel and Spider. Colonel Quaritch’s growth from a human extremist to becoming a twisted mirror version of Jake Sully was so fascinating to watch that I would actually be down just to watch a Recom Quaritch-Varang movie. In fact, that’s what Fire and Ash should’ve just been, an evil version of Avatar 2009. Meanwhile, Spider Socorro was the heart of the Sully storyline. He had the most development and most of the family’s struggles were revolving around Spider (Neytiri’s xenophobia, Jake trying to be a good dad, Kiri’s romance, Lo’ak needing a brother in his life).

But then after the amazing first act, the movie grinds to a halt when everyone returns to the Water Tribe. As soon as the movie goes back to being about the whales, the movie nosedives in quality. I honestly couldn’t believe it. James Cameron literally had the rest of the movie just be a rehash of Way of Water. You have the whale poachers back to patrolling the ocean, Lo’ak doing his Free Willy shit, Quaritch looking for the Sullys AGAIN (even though he’s been to the damn water village in the 2nd movie), and Jake back to the same arc of him trying to protect his family.

The fact that Fire and Ash is just a rehash of Way of Water is bad enough. But somehow, this movie is Way of Water but worse? What I mean is:

1) The guy from Flight of the Conchords randomly shows up and saves Jake Sully. He doesn’t appear anywhere else in the movie and you don’t even see him until 1-2 hours into the movie. Who was this guy? Why was he suddenly important? Was there really no other way that Jake Sully could’ve been freed from his holding cell? Did we really need a human deus ex machina?

2) Jake Sully somehow got stupider as a character. Quaritch and the Wagwan tribe have machine guns, rocket launchers, and flamethrowers aimed at everyone. Jake, seeing all of this, was ready to have the Water Tribe throw their spears and arrows at them. And he has the nerve to say, “Oh, what makes you think you can kill us before we kill you”. Sir, what? There’s a reason why people use guns and bombs now over spears. Aside from getting stupider, his character isn’t growing anymore. He goes from being toruk makto, then not toruk makto, and then back to being toruk makto. He has a fight with Neytiri, but the fight gets resolved cleanly. The only moment that felt like genuine growth was when he decided to kill Spider. But then, the movie backtracked on this by having him pull back. So what were we supposed to gain from that moment, knowing the fact that Jake loves his kids? We fucking already knew that!

3) Kiri and Spider’s random ass romance that goes nowhere. I’m not against love in movies, but when there’s no build-up and no follow-through, it just makes you wonder what was the point. Plus, Sigourney Weaver and Jack Champion have no chemistry with each other (which isn’t a bad thing considering their real life age gap).

4) Neytiri’s xenophobia arc was pretty undercooked. It makes sense that she hates humans because of Son #1’s death, but I felt like she got over her xenophobia too easily. She was the one who suggested killing Spider, but when Jake was actually going to do so, now she realizes the error of her ways?

5) Kiri summoning Eywa to win the battle. Cool moment, except for the fact that we’ve already done this like 3 times now. Does Eywa have amnesia or something? The Sullys have been asking for her help in all three movies, then after helping, she just leaves. Are we using video game logic here? Do the Sullys have to wait until their Eywa meter charges up before they can summon her again?

6) Most of the cast was so underdeveloped that several moments that should’ve been impactful fell flat. For example, when Teal Teenager #2 dies, my first thought was, “Who was that guy again?” I know he’s one of the whale subplot teenagers, but he had such little screentime that when he died, no one in the audience gave a shit. Also, when the pregnant woman died (don’t remember her name either), the moment just didn’t feel sad. I guess she and Neytiri were sorta kinda friends? If that was the case, maybe the movie should’ve dedicated more time in exploring their friendship? You know, instead of just redoing Way of Water.

7) The final fight between Jake and Quaritch. After three movies of this shit, their final fight wasn’t even exciting. Since there’s two more movies coming, you already knew that the fight would end in a draw and that Quaritch would get away. Rinse and repeat.

8) Lo’ak tried to kill himself, then the movie just abandons this plot point.

I think I made my point clear. I feel like James Cameron is losing his touch. How the hell did you make a 197-minute movie and have no meaningful progress in the story? In fact, all three movies end the same way! There’s a battle with the humans, humans lose, showdown with Quaritch, village is saved. At this point, I want the humans to win one of these final battles since at the very least, we’ll get some kind of story progression.

But again, I want to emphasize. When the movie is good, it’s really good. Every time Colonel Quaritch and Spider develop as characters and Varang and the Wagwan tribe shows up onscreen, you’re immediately invested. Quaritch and Varang’s twisted romance? Honestly, cinema. I’ve actually gotten to the point where I want to see more of the Colonel since his character development is by far the most interesting in this entire series. I’d even be fine with Jake Sully dying at this point, that’s how uninteresting Jake as a character has become.

I was expecting to love the book and I’m so, so happy to see aromanticism/asexuality in the public eye, but as far as the story/characters went I was really struggling. Maybe I’m too old for it but I found it… very lackluster. The characters felt deeply one-dimensional and I did not like the protagonist at all.

If any of you have read this book and really enjoyed the characters, I would love to hear more about it. Maybe I’m just missing something. But also if any of you have recommendations for LGBTQA+ media with engaging characters and an engaging story I would love some recommendations.

Warning! This is a long post and it won’t be positive! If you like the game but want to read on, take care of yourself first. 

Thanks to @heartinhands for this original post.

I love writing essays on disability, OP. I’m not Cripplepunk ™ just yet, but I identify with so many of the sentiments in the community already.  

I wanna start by sharing my experiences with Clair Obscur. I’m not French but I do read it and sort of speak it (out of practice), and I like steampunk and fantasy. As a budding Baldur’s Gate fan and history buff for the period the game is modeled after, I was really excited to see so many of my interests crossing over, and decided to give the game a shot. Now, the way I give games a shot is by going on Wikipedia and reading the plot over and over (I’m not in a family friendly to anyone who’s a dedicated gamer, you know the ones, so I gotta pick the games I’m into this way).

And when I tell you how horrified I was at nearly everything about this game. I gave the soundtrack a shot and the soundtrack is a mound of spoilers. I gave the game UI a look at it looks like the League of Legends UI and would be extremely inaccessible to me if it cannot be altered. I looked at the gameplay and realized that a lot of the story is bathed in single-color overlays with none of the opacity control and use of environment that the Souls-like games have, where it’s awash but you can still SEE what you’re doing. The animations are also very facial-oriented and shiny, which triggers the old uncanny valley that I thought we’d already left behind in games from five years ago. 

That’s just the game. You touched on the main reason I won’t even get into this game: The end-game ableism. I’m going to break down your post into summarized chunks, reply to each one as if it were a text conversation, and then present my own larger arguments at the end. For those who use screen readers, there is a cut in this post because it will contain spoilers.