reviews

Retrospective: Metal Gear (1987)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Kept you waiting, huh? It’s finally time for the Metal Gear retrospective! I’ve spent way too much time over the past few months getting through every canonical game in the franchise and then writing up my analyses, so hopefully you enjoy the fruits of my labour. For this retrospective, we’ll be only looking at the 11 canonical installments in the Metal Gear franchise, and then I’ll cap everything off with some final words, a ranking of the series’ 10 greatest moments and my personal ranking of all the games in the franchise! First up is the game which started it all, 1987’s Metal Gear for the MSX2.

(Note, I will be reviewing this game based on the HD Edition re-release on PS3, which I beat on Original difficulty to try to get the “authentic experience”. I will also mention that I hadn’t completed Metal Gear before this playthrough and was relying heavily on a guide, so my review is probably going to be somewhat skewed as a result.)

DEVELOPMENT
A young Hideo Kojima joined Konami in 1986 as a planner, but was having trouble getting his ideas completed. After the cancellation of a game he had been working on for six months, Konami asked Kojima to come up with a war game for them for the MSX2. Due to hardware limitations, Kojima was becoming frustrated by the lack of bullet and enemy sprites he was able to get on screen at once. A massive film buff*, Kojima took inspiration from The Great Escape and decided to make a game where the goal was to avoid combat as much as possible. Konami wasn’t too keen on this idea, and Kojima nearly left the company due to internal friction, but eventually these differences were sorted out and the game was completed and released in 1987.

Shortly after Metal Gear‘s completion, the game’s code was given to a separate team to release a NES port without Kojima’s knowledge or consent. The heads at Konami specified that they wanted this version to be as different as the team could make it, and gave them a 3 month development window. The resulting game was markedly different and much shoddier, with notoriously bad Engrish and with the game’s Metal Gear boss being replaced by a supercomputer, among other questionable changes. This already-inferior port was further tarnished by being ported again to the shoddier Commodore 64 and MS-DOS, resulting in two practically unplayable versions of the game.

As I played the PS3 re-release, which is very slightly changed from the MSX2 version, I can’t really give much commentary on the NES port or its bastards, but I will link to this review for an analysis if you’re interested. For quite some time though, the NES port was the only version of Metal Gear available in North America, and actually received its own non-canon sequel, Metal Gear 2: Snake’s Revenge. Suffice to say, that game will not be covered in this retrospective.

PLOT SUMMARY
In 1995, intelligence reports begin to leak out that there a weapon of mass destruction has been constructed within Outer Heaven, a mercenary fortress in South Africa. The US government gets Big Boss to send FOXHOUND operative Gray Fox to infiltrate their fortress and determine if their intelligence was correct. Gray Fox does locate the weapon, but is captured by Outer Heaven forces, his last transmission being an ominous utterance of “Metal Gear…”

Shortly after, FOXHOUND member Solid Snake is sent into Outer Heaven for his first mission by Big Boss. He is instructed to locate and rescue Gray Fox and then find what he can about Metal Gear. After freeing many prisoners of war, including the local resistance leader Kyle Schneider, Snake is pointed to Gray Fox’s location. He is intentionally captured and then breaks into Fox’s cell, where he is told of Metal Gear’s capabilities: it is a walking, nuclear-equipped tank, but luckily is still inactive. Fox instructs Snake to locate Metal Gear’s captive creator, Dr. Pettrovich Madnar, in order to discover how to destroy it.

After fighting his way through Outer Heaven, including taking down some of the group’s lieutenants, a Hind D, a battle tank, a bulldozer and an imposter Dr. Madnar, Snake makes his way to the real Dr. Madnar’s cell with the help of the resistance member, Jennifer. However, Dr. Madnar refuses to help Snake until his daughter, Ellen, is saved. A resistance member, Diane, advises Snake on where to find Ellen, and he dutifully hurries to rescue her. After fighting through more of Outer Heaven’s soldiers, Ellen is rescued and Snake returns to Dr. Madnar. He tells Snake that Metal Gear is in the 100th basement floor 20km north and would need to place plastic explosives on its feet in a specific order to destroy it.

Determined to complete his mission, Snake hurries to Metal Gear’s hangar, but is constantly ambushed by enemy troops and nearly led into a series of traps due to poor intelligence from Big Boss. Eventually, Big Boss orders him to abort the mission entirely. Disregarding Big Boss’s orders, Snake enters Metal Gear TX-55’s hangar and places the explosives on its feet as per Dr. Madnar’s orders. Metal Gear is destroyed and a self-destruct sequence is initiated. Snake hurries to escape, but is confronted by Big Boss! Big Boss tells him that Snake had been sent in to acquire false information, but he had gone too far. The pair fight, but Snake defeats his mentor and escapes Outer Heaven just as the facility is destroyed.

However, as the credits draw to a close, Big Boss vows revenge on Snake for destroying Outer Heaven…

 
GAMEPLAY & DESIGN

It should probably go without saying that Metal Gear‘s gameplay is incredibly simple, but I was actually really surprised by how many of the series’ distinctive elements were still intact here. For example, Metal Gear has remote control missiles, cigarettes, rations, card keys, a Hind D, post-credit twist and even the cardboard box – elements which would be intact through most (or, in some cases, all) subsequent releases in the franchise. As a result, this lends the game a sense of familiarity for someone like me who got into the series with Metal Gear Solid, and makes it quite interesting to see how the game’s systems were iterated upon over time.

Naturally, the stealth gameplay is incredibly simple – enemies and cameras can basically only see things that are right in front of them and you’re going to be punching most enemies to death to sneak around. A methodical approach is very much necessary though, especially in the early moments in the game as you are still learning how to remain undetected. I was trying to rush at times (especially when I died and redid a section), but when I did so I was making all sorts of little, critical errors which would get me killed all over again. As a result, the game has a very clear skill gap which rewards replays, similar to many 8-bit classics of the era.

Rewarding replays also ties into the map layouts. The game gives you very little direction and lacks a map system, so you’re probably going to end up wandering around a lot if you don’t have a guide. It’s also worth noting that most items and enemies refresh when you exit a room, so you can farm for necessary items by entering and exiting rooms. This is, in fact, a crucial key to success, and a factor which I was ignoring in my noob-ness in the first hour with the game. Once I figured this out though, the game became significantly easier and I enjoyed it much more. Guide-less exploration also helps to memorize map layouts and these critical item locations. While the game contains quite a bit of “Metroidvania”-style backtracking, it becomes rather satisfying to be able to navigate throughout the buildings to get to a specific destination without having to refer to a guide or map to get you through. There are quite a few parts of the game though where you need to punch specific walls to figure out where to place plastic explosives in order to advance, and if you are unaware of this then I imagine that these sections can be quite frustrating.

There is definitely a vein of old-school charm to be had in Metal Gear, but it also has a punishing skill gap which is going to be a major turn-off for many who might not even get past the first 15 minutes. I myself was tempted to throw in the towel a few times. The game can be very difficult, especially in the first part of the game where every death can cost you 10-15 minutes of playtime. This is primarily due to the game’s poor checkpoint system, which only triggers when you reach an elevator or achieve some sort of major progress (eg, getting captured in order to rescue Gray Fox). From what I understand, the frequency of the checkpoint system is also tied to your “Class”, a system which also increases your inventory size and health bar based on how many POWs you rescue during the game. This system further makes the early parts of the game significantly harder than the latter sections, but can also make completion of the game impossible – if you don’t have 4 stars and there are no POWs left, then it becomes impossible to destroy Metal Gear, prompting a full-restart. To make this worse, one of the last bosses that you might before Metal Gear uses POWs as human shields, and if you shoot a POW, your class will decrease.

Detection is also very punishing, if only due to the inadequate shooting controls on the MSX2. Snake can only shoot up, down, left and right, meaning that there are huge chunks of the screen which he can’t hit. Considering that enemies can shoot diagonally and move very fast and very erratically, chances are that you’re probably going to take quite a bit of damage on every detection. This is mitigated somewhat by having most alerts refresh as soon as you move on to the next screen, but this isn’t really a foolproof solution – for one thing, it makes the enemies seem extremely stupid, but it also is really inconsistently implemented. Sometimes detection results in enemies pursuing you constantly, with total annihilation of them being required to end the alert. However, you won’t know if this is the case until you have left the screen and the alert is still in effect, as there seems to be no audio or visual cue to show what state of alert is in effect.

Arguably the worst aspect of the game though is the reliance on key cards. This is a major source of frustration and is the main reason why the backtracking is so prevalent in the game (not to mention that it pads out the runtime significantly). The game has 8 unique key cards, so if you don’t know which card works for each door then you’re going to have to cycle through your entire inventory to see if a card will work on the door you’re trying to get into (and you may not even have the required card in your inventory, which is even more of a kick in the balls). Considering that you may be under fire when this is happening or in a room filled with poison gas (and not wearing your mask because you can only have 1 item equipped at a time), you can very easily die because of this inexcusable, frustrating piece of archaic game design.

The game’s graphics are also pretty bad. This is actually more than a petty complaint (although the graphical style is strikingly reminiscent of the notoriously bad Bible Adventures game), because the graphical design does a poor job of letting you know when you’re in danger. For example, the security cameras can be annoyingly inconsistent – normally you have to hide behind cover to avoid them, but I had a few instances where I was certain that I was in cover but would get spotted anyway. The land mines are also major offenders here, as I was constantly stepping on land mines… with my upper torso. I had a quite a few inexplicably cheap deaths from the game’s ambiguity about whether you’re safe or not. The absolute worst offender in the game though is the infamous “trap rooms” in the late stage of the game – these floor traps are one-hit kills and if even 1 pixel of your character model brushes against them, you die. There’s basically no warning when or where these traps show up, so getting through them is just a matter of frustrating trial, error and route memorization as you try to remember the few places where you won’t get killed if a single pixel touches the edge of the pits.

Guards in this game are incredibly stupid. In addition to completely forgetting you if you leave their screen most of the time, when they are alerted they will run around randomly and bump into objects as they try to home in on you, meaning you can hide behind a corner and punch them to death easily when they finally manage to get to you. When they are unaware though, they follow a standard, set patrol pattern which will feel instantly familiar to Metal Gear franchise vets and makes for some fun gameplay. The game also features jetpack enemies, which can be panic-inducing the first few times you encounter them. They’re very fast and hard to actually hit, making combat with them inadvisable. Luckily, they only show up at parts where you should run like hell away from them, but if you aren’t following a guide then I imagine they could be a major headache.

The game also has quite a few distinct bosses which, while very simple and easy, are quite fun and often feature the signature Metal Gear gameplay-twists that make these battles so exciting… plus in the original release they have some pretty hilarious Engrish names like Shoot Gunner and Coward Duck. I think my favourites were the fights against a tank and the fight with Shotmaker (aka Shoot Gunner), in which you start the battle with no weapons. Also of note is that the MSX version of the game has a showdown with a non-active Metal Gear. This fight is a bit disappointing and artificially challenging – you have to put plastic explosives on its legs in a specific order to do any damage for some inexplicable reason. Meanwhile, laser cameras shoot at you, with each shot taking off half of your health bar! It’s not particularly challenging, especially if you’ve farmed for rations prior to the fight, but it is certainly noteworthy as the first battle with Metal Gear in the entire series. This is then capped off with a fight against “Big Boss” himself, although it is quite easy as he doesn’t seem to know enough to not run into your rocket launcher’s shots.

STORY & CHARACTER ANALYSIS

It should probably go without saying, but Metal Gear‘s story is significantly more simple than any other game in the franchise, and is only marginally better than your average 8-bit game. Most of the plot points are just meant to pad out the game’s length (eg, all the hunting for Dr. Madnar and then having to rescue his daughter before he’ll actually help you). As a result, it is probably the most heavily-retconned game in the entire franchise, with even its direct sequel, Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, making some pretty substantial changes to the game’s story. Unfortunately, this can lead to some retroactive disappointment, such as Solid Snake’s lack of characterization and Outer Heaven getting dispatched so easily after being hyped up so much in the prequel games (not to mention the multiple issues that The Phantom Pain‘s ending throws into the mix). At best, I guess you can argue that the simple nature of the plot means that there’s a lot of room for background plots to be unfolding which are implied by the other games but never really explicitly shown in Metal Gear itself.

Put simply, Metal Gear was obviously never intended to become the first chapter in an epic saga. It was clearly just meant to be a fun, 80s-style action story, including the requisite “traitorous commander” twist. Considering that the game’s art (and the art of its sequel) use images of action movie stars as the basis of Solid Snake and Big Boss, it seems fair to suggest that this was the intent. The concept of Metal Gear itself though is quite an interesting one for such an otherwise simple game and one which definitely deserved expanding upon for its own merits. Metal Gear TX-55 has a really cool, unique, old-school design which I wish that Peace Walker and The Phantom Pain would have tried to emulate.

As I’ve hopefully made clear, Metal Gear is a very simple, if at times frustrating, game with a lot of old-school charm and a great (if sparse) 8-bit soundtrack. Not not sure that everyone will have what it takes to get through it, but completing it with a guide should only take around 3-4 hours. In fact, now that I have gotten through the game and have acquired the necessary skills to succeed, I’m kind of itching to play it again – this time, without a guide. Considering that I still have to play through the rest of the series to get this retrospective done, it probably won’t happen, but if that isn’t a testament to how fun this game is almost 30 years later, then I don’t know what else will sway you.

7/10

*As a child, Kojima was apparently forced to watch 1 movie every night before bedtime.

Review Misuse

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Critical reviews are an endless source of discussion in popular culture. On the one hand, they offer a useful tool to sort through content and get a general idea of whether the product will appeal to you. On the other hand though, people often bristle at review scores and find themselves in a sharp divide between critical opinion and public perception. TotalBiscuit recently put out a pretty good video highlighting the disconnect between reviewers and the general public after the latest debacle regarding review scores of the Mad Max video game. In case you don’t feel like watching/listening to a 40 minute video, TotalBiscuit basically says that reviewers and the public have differing opinions on what constitutes value, that the public tends to value familiarity over innovation and that the public puts too much stock into review scores rather than the content of reviews themselves. While I liked the video, I think that TotalBiscuit waffled a little too much and didn’t really dig hard enough into the issues at hand for my tastes.

First off, I will agree 100% that people (particularly video gamers in my experience) put way too much emphasis into review scores. This is generally where the most ridiculous controversies spring from, such as the numerous occasions where reviewers have received death threats for giving games a glowing 9/10 review. This is due in part to some members of the gaming media’s really poorly skewed scoring system, which has messed with gamers’ expectations of what score a game should receive. I can’t be the only one who has noticed that many video game reviewers tend to score games very “softly”, giving almost every major release an 8 or a 9, with one or two huge releases typically getting 10s. For many gamers, this has created the expectation that games scoring lower than a 8 are unacceptable, even though the scale itself has been incredibly devalued and uninformative (and even then, they have a hard time accepting an 8 for a hyped, triple-A release).

In spite of its problems, I actually rather like the 10-point review scale (or its various gradients, such as the 100-point scale). As a bit of a stats geek, I like the idea of being able to quantify my feelings towards a piece of media through a simple system like this. This is the whole reason that I signed up for an IMDb account more than a decade ago and have been tracking every movie I’ve seen ever since. Obviously it’s still not perfect – “so bad they’re good” movies such as Troll 2 get a low rating for quality but I find them endlessly enjoyable. Other movies just may be super generic or very flawed, but I like them quite a bit anyway (such as Howling V).

That said, I don’t find websites like Metacritic to be very helpful*. Metacritic prioritizes review scores over the content of the reviews themselves, effectively making anything but that final score worthless. This also becomes problematic when different reviewers use differing review scales – since many game reviewers are “soft” these days, the few that actually do use the full spectrum of the 10-point scale can knock a game’s Metacritic score down and cause an uproar. This becomes even more distressing though, because publishers have been known to hand out bonuses to developers for hitting score-thresholds on Metacritic. How about this publishers: if you want the game to hit a score-threshold on Metacritic, then maybe give your developers more time to polish the game and don’t hold them to a hard-and-fast release deadline? Or worse, what are the odds that the desire for high review scores and sales stifles creativity by stifling innovation?

Another element that I thought that TotalBiscuit missed the mark on was the disconnect between critics and the public. He was acting like he thought critics were on a totally different wavelength from the rest of us. Personally, I think this stems from a misunderstanding of the purpose of critics. In essence, a critic is someone who has studied, and consumes, a lot of media and therefore has an informed opinion on whether individual media is worth consuming, which they pass on to the public as a form of service. Having seen a wider variety of good and bad content than most consumers, a critic tends to be better able to judge the quality of a piece of art. That said, it must always be remembered that a critic is just a professional giver of opinions – even the best critic will find themselves at odds with other critics and/or the public at times and it isn’t unheard of for peoples’ opinions to change over time. The critic’s own preferences can also affect the review process – it’s pretty common for horror movies to get mixed to negative reviews, even if they’re well-regarded amongst fans of the genre.

The disconnect comes from a couple elements of the differences between critics and consumers. Many consumers will have a very limited scope of the media – they may only watch summer blockbusters, or only play first person shooters, or not have a lot of interest in the finer points of a genre outside of whether they enjoyed it or not. As a result, reviews might not even be that big a factor in their purchase, but rather a badge of pride that something they like is considered “good”. These will often be the consumers most vocally hostile towards critics as, from their perspective, critics are held in high regard but do not line up with their understanding of media. This is related to arguably my favourite post on this blog, Translating Ideology, where I explored the gulfs that form between people with different world views. It’s a strange dichotomy – they may personally dislike critics for disagreeing with their perspectives, but still hold their opinions as authoritative and somehow able to diminish their media. Consumers in this mindset need to keep into perspective that, in the end, critics are just putting out their opinions.

Perhaps this prods at a deeper area of resentment though – the old hatred of “snobby intellectuals” versus the uneducated “everyman” who knows what is actually good and what isn’t (this is what Conservapedia would refer to as “the best of the public”, and you know it has to be great if Conservapedia endorses it…). I wouldn’t be surprised if there is an element of this in complaints about snobby critics, where the consumer is literally too unlearned on the subject to understand the critic’s perspective. Bear in mind that this isn’t to say that the consumer is wrong to enjoy whatever media they want to, but it is worth understanding that the divergence between critics and consumers comes down to a wide variety of personal experiences, not simply because “critics like innovation, consumers like what’s familiar” as TotalBiscuit boils it down to.

Wrapping things up, I think that we need to keep a few things about reviews in mind in the future. First of all, don’t put all your faith in review scores, but be sure to read the full reviews to see if you agree with their analysis. Secondly, understand that a “low” review score can still be great – I really enjoyed Lollipop Chainsaw and Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge, both relatively low-scoring games which I feel deserved their lower score for technical/design reasons, but which were still well worth playing. I myself gave Alien Isolation a 6/10 on this blog, but enjoyed it for the most part and would recommend trying it. Lastly, keep in mind that the opinion of a critic is just that – an opinion. If you have different experiences than they do, then you may disagree and that’s totally fine. Don’t let it diminish your own feelings towards a piece of media.

*That said, I actually quite like Rotten Tomatoes’ system. Instead of just averaging the differing scales of a handful of critics, Rotten Tomatoes measures from the number of critics who “liked” and “disliked” the movie and then gives it a “fresh” rating if more than 60% of critics liked it. It’s a much better aggregate system in my opinion and tends to be my personal source for information on a movie’s reception.

Video Game Review: Alien Isolation (2014)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

(NOTE: I’m going to be super busy this week so I’m going to hold off from updating the playlist until next week hopefully)

Harkening back to the origins of this blog, back when its focus was mainly on pop culture rather than Christian/social issues/current events, I’m going to put out a long-overdue video game review about 2014’s survival-horror game, Alien Isolation. As you might be aware, I’m quite a big fan of the Alien series, and would count the first 2 films in the franchise amongst my all-time favourite movies ever. As a result, the prospect of being stalked constantly by one of these killer rape-beasts left me extremely excited to try out the final product. So how did the game measure up? Read on to find out… (and as a warning, there will be some spoilers.)

Alien Isolation stars Amanda Ripley, daughter of Ellen Ripley, as she travels to the run-down space station Sevastapol in search of the flight recorder for the doomed ship, Nostromo… and, uh, well that’s basically the entire plot summed up right there. Don’t get me wrong, there are obviously plot points that go beyond that, but the plot was sadly not all that memorable. Even worse, most of the stuff that you’re tasked with doing in the game has basically no bearing on the main plot, so it’s really easy to forget what the hell is actually going on, or why it matters, at any point in time. Oh, and the ending is freaking awful.

That said, Amanda Ripley is quite a good protagonist. She is very capable and brave, even if she is in way over her head and is no match for the foes all coming after her. It’s refreshingly positive to see a strong female character in a big game like this too, so major props to Sega and The Creative Assembly for that. Again though, the plot doesn’t give her much room to develop, outside of just going and performing tasks, so that’s unfortunate. Still, she gets a better shake than the rest of the cast, who are completely forgettable.

Of course, you’re probably not coming to Alien Isolation for the plot, you’re here for the antagonist, the scares and the gameplay. First off, I have to say that the alien is consistently terrifying. For the first few hours, every time you see the alien you’re going to squeal in terror and want to shit your pants. Even later in the game, when you’re starting to get used to the alien’s movements and have some methods to defend yourself, the alien can still catch you off guard and scare the crap out of you. The alien’s dynamic AI keeps it from getting too predictable and keeps alien encounters very tense. The game seems to “cheat” sometimes though – at a couple points in the game, it seems like there is a certain amount of rubber-banding with the alien, where you can’t leave an area without having the alien be forced to follow you around despite not even knowing that you’re there. It can also be really frustrating when you wait for the alien to buzz off somewhere, wait until it’s safe to leave a room and suddenly find yourself face-to-face with the alien out of nowhere, leading to a quick respawn back to the last save point. These moments can be extremely frustrating, but there’s enough unpredictability and tension in alien encounters to keep the game engaging and interesting.

The alien isn’t the only enemy on the station though. The there are human looters aboard the station who will shoot on sight. You only run into them a handful of times thankfully (this isn’t the sort of game that needs to turn into a shooter), but they are typically pretty interesting moments when you do. This is mostly because confrontation is basically impossible – while you do get a revolver early on, the shooting in the game is very difficult and unreliable… and gunfire typically attracts the alien, so it is very much discouraged. The nice thing about human encounters is that you can either sneak past them very carefully, or you can lure the alien in to kill them all for you, giving you a clear path to escape. The only real issue I have with the human enemies is that their AI can be kind of stupid. At one point, I opened a door and had 2 humans look right at me, but they didn’t even see me. I threw a noisemaker in the corner to distract them and just snuck around without them even having a clue I was there. I don’t know if their vision cones are just embarrassingly small or what, but there are lots of moments where you think a human should be able to see you, but don’t.

The other main enemy type in the game are the Seegson androids which populate the station. They are moderately unsettling the first few times you see them, but I quickly got tired of fighting these enemies (which sucks, because you’re going to fight A LOT of them, and there’s a fairly large chunk of the game where the alien disappears and you have to fight androids exclusively). Their AI is even stupider and more inconsistent than the humans’, and their grab animations are annoyingly long (probably around 10 seconds… and you’re going to be seeing it quite often). The only good thing about androids is that they give you an excuse to use some of your weapons which are useless against the alien (eg, shotgun and stun baton) or overkill versus humans (eg, bolt gun), but this doesn’t really make up for the frustration.

The gameplay itself generally revolves around trying to get from point A to point B without being spotted (at which point you will usually die). The maps are generally have a few different ways to get to your destination, opening things up for player choice – do you risk the most direct path, or do you take the safer path along the perimeter where you have more hiding places? The game features a The Last of Us-style improvised crafting system, which can be helpful and encourages risk-taking as you try to find parts. Unfortunately, as with all of these survival games with crafting, if you play like me then you’re going to find yourself stockpiling these scarce items on the off chance that you might need them someday, and never end up trying them out. I don’t think I ever even used two of the strongest items, the EMP mine and the pipe bomb, just because I was worried that I might need them later and wouldn’t have the parts to build new ones. This isn’t a major issue by any means, but it is an annoying aspect of this kind of game. The game also features an old-school save system where you have to reach a save point in order to get a checkpoint. This system can lead to some major frustration at times, but I personally found this to be a great system for this sort of game. The threat of dying becomes even more terrifying and it keeps you playing carefully to avoid the harsh penalties of failure.

To help you when you’re being hunted by the alien, the game gives you a motion tracker early on, and this is arguably the most useful tool in your arsenal. The motion tracker is basically essential to survive, and features an objective compass as well, which is good because it is easy to get lost (especially since the narrative is so unhelpful about what you need to do). You can’t rely on it too much (it gives a lot of useless readings and doesn’t work in air vents, so you have to rely on audio cues just as much), but it is really handy and makes the game fairer. At around the halfway point in the game though, you get a flamethrower which arguably breaks the game from there onwards. As soon as you get the flamethrower, alien encounters become significantly easier and less tense, as you can whip out the weapon and fire a couple bursts to keep the alien from attacking you. You still have to avoid combat as much as possible, since fuel consumption is a major concern, but by that point in the game you should be adept enough at facing aliens that they no longer become nearly as terrifying (except when they catch you off guard, at which point you’ll squeal like a pig all over again).

Also worth mentioning is the game’s fantastic environmental work and sound design. Sevastapol looks incredible, fitting the retro-future aesthetic of the first film perfectly (something which Prometheus should have taken a cue from). The game just looks so good that you’re almost tempted to wander around and check out all the cool little details of the world. The sound design is also really crucial to the game’s world. Sometimes the only way to know if it’s safe is to hear the tell-tale sound of the alien heading into an air duct, or clench your asshole in terror as you hear it dropping down from a duct or screaming as it barrels right at you. I don’t know how many times I jumped just from walking past one of those creepy air duct entrances, which make a jarring sound of metal scraping against metal. Arguably the scariest moment in the game for me was when I was hiding and listening for the alien in the corner of a pitch black air duct, not daring to turn on my flashlight for fear that the alien will see it and come find me (it did, and I yelled “SHIT” loud enough that probably everyone in the house heard me).

I have touched on the good and the bad of Alien Isolation so far, but I think the absolute worst issue in the game is that it’s just too damn long. Playing on hard mode, the game probably took me at least 22 hours to complete, which is just insane for this kind of game. It would be one thing if the game managed to stay fresh throughout this playtime, but unfortunately Alien Isolation starts to outstay its welcome very quickly and features a ridiculous amount of padding. Most of the complaints I have had thus far are quite minor, and can easily be ignored if the rest of the game is strong enough. However, the long playtime just services to exacerbate all of the issues with the game – fetch quests and point-A-to-point-B gameplay become stale very quickly, hours of the game get dedicated to just fighting waves of androids (which are now immune to your stun baton…), and the plot just becomes utter background noise. Hell, even the game’s strengths start to lose their lustre. The environments start to bleed together through asset reusual and the alien gets annoying very quickly because it won’t leave you alone long enough to finish your already-unfun objectives.

If they had cut the game’s length in half and focused about half-to-two-thirds of the game towards alien encounters, the game would have been a hell of a lot more enjoyable. As it is, it’s an utter slog and a chore… which is too bad, because there are a lot of things to like about it, buried beneath all of that. Unfortunately, I’m going to have to give the first person survival-horror crown to Outlast, a game which knew damn well not to outstay its welcome and was all the better for it. If there is an Alien Isolation 2 though, I really hope that The Creative Assembly can work out the issues with this one and make a better experience.

6/10

Album Review: Laniakea (2015)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

So I was very excited the other day when I saw that my copy of Laniakea by Sovereign Council had arrived (and earlier than I had expected no less)! I have written in the past about how excited I was for this album, so I busted it out and have listened to it a few times now. Unfortunately, I’m not a very learned music reviewer, so this will probably be more impressionistic and less in-depth than my movie or video game reviews (not to mention that music might be the most subjective medium to attempt to review), but I’m going to try to tackle this anyway.

If you’re familiar with Sovereign Council’s debut album, New Reign, then the first thing that will probably strike you about Laniakea is just how ambitious it is. It’s obvious the band decided to step things up and pour their souls into this release, because it really shows in basically every facet of the production. This shows perhaps most clearly in the lyrics. Most of the songs on Laniakea follow a non-traditional structure (as in, they do not feature rhyming couplets and don’t necessarily follow the verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/chorus structure that typifies most popular forms of music). While the lyrics were the sole weak point on New Reign, the songwriting has been stepped up quite significantly, and the non-traditional structure works quite well. There are still a couple awkward moments (most notably on “The Human Condition”, where the line “I only see one constant failure to perfect” doesn’t flow very well and makes the song stutter for a moment), but these are just as often offset by some very cool songwriting (“Decima” features the epic repeated verse “it’s the only way to enjoy the slow ride into the afterlife”, which just makes me want to sing along). In addition, Laniakea also happens to be a concept album, a feature which I did not expect going in. This cohesion actually makes the individual songs feel more meaningful. I’m usually pretty bad at deciphering concept albums, but on a very basic level, the album seems to follow the life of a man who seeks knowledge and wants to overcome human weakness – particularly the ultimate equalizer, death. To that end, the album remains quite consistent and slots into the power metal genre very comfortably.

While ambitious is the buzzword that I’d say most clearly typifies Laniakea, Sovereign Council have also clearly matured since New Reign, and wisely keep themselves from overstuffing the album in the pursuit of ambition. They have refined their sound in a very deliberate manner, making Laniakea‘s sound feel very polished and cohesive, while also allowing for some diversity to keep things fresh from song to song. While the album features 14 tracks, none of them feel like filler. The vocals have also gotten far more diverse. There is far more interplay between Alex and Lisa now, and when they join together in vocal harmony, we get some of the absolute most powerful moments on the album. Also, I have to give a shoutout to whoever the band member is doing the death growls (I regret that I don’t know who it is), they really punctuate the lyrics whenever they appear, particularly on “Nona”.

As for some track highlights, the album opens with “Rise”, which de-emphasizes the vocals in favour of showing off the expertise of the musicians and the guest violins. It’s a good preview of the rest of the album to come. “The Burden of Life” is definitely one of the stronger songs on the album, with the vocal harmonies of Alex and Lisa mixing with the death growls to create a very pleasing sound. “The Human Condition” is, I think, meant to be the “Bring It Down” moment on this album, and is probably the most relentlessly heavy and fast-tempo song on the album, while also tackling some pretty interesting themes. However, as far as I’m concerned, the real crown jewel of the album is the trifecta of “Morta”, “Nona” and “Decima”. While they are technically 3 separate tracks, as far as I am concerned they should be viewed as a single 10-minute epic. “Morta” opens slowly, building up appropriately to make the heavy stuff later more effective, while the death growls on “Nona” are contrasted fantastically with Lisa’s much softer vocals. Finally, “Decima” just blows the doors right off as the vocals and music get raised to equal prominence and we get a passionate and aggressive conclusion.

All-in-all, if you have any interest in hard rock or metal music and are in the market for something distinctly ambitious, I recommend giving Laniakea a look. While there is probably still some room for improvement in the future, Sovereign Council has poured their all into creating a really professional product, and the results do not disappoint.

8/10

UPDATE: Okay, I just saw Sovereign Council in concert for their album release celebration, and they were fantastic. If you get a chance to see them live, then just do it. I want to clarify a couple things though. First off, the person doing the death growls/screams on the album is Alex, which is even more impressive than I first thought. Secondly, I want to clarify that my thoughts on the lyrics on New Reign were just my opinion, confined to a handful of songs which stood out, and even then I really love that album regardless. Just figured I’d mention that because I was super surprised (and humbled) when it turned out that people had actually read this review and I don’t want anyone to get the wrong ideas because of my potentially crappy impression.

Retrospective: Shrek (2001)

~ Barloq ~ 1 Comment

Welcome back good readers as we begin a new retrospectives series! The franchise that we’re going to be focusing on for the next few weeks is the Shrek series (for the record though, I’m not including the holiday specials and countless short films on the DVDs in this analysis, otherwise I’d be at this for months). The franchise has been incredibly successful, raking in over $3.5 billion in just a decade and being popular among kids and adults alike. In this entry, we’re going to cover the film which started it all – 2001’s Shrek.

A bit of an odd poster design, but I like it (maybe I’m just nostalgic for it though).

In 1990, William Steig published a children’s book called Shrek!, about an ogre who travels away from home and finds another ogre just as ugly as he is (and falls in love with her of course). It’s a gross and irreverent story, with very little in the way of plot. However, Steven Spielberg saw merit in the premise and bought the rights for the story prior to founding DreamWorks. He was initially planning to turn it into a traditionally animated film which hewed closely to the book, starring Bill Murray as Shrek and Steve Martin as Donkey. After the success of Toy Story, the film was reconstituted as a motion captured animation. However, the results were considered unsatisfactory, so it was once again restarted as a CGI animation. First time director Andrew Adamson was hired to co-direct alongside Kelly Asbury – however, Asbury dropped out after a year and story artist Vicky Jenson took over instead. Adamson actually wanted the film to appeal more to adults than the final film did, putting in more sexual jokes and Guns N’ Roses music (both ideas which caused a clash with the studio executives).

Initially, Chris Farley was cast to play Shrek, and recorded most of his dialogue. However, he died in 1997 before the film was completed. As a result, Mike Myers was cast to replace him. Myers actually recorded all of his dialogue twice, replacing it all of his original lines with the iconic Scottish accent that we hear in the final film. The process cost the film an additional $4 million, but was considered such an improvement that Spielberg himself thanked Myers for the change. The character also was better understood after the change and more comedy bits were added as the creators gained a better handle on the film. Janeane Garofalo was initially cast as Princess Fiona, but was unceremoniously fired and replaced by Cameron Diaz. Eddie Murphy was cast as Donkey, who was actually modelled after a real donkey named Pericles.

…am I the only one who doesn’t see the resemblance?

The plot of Shrek is quite different than the book it is based on. For one thing, in Shrek!, the ogre is so ugly that he actually smites donkey with his ugliness. In the film, Shrek is a grumpy ogre whose swamp becomes a dumping ground for fairy tale creatures by Lord Farquaad, who is trying to build the “perfect kingdom”. Farquaad declares he’ll give Shrek his swamp back if he rescues the perfect princess, Fiona, from her dragon guarded tower. Together Shrek and his annoying talking sidekick, Donkey, have to rescue the princess, but discover that there’s more to her (and themselves) than meets the eye…

I probably don’t need to tell you the plot to Shrek because let’s be honest – everyone has seen it. Even the last man on earth can quote it word for word (and you were doing it too alongside him). The plot is a relatively straight-forward fairy tale/hero’s journey, but the expectations are inverted and played with. Instead of the noble king vanquishing the terrifying monster to get the princess, the monster is the hero and the king is the villain. Furthermore, the princess is a monster as well. This simplistic plot makes the film appealing enough for children, but the inversions keep it fresh and interesting enough for adults as well. The inversions also help to make the film very funny. The humour in the film is a perfect mix of satire, references, gross-out humour and clever jokes, often springing from the excellent chemistry between the lead characters. There are also lots of pointless little moments in the film, such as the Robin Hood attack, which could have come across as little more than filler. However, these almost all end up being hilarious and highlights of the film (although the “muffin man” bit is the annoying exception). Some of the jokes are more adult-oriented as well, although there is plenty of content to entertain both children and adults. In general, the film is just plain funny and nearly every joke hits its mark.

As for the characters, all of them are a lot of fun. The performances are exceptional and it’s difficult to imagine anyone else in the roles. Mike Myers is great as Shrek, making us genuinely care about such a grumpy individual. Donkey could easily have been annoying as shit, but Eddie Murphy does a good job of keeping him funny throughout. Cameron Diaz also adds a lot to Princess Fiona, a role which could have easily been dangerously close to the “generic damsel in distress” if the wrong actress was cast. John Lithgow’s Lord Farquaad is also an interesting role – on the one hand, he’s an effective villain, but on the other hand he’s hilariously diminutive and unthreatening. Farquaad strikes a very delicate balance as a comedic villain, and in my opinion that balance is achieved perfectly. The minor supporting cast also add a few laughs, such as Pinocchio, the three blind mice and the Gingerbread Man.

I’m also pleased to see that the animation still holds up very well almost 13 years after the film’s release. Shrek isn’t quite as detailed or flashy as many of the CGI animated films which have succeeded it, but the characters’ movements are still top-notch and all of the scenes are rendered very impressively. I was watching the film with a critical eye towards the animation in particular to see if I could find any problems, but I ended up being more impressed by the little details, such as bent grass, Donkey’s fur, Shrek’s subtle facial details, etc. Shrek could be released today and still easily achieve nearly as much acclaim as it did in 2001.

If there’s a weak point in the film, I’d say that the biggest problem is probably Donkey and Dragon’s relationship. It makes for some funny moments initially, but it really seems to be done for little more than plot convenience. Donkey’s going to die? Make the dragon fall in love with him! Need to get to the wedding fast? Take the dragon! Lord Farquaad’s about to kill Shrek and Fiona? Make the dragon eat him! Dragon just deflates some of the more interesting ways the plot could have gone for the sake of convenience, and makes for some more awkward problems later on down the line… All things said and done though, Shrek is an awesome movie. Everyone loves it, from all ages. I remember going to my friends’ birthday 11th party and seeing the film with absolutely no prior knowledge of the film, and loving it. Seriously, if you haven’t seen Shrek yet then you must have been living in a Fallout vault or something.

8/10

Be sure to come back soon for the second part of this retrospective series, Shrek 2!

Video Game Review: Metal Gear Solid V – Ground Zeroes

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

As you probably know if you read the blog, I’m a big Metal Gear Solid fan. Snake Eater and Guns of the Patriots are amongst my favourite games of all time, and I’ve played through each probably at least a half dozen times. Naturally, I bought the game almost immediately, despite some trepidations about its short length. Is it really just an over-glorified demo as some are stating, or is it a solid prologue for The Phantom Pain? Read on to find out…

First of all, I have to get this out of the way: Kiefer Sutherland is fine as Snake. Fans were talking about boycotting the game if David Hayter didn’t get the role, but if you seriously skipped out on this game only because you thought only Hayter could be Snake, then you’re an idiot, pure and simple. I think I would have preferred Hayter, but I was surprised to find that Sutherland brought a more serious edge to the role. Rather than Hayter’s awesomely over-the-top voice, we get a more subdued performance which sounds like Snake could actually be a grizzled veteran. In any case though, Sutherland does a fine job, and is not distracting in the least.

Now for the real talking point about the game – the length. It’s true, the main mission in Ground Zeroes is pretty short – probably on par with the Tanker chapter or Virtuous Mission prologues from MGS2 and 3. I spent somewhere between an hour and a half to two hours on the mission and wasn’t even doing all that much exploring – mostly just trying to get from point A to point B while minimizing kills and alerts (well, until I stole a LAV anyway, at which point I couldn’t help myself…). However, that said, there is a lot more freedom to approach the mission, which makes it much more replayable and can vary the playtime significantly. Like any Metal Gear game, I can see myself playing through the main campaign a few times to try out different strategies and search for secrets.

The game isn’t just restricted to the main mission though either; it also ships with 5 side ops. Unlike most open world side missions, the side ops are surprisingly compelling. Kojima has clearly gone to a lot of effort to make them interesting and varied. There’s one mission where you have to visually identify two targets and stealthily assassinate them both. This would be fun in itself, but as we play the mission, we’re given backstory into the war crimes these targets committed. Learning about how awful the targets were makes the mission completion all the more satisfying and compelling, rather than a chore. That’s only one of the side ops too, the others are equally as enjoyable, and well worth playing through. People are getting way too caught up on the short length of the main mission itself, because I imagine on a reasonable playthrough you could get another 3+ hours out of the side missions themselves, and that’s not including the inevitability of replaying missions to increase your score. If you really want to squeeze every second of value out of the game, there’s also a bunch of collectable cassette tapes and XOF patches to find, and some weird tiki heads you can shoot too for a reward, all of which should keep dedicated players occupied for well over 15+ hours. So really, the game certainly has plenty of content for $30, but you have to be willing to work for it. In any case, if you’re a Metal Gear fan like me, you already knew you’d be willing to spend $30+ up front. At worst, wait a few months for it to drop down to about $20, or wait until the inevitable Ground Zeroes + The Phantom Pain bundle that will drop in a year or two.

Anyway, now that the big controversies are out of the way, it’s time to move onto my impressions in proper. First of all, the game is very much Metal Gear, but with a lot of needed refinement. The cutscenes are far less overbearing, which is welcome. As much as I enjoy the cutscenes in Metal Gear games, it becomes annoying having to wait upwards of an hour and a half to play the game again, only to have another cutscene interrupt me 30 seconds later. In Ground Zeroes, the cut scenes are still key, but they are spaced out far more infrequently, and don’t meander nearly as much. The open world trappings also work very well and provide a lot of freedom and replayability for the player. Some people wondered if an open world was appropriate for Metal Gear, but I always thought such thinking was very short-sighted – these games have always aspired for an open world setting (yes, even since the original Metal Gear on MSX), but always lacked the technology to make that a reality. Instead, they’ve been restricted to maneuvering through linked corridors and open jungle and urban settings, but I can’t have been the only player to think “damn, how awesome would it be if all these areas were seamlessly linked without loading screens?” Now that is a reality, and I couldn’t be happier.

As far as the gameplay goes, it feels a lot like 2010’s Peace Walker. Gunplay is certainly better than it was in the early games in the series, although it doesn’t feel quite as smooth to me as something like, say, Uncharted does. Luckily, the game is about avoiding combat as much as possible, and so that’s not a major issue by any means. Appropriately, Ground Zeroes also seems to have taken some cues from Splinter Cell: Blacklist, most notably the “last known position” mechanic, marking enemies on the HUD and Reflex mode. Reflex mode was a bit of a controversial addition, but I welcome it – sometimes it can be incredibly frustrating to sneak through an area, only to have an unseen enemy suddenly spot you and set off an alert phase. Reflex mode gives you a last chance to take that enemy out, although if you panic fire there’s a good chance you won’t pull off the shot. Perhaps best of all though is the fact that the developers made Reflex mode completely optional for those who want a challenge. I really appreciate when a developer gives players this sort of option, and it’s just further incentive to become more skilled at the game so that you won’t need to activate Reflex mode at all.

I would also like to point out that the game looks gorgeous on PS4. I’ve seen some comparison videos online and it looks quite good on last-gen too, so you really can’t go wrong in terms of graphics (although current-gen is clearly superior). On the negative side though, there are still some issues I noticed with the engine which need to be ironed out before The Phantom Pain is released. Most noticeably, there’s some considerable pop-in. I’ve tranquilized enemies, looked away from them and then looked back, only to have their bodies disappear for a couple seconds before the game reloaded them into the scene. It’s not a major issue, but it is distracting and a surprising issue to see in a released title. I also notice that objects completely disappear at long distances, but can reappear when you zoom in on them. In the helicopter extraction side op, I noticed that exploding barrels were completely missing until I zoomed in on them – a pretty egregious issue because I could need to shoot those to kill enemies (or, theoretically, could accidentally shoot one and kill my target). These are relatively minor technical issues, but noticeable and annoying none-the-less.

I should also probably mention that the enemy AI can be pretty stupid at times. They’re fine in general until an alert gets triggered, at which point they crouch through the open to try to attack Snake head on. When a full-on shootout occurs, it’s not uncommon to gun down a half dozen idiots as they try to get closer to Snake (although I’ll admit their animations when they get shot are very nice). That said, I was playing on Normal, so maybe they’re improved in Hard mode… but somehow I doubt it. In my opinion, MGS2 continues to reign with the best AI in the series.

Moving on from gameplay, how is the story in Ground Zeroes? After all, for all its convoluted threads, story is just as important as gameplay to a Metal Gear game. In that respect, I’m pleased to announce that Ground Zeroes lives up to the previous games in the series, despite its short runtime. Of course, it’s merely a prologue, but it lays the groundwork for The Phantom Pain very well, and am absolutely certain that that game is going to be gripping. It’s also a far more mature story, touching on themes of torture and suffering in war (and explicitly drawing real-world parallels to Guantanamo Bay). Of course, there are still hammy bits, and lots of signature Kojima humour, but in general the story feels much more dark than normal. The ending is also not very satisfying, but it definitely leaves you pumped for the next chapter.

However, there are some rather shocking, and dare I say gratuitous, moments due to this mature emphasis. Paz ends up being subjected to some truly awful stuff – she has to have a bomb removed from her stomach sans anesthetic (which is shown in gory detail), and we find out that she was raped by the villain as well. That’s pretty dark stuff, although it definitely tows the line of the “rape as plot device” trope. It certainly fits into the themes of the game overall, but Paz herself is reduced to nothing more than a torture plot point… a distressing reality which doesn’t bode so well for Quiet’s characterization later on. To be fair though, these sorts of dark moments have been a part of Metal Gear for quite some time now (probably most memorably with the origins of the Beauty and the Beast unit in MGS4, whose stories could probably rival anything on display here), but such moments tended to be off-screen and de-emphasized compared to what we have here.

All-in-all, it really is hard to score this game. It’s fun, but it’s clearly divisive. There’s also some technical issues that need work, and its narrative leaves you hanging, but the core game play is very liberating. I think the best I can say is that you probably already know if you want to buy Ground Zeroes, and what price point you’d consider it to be worthwhile. If you aren’t yet ready to take the plunge, hold off until it gets cheaper, or wait for the inevitable The Phantom Pain pack-in. If we take price out of the equation though, Ground Zeroes is undoubtedly a ton of fun.

7.5/10

Video Game Review: Gravity Rush

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It’s no secret that I’m a big PlayStation fanboy – I’ve owned every PS console and handheld and loved them. However, even then I wasn’t really planning on jumping on the PS Vita. For one thing, when it was released it was obscenely overpriced, and the proprietary memory cards were even worse. Then there’s the typical memes on the system that you can see plastered across the Internet which display the common knowledge about the system…

Well I want to do a bit of mythbusting before we hop into the meat of this article. I bought a Vita on a bit of a whim after the price drop a few months ago. However, I wasn’t getting a ton of use out of it until I got my PS4 and PS+ subscription, at which point my eyes were opened to the awesomeness. PS+ carries across all PS devices, and so suddenly I had access to a ton of free games. Seriously, whoever said that PS Vita has no games has clearly never played one – I’ve been spoiled with Gravity Rush, Uncharted: Golden Abyss, Hotline Miami, Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath, Guacamelee! and Kick Beat – all of which I got for free or heavily discounted thanks to PS+. Then there’s the games I happily paid full price for, including Ninja Gaiden Sigma +, Ninja Gaden Sigma + 2, DOA5+, MGS3 and Soulcalibur: Broken Destiny (oh, did I mention it plays PSP and PS1 downloadable games too?). That’s not mentioning the games I want to play soon enough, like Killzone: Mercenary and Borderlands 2, but am too swamped with games to justify the purchase quite yet. Plus you can remote play PS3 and PS4 games, such as Battlefield 4, via the Vita. Bottom-line: PS Vita has an excellent games library, and people need to wake up to this fact.

Is it probably still better to get a 3DS? Yes, probably, if you want only one handheld. However, you can’t really go wrong with a PS Vita, it’s still a great little handheld with a ton of potential still in store (such as the epic-sounding PlayStation Now cloud streaming service).

Anyway, with that out of the way, onto the real purpose of this article – Gravity Rush. I had heard that this was the best game in the Vita’s launch lineup, but I wasn’t entirely sold on it until I played the incredibly fun demo. As soon as I got PS+, I downloaded the game (which I got for free, remember) and booted it up. I finally finished it a couple weeks ago and knew I needed to write a review as soon as the credits began to roll.

Gravity Rush is an open-world adventure game about a mysterious girl named Kat who is befriended by a celestial cat she names Dusty. Dusty gives Kat the ability to “gravity shift”, allowing for them to reorient the direction of their personal gravity. This gives Kat a plethora of abilities, from being able to float, fly, launch objects, set up a high-speed kick, walk on walls/ceilings, etc. Gravity shifting is a fantastic central mechanic and is an absolute joy to perform. It’s a little difficult to control at first, but quickly you’ll build up your skills and be soaring and aligning yourself with total precision. I got about 12 hours out of the campaign and didn’t grow tired of shifting once, which is quite a feat – I loved the Assassin’s Creed franchise, but ended up ditching it because of how irritating and repetitive free running a city for 5-10 minutes just to get to the next objective would get.

The story was also surprisingly engaging. It’s told in a rather silly and whimsical manner, with all sorts of random stuff just showing up out of nowhere, but it manages to stay engaging and fairly coherent. Kat was also a fun, light-hearted protagonist, which is refreshing compared to the dour, self-serious heroes we have to put up with these days. Her asides provide quite a bit of humour to the proceedings. The game also features quite a diverse female cast, a rarity within the games industry (especially since they aren’t extremely sexualized either). In addition to Kat, the game also features Raven (another gravity shifter who is notably more dark than Kat), Cyanea (a “creator”) and Yunica (a hardboiled soldier who is second in command of the army). Considering that many games don’t have female characters outside of minor supporting roles, this has to be commended. That said, Kat and Raven aren’t exactly feminist icons – both are somewhat sexualized (especially Kat in a fanservice DLC costume, a mission where she’s hunting for a boyfriend and a couple very random shower scenes), although it’s not to a particularly untasteful level at least. Outside of those shower scenes, I didn’t really feel like the game was ever objectifying the characters, their garb was just the norm of the shifters.

Beyond the story and gameplay, the graphics are just gorgeous for a handheld, and a launch title at that. The game has a distinct cel-shaded look with fairly sprawling and detailed city-scapes, featuring plenty of citizens milling about. It’ll seriously make you reconsider what is possible on a handheld system. On the negative side though, the draw distance isn’t as good as it probably needs to be and the cities are lacking in stuff to do outside of explore and complete a few side missions, but at least shifting to find gems is fun in itself.

The only major fumble is that combat can get pretty irritating. The enemies, called Nevi, all feature requisite glowing weak points and come in a variety of shapes and sizes. They’re not too bad usually, unless you have to “gravity kick” them mid-air. This involves shifting and then launching a kick at them, which makes Kat shoot towards them for a monumental kick. Unfortunately, Kat has a limited lock-on to the target and it’s too easy to overshoot them. In some of the later fights, I was having to line up 4 or 5 gravity kicks just to hit the target, which got especially annoying when I would have to cancel my kicks to dodge projectiles. However, this was hardly game-breaking.

I was also annoyed by the tacked-on “gravity sliding” sections. A lot of PS Vita games have annoying features to taut the system’s touch screens and tilt functionality. Uncharted: Golden Abyss is a particularly egregious offender in this regard, but Gravity Rush is usually pretty good at incorporating swipes for dodging, turning pages in cutscenes and tilting the camera. However, the gravity sliding sequences were just way too imprecise as you tried to tilt the camera so Kat wouldn’t run into anything. Luckily, gravity sliding is largely confined to side missions and isn’t a major requirement to complete the game, but it was definitely a cause of frustration.

Also worth noting is that the ending of the game isn’t particularly satisfying. The game ends with a lot of loose ends still hanging, which is clearly just done because Sony sees the game as a potential franchise. Luckily, Gravity Rush 2 was recently announced, so hopefully it will give us more answers and improve on the combat.

So what did I think of Gravity Rush? I thought it was slightly flawed, but very charming and it kept me engaged for many an hour. I can’t wait to step into Kat’s shoes again for the sequel, and will be sure to buy it as soon as it comes out. If you have been thinking about getting a PS Vita and are looking for a good game for it, or you have a Vita already and haven’t experienced the game yet, I heartily recommend Gravity Rush.

8/10

Retrospective: The Butterfly Effect 3 – Revelations (2009)

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Welcome back to the third and final part of The Butterfly Effect retrospective! You’ll probably notice that this has definitely been the shortest franchise we’ve covered so far, and I must say that that’s one of the reasons I chose it. For one thing, it saves me a bit of schedule juggling which can get hectic with a franchise with 5+ entries. I also chose it because the idea of the retrospectives is to cover franchises, and not all of them are extensive – hence why I wanted to focus on the shorter end of the spectrum with a film I liked. I think 3 entries will be the minimum barrier of entry though, so no Battle Royale or The Raid quite yet. Anyway, with that in mind, we get to the most recent Butterfly Effect movie: another straight-to-DVD release. Would it succumb to the same problems that plagued The Butterfly Effect 2, or would Revelations carve its own niche? Read on to find out…

This poster may not tell us a single thing about the movie, but it’s pretty cool looking in my opinion.

The Butterfly Effect as a viable franchise was pretty much dead even before the second film was made (due to the venomous lashing it would get whenever anyone brought it up), but apparently it was successful enough to merit another straight-to-DVD sequel. The film was produced by After Dark films, which marketed its releases with an annual After Dark Horrorfest, which showcased eight independent horror films. Most of them were pretty shlocky, but it seems they’ve built up enough capital to get some more high profile releases, including Wristcutters: A Love Story and Sylvester Stallone’s Bullet to the Head.

The script was written by Holly Brix, who has written basically nothing… it would seem that this was her first screenwriting assignment to get greenlit. Seth Grossman was hired to direct, who similarly hadn’t really done much. He had a couple documentary and short film credits to his name, but not much to go by to get him the gig as director of a dark time travel thriller… although at least The Elephant King was supposed to be pretty good. Anyway, the cast was once again filled with nobodies. The protagonist, Sam, is played by Chris Carmack, who is known less for his acting (which includes such greats as David R. Ellis’ Shark Night 3D and Into the Blue 2) and more for his physique… a fact reinforced by his damn Wikipedia portrait. The only other character worth noting is Sam’s sister, Jenna, played by Rachel Miner (who has some decent TV credits to her name but a lot of poor quality stuff as well).

While Hollie Brix is a neophyte scriptwriter, her take on the material is probably the most interesting aspect of the movie. Rather than rehashing the story of the first movie like The Butterfly Effect 2 did, Revelations follows a time traveler who uses his abilities to solve crimes, while sticking to a code to prevent himself from changing the past. He has determined that changing the past only results in tragedy, and so needs to restrain himself to prevent himself from inadvertently killing people. However, when the sister of his murdered ex-girlfriend asks for his help in solving the killing, the rules get thrown away as Sam can’t help but try to save her. Unfortunately, in the process he accidentally unleashes a sadistic serial killer on the populace…

A mystery is a pretty cool angle to go with the time travel material, but unfortunately it doesn’t manage to be engaging for a few reasons. First of all, the whole relationship between Sam and his dead girlfriend is basically jettisoned out the window as soon as Sam time travels, so we don’t get any sort of emotional drive from that and when she shows up again at the end of the film it’s very awkward. This largely stems from the fact that the acting and dialogue is mediocre at best and the two leads are bland (Rachel Miner is especially bad and sometimes Chris Carmack’s facial expressions are unintentionally hilarious).

The script is also absolutely riddled with plot holes and fridge logic. Seriously, just writing this retrospective entry made the logical issues even more prevalent than when I was watching the film. For one thing, characters aren’t consistent at all when time travelling. In the original timeline, a cop named Glenn is a good friend of Sam’s. However, when he changes the past, Glenn begins pursuing him as a suspect of the murders. Despite that, when Sam gets arrested they talk like they’re old pals, even though in this timeline they only know each other as hunter-hunted. The character Lonnie, who was cheating with Sam’s girlfriend, is also a blatant red herring in retrospect, since the only reason he exists is for him to say to Sam “YOU KILLED HER!!!” to make it look like Sam’s the murderer all along… except that when it turns out he isn’t, mistaking somebody else for Sam makes absolutely no sense. Sam also makes a change that makes him have to rent out his couch to a dude named Paco, and then after another change suddenly Sam becomes Paco’s couch mate… how does that work exactly? It’s like a lot of the attempts at “butterfly effect” changes were made without really understanding the idea of the concept, because there’s absolutely no logic to the decisions they make.

In a time travel movie, the “rules” should be well-defined, and Revelations seems to actually try this. Sam’s friend, Goldburg, lays out the basics – only observe so you don’t change the past, always “jump” with supervision and don’t return to the same time twice or you’ll fry your brain. Unfortunately, two of those rules are incredibly ill-defined and don’t really make a lot of sense (not to mention that they’re broken in the film itself without consequence). First off, if you’re jumping to the past, why would you need supervision? It’s not like they’re going to notice if you do something… the only possible explanation I can think of is that if their observer is gone when they wake up, the time traveler knows they changed things. Still, some elaboration would have helped here, because otherwise it just sounds like Golburg and Jenna like to stare at Sam’s naked body… Anyway, the “don’t jump to the same time or your brain will fry” thing is clearly just a plot convenience. That way people can’t say “well why not go back to your girlfriend’s murder again and kill the killer this time?”, because clearly that’s what Sam should actually do. Luckily for the plot, Sam’s an idiot (although at least he’s a well-intentioned idiot) and messes up his chances to change things in the silliest of ways every time he jumps. Most hilariously is the time he hides in a victim’s closet and watches her getting raped… until it turns out that it was just a roleplay between her and her boyfriend, who then finds Sam in the closet and punches him out. Oops.

Another notable element of the film is that its content is noticeably more explicit than the previous films in the franchise. By that I mean that the violence is extremely bloody and gory and that the movie features a borderline pornographic sex scene… and yet it still doesn’t manage to be as dark as the original film was. I’m guessing that the more hardcore elements of the film in part stem from After Dark films pushing the horror angle and trying to get a wider viewership, but it makes the film feel more sleazy and cheap than either of the other films in the franchise. The violence is pretty over the top, with the first couple minutes featuring a brutal, detailed shot of a mother getting her skull caved in in front of her son. Then there’s a few scenes of women getting chopped up with a buzz saw (complete with fingore), which of course results in fountains of blood. The violence is infrequent, but when it hits it’s like an Evil Dead movie. As for the sex scene, it just comes out of absolutely nowhere. First we get the generic bartender woman flirting with Sam, pan down to her cleavage and then HOLY CRAP, UNNECESSARY, GRAPHIC SEX SCENE. Like, I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say borderline pornographic. It’s only about 30 seconds long, but in that time they go through a half dozen ridiculous positions, the girl looks like a porn star and they even play a bloody porno soundtrack over it all. It’s just a totally out of left field scene and was obviously only thrown in because someone decided that the movie needed boobs or it wasn’t going to sell.

And then there’s the ending… Sam finally unravels the location of the serial killer and discovers that the killer is… Jenna!? And she can time travel as well? Oh no! Turns out that Sam saved her from dying when they were kids and she’s had a creepy, incestual obession with Sam ever since. Therefore, she has been killing off all of his potential girlfriends to force them to be together… she’s like the time travelling version of the Overly Attached Girlfriend. It also turns out that her cover has been blown a bunch of times now and she just changes the past to keep Sam from knowing. As a result, Sam time travels to when he saves her and just lets her die instead, making everything alright. It’s a rushed ending that isn’t satisfying in the slightest. For one thing, having two people time travelling at the same time creatures enormous logical headaches – in order for the plot to work, Sam and Jenna must have been travelling to the same time periods simultaneously, which shouldn’t work according to the film’s logic. There’s also the fact that Sam blatantly breaks the “don’t travel to the same time twice” rule in order to kill Jenna, with no repercussions. Couldn’t he have, I dunno, just prevented the fire instead of killing his sister (therefore keeping everyone alive and keeping Jenna from going gaga over him)? Again… Sam’s an idiot. The ending is also kind of stupid because Sam’s daughter, also called Jenna, seems to be a psycho as well – it’s sort of implied that the other Jenna got reincarnated into her or possessed her or something, but it’s just silly and unnecessary. Someone probably said “dammit, this ending where the sister gets burned alive is too happy, we need to make it dark, STAT!” Anyway, all of this resolution happens in about a 5 minute span, which is way too short for what the movie needed. Kind of like Die Hard With a Vengeance, the poor ending ruins the rest of the film.

The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations isn’t as horrible as I make it sound. It certainly gets points for originality and actually manages to be somewhat engaging, but the glaring issues with the script, acting, overall cheapness and horrid ending dampen the enjoyment significantly. That said, I think there’s a kernel of a great film hiding within the film, so if you’re very forgiving you might want to check it out – however, it doesn’t hold a candle to the first Butterfly Effect film.

3.5/10

So, The Butterfly Effect is dead and buried now, right? Well no, it’s not, and that’s another major reason why I chose to cover the film in a retrospective. Almost half a year ago it was announced that a remake of the original film is in production, with Eric Bress returning to write the script. People have reacted pretty derisively of the announcement, but there hasn’t been any news on the film’s status since, so for all we know it might have been cancelled. However, if it does get made, then it could be a blessing – The Butterfly Effect has a great premise, one which hasn’t been properly explored yet. If the remake manages to fix the logical issues with the original, it could be the best entry in the series. Like they say in the link, The Butterfly Effect is the sort of movie that should be remade because it hasn’t been done properly yet. Speculating even further, I think that a sequel should give Revelations‘ murder-mystery angle another shot, because it is a great central idea to go with. That said, if the remake never happens I’m sure I’ll be satisfied with the uniqueness of the original film, but I’m moderately intrigued at present.

This is how I’d rank the series from best to worst:
1. The Butterfly Effect
2. The Butterfly Effect 2 (it’s better made than Revelations, even if it’s not as worthwhile)
3. The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations

 
As always, thanks for reading and leave a comment for any future franchise suggestions!

Retrospective: The Butterfly Effect 2 (2006)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Despite a very mixed reception, The Butterfly Effect made enough money for New Line Cinema to warrant a sequel. Could it fix the issues with the original, or was it doomed to straight-to-DVD hell? Read on to find out…

While The Butterfly Effect made New Line a solid profit, its very mixed reaction made a sequel a bit of a risky proposition. As a result, while a sequel was quickly greenlit, the production budget was slashed in half and the film ended up going straight-to-DVD. To be honest, I’m having trouble finding out if the film was always planned as a straight-to-DVD feature or if it ended up that way due to a lack of confidence over the production, but in any case it’s not a great sign of the sequel’s quality. In any case, original writer-directors Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber did not return to write the script or direct.

The film was directed by John R. Leonetti, better known as a horror movie cinematographer/director of photography rather than a director in his own right. The script was written by Michael D. Weiss, whose CV includes such notable films as… uh… I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer, Hostel: Part III and Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D. Ouch, when a Brendan Fraser kids movie’s the highlight of your resume, you know something’s wrong. As for the cast, the film stars a bunch of nobodies: Eric Lively (who has really only been in unnotable roles for his whole career) plays the lead character, Nick. Dustin Milligan (male lead of… Shark Night 3D) plays Trevor, Nick’s best friend. His girlfriend Amanda is played by Gina Holden (known for minor roles in Saw 3D, in which I remember her dying an infuriatingly unjustified death, and Final Destionation 3). The only “big name” in the film is Erica Durance, famous for TV series Smallville and Saving Hope, who plays Nick’s girlfriend Julie.

The plot follows Nick, a sales representative at a tech start-up. After his girlfriend and best friends are killed in a car accident, in which he was the sole survivor, he discovers he has the ability to time travel to fix his life. However, as he changes things to try to get himself ahead, he soon discovers that altering the past can lead to unexpected consequences in the future… As you can probably tell by that short synopsis, The Butterfly Effect 2 is basically a “rehash-sequel” along the lines of Howling IV. The script is a hell of a lot less daring and complicated than the original film. In a lot of ways, it feels like Michael D. Weiss was trying to fix some of the criticisms of the original film. One of the ways this is done is by making the plot far simpler. For example, the blackouts have been removed from the equation entirely, the time travel sequences only stretch back a year and the number of time travel instances has been cut back significantly. As a result, The Butterfly Effect 2 boasts far less plot holes and logical inconsistencies than the original film, although more time travel couldn’t have hurt. Weiss also cuts out much of the extremely dark content which defined the original (the darkest thing in this is a really awkward man-rape, but it’s played for laughs). However, this change is less-positive, since instead of interesting, psychotic leads we get whiny, pretty-faced douche bags. Ultimately, this just makes the sequel’s content far more boring.

While the film doesn’t have as many logical issues as the original, the script still has some strange issues. For example, there’s no real setup for Nick’s time travel abilities. His mother says that he has always had nightmares and headaches, and it’s sort of implied that post-traumatic stress disorder unlocks the ability to time travel. However, it’s not really explained at all how he unlocks his abilities, or how he manages to function when just looking at photos gives him debilitating headaches. The film also works a mention of Jason Treborn into the plot just to link it to the original movie, but that just makes the mechanics of time travel more confusing… how many people are out there that can change the past?

The characters are also very uninteresting. No one puts in a particularly great performance, although they don’t really have much material to work with. Compared to Evan Treborn, Nick just comes across as a dick. Rather than using time travel to help his friends, he uses it as a self-serving tool to get ahead. He embarrasses his boss, steals his promotion and makes himself rich as a form of revenge… and then continues to treat his (now innocent) former boss like shit after he does all this. Not only that, but he inadvertently screws over his company in the process, taking it from a successful start up to a company hemorrhaging money and in debt to the mob. The other characters aren’t much better – Julie is the generic girlfriend, Trevor’s the annoying best friend and Amanda has so little screentime that I can’t even tell you what she was like. Like Evan, Nick also has a whiney mother, but she’s basically useless to the plot, existing only to tell us that Nick’s father was crazy too… a plot point which really only exists to rehash the original film’s family dynamics. Oh, and I’d be remiss to neglect to mention that totally random and offensive gay gangster, Wayne. He barely has any screen time, but he is such a ridiculous addition to the plot that he’s memorable (and yes, he has the stereotypical gay voice). This is mostly due to the aforementioned man-rape scene where Nick wakes up getting blown off by somebody. He thinks it’s his girlfriend, but then suddenly Wayne pops out of the covers and everyone in the universe yells “WTF?!?!” simultaneously. It’s such a random and pointless scene that it’s almost funny.

Actually, the random gay blowjob seems to be a symptom of the lowered budget, because The Butterfly Effect 2 features a few pointless sex scenes which seem to only exist to sell copies of the movie. Now, The Butterfly Effect didn’t exactly shy away from sleaze (there were plenty of sex scenes and a random full-frontal shot), but these sequences were usually very short – in the sequel, they’re far more pronounced and extended, even if they don’t show as much. In addition to the gay blowjob scene, there’s also a mostly-clothed sex scene which goes on longer than it really needed to without any real justification beyond “(clothed) boobies!!!”, and a goofy scene where Nick bangs his boss’s daughter in the bathroom. These scenes don’t really add anything and were clearly only implemented to secure an R-rating and draw in viewers looking for a bit of sleaze.

Of course, the budget also shows itself elsewhere. The opening titles and title card are pathetically tacky, like something you’d expect to see in a student horror film. In general, the film just looks cheaply filmed, in spite of Leonetti’s cinematographer experience. The editing is also very bad at times – I noticed that the blood makeup would very noticeably change at times and that even one of the pictures that Nick looks at changes between shots.

It also seems that a lot of content ended up getting cut out of the film. At one point, Nick whines that everything he does just makes things worse… which doesn’t make a lot of sense, because he has only time traveled twice and all the bad stuff only happened because of one change (which only attempted to “fix” one thing). I really wonder if they had more time travel sequences planned and/or written, but weren’t given the budget to implement them. It’s also possible that they had filmed much of the movie, but then ran out of budget and had to rush the last act as a result.

Oh and speaking of the ending, it’s an absolute embarrassment. It makes no sense and is not set up at all. To set the scene, Nick travels back to just before the car accident to try to save his friends. He tells Julie that he’s breaking up with her (which doesn’t make a lot of sense in itself, he’s only time traveled twice and hasn’t exactly exhausted his options enough to require self-sacrifice), which causes Julie to rush off in her car. Nick chases after her to save her from crashing and dying (even though the accident can’t even happen now as per the butterfly effect itself), and succeeds… however, in doing so, he ends up in oncoming traffic and decides to sacrifice himself to save her by driving off a cliff. What the hell!?!???!?! Why did Nick commit vehicular suicide? He barely even bothered to change his past, suicide wasn’t even a justified option to save anybody, unlike Evan in The Butterfly Effect director’s cut, where he had exhausted all other possibilities. It’s like they wanted to force in a twist/Christ-like ending, but did so without logic. As a result, we get an incredibly unsatisfying non-sequitur ending of epic proportions. Of course, that’s not the end, because Julie gives birth to a son who shares Nick’s time travel abilities. Oh no! Time travel baby! The cycle continues!

All in all, the movie just isn’t very interesting. It’s basically just a cheap, sanitized version of the original, which is about the worst thing you can say about a sequel – why bother with it when there’s a superior version out there? The Butterfly Effect 2 is just mediocre, although the stupid ending makes it hard to recommend, even as a curiosity.

4/10

Be sure to come back soon for the third, and final, part of this retrospective series, The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations!

*Coincidentally, Holden and Milligan both appeared in Final Destination 3… that franchise always seems to be an anchor for the Retrospective series!

Retrospective: The Butterfly Effect (2004)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Welcome back good readers as we begin a new retrospectives series! If you want to check out previous series, I’ve added a “Retrospectives” link on the pages sidebar that lists all the previous series we’ve covered and links to all the entries – be sure to check it out! Anyway, the franchise that we’re going to be focusing on for the next few weeks is The Butterfly Effect series. And obviously, since this is the first entry in the retrospective, we’re going to be examining the first film in the franchise, 2004’s The Butterfly Effect. For the record, this is easily one of the most divisive movies that I can think of, so much like my review of Live Free or Die Hard, I expect this entry could get heated. That’s okay, we’re all entitled to our opinions, and that’s all that this is. Oh, and this review is based off of the Director’s Cut, which is generally considered the “definitive” version among viewers.

Kind of an odd poster design. On the one hand, I like how sinister it looks, and it plays up the messed-up romance between Evan and Kayleigh. On the other hand though, it doesn’t really scream “psychological-time-travel-thriller”.

The script for The Butterfly Effect was written by J. Mackye Gruber and Eric Bress, both of which would end up directing the film. Bress and Gruber were also known for writing Final Destination 2, with Bress also having the dubious “honour” of having penned The Final Destination. The story was heavily inspired by Ray Bradbury’s short story, “A Sound of Thunder”, in which a time traveler accidentally steps on a butterfly and changes the future through a seemingly insignificant event. Of course, both stories stem from the butterfly effect itself, an example (and shorthand) of chaos theory. The idea is that small changes in a system can have larger, unforseen consequences. The classic example is a butterfly flapping its wings can cause a chain of events which eventually leads to a sunny day becoming a hurricane instead. It’s also one of the reasons why the weather can’t be predicted with any sort accuracy more than 3 or 4 days ahead of time.

Apparently The Butterfly Effect‘s script had been floating around for quite some time, becoming known as one of the most widely read unproduced scripts in Hollywood. However, when Ashton Kutcher came on as executive producer, the script finally was greenlit and entered production. Seann William Scott and Josh Hartnett, among others, were offered the lead role of Evan Treborn, but it eventually fell on Kutcher himself. Kutcher’s involvement in the film was (and still is) the film’s biggest controversial talking point, as he was (and still is) mostly known for being a horrible actor who appears in terrible movies. Final Destination 2 actress and Retrospectives favourite Ali Larter was offered the main female role of Kayleigh, but the role eventually was picked up by Amy Smart (best known for Rat Race, Road Trip and, uh, Crank…).

The story of The Butterfly Effect revolves around a child called Evan Treborn. When he’s seven, he starts experiencing blackouts, during which he displays seemingly psychotic behaviour (violent drawings, grabbing kitchen knives, etc). His psychiatrist recommends that he begin chronicling his memories in journals as therapy and that he see his father, who went insane years prior. However, when Evan confronts his father, he blacks out, only waking in time to see his father trying to strangle him before being bludgeoned to death. As the years pass, Evan becomes close with his abused neighbour, Kayleigh Miller. He, Kayleigh, her disturbed brother Tommy and another friend named Lenny grow up together, until a prank-gone-awry committed by Tommy ends fatally. This prank gives Lenny severe PTSD, causing Evan’s mother to move away. Evan promises to come back and save Kayleigh from her pedophile father and psychotic brother.

Seven years later, Evan’s a gifted psych major working on theoretical memory assimilation. However, when he uncovers an old journal, he gets a flashback to one of his blackouts, shocking him since he could not remember what happened during them. As he begins to uncover more details about the past, Evan discovers that he can use these flashbacks to not only witness the past, but to change it as well. Unfortunately, as Evan changes things, the consequences of his actions reverberate and cause unexpected tragedy in the future…

Obviously, the film’s plot is fairly complicated (it is a time travel movie after all), and what you think of it will really make-or-break the film for you. On the one hand, the script makes for a very effective tragic thriller. On the other hand, the movie’s rules aren’t particularly well-defined and as a result there are some pretty major logical gaps. For example, in the opening scene, why the hell does Evan bother to write a note? Who’s going to read it if he’s going to change the past anyway? Also, when Evan blacks out he seems to remember some aspects of what happened, because he writes down details he wouldn’t have known otherwise. Why did Evan’s father try to kill him (remember, when Evan goes to the past, he changes the future, so he wasn’t travelling to his own past to make his father kill him)? Probably the biggest, most noticable logical gap though is when Evan goes back in time to give himself “stigmata” – how did he not change his future in the process? The last two points in particular highlight how ill-defined the rules of time travel can be in the film. The movie doesn’t seem to make up its mind whether Evan’s actually travelling to the past without changing the future or not. For the most part, it’s fairly consistent, but there are moments which don’t make a lot of sense under scrutiny. There’s also the fact that when Evan changes the past, only his circle of friends seem to have any changes, rather than the world around them, but this was likely done to simplify things rather than being an oversight.

The blackouts as a plot device are pretty confusing too. For the first viewing or two they’re totally fine because they’re meant to be a mystery. However, when you actually start thinking about them, they don’t make any sense. It’s heavily implied that Evan’s time travelling causing his own blackouts, but since the whole point of the movie is that time travel changes the future, how is this even possible within the movie’s own logic? I’m not even taking time paradoxes into account either with this assessment – the time travel in this movie doesn’t operate with multiple dimensions or alternate timelines. When the past is changed, everything is changed instantly. Then there’s the question of whether Evan can only travel back to times where he blacked out – this is implied as well, but never really stated. I kind of wonder if there’s a deleted scene somewhere where Evan finds out he can only change the past during his blackouts. In any case, the blackouts are a very confusing element of the film once you start dwelling upon them – however, this point isn’t too critical since it’s intentionally kept mysterious and doesn’t detract from enjoyment of the film.

The plot is also notable for just how dark it gets. Sometimes it goes on overload, since it always seems like everything ends up being the worst case scenario. Seriously, how much bad shit can happen to one group of people!? Evan ends up in the worst prison ever, Kayleigh ends up in the dirtiest whorehouse ever, Lenny ends up in solitary confinement at the psych ward, etc. Anyway, think of the most vile evils you can, and there’s a good chance that it’s a major plot point in The Butterfly Effect. It’s hard to choose the worst thing when you’ve got child pornography, molestation, abuse, rape, suicide, animal torture, death, murder, attempted infanticide, sadism, forced prostitution, etc. Hell, that’s not even going into the even worse details of these acts – one murder is committed by a child. A woman, her baby and another child get blown to smithereens by a stick of dynamite. The Director’s Cut ending is perhaps the crowning achievement of darkness though – a baby commits suicide by strangling itself with its umbilical cord. Lovely. As screwed up as all of that sounds (and it’s sure as hell screwed up), the script is kind of enjoyable for how twisted it is. It’s certainly not for the weak-willed, but I struggle to think of a movie outside of the horror genre which is this relentlessly dark.

Of course, since it is a time travel film, one of the most interesting aspects is seeing how the future is changed each time Evan travels to the past, and the unintended consequences of his actions. Honestly, the viewer is rooting for Evan to fix things – I know I’d keep on trying, even if I kept making things worse every time. The changes are a little… drastic though sometimes. How does Evan go from relatively normal college guy to frat boy douchebag, simply because he and Kayleigh stayed together? Why does Kayleigh sell herself to the dirtiest pimp ever when her brother dies? For the most part it’s not too bad, but those two examples are points where the film could have done with some restraint.

As for the acting, Ashton Kutcher is of course the talking point. He takes a lot of shit for his role, but I honestly think he did very well overall… well, except for this scene anyway. The only actor who I thought did a particularly poor job was Melora Walters, who plays Evan’s mother. Almost every line of dialogue she says comes out unconvincingly, but at least she’s a secondary character. Amy Smart’s Kayleigh was also rather inconsistent, although not enough to derail the film by any means. The Butterfly Effect also features quite a few child actors due to the time travel mechanics, which could have been very problematic – after all, child actors aren’t exactly known for being amazing performers. However, the movie dodges a bullet, since I actually quite liked the child and teen actors in the film. The kid who plays the teenaged Tommy might have been a tiny bit over the top, but he really does a great job of coming across as a disturbed, twisted son of a bitch… not to mention that he totally sells Tommy’s implied incestuous desire towards Kayleigh.

The theatrical and director’s cut endings both deserve a mention, as each radically changes the film. In the theatrical ending, an exasperated Evan goes back to his seventh birthday party and tells Kayleigh that he’ll kill her if she comes near him again. This causes Kayleigh and Tommy to move away with their mom, therefore avoiding their father’s abuse, preventing Lenny from becoming traumatized by Tommy and allowing his mother to have a fulfilling life. In the present, Evan destroys his journals and tries to regain a relatively normal life. It’s a bittersweet ending, since Evan has to hurt his true love to keep her safe, although the viewer definitely feels that things are going to be ideal for everyone involved… although it never really addresses how messed up Evan had become throughout this whole ordeal.

However, the director’s cut is another beast entirely. For one thing, the ending is better set up – Evan discovers that his mother has had two stillbirths before him, and that both his father and grandfather both went crazy from their “gift”. This cut of the film also actually sets up the revelation that journals aren’t the only means of time travel available to Evan. In the ending, Evan goes back to his birth and strangles himself in the womb. This ending is just plain tragic and depressing, and you could also argue that it’s preposterous and tasteless… but it’s far more in-tune with what the rest of the film had been setting up and brilliant in its audacity. I prefer the director’s cut ending because it’s very powerful and affecting, although I’m glad that there are alternate cuts for those who want something a little less depressing.

The Butterfly Effect was, and continues to be, an extremely divisive film in pretty much every regard. For as much as its plot, acting or ending are praised, it seems to get an equal number of scorn for the exact same qualities. For my own part, I actually went into this review with a harsh eye on the property to try to see what the haters dislike so much about the film… but I still came out thinking it’s a flawed piece of brilliance. Honestly, I can look past most of the logical gaps, because The Butterfly Effect is so unique and daring that it nullifies their impact for me. If you can stomach the dark content, then I heartily recommend the film.

7.5/10

Be sure to come back soon for part two of this retrospective series, The Butterfly Effect 2!

Retrospective: A Good Day to Die Hard (2013)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Merry Christmas good readers, and welcome back to the Die Hard retrospective! In this entry, we’re going to cover the fifth film in the franchise, A Good Day to Die Hard (ugh, stupid title). Just as a note, since the Die Hard franchise started out as a “Christmas movie” of sorts, I’ve intentionally lined up this retrospective to coincide with the holiday. I’m sure plenty of us will be watching the original tonight… I’d also like to mention that this blog is over a year old now! It actually hit that mark on December 4th, but I thought it was a little later than that. In any case, I’m glad I’ve been able to keep this thing going at a regular pace, and hopefully we can continue to do so well into 2014! Oh and thanks for reading and supporting I Choose to Stand! Anyway, I missed A Good Day to Die Hard in theaters and so went into this retrospective with a fresh view on the film. Does it live up to previous films in the franchise? Read on to find out…

Again, same template for the poster design. Not particularly innovative, although it highlights the characters and setting (via the humorously photoshopped Kremlin in the background).

Despite the financial and critical success of Live Free or Die Hard, production didn’t begin on a fifth Die Hard film until 2010. Initially, the project was known as Die Hard 24/7, leading to significant speculation that the film was to be a crossover between Die Hard and 24. Supposedly, the film would have been pretty similar, with Jack McClane being replaced with Jack Bauer. Maybe John McClane would have been on vacation in Russia, which would make some of the film we got make a bit more sense… but anyway, this was never confirmed and the film was eventually retitled to “A Good Day to Die Hard“. In any case, A Good Day is the first Die Hard film to start production as a part of the Die Hard franchise instead of another source.

Scriptwriting duties were given to Skip Woods… and his CV is a doozy. X-Men Origins: Wolverine? Hitman? Swordfish? The A-Team? His screenwriting credits read like a history of major failed blockbusters. The film was directed by John Moore, notable for such films as Max Payne, the Flight of the Phoenix and The Omen remakes and Behind Enemy Lines. While I haven’t really watched any of his films, I am told that they tend to not be very good. That said, the trailers for Max Payne had a really strong, interesting visual element, so if nothing else then hopefully he could make the film look very nice. As for the cast, Bruce Willis returns (obviously), and Mary Elizabeth Winstead has a small cameo as well. Playing Jack McClane, John’s estranged son, is Jai Courtney, known for Jack Reacher and Spartacus: Blood and Sand. Sebastian Koch plays Komarov, an imprisoned billionare who Jack has to defend. The film also features of few villains, although only a couple are notable. Radivoje Bukvic plays Alik, the main villain though most of the film. Yuliya Snigr plays Irina, the skanky chick from the trailer who acts as Alik’s main henchwoman.

Moving on to the plot, A Good Day to Die Hard follows John McClane trying to reconnect with his son, Jack. He discovers that Jack has been imprisoned and is on trial in Moscow for attempted assassination. Travelling to Moscow to bail Jack out, he gets caught up in a terrorist plot to assassinate billionare Komarov who Jack has been assigned to protect – it turns out that Jack’s actually a CIA agent and Komarov holds information which is vital to international security. As a result, John and Jack take the fight to the terrorists and bond in the process.

If it sounds like A Good Day to Die Hard has a pretty typical set-up for the Die Hard series, you’d be dead wrong. From the opening credit sequence, A Good Day feels very “off” from how a Die Hard film’s tone usually feels. The opening sets up a self-serious political action-thriller story about how Komarov and Russian defence minister Chagarin had a falling out, and now want each other dead. Considering that this is the first film intentionally written for the franchise, it’s very odd that they didn’t nail the Die Hard tone at all. I should also mention that I honestly didn’t really understand the plot all that much. It’s not very well elaborated on or particularly interesting. Say what you will about previous Die Hard films, but at least they always kept their plots engaging and left the audience invested in what was happening – we may not always know what the villains are planning, but we have a basic grasp of what their current objectives are. A Good Day just doesn’t really seem to care all that much about plot, just stringing together action sequences willy-nilly. Funnily enough, it feels like the sort of stupid action movie I would have filmed as a kid with my brothers, only with a $92 million budget (and no, that’s not a complement).

Speaking of student filmmaking, the script really comes across as an amateur production. “Emotional” scenes are hamfisted and handled with no subtly whatsoever. Oh looky, McClane and Komarov are talking about how they wasted their time at work instead of spending it with their kids, and Jack happens to be listening in on them! How touching! Oh, or the scene where John tells Jack that he loves him, but sounds really bored while saying it. Then there’s just tons and tons of action movie tropes, such as “the bad guy wants to destroy the world just because” and the generic “trapped heroes laugh with the bad guy while they hatch an escape” trope. Actually, they pretty much ripped that last one off of Die Hard itself. In fact, I noticed quite a few moments which were clear ripoffs of the original Die Hard, such as Jack and John defeating bad guys by “shooting the glass”, one of the villains getting caught with his (metaphorical) pants down and pretending to be a good guy and the same villain looking in fear as he gets thrown off a rooftop.

On top of all of this, there are lots of just plain illogical and overly-convenient moments in the film. If you’re getting shot at by a helicopter, is your first idea to run across the room and jump out the 20th story window? Luckily for John and Jack there was something to catch their fall, or they could have done their bonding… to the pavement. Why didn’t they just head to the damn staircase? Or what about the fact that John and Jack seem to have unlimited ammunition? They obviously don’t have spare magazines/clips, since they’re picking their weapons up off of dead bad guys half the time. And then there’s the moment where John sets off an incendiary grenade which (somehow) engulfs an entire lobby, and yet because Jack hides behind a skinny pole he gets through completely unscathed. I’d also be remiss to not mention the absolutely baffling moment where Irina gets her slightly damaged helicopter back under control and then decides to ram John and Jack with it in a display of helicopter suicide. The co-pilot screams “WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?!”… at least I think it was the co-pilot, and not God himself every time that scene is played. Could they not have landed and then, I dunno, shot at the McClanes instead? This just reeks to me of a studio afraid to have their all-American hero kill a woman. In any case, this movie just feels like a video game… in fact, it would have been much better served as one, since the plot’s about as good as the campaign in Battlefield 4 (read: horrible, but with gameplay it could be negated).

Oh looky, someone has seen a Tarantino movie before.

As for the acting, the movie colossally screws this department up as well. Bruce Willis looks and sounds bored throughout the entire movie. Gone is the wit and humour of John McClane of old – in this film, John actually manages to be annoying. Seriously. He does all sorts of quips like he used to in previous Die Hard movies, but they fall flat and I end up yelling “Shut up John, no one can hear you and you’re not being funny”. Most grating of all of these is the “I’m on vacation!” line which McClane throws about as a mini-catchphrase. I think it’s supposed to be hilarious, but it’s just stupid because dammit John you’re not on vacation. Who considers “picking up my son (who has been accused of attempted assassination) from a foreign prison” a vacation?! How the hell do you screw up a Die Hard movie so badly that John McClane, a hero whose longevity has stemmed from his charisma and smart ass attitude, ends up being one of the most irritating aspects of it? In fact, I’d only say a couple of characters were passable. Jai Courtney’s Jack McClane is okay, but he has absolutely no material to work with, so I can’t really fault him. Irina’s also alright, although she ends up as little more than eye candy (funnily enough, that stripping scene from the trailer doesn’t even show up in the movie).

As for the villains, they’re easily the worst in the entire franchise. The main bad guy is Chagarin, the Russian defence minister. He basically does nothing the whole film, seemingly orchestrating an assassination on Komarov by being a political dickhead. There’s one part where I literally burst out laughing when they show him walking in a crowd in slow motion as he takes off his sunglasses and grins. The actual main bad guy is Alik, a villain who they barely even bother to give any sort of personality. He’s “supposed” to be eccentric. He “intimidates” the main characters by eating carrots and… uh… dancing in front of them. Yeah, I’m not kidding, it’s as goofy as it sounds. Plus he literally says that he “hates all the Americans”… what is this, a Cold War propaganda film? Suffice to say, Alik sucks, and is nowhere near to the villainous standard set by previous films. I just didn’t give a half a shit about him at all.

Oh wait, it turns out that the actual actual villain was Komarov all along! He was orchestrating everything that happened to break himself out of jail and then get to Chernobyl so he could steal weapons-grade uranium and sell it on the black market to terrorists! Who saw that coming!?

Oh wait, that doesn’t make a lick of sense. Remember when I said that plot conveniences just riddle this movie? Everything revolving around Komarov is basically a plot convenience. For one thing, wasn’t there an easier way to pull this sort of thing off? It seems like everyone except Alik and Chagarin were in on it, so why not just get the bad guys to break Komarov out straight away and then head to Chernobyl by yourself? Why did he have to involve the CIA and his sworn enemy in the deal (not to mention putting his daughter at risk)? Doesn’t that just complicate things, like, a lot? Didn’t he think things were getting really bad when he was getting shot at, or blazed through incoming Moscow traffic at high speeds, or when he got freaking shot? Apparently that was all part of the plan. Seriously, the whole Joker-izing of villains is just stupid and has only ever worked in The Dark Knight. Hollywood hacks and Academy Award-winning screenwriters alike – stop using the Joker as inspiration, thank you. Komarov isn’t nearly as bad as Alik, he’s just bland and the unfortunate subject of most of the scenes which rip-off the original Die Hard – which just go to illustrate how woefully he measures up to Alan Rickman’s Hans Gruber. In fact, the only good thing about him in the movie is his death, where he’s thrown from the roof in an uninspired, rip-off manner… until he gets sucked into a helicopter’s tail rotor and evicerated. Holy crap, that was an epic, brutal death and a good send off to damn near any villain in my books.

I want to be done complaining, I really do, but there’s just so much to bitch about in this film. For one thing, John Moore decided to film the movie in shaky cam style. Now I’ll admit, he actually has some justification for using this style: “McClane is in a strange world, with little or no initial control over his environment. He’s unable to anticipate things as he normally might. He’s caught off guard, and we want the camera to mimic that surprise and confusion.” Unfortunately, it just doesn’t work. Action scenes get the shit shaken out of them, and even dialogue exchanges get bobbed back and forth, especially evident in close-ups. The fact that we don’t really relate to McClane in this film either just exacerbate the problem. Now I’ll admit I don’t hate shaky cam – I think it’s well-used in the Bourne films – but A Good Day to Die Hard is a bad example of the process in action. It also features slap-dash editing, mashing together images at rapid-fire rates. Hell, there’s even a conversation between Jack and John in a car where everytime one of them goes to speak, the camera angle shifts… every… single… time… one… of… them… speaks. It’s noticeably distracting. All-in-all, the movie feels outdated, like it was supposed to be released five years ago on the coattails of the successes of Bourne.

Poor editing also takes a toll on the action scenes. Early on there’s a car chase that is actually pretty good in spite of the filmmakers’ efforts to make it as incomprehensible as possible – the camera shakes like hell, the editing is full of garbled quick cuts and the shots never really cohere into a proper string of events. What happened to epic, well-choreographed sequences like the amazing car chase in Raiders of the Lost Ark? There’s also a couple moments with some misjudged editing choices in my opinion – during a couple scenes, the audio is cut out entirely. This is supposed to be a stylistic choice to make the scene more “epic” or “cool”, but it doesn’t really work… and in one instance, it actually derives the film of a chance to get the audience up to speed on what’s actually happening. There’s just a distinct lack of ambition permeating throughout the film – it’s just content to ease back and let a hundred years of action movie cliches play out on screen for 95 minutes without adding any new ideas or mining its settings for anything beyond the conventional.

It should also be noted that while it is not as over-the-top as Live Free, A Good Day is still pretty ridiculous and nowhere near realistic. If anything, John McClane is knowingly indestructible, charging in headlong without even a worry about dying. He spins out and then flips a transport truck a dozen times without sustaining a scratch and falls from great heights on a couple occasions with Jack without being killed. Hell, I don’t think John or Jack get shot once this whole movie either. Also, while this film is rated R, it’s easily the tamest film in the entire franchise. There’s barely any swearing (even less than Live Free) and the violence is pretty tame as well (well… except for the helicopter blade death I suppose, but that could probably still get by on a PG-13).

All-in-all, I can count the things I liked in A Good Day to Die Hard on one hand – the Moscow car chase was cool at times (if badly shot), the bad guy getting thrown in a propeller blade was awesome and the slo-mo exploding helicopter jump was ridiculous, but cool… and that’s it. A Good Day to Die Hard is a dull, generic B-movie… which, if you’ll remember waaaaay back to the first entry in this retrospective, is exactly what Die Hard was created to not be. A Good Day to Die Hard is a total shame worth of the scorn placed upon it.

3/10

With the shit stain that is A Good Day to Die Hard now inked on the franchise, is there any real future for John McClane? Well, yes actually. Bruce Willis wants to give the character a final send-off… and I’m hesitant at this point, but I think this actually makes sense. Look at it this way – Live Free or Die Hard began a new trilogy that I dub “The Redemption of John McClane”. The first three movies saw John’s life more or less fall apart as he constantly screws up. Since Live Free, John has been reconnecting with his estranged children and rebuilding his life. If there is another Die Hard, John has to reconnect with Holly and finally live in long-deserved peace. It looks like this is the direction the series is headed in. Remember Ben Trebilcook, who I mentioned wrote two scripts for Die Hard 4, both titled Die Hardest? Well idiotic title aside, these seem to be the basis for the sixth film in the franchise, which will see the return of Zeus Carver as well. Bruce Willis seems pretty adamant that Die Hardest (sigh…) will be the final movie for John McClane, but of course that leaves the door open for Jack and Lucy McClane to take the reins. I had the feeling that they were testing this approach during A Good Day to Die Hard, but I can’t really see it taking off – people love John McClane, they don’t really have any reason as of yet to care about Jack or Lucy on their own adventures. In any case, A Good Day to Die Hard has shaken many peoples’ faith in the franchise, so if Die Hardest were to be cancelled right now, I wouldn’t be too torn up about it.

This is how I would rank the series from best to worst:
1. Die Hard
2. Live Free or Die Hard
3. Die Hard with a Vengeance
4. Die Hard 2
5. A Good Day to Die Hard

Thanks for getting through this retrospective series and as always feel free to comment and give suggestions for future franchises for me to review! Oh and have a Merry Christmas!

Retrospective: Live Free or Die Hard (2007)

~ Barloq ~ 2 Comments

Welcome back to the Die Hard retrospective! In this entry we’re going to cover the fourth film in the franchise, Live Free or Die Hard (aka Die Hard 4.0 as it is known internationally). This was actually the first Die Hard movie I saw, and as of right now, it’s the newest entry in the franchise that I’ve watched (of course, that’ll change next week when I finally see A Good Day to Die Hard). After a 12 year absence, audiences thought that Die Hard was a thing of the past – could a fourth Die Hard movie give the franchise a second life? Read on to find out…

Basically the traditional Die Hard poster design. Not one of the more interesting uses of the design, but decent enough.

Live Free or Die Hard started life as an article called “A Farewell to Arms” in Wired, a theoretical piece on how modern day America’s entire infrastructure could be crippled by cyber terrorists. The article was adapted into a movie called WW3.com and was supposed to be released in the late 90s to capitalize on all the paranoia surrounding computers and the Internet in the new millennium. However, the movie ended up getting delayed and then was shelved all-together following 9/11. There were a couple of attempts to get the movie off the ground again, but it wasn’t until the movie was picked up as a Die Hard sequel that it finally gained traction. The modified script went through quite a few rewrites, with writers such as Doug Richardson (who did Die Hard 2), Mark Bomback, Kevin Smith (celebrity geek who appeared in the film itself) and William Wisher. At the same time, two other Die Hard sequels were being optioned, both written by Ben Trebilcook and both titled Die Hardest (remember this, it’ll be important later), but they were passed in favour of the WW3.com script. Eventually the script was retitled “Live Free or Die Hard” as a play on the state motto of New Hampshire, although it was decided that it should be titled Die Hard 4.0 in international markets since they wouldn’t “get it” (that said, as a Canadian, I didn’t “get” it, but there’s no denying that Live Free or Die Hard is a bad ass title… even if the movie doesn’t take place anywhere near New Hampshire).

The film was directed by Len Wiseman, who at the time was a pretty big name in Hollywood, having directed the very successful Underworld (although he had just come off of the major disappointment, Underworld: Evolution). Of course, now adays Len Wiseman is largely considered to be a reboot of Paul W.S. Anderson, since they are both known for making crappy films and the fact that their love lives are damn-near identical. Bruce Willis makes his return, obviously, although considerably more… bald than in previous Die Hard films. The villain, Thomas Gabriel, was played by perpetual up-and-comer Timothy Olyphant (seriously, outside of TV he just can’t seem to get that major break). Playing the role of McClane’s tag-along/”buddy” in the film is Justin Long as Matt Farrell, a computer hacker tied into the terrist attack crippling America. Probably best known at the time as “The Mac Guy”, which actually helps sell him in the role better. Also making an appearance is Retrospectives favourite Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Lucy McClane. She has a relatively small role (basically little more than a plot device) but it’s actually considered her most famous performance. In any case, she does a good job convincing us she’s the utter bad ass daughter of John McClane, despite the limited screen time. Also worth noting is Maggie Q as Gabriel’s lead henchwoman, Mai Linh, who is pretty kick ass, if robotic.

The film takes place in the aftermath of a cyber attack on the FBI. The director of the FBI decides to track down the top hackers in the country who could have pulled this off, but it is discovered that all but one of them have been systematically murdered. John McClane is sent to pick up the last one, Matt Farrell, but a shootout ensues. McClane is forced to protect Farrell as cyber terrorist Thomas Gabriel launches a “fire sale” attack, crippling American society with coordinated, systematic hacks on key parts of the nation’s infrastructure. Of course, it’s up to John McClane to stop the bad guys and save the day…

Based on the above synopsis, it’s pretty easy to see that Live Free or Die Hard has some pretty big problems. For one thing, John McClane has pretty much been transformed from a vulnerable, realistic man thrown into a bad situtation to a T-800. McClane jumps from speeding cars, jumps from a freaking exploding F-35, jumps from an exploding power plant… okay, he does a lot of jumping, but that’s besides the point. McClane gets run through a gauntlet of death and just walks away from it all with a bit of blood and maybe a minor bullet wound to show for it. It carries on the legacy of With a Vengeance, but then takes it to the next degree of ridiculousness with plenty of unbelievable scenes. McClane himself has lost a lot of his character from previous films as well. While he’s still highly invested in his family, his character has basically been boiled down to “smart ass old guy with a gun”. No longer does McClane run from danger, he drives from Washington DC to West Virginia to find it. McClane doesn’t worry about getting hurt anymore, he’ll actively shoot himself to kill a bad guy. On one hand it makes sense for McClane to be somewhat transformed considering how much crap he’s been through over the years, but Live Free could easily be a stand-alone action movie if they just changed McClane’s name and no one would notice.

The film’s plot should also be mentioned for being pretty ridiculous. Many, many articles have been written about how Live Free is basically the apex of Hollywood treating hackers like basement-dwelling Level 99 wizards. In fact, everything with computers in the film is basically just Hollywood cliche – everyone has a dozen monitors for each computer, laptops capable of magically hacking into US government databases instantly, hacking all of the US television networks simultaneously, sexed-up/impractical futuristic work stations for government security workers and instantly finding Farrell because of software analyzing all the voices on radio broadcasts… It’s pretty clear that very little actual research was put up on screen – well, except for when Gabriel manages to remote access Kevin Smith’s webcam, although at this rate that was probably just a lucky fluke (and yes, your webcam can be used to spy on you… sleep tight).

I’d also be making a mistake if I didn’t mention the MASSIVE controversy which was Live Free or Die Hard‘s PG-13 rating. Hollywood wanted to maximize profits on the film, which was fairly highly-budgeted at $110 million, and so cut out all of the f-bombs to avoid an R-rating (since PG-13 films tend to make more money than R-rated ones). Fans spewed vitrol over this decision, since bad language is considered a hallmark of the series, and the fact that John McClane’s own catchphrase is “yippee-ki-yay motherf–ker”… it’s just not something that you can do in a PG-13 movie. For that matter, Die Hard just isn’t really PG-13 material, although the fact that they managed to easily secure the rating by simply cutting out all instances of “f–k” (simply replacing them with more “minor” swear words which actually accumulate to a level equivalent of the first Die Hard) and removing a tiny bit of CGI blood says more about the MPAA’s standards than anything I suppose (the film easily has R-rating levels of violence fully intact, it’s just not bloody/gory). That said, this review is based on the Unrated version, which restores all of the cut language (maybe around 20 f-bombs) and blood, although the differences are really negligible – if you’re a hardcore fan who froths at the mouth at the thought of a Die Hard movie without at least one f-bomb, or hates any sort of compromise, then the Unrated version should sate your appetite in that department.

I’ve been intentionally front-loading all of the complaining in this review, and that’s because Live Free or Die Hard is a hell of a lot of fun. I know I’m probably going to get a lot of shit for this from Die Hard fans if any bother to read this review, but I really like Live Free or Die Hard. Len Wiseman isn’t a good director by any means, but this is probably the second best thing he’s ever done (really only rivaled by Underworld and surpassed by his coup to marry Kate Beckinsale). While the film is totally ridiculous and over the top, literally every single action scene is just plain kick ass. Seriously, I was listing all of the awesome scenes in this movie  for the review until I realized that I had written down every single action scene to that point. The movie is ridiculous and fun that it puts movies which are supposed to be over-the-top action fests, like RED, to shame (without dipping into parody for that matter too!). There are so many awesome moments throughout the film that it’s hard to pick a true standout moment (although the car killing a helicopter is certainly the most iconic moment from the film). This is in part due to the fact that barely any CGI was used in the film (in fact, nearly everything that looks like CGI was either composited, such as the scene where McClane and Farrell are nearly crushed by a flying car, or used miniatures, such as the F-35 chase). It is also due to Len Wiseman, er, wisely deciding not to shake the shit out of the camera during action sequences. Bourne was becoming very popular at this time, and so studios were jumping on the bandwagon by trying to emulate its shaky-cam style… but they did a horrible job at it, making many movies just plain incomprehensible (see Quantum of Solace and Battle: Los Angeles). There is a tiny bit of shaky cam present in Live Free, but it is not distracting and plays second fiddle to steady, well-shot footage which presents epic action moments to us in all their glory.

Adding to the fun are the assortment of “talented” bad guys who shake up the action at times. The first of these is the random parkour villain (dubbed “Hamster” by McClane) who flips, shoots and does all sorts of crazy shit, which is a joy to watch in spite of its ridiculousness (even if he’s basically a rip-off of the parkour bad guy in Casino Royale). Maggie Q also shakes things up by kicking McClane’s ass with martial arts in a rather entertaining fight sequence which culminates with McClane deciding to fight kung fu with an SUV (although McClane’s misogynist taunting is a bit off-putting, but I suppose it can be justified in the context of the film). Sure, these characters are pretty flat and make the film all that more ridiculous, but at least they’re far more visually interesting that the faceless goons McClane wipes out in the previous two films in the franchise.

And speaking of goons, Thomas Gabriel’s a pretty good villain. Sure a lot of his threat comes from his unrealistic hacking skills, but it makes him a legitimate threat in the film. In any case, Timothy Olyphant’s performance is quite menacing, even if he doesn’t live up to the same level as either of the Gruber brothers (mostly because the script makes Gabriel’s character somewhat boring). Meanwhile, Matt Farrell is the “ordinary guy”, sort of like Zeus Carver was in With a Vengeance. He’s the character the audience relates to, a sarcastic geek who can’t hope to be as badass as John McClane… actually, he basically embodies a modern day version of the whole “every man” aspect that defined the original Die Hard. Live Free would be much weaker (and far less funny) without Farrell and McClane’s dialogue playing off of each other, representing the past vs the present, a criminal vs a policeman, etc. Of course, Farrell himself isn’t just a foil, he actually gets to use his tech savvy to help McClane, who would be utterly lost without his expertise. Farrell sort of represents the bridge between the Die Hard films of the past and this film, since computers have become ubiquitous since then. There are also quite a few in-jokes in the film which also bridge the 12 year gap between this film and the last Die Hard, most of which are quite subtle. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more, but I noticed that there was an FBI agent escorting McClane called “Agent Johnson”, McClane saying that he was afraid of flying until he took some piloting classes and an off-hand comment about “taking it under advisement”. For my money, this is how references to previous films in the franchise should be handled, rather than employing the Predators or Rise of the Planet of the Apes model where they basically pull you out of your seat and go “HEY! DID YOU SEE THAT? THAT WAS A REFERENCE TO ANOTHER MOVIE! AND WE WROTE THE WHOLE PLOT TO ACCOMMODATE IT!” These were very well-done, subtle references which can easily go over your head and make subsequent viewings more enjoyable.

Live Free is a bit of a conundrum. On the one hand, it isn’t a proper Die Hard movie at all, but it is a really kick ass action movie. However, if you watched it and would only be satisfied with a movie in the Die Hard mold, then that won’t matter to you. The movie is totally over the top, but it’s consistently and entertainingly over the top (whereas With a Vengeance became over the top halfway through after being relatively grounded in its first hour). The movie’s PG-13, but it’s still quite violent and has a lot of swearing – just no f-bombs in the theatrical version. “Yippee-ki-yay” gets cut off (in the theatrical version), but the moment it happens is easily the best usage of McClane’s catchphrase since the first film. You may not like where the Die Hard series has gone in this film, but this is what Die Hard is now (if my impressions of A Good Day to Die Hard are correct anyway). Hardcore fans seem to hate the movie, but it’s the highest praised film in the franchise since the original.

For my part, I really like Live Free or Die Hard. It doesn’t really fit the Die Hard franchise particularly well, but it’s a hell of a lot of fun and way more consistent than any of the previous sequels (including With a Vengeance, which many fans dub the “only good Die Hard sequel”). If you can get over the fact that it’s a new, different kind of movie with the title of “Die Hard” then I’m sure you’ll be very entertained. If not, then you’re entitled to that opinion, but I can’t say I agree with you or will step down from my own assessment.

7.5/10 (oh yeah, I’m definitely going to be receiving hate mail for that)

Be sure to come back soon for the fifth, and final, part of this retrospective series with A Good Day to Die Hard!

Retrospective: Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Welcome back to the Die Hard retrospective! In this entry we’re going to cover the third film in the franchise, Die Hard with a Vengeance (which started the annoying trend of the franchises’ sequels shoehorning Die Hard into a phrase for the film’s title)! Die Hard 2 was a rather lazy rehash of a sequel, but the producers seemed keen to not make the same mistake. Could the third entry in the franchise bring back the series’ AAA reputation, “with a vengeance”? Read on to find out…

Again, a nice poster with the prominence going to both its star (at his most bad-ass looking, I might add) and its setting.

Production on a sequel to Die Hard 2 stalled a bit after the entire premise became the template for every action movie of the 90s. Die Hard 2 was lucky enough to have the turn-around time to beat out a rival “Die Hard in an airport” movie (although technically it’s really just a canonized “Die Hard in an airport”), but by the time the third movie went into production, the premise had already been significantly mined. How many interesting, confined locations could be used when rip-offs had already had to resort to having terrorists on a bus? Well Fox decided to go back to the old well of unproduced scripts to find one to adapt. One of the early scripts they were interested in was called Troubleshooter, and would have seen McClane fighting terrorists on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. If this sounds like the disastrous Speed 2: Cruise Control… well, that’s because the script was the basis for that movie. The Die Hard producers passed on Troubleshooter after hearing about a similar-sounding film called Under Siege (aka, Steven Seagal’s entire career), but the script would later be picked up as the basis of Speed 2.

Quite a few scripts were optioned, but the one which would become Die Hard with a Vengeance wasn’t even supposed to be a Die Hard movie. A script by Jonathan Hensleigh called Simon Says was originally intended to be the fourth entry in the Lethal Weapon series (it certainly would have been better than the Lethal Weapon 4 that we got anyway…). However, this did not come to pass, and so the script was reworked to fit into the Die Hard mold. That said, there are still obvious parallels between this film and the Lethal Weapon series – in a lot of ways, the film feels more like a Lethal Weapon and less like a traditional Die Hard. The film is also notable for having a heist scheme which was so clever that the FBI investigated Hensleigh to ensure that he wasn’t actually planning on pulling it off (because, y’know, turning your plan into a major motion picture is the perfect way to get away with it).

John McTiernan made his return to the director’s chair, taking the reins back from Renny Harlin. He had just come off of the rather infamous Last Action Hero with Arnold Schwarzenegger, and was looking to get into the studio and audiences’ good graces once more. Of course, Bruce Willis also returned as John McClane, although he is the only member of the original cast to return (aside from a very limited vocal cameo by Bonnie Bedelia… although I can’t even confirm that it’s actually her). Two major new faces were added to the franchise in this entry. The first is Samuel L. Jackson’s Zeus Carver, an electrician who becomes McClane’s unwilling sidekick throughout the film. The second is the film’s villain, Simon Gruber, played by Jeremy Irons. Simon is the brother of Hans Gruber, giving the villain’s motivations a personal vendetta as he matches wits with McClane. There are also a host of minor supporting characters, but they aren’t really worth noting – this film is held up by its major players.

The film opens with a literal bang, as a bomb unexpectedly goes off in the middle of downtown New York. It’s quite a surprising opening and certainly gets the audiences’ interest immediately without cheaply throwing us into the action. Anyway, it turns out that the bomber is threatening to detonate more explosives across the city if John McClane doesn’t obey his wishes. Along the way, McClane accidentally ropes electrician Zeus Carver to come along with him, and the pair are sent on races across the city to defuse bombs before they can detonate. However, McClane gets the sneaking suspicion that there’s more going on here than meets the eye…

As you can probably tell, With a Vengeance throws away the whole confined setting aspect of the series, as the film takes place all across the city of New York. It’s not necessarily a terrible decision, but it certainly makes the film feel extremely different than previous films in the franchise. I’m not sure why, but the film also looks very different than previous Die Hards… maybe it’s the lighting, the film stock or the lack of confined space… if I were a film student I could probably pin-point it, but the filming technique seems vastly different than any other film in the franchise to this point. I should also mention that I’m kind of annoyed that Holly has separated with McClane at the start of the film, but at least this makes McClane down on his luck again.

Anyway, beyond the intangibles, the realism of previous Die Hard movies is absent as well. At times the movie makes Die Hard 2 look totally plausible. Seriously, people crap on Live Free or Die Hard for being over the top, but that really just carried over from some of the ridiculous stuff on display in With a Vengeance. It starts out fairly innocently: McClane drives like a total nut, but somehow manages to avoid getting in an accident or killing anyone, he jumps onto a moving subway car, etc. This sort of thing is certainly straining believably, but it’s not exactly off the rails… no, that comes when McClane surfs a freaking dump truck to safety and then gets shot out of a water main right in front of Zeus (who just so happened to be passing by at the time). It’s such a ridiculous scene that it’s impossible to take the movie seriously beyond that point. It reminds me of a friend who said that he saw a movie called Escape from LA where a guy chases after one of the bad guys by catching a random tidal wave and surfing onto the guy’s vehicle. It’s the sort of scene that just sounds so implausible that you can’t believe it’s real, but it totally is. Anyway, the movie really jumps the shark at that point, culminating with McClane and Zeus surviving jumping from a ship just as it explodes into a giant mushroom cloud… yeah, so much for the grounded action franchise, With a Vengeance basically just moves into typical action movie territory.

Okay, I may be ragging on With a Vengeance for being over the top, but that’s not that big a deal in all honesty. To be fair, the film is a ton of fun. For one thing, it recaptures much of the humour of the first film. The whole situation where McClane is forced to go into Harlem with a racist sign is just a funny situation and shows that Simon Gruber is a troll. There’s also quite a few occasions where random douche bags in New York interact with the main characters, almost always provoking laughs. Of course, the interplay between McClane and Zeus also is a major source of humour – Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson have a lot of chemistry and it shows on-screen.

Also contributing to the fun factor is the script – for most of the runtime, the plot is very tense, the villain is great and the main characters are a lot of fun. The whole “Simon Says game” aspect of the plot is a very clever way to drive the plot forward and keep it engaging, especially when you consider that about a third of the movie boils down to “John and Zeus drive around New York”. Before the “game” can get repetitive, the heist aspect of the story falls into place, and it really is ingenious. Seriously, the master plan of this film more than lives up to Hans’ heist in the original Die Hard. It should also be mentioned that Simon Gruber is a great villain in his own right, basically a “bigger and better” version of Hans (although he’s not quite as memorable). Seeing McClane trying to unravel Simon’s plans is a joy in itself as he kicks quite a bit of ass as can be expected.

That said, while the plot quite fun, it also has some rather gaping holes in it. For one thing, how the hell did Simon manage to get financial backing for his heist? It’s sort of implied that a foreign nation is funding it, but I don’t think the movie bothers to dwell on it. In any case, Simon’s packing some expensive hardware and probably is managing a hundred baddies. There’s just so many intricacies that it’s hard to think that the plan only ever gets messed up when McClane’s involved (eg, they leave briefcase bombs in the open in a busy park, how is it that no random bystanders came along and stole them?). There’s also the fact that everyone’s travelling all across the city in no time at all due to the magic of editing, much like in Die Hard 2.

While I may gripe about plot holes in the film, I’ll be honest – they’re all pretty minor. The major issue with With a Vengeance is that it starts to rapidly lose steam around the 40 minute mark. For one thing, you can tell that the film wasn’t really figured out at this point. The aforementioned scene where Zeus just so happens to come across McClane shooting out of a water main just reeks of slap-dash editing. There’s also the fact that Simon Gruber plants a bomb at the school Zeus’ kids attend. When Zeus discovers this, he says that Gruber was doing that to keep him involved in the game. However, this was clearly just thrown in there to try to justify adding some more tension, because it makes no sense whatsoever. How did Simon know Zeus had kids? Are you telling me he didn’t plant his bombs until after his plans were already being set in motion? How is secretly planting the bomb in Zeus’ kids’ school going to keep him in line? Hell, why does Simon even care if Zeus stays involved (he doesn’t have a vendetta against him after all)? Anyway, it’s contrived and cliched stuff like this which make the final 40 minutes far less compelling than the preceding hour and a half.

Of course, none of that compares to the abysmal ending. It turns out that the original ending wasn’t very well liked – originally, McClane’s life was going to be ruined by Gruber’s antics. As a result, McClane hunted down Gruber to play some Russian roulette… with a rocket launcher. It’s kind of a ridiculous scene, but it wasn’t liked for how it made McClane look un-heroic. As a result, we ended up with the dud of an ending which we have been cursed with: McClane and Zeus (for some reason) travel to Quebec and make a bunch of wisecracks until Simon shoots down their helicopter. Then McClane shoots a power line, destroying Simon’s helicopter. That’s it. Simon dies like a total bitch and the whole plan unravels in about 5 minutes. What a major letdown. There’s also a really awkward and completely random sex scene thrown in there for absolutely no other reason than they could, which doesn’t really help the ending any. Whatever the case though, this is supposed to be the climax of the film, but it’s nowhere near as thrilling as the climax of the previous two movies. Hell, pretty much every action set piece in this movie is better than its ending. It’s just completely half-assed, and it really shows.

Overall, I want to love Die Hard with a Vengeance. For much of the first two acts, it is absolutely the sequel that Die Hard deserves which lives up to its legacy. However, the final 40 minutes just kill it and the ending in particular leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Die Hard 2 may be a worse film overall, but at least it improves in the last half hour and leaves a better impression – With a Vengeance just makes me feel disappointed when all is said in done. Many fans of the franchise cite With a Vengeance as being the only good sequel to Die Hard, but I think they’re being too forgiving – it’s about 2/3rds of a good sequel. It really is a shame that they couldn’t have worked out a proper third act and ending before commencing filming, because there really isn’t all that much holding With a Vengeance back from being a great action movie. As it is, it has to settle with being the film that fumbled it in the third act.

6.5/10

Be sure to come back soon for part four of this retrospective series with Live Free or Die Hard.

Retrospective: Die Hard 2 (1990)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Welcome back to the Die Hard retrospective! In this entry we’re going to cover the second entry in the franchise, Die Hard 2 (aka Die Harder). When Die Hard revolutionized the action genre and made a hefty profit, a sequel was an inevitability. Could Fox make lightning strike twice? Read on to find out…

This poster’s much like the original Die Hard‘s, with a similar layout telling you pretty much everything you need to know. The whole “just like the original!” aspect is a bit of a trend though, as we’ll get into soon enough…

Soon after the success of Die Hard, production on a sequel began. Rather than write an original script, the producers decided once again to borrow from a pre-existing source. This time, the 1987 novel 58 Minutes by Walter Wager was selected, since it had a very Die Hard-esque premise. From what I understand, the novel and film are both fairly similar, with John McClane and a couple other characters being substituted or added in to please fans of the original film. Of course, Bruce Willis returns as John McClane. Bonnie Bedelia, William Atherton and Reginald VelJohnson also reprise their roles. Playing the leader of the terrorists was William Sadler (not a big name to us, although he has shown up in a variety of roles that you’ve probably seen him in, including The Shawshank Redemption, The Mist and Iron Man 3). Most of the rest of the cast are unnotable, although two of the minor terrorists would become known actors later: John Leguizamo (Sid in Ice Age) and Robert Patrick (T-1000 in Terminator 2… in fact, he’s badass enough in his 30 second screen time in this that it’s kind of distracting).

John McTiernan did not return to the director’s chair, going on to do The Hunt For Red October instead. Replacing McTiernan as director was Renny Harlin, who had achieved success with the well-received Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master. The name sounded familiar to me, and that’s because Harlin was one of the many people who were brought in to direct Alien 3 – however, Fox passed on all of his ideas rather quickly, offering him Die Hard 2 instead.

Exactly two years after the original film, John McClane’s waiting at Dulles Airport in Washington D.C. for his wife to arrive for Christmas Eve. Coinciding with this is the arrival of extradited South American drug trafficking general, Ramon Esperanza. A team of terrorists, led by rogue US Army colonel, Stuart, seize control of the air traffic control system, effectively holding all the planes in the airspace hostage unless Esperanza is set free. Of course, John McClane isn’t going to let a bunch of pansy-ass terrorists put his wife’s life get in danger. Pretty conventional set-up for a Die Hard movie… of course, that’s because the movie is pretty conventional itself.

Die Hard 2‘s script can be pretty convoluted at times and just doesn’t make a lick of sense when you put thought to it. The script is definitely the biggest issue in Die Hard 2 for a number of reasons. First of all, how can you justify the exact same situation happening to the same guy on the same day of the year twice? The movie tries to lampshade this by having John acknowledge it, but it’s still clear that they don’t bother to chalk it up to anything other than coincidence. Credibility get stretched even further by the fact that Holly and scumbag reporter Thornburg happen to end up on the same flight by mere chance, despite the fact that Thornburg has a court-ordered restraining order against her. Then there’s also the question of how the hell everyone keeps getting into the damn air control tower, although that’s a smaller “JUST BECAUSE!!!” issue in the grand scheme of things…

Then there’s just the fact that the plot isn’t paced very well. The opening scene doesn’t ease you into the plot, it plops you right into John’s shitty day. I almost wonder if the editors cut out a longer opening, because the opening scene just feels so stilted. Die Hard had a good 20 minutes of set up to get you up to speed on the situation and characters. Die Hard 2 has 3 1/2 minutes before the villains show up and start doing dastardly things. The first gunfight is only around 10 minutes in. Yet, in spite of all this, literally the first 30 minutes are incredibly dull to watch. The next hour has moments of interest, but the movie lacks a lot of the tension that the original had in spades. I mean, sure, there’s only 90 minues left til airplanes begin falling from the sky, but we rarely feel the urgency of this fact, in part due to the fact that everyone just sits around until John McClane decides to do something. Seriously, John McClane is apparently the only competent person in the whole airport – he must have run a few marathons over the course of the movie with all the footslogging he does while everyone else shoves their thumbs up their arses. It’s not until the last half hour that the movie finally starts to get legitimately fun, kicking off with a rather surprising (if cliche) twist and ending with an exciting, explosive climax.

Then there’s the fact that the characters in this film just aren’t anywhere near as good as they were in Die Hard. John McClane stands head and shoulders above everyone else. Colonel Stuart’s not a bad villain, but he doesn’t hold a candle to Alan Rickman… plus he really doesn’t get all that much to do anyway. Bonnie Bedelia’s given a leading role in the film, but her contribution is minimal and it makes her role feel like little more than an over-glorified cameo. Then there’s airport security captain Lorenzo, whose only real job is to antagonize McClane incessantly, which gets grating quickly. Whereas the terrorists in Die Hard were all pretty distinguishable, the terrorists in this film all blend together (except for the aforementioned Robert Patrick, although that’s because he had an iconic role later in his career). Other than that, supporting characters such as Sam Colman (played by Sheila McCarthy, who fellow Canadians might recognize from Little Mosque on the Prairie) are basically useless and contribute practically nothing to the plot. The lines they get to spout aren’t that great either – Die Hard had some fantastic one-liners, but nearly every attempt at a one-liner in this film falls flat. For example:

McClane: Hey, Carmine, let me ask you something. What sets off the metal detectors first? The lead in your ass or the shit in your brains?

Umm, what? Does anyone know how that’s supposed to make any sense? I mean sure, it’s kind of insulting, but usually you want your insults to actually make sense…

Oh and I think I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the incredibly random and awkward scene early in the movie where Colonel Stuart practices martial arts in his hotel room… in the buff. The whole point of the scene is to provide an exposition dump from a news reporter on the hotel TV, but it’s completely distracted by the fact that there’s a naked guy practicing punching people the whole time. If there was ever a movie scene that made me feel like a closeted homosexual, it’d probably be this one. Anyway, this scene also makes me wonder if Die Hard 2 beat Game of Thrones to the punch with the whole “sexposition” thing…

Sure I’ve beat up the plot quite a bit, but there is one legitimately surprising and ballsy moment in the movie when the terrorists decide to bring down one of the circling planes. It’s pretty disturbing to watch the people on board unwittingly head to their deaths while the air traffic controllers are helpless to stop them. The crash itself is pretty spectacular, although the size of the fireball’s probably excessive considering that the plane was “running on fumes”… but whatever, I can let a minor detail like that slide.

Then there’s the campy tone of the film. The original film was a lot of fun, but it tried to have a generally realistic tone. This film seems to play up the campy angle with a bunch of silly moments. For example, when a bad guy goes running away across the tarmac, McClane grabs a kiddy bike and chases after him. Then there’s the above screen grab, where McClane escapes the bad guys by firing an ejector seat just before the plane blows up. Just from the way it’s shot, it comes across as being an extremely silly moment. Everyone has an infinity bandana too, because the number of shots that come out of the characters’ single clips is just ridiculous.

Overall, I’ve been ragging on Die Hard 2 quite a bit, because it really does have a lot of problems and is clearly inferior to the original film. However, it is a fairly fun movie, which exonerates it to a point. That said, it’s basically just a generic, mindless action movie hardly befitting a sequel to one of the greatest action movies of all time.

5/10

Be sure to come back soon for part 3 of this retrospective series with Die Hard with a Vengeance.