Tuesday, June 02, 2009

E3: Super Mario Galaxy 2, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Metroid... and Final Fantasy XIV?!

So far, this year's E3 has been very good to us old school gamers. Just today, Nintendo announced not one, but TWO new Mario games for Wii and a killer looking Metroid from the Ninja Gaiden crew...








Another big surprise was the announcement of Final Fantasy XIV for the PS3. That's right, part XIII is still about a year away and they're already talking about XIV. I'd be excited -- but it's another online installment like XI, and I really don't care for MMORPGs. (I personally think the main Final Fantasy series should be strictly offline, single-player experiences and that they should save the online installments for a spinoff series. But hey, that's just me.)

So yeah, sounds like a good show so far and there are still a few days left. Maybe Square Enix will drop a Chrono bomb on us...? Maybe? Please?

Friday, April 24, 2009

whalecrash: Making webcomics with Twitter

So I've started a new experiment this week. I wanted to see if I could make a webcomic with Twitter.


No, not just tweet about a comic -- make it with Twitter. 

"Constrained comics" lend themselves to something like this, so I whipped up an off-the-wall image and decided to pull tweets into the word balloon.



With Twitter, I can update it on the fly whenever I want, from wherever I am. There's no set update schedule, but at least once a day would be nice. To the best of my knowledge, no one else has done this yet. I'm guessing either because they haven't thought to... or it's just an awful idea. We'll see how this goes!

Want to help me out? DM or reply @whalecrash with something clever and/or funny in 140 characters or less. If I like your script, I'll tweet it. And don't forget to follow me @kneon !

Monday, December 22, 2008

'A Miser Brothers Christmas' review

They're too much? Nope... they're not enough.

So I wrote a couple weeks ago about how I was cautiously optimistic regarding the A Miser Brothers' Christmas special airing this year on ABC Family. This special was, supposedly, a sequel to the Rankin/Bass classic The Year Without a Santa Claus.

It... well... fell short. I'm not completely surprised. So far, there hasn't been a single truly worthy sequel to a classic Rankin/Bass holiday special. I had a glimmer of hope because this one had so, so much more going for it than the others, including the return of original voice actors Mickey Rooney as Santa and George S. Irving as Heat Miser. It was also the only sequel done in stop motion animation (as opposed to CG,) which was a hallmark of most of Rankin/Bass' specials.

So what, exactly, didn't I like? Well, the two biggest turnoffs for me were the writing and the music. Rankin/Bass was a well oiled holiday machine, and they usually employed the services of Romeo Muller as screenwriter and Maury Laws as composer. Muller's screenplays had a certain "it" factor... it's really hard to pin down exactly was "it" was... he had a real knack for pacing and characterization.

On the few rare occasions when they did sequels, Mr. Muller often took things in a totally different direction. This show, on the other hand, simply rehashed bits of the original (Santa is out of commission... again) and what was new, was just... not all that interesting, really. The pacing was slow, and none of the new characters were all that memorable.

Besides, as great as the Misers were in the original special, they were a plot device. That's it. They existed as an obstacle for Mrs. Claus and the elves to overcome. The story wasn't about them, and they got very little screen time aside from a snappy musical number. They were never meant to carry an entire show themselves, and they just... can't. The fighting gets real old, real quick. Then they kiss and make up, so the one thing they did have going for them was gone.

So that brings me to the music. The Rankin/Bass classics had classic music. The Misers are as popular as they are because of a catchy song. No memorable showstoppers are to be found here. Even the classic Miser Brothers musical number was watered down compared to the original. In fact, I have to say that all of the original tunes were downright painful to listen to. From the opening number to Mrs. Claus' awful warbling, the music was really, really subpar. Even the background music sounded like something from your average Saturday morning cartoon show.

I understand that Maury Laws probably wanted nothing to do with this thing, but surely there are some talented folks on Broadway that could write some catchy tunes...?

The music is absolutely, absolutely a key ingredient of most successful holiday specials. Aside from the Rankin/Bass specials, where would the Grinch be without "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" or what would Charlie Brown be without "Christmastime is Here" or "Linus and Lucy" ...?

Yeah, it's that important. And one of the things I've seen mucked up the most in these Rankin/Bass "sequels."

So what was done right?

Using stop motion animation. Soooo close, yet so far to go, guys. Cuppa Coffee is the studio behind this special. They're the folks who did Jojo's Circus on Playhouse Disney. And I cannot deny that they're talented.

The animation quality is excellent. This thing looked expensive. The art direction, well, would be very nice if this weren't billed as a sequel to a show with such a classic, classic look. Rankin/Bass shows had a distinct style thanks to the uber talented Paul Coker Jr.

This show was very bright, very pastel and very stylized. That's not a bad thing... it's just hard to reconcile it with the original when many of the characters look so different (such as a skinny Mrs. Claus and an unrecognizable Mother Nature.) Oddly enough, some of the new characters (like North Wind) looked more like a Coker design than the returning cast. The elves seemed to be a throwback to the elves from Rudolf instead of the elves from The Year Without a Santa Claus. Jingle and Jangle are nowhere to be found. Rankin/Bass characters were cartoony, but the sets and costuming were usually grounded in reality. Again, not understanding the logic here.

So yeah... if it weren't a sequel to a show with an established look, I'd have nothing but praise.

Voice casting. Bringing back Mickey Rooney and George S. Irving was inspired. They both did an excellent job with the material they were given, and Mr. Rooney slipped back into the Santa role effortlessly.

And, well, that's about it. Worth checking out for the curiosity of it, but don't expect the second coming of Rankin/Bass. It is what it is. And, believe it or not, it's the best of the bunch so far.

Now, if Warner/Cuppa Coffee would've worked on a new special that wasn't a sequel to such a classic, I think I would've been much, much more receptive. I see potential to do Rankin/Bass style shows... but the classics really should be left alone. (Yeaaaaah... I'm lookin' at you, Classic Media!)

But, man... if Cuppa Coffee teamed up with Rankin, Bass, Laws and Coker on something new... that might actually work out quite well indeed. There's definitely a demand, or these "sequels" wouldn't be churned out at such an alarming rate. Who better to give the public what they want than the guys behind the originals? One can dream...

Tuesday, December 02, 2008

A Miser Brothers' Christmas: ABC Family churns out a sequel to 'The Year Without a Santa Claus'

Wow.

This one caught me off guard, but I guess it shouldn't have. Hot on the heels of last week's Rankin/Bass post comes word that ABC Family is producing its own sequel to my favorite Rankin/Bass special of all time, The Year Without a Santa Claus. It'll be airing on December 13 at 8:00 p.m. EST as part of their 25 Days of Christmas programming event.

Wow.

See, this isn't the first time a "sequel" to a Rankin/Bass classic has been produced without, well, Mr. Rankin and/or Mr. Bass. Some were pretty mediocre, some were downright abysmal.

This is, however, the first time that such a sequel has been produced for television, as opposed to direct-to-video, and by the very same channel that aired the original at that (ABC.)

It's also the first time that a sequel to a special animated in "Animagic" (stop-motion animation) has had its sequel animated in stop-motion as well. This is a biggie, because the sequels to Rudolf and Peter Cottontail were both done in (low-rent) CGI. You see, stop motion animation is very, very expensive and very, very time consuming.

Oh, and, it's also the first time that a sequel to a Rankin/Bass special has had some of the original voice actors return. That's right folks -- Mickey Rooney returns as Santa Claus and George S. Irving reprises his role as Heat Miser.

Wow.

I really, really hate to get my hopes up for a truly worthy sequel to a Rankin/Bass classic. This one seems to have a lot going for it that the others haven't, but it's still missing several key ingredients: most notably Rankin, Bass and their Christmas special "regulars." Apparently this show was produced without any involvement or input from the original's creators, and that is worrisome.

Still, it does look a darn sight better than what has come before. The DVR is already set to record this one, and I will let you all know what I think.

In the meantime, check out the trailer and judge for yourselves...

Monday, November 24, 2008

Transformers 2: Soundwave?

I admittedly wasn't a huge fan of the first live-action Transformers movie, mostly because I saw very few of the characters I grew up with make the transition to the big screen intact (save for Prime, voiced by the always excellent Peter Cullen.)

So a peristent rumor has been that Soundwave is making an appearance in Transfomers: Revenge of the Fallen. I admit that my interest was piqued, but I also expected a total mess of a design akin to Starscream and Megatron version 1.0.


A toy design was recently leaked that seems to confirm his presence, and I have to say that I'm... pleasantly surprised. The head is undeniably an homage to G1 Soundwave, and it looks as if some TLC was taken to get the colors and overall body design right (even if he's a not tapedeck in this movie.)

The vehicle mode reminds me of Soundwave in Transformers: Cybertron.

Maybe this is a good omen...?


(Pic thanks to www.tformers.com)