Harry Shearer Leaving The Simpsons

It was quite a shocker yesterday morning to read that Harry Shearer was apparently leaving The Simpsons. There have been some struggles between the voice actors and production team before, but from what I've read it seems all the cast have been together for it then. Now it's just Shearer that's leaving, which is weird. Show runner Al Jean told The Hollywood Reporter that even he has no idea why Shearer doesn't want to do the show anymore. Shearer seems to have said that he wants the freedom to do other projects, which sounds odd since all of the voice cast has a lot of freedom. The production team seems to be willing to try to work with him to make him stay, except that he should have the same deal as the rest of the cast, money-wise. And I guess he could want a bigger salary, but to walk away from an over 25 years legacy just to get even more money (more than $14 million over two years) rings a bit false. What would he do that'd pay more in that case?

The last reason I can think of would be that he's simply tired of it. That he doesn't think it's fun to do any longer, and think that 25 years is enough. Anyone could get tired of doing the same thing for over 25 years, but if that is the case I feel he would've told the rest of the cast and production team already, and prepared them for it. His leaving is very sudden and mysterious so I don't think the reason is as simple as getting tired of it.

I honestly can't think of any good reason why he would leave, but I hope he changes his mind and come back and see it to an end. Mr. Burns, Smithers, Skinner and especially Ned Flanders, are such major characters and I can't see the show going on without them or with someone else voicing them.

Edit: Just after I posted this Al Jean tweeted out a link to this article, which indicates that not all hope is lost yet. We will just have to wait and see.

Image from here.

A Bug's Life vs Antz [Spoilers]

Which is best, Pixar's A Bug's Life or Dreamworks' Antz? They are both quite similar, about an ant that doesn't really fit in and wants to change things in the colony and in the meantime falls for the princess.

First of all, from what I've read it was Katzenberg who stole Lasseter's idea about an ant movie. That alone makes me want to give the point to A Bug's Life, but I'm trying to look past that and just focus on the movies themselves.





Let's start with the story. Antz is about an ant called Z, who doesn't feel like he fits in and he wants more out of life than just being a worker ant. One day at the bar he starts dancing with a girl and finds out that she's the princess. To be able to see her again he switches places with a friend who is a soldier ant and soon finds himself going to war. Some way he's the only survivor and returns to the colony a hero, but when they learn that he's a worker ant Z finds himself in trouble again and (a bit accidentally) holds the princess hostage to get out of the situation. Well out of the ant hill Z decides to search for a paradise like place called Insectopia, and princess Bala has to go along. At the same time back at the colony, a power hungry general is setting his evil plans in motion and it's up to Z to save the colony.

A Bug's life is about an ant called Flip, he likes to invent things that is supposed to help the colony but he always seem to screw up. The colony works to gather food for the grass hoppers, but when Flip accidentally makes all the food disappear, the ants are threatened to gather the double in a shorter period of time. While deciding how to punish Flip, he comes up with an idea to go find some bugs that can help fight the grass hoppers. After a misunderstanding Flip recruits some circus bugs and bring them home to the island. The ants are impressed but when the circus bugs and Flip realizes their mistake they have to figure out a way to keep their secret and scare away the grass hoppers once and for all.

The story in A Bug's Life is simpler and more straight forward. Antz is aimed for an older audience, having more adult humor and even some gruesome scenes (a beheaded ant anyone?) I like the Antz story better, there are more things going on and the villain is more villainous. I get more of a sense of danger in Antz. The main villain in A Bug's Life even says that they aren't that big of a threat. Point goes to Antz.

Let's take a look at the characters. The main characters are pretty different even though they might look the same on paper. Z is the neurotic and want more than his predestined place in life. Flip is more the "spacey", excited but a bit careless inventor, who mostly wants to get some respect and help his colony. The princesses are also very different. Bala is ironically more of a Disney princess, she's not really satisfied with her life, she finds it boring and is looking for some adventure. Atta is nervous and trying to get ready to take over as queen but is scared that she isn't quite ready for it. The last same character is the queen. The queen in Antz is very royal, she knows her place and duty and cares a lot about the colony and her daughter. The queen in A Bug's Life (how come neither of them have a name?) is more of a relaxed, fun character. She isn't too worried about much but takes care of her colony.

Obviously there are a lot more characters to go, but we'll be here all day if I were to describe them all. The circus bugs, Zs friends, the villains. Most of them are good in their own way. But which ones do I like more? I have to go with Antz. First the main character, I find Flip a bit annoying. He's just a bit much and I almost want to yell at him to stop fiddling around. Z is fun, he's sarcastic and pessimistic and he knows what he wants. I like Bala more because of her confidence and calm, which creates some contrast to Z. Both Atta and Flip are very jumpy and high-energy characters, and that gets kind of annoying. And then you add a kid character and circus bugs and it seems none of the characters can stand still for more than two seconds. I do like the queen in A Bug's Life a bit more because of her energy and how fun she is, but she's not enough to save the rest. Point goes to Antz.

What is a story without its villains? Not as fun I'm guessing. Both of these have some good villains. Let's start with ABL. Hopper is the leader of the grass hoppers. His goal is to scare the ants into submission so they don't realize that they could stand up against him. He's a very serious and intimidating type but does enjoy some comedy. He's the biggest grass hopper and he's brown which makes him stand out and is easily recognizable among the green grass hoppers.

Antz has General Mandible, the highest general ant who starts of as a bit more than a jerk, but grows more and more dangerous. He wants to create a stronger colony by killing the weaker ants. He is very calm and collected and only gets aggressive or blows up towards the end of the movie, when things go wrong for him.

This is a tricky one because I do like them both, they are both good villains. But I do have problems with one of them and it's Hopper. I like him a bit too much, I like him more than the rest of the characters which makes A Bug's Life harder to sit through because the antagonist has to loose. You might think that'd be more of a problem with the rest of the characters than with Hopper, but I should still want the villain to loose even if I don't like the protagonists. And it sort of fails at that. Mandible on the other hand is intimidating, interesting to watch but you still want him to loose in the end. So the point goes to Antz again.

The last thing I want to comment on is the colony. We learn much more about it in Antz, we find out how it works, that they have soldier ants and worker ants and how they're chosen, that they have a bar/dance club and we even get to see how some of them sleep. In A Bug's Life we don't learn a whole lot about the colony. We know they're routine based and they get anxious when things don't go according to plan. We know they have some sort of council for handing out punishment and we know they never leave the island. Other than that I feel like I know nothing about that colony. And the few ants that we get to hear from are mean and condescending. That leads to me not caring at all whether they make it or not, and that's kind of a big deal since the whole plot resolves around rescuing them. In Antz we see more of their day to day lives and I end up caring more for them. Antz win another one.

"Yowch"

So for me, Antz is the better movie. I'm not surprised that I ended up here because I've thought that for quite a while, but it's been so long since I saw A Bug's Life so I was hoping that I would think it was a better watch now. Some things surprised me though, it had some fun jokes, some very nice colors and I do like the circus bugs more now than when I was younger (though I still have some issues with Heimlich). But it just isn't as good as Antz. I'm sorry Lasseter.

Do you think I'm out of my mind or do you agree with me? Let me know below!

New Jurassic World Trailer

[Spoilers for Jurassic Park ahead]


There has been a new trailer released for Jurassic World. And I'm so excited! It looks great and has a lot of action and quite a few different kinds of dinosaurs. We learn in this one that Chris Pratt's character seems to be some kind of raptor "trainer/tamer", or caretaker. I'm all for that, that would be a natural step to take for a theme park/zoo place. I'm so ready to see some more interaction with the raptors. We also saw a glimpse of a tyrannosaurus, which is great because it wouldn't really be a Jurassic Park movie without it.

There were a few things I'm not loving, the first is the whole "she's killing for sport". That immediately puts her in a villain role, which means they have to kill/defeat her in the end. What I really like about the original is that the tyrannosaurus isn't a villain, she's probably just hungry and happen to come across some tasty humans with annoying flashlights every now and then. There is never any plan to "defeat" her, the protagonists are just trying to get away. And at the end she even saves them, though I'm sure that wasn't her plan. The Jurassic World trailer makes it feel more like Godzilla (1998), where you bring in the military to try to take the monster down. I think I liked it more when they were just trying to survive in a world of dinosaurs.

The second thing I didn't like was that they revealed what the super dino looked like. She looks good, very impressive and so, but I think they should've waited with the reveal for the movie. Going back again to Godzilla (1998), if you want to see the monster you have to see the movie. Asses into seats.

So I'm not totally loving the approach they're going for here, but the rest is brilliant. The park is looking great, good actors, lots of dinosaurs and the CGI is looking really good. The movie's already getting quite a bit of complains about the CGI, and I'd be lying if I'd say I didn't miss the live action dinosaur animatronics/costumes, but they weren't that great looking. It was just nice because they were really there. But these dinosaurs are looking so awesome, they look powerful and living and I'm all for the dinosaurs being CGI. I said it, sue me.

What I meant to say was: the trailer is very good, if a bit long, and I can't wait for June.

Another Live Action One: Mulan

"Did you hear we're being remade in live action?"

"I'm not being played by Jackie Chan, am I?"

It seems Disney is developing another live action remake of one of their animated classics, Mulan. This is unbelievable. Disney already has four remakes coming in the next two(!) years, and then there's Dumbo that hasn't gotten a release date yet and now Mulan. That's six remakes, plus the three that's been released in the last five years. I'm trying to think if any company has remade so many of their own movies.

What is the reason for them making remake after remake after remake? I guess money is the answer, the remakes have been grossing fairly well. But I don't want to think that the people at Disney are only in it for the money, there has to be more than that. I think a movie could be up for a remake if it's set in an older time, and you want to update the technology and set it in a present time. With all phones and Internet it could change quite a bit of the story, for example Romeo and Juliet would be quite different in present time. But here's the thing. The Disney classics are fairytales and they are being remade as fairytales, in the same time and age. Why do you update a story if you're not going to update it?

And the major thing is, we've already seen the story. We've seen Mulan, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Beauty and the Beast. We want to see something new. Let me give you Disney's upcoming live action movies: original, original, Star wars, remake, sequel to remake, remake, original, remake, Star Wars, sequel, Star Wars, Star Wars. That's three original movies, two sequels, four remakes and four Star Wars movies. And I'm not even sure how many of the Star Wars movies are sequels. And then Dumbo and Mulan which are not on the list yet.

Not everyone will agree with me now, but I think a movie studio should have more original movies than sequels/remakes. I want to see more original stories from Disney, because I know they can be great. It hasn't happened often yet but I believe they can turn that around, like they did with their animated movies.

Image from here

Big Hero 6 Review - SPOILERS!

I finally saw Big Hero 6. It's been out in Sweden for over a month and I can't believe it took me this long to see it, but now I've rectified it. And my general feeling right now, five minutes after watching it is: disappointment. I'm sad to write that because I honestly want to love this movie, but I'm not sure I do.

The main issue with this movie is probably that it's way too short, it doesn't give time for anything more than the bare minimum story elements. This is a big problem when you have a cast of seven, five of them being big secondary characters. It's only Hiro that gets any character development, at all. Since the title is Big Hero 6 you'd think this was a team movie, like Avengers and Rise of The Guardians, but it doesn't do anything to make us really care about anyone else but Hiro, Tadashi and Baymax.

The character development is really underwhelming. What do we learn about the characters? Wasabi is pedantic, Fred has a rich family. There isn't much else there. They seem to like each other somewhat, but I don't really see any love except towards Tadashi. Do they hang out outside of school? I have no idea. I saw them briefly in the Hamada home when Hiro was building the robots, but where they hanging just for fun or were they helping? I felt no connection between them and Hiro at all, despite them being very excited about his project.

Another thing they could have explored a little more was Tadashi's death, or in particular, the mourning. Since the rest of the movie is based on Hiro wanting revenge, I'd like to have seen a bit more effect on him, and stayed in the grieving face a little longer. Also the scene where Hiro orders Baymax to kill the villain was good, but could have been made a lot stronger.

The scene where they decide to be super heroes was way too fast. Almost no one is objecting (except for "we're just us", which is such a set up line), no one suggests calling the police or even discuss what's happened for very long. They just decide to be super heroes and then they do it. No one seems scared, even though they were almost killed by the villain just an hour earlier.

Finally, Baymax "sacrifice". We all know this scene, someone sacrifices him/herself, then you're sad for two minutes and then you find out they survived one way or another. I didn't mind that there was a scene like that, but I think they should either have made it longer so you really have time to start doubting the return and be sad for a while, or made it very short so it isn't such a big deal. (Robot, remember?)

Let's get onto the good things in the movie. First of all, it's beautiful! The flying scene was gorgeous, the city looks amazing and the animation is top notch. Baymax is the perfect amount of fun without being distracting, and the movie has both a lot of heart and some humor. All the main characters are likeable, and it was interesting seeing a villain that wasn't just evil.

That's where my disappointment comes from I guess. Big Hero 6 could have been a really great movie, but as it is it's only very good. And I was hoping for, and expecting, more than very good. 

New Trailer for Inside Out

Just saw the new trailer for Pixar's Inside Out. It was fun. But I'm also a little disappointed. I had wanted to see more of the heart of the movie, not just the comedy. I don't doubt there will be heart in the movie, but I fear it will be pushed aside and the comedy will take over, like another movie directed by Pete Docter. Do all animated movies these days have to be advertised as comedies? Will people not go see them otherwise? And yes, I am aware that it's supposed to be comedy.

We don't really get to see a lot from the characters, other than Riley being a typical older child/going on teenager, the mother being the understanding caring one disappointed in the husband, and the neglectful husband who doesn't really pay attention. How many times have we seen that before? I hope there will be more in the movie that makes them unique.

The emotions are kind of fun. They are bringing a lot of energy, but I'm wondering if the whole movie will be like this. I'm going to guess no, but that leaves us with nothing as for how the movie will go, what the story is. We don't even get to know who the main character is, which you would think they would reveal in the second trailer.

The designs are good and the emotions are fun, but other than than I'm hoping that the trailer is not representative of the movie.

Christmas Present Ideas For an Animation Nerd

It's that time of year again. Brace yourselves, Christmas is coming. And with that all the Christmas presents. You might really enjoy giving presents to other people, or you might hate all the stress and wish you could just give hugs. Whatever your feelings on the matter is, I'm here to give you a little help with ideas. This blog post will be a gift guide for all of you that have someone in your life that's into animation. (Disclaimer: if your present receiver is a huge nerd, they may already have all the things listed below. You might want to consider a scarf.)

The Art of The Incredibles by Mark Cotta Vaz

First off, this is a beautiful book. The cover is gorgeous and the art inside it is very interesting to look at. It has forewords by John Lasseter and Brad Bird, and about every other page has some insight to the creation of the characters and the world. This is a must for anyone who is interested in the design or is a fan of The Incredibles.

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

Steve Jobs knew he was going to die and asked Walter Isaacson to write a biography about him. A very Jobs-y thing to do, and you'd think that's a setup for a glorifying biography about the genius Steve Jobs. But it really isn't. Isaacson was allowed to write about both the good and the bad sides of Jobs character and life, which makes it a very well-rounded portrayal. I'd suggest this book to anyone, it's so interesting and really sucks you into the story. If you know someone who's interested in technology or Apple this will be the perfect book to give them, but I think most people can enjoy this one. It's a pretty long book at over 600 pages, but well worth your time.

The Pixar Touch: The Making of a Company by David A. Price

This is one for all Pixar fans. Do you want to know how Pixar got started? This is the book for you. It starts back when Ed Catmull was studying at the university and moves through time to the production of Ratatouille, though an updated epilogue goes further. This book is really good, it's so fascinating reading about everything that contributed to Pixar being just Pixar. It's relatively short at 258 pages excluding epilogue, which is noticeable in some parts where they look over a few things a little fast. But it's good for those that aren't fans of very long books. I think it's a good marriage between too long and too short, but I would recommend the Steve Jobs book for further reading on Jobs part of it. All in all, a very good book.

Pictures from here, here and here.