People can get pretty passionate about why they like or hate movies. On the CartoonBrew web site, when the original movie came out and they posted a talkback thread, they baited it with "C'mon Furries, I'm counting on you. This one's right up your alley... let us know what you think." Here was my reply:
Arright, you want a furry's opinion on it... well you DID ask. First thing to understand is that when furries go out to see movies like this, objectivity takes a major hit. There's not a tremoundous amount of anthropomorphic stuff to be found in mainstream culture, so it's often a case of grasping at whatever straws can be found, quality be damned. That's why it's a heavily art-based subculture: generating its own content is the only way to get the furry fix until the next sporadic movie or cartoon comes out. A lot of furries won't watch the film for the plot, they're looking for cute scenes, poses, clever species-related humor, symbolic aspects - if enough little fleeting sparks happen of whatever appeals to the viewer, entertainment has been achieved.
Initially I had no intention of watching this film. Actually I learned of it here on Cartoon Brew and agreed with the general consensus. I deliberately avoided telling my local furry community about it, because I didn't want to give it any additional publicity. As it turned out, someone else clued in and went all (and I quote) "OMG WOLVES!" This is the grasping-at-straws thing I'm talking about. What's sad is this person is over age 30, like me.
What's also sad is that I still haven't thrown off similar attitudes. I must admit to being partially interested in going to see Voyage of the Dawn Treader to see the CGI critters. But with age comes maturity. I didn't watch The Secret of Kells for the critters; I sat awash in the beautiful designs. Curious to see The Illusionist. I love animation, furry or not. If it happens to be anthropomorphic, great, icing on the cake, unless it's a complete piece of shit like Roadside Romeo. I need good writing, anthropomorphism be damned.
Anyway the reason I ended up going was that there was a get-together happening afterwards that I wanted to attend and I needed a ride, so it was part and parcel. First bad sign, in a city of over 600,000 people it was only showing on two screens, 3D only. Opening weekend Saturday matinee... 30-ish people in the audience, a very bad turn-out. Most of them were a large group of 5-to-8 year-olds. Of the local furries, besides me and the OMG guy, only two others showed up. So the trailer had not made much of an impression on our group either. Another over-30 furry friend of mine, living in a different city with 4 times the population, had only 12 people in the theater when he went. He too questioned why he was there to begin with, and described his experience using the words "pain", "make it stop", and the characters as "boring" and the design "gross".
Still, let's start at the beginning: Trailers. Yogi, most of which I missed (uuugh, thank god) because I was out getting a drink. The only thing I saw was BooBoo hanging onto the side of a vehicle while his butt was pummeled by the tops of passing fenceposts. As if the Cartoon Brew posts about it haven't been nightmarish enough. Second trailer, Tangled. Enh. (Personal bias.) And that was it - only two trailers. I was surprised.
Film plot: "alpha" and "omega" are class differences within the wolfpack. There are multiple alphas (trained hunters, duty, responsibility, seriousness) and omegas (lower class, who are supposed to ease tensions, by telling jokes, etc., their duty is to encourage fun in the pack; surprisingly didn't often use the clumsy-goof trope). Custom has it that alphas and omegas don't form relationships together. Main protagonists, Kate and Humphrey. What the trailer didn't show is that the two of them are long-time childhood friends to begin with, they're not especially adverse to each other's company; but now that Kate is becoming a trained alpha, she must move on. There is also a neighboring wolf pack, the "Eastern wolves". They have no more caribou on their territory, are beginning to starve, and are crossing territorial lines. An agreement is made that the two packs will unite to ensure survival and avoid war, to be sealed by an arranged marriage between Kate and the son of the Eastern pack's leader, Garth.
Kate is initially impressed by Garth's many skills until she finds out that his howling is epically terrible. In fact his howling is so bad, it stuns birds right out of the sky. (This is one of the few better jokes in the film.) Before she can reconcile what she wants to do, and before Humphrey gets a chance to express his feelings for her, they're tranquilizer-darted and carted off to a park in Idaho as part of a park repopulation program. Immediately they start heading back north, because without Kate, the two wolf packs will go to war. To appease tensions until the full moon deadline, Kate's sister Lilly (an omega) hangs out with Garth.
At this point we get the road/buddy film thing happening. Humphrey gets Kate to be a little less serious, and earns her respect by saving her life at one point. They travel with the occasional help of a French-Canadian goose golfer and his bird sidekick caddy. Meanwhile, Garth encourages Lilly's self-confidence, and she teaches him how to howl. In fact his howling gets so good that now he attracts birds to him instead.
Anyway, war is about to break out and Kate arrives in the nick of time. She appears to be sacrificing her own interests for the good of the packs, but at the last moment can't go through with it. Fighting starts to break out, interrupted by a caribou stampede that almost kills the two pack leaders, who are saved by Kate and Humphrey. Their deep friendship and Humphrey's mourning over Kate's near-death impresses them that maybe custom should be broken and alpha-omega relationships be given a try, so Kate hooks up with Humphrey, and Garth with Lilly. The end.
Sex jokes: surprisingly few, though a good bit of leering-at-potential-girlfriends. The word 'mate' (noun, not verb) is barely used, thank god. Toilet humor: a lot. I counted at least 14 instances, not including many butt shots. The toilet humor stops abruptly after the road-trip part of the movie ends; this was refreshing. The end portion gets a good deal more serious and dramatic.
I have to tangent here momentarily to talk about 3D. Personally I'm not a fan of the trend. I don't like how it causes directors to frame shots, it makes my eyes water, and the glasses make the lighting less vibrant. 3D animation falls into three categories for me:
(1) Innocuous 3D - this is the most common, and is the general state of affairs in Alpha and Omega. You forget the film is in 3D, can suspend your disbelief, and although nothing special is happening, it's quite passable as is. This was, in my opinion, the only thing that made Avatar in any way notable; the successful creation of a full CGI/live-action 3D world you could suspend disbelief in. Pity the rest of it was such a piece of crap. Unfortunately this effect is immediately ruined when...
(2) A film sets up a shot specifically for 3D purposes which will look all too obvious in 2D, making one's brain leave the film. Things flying out of the screen, "Oooh, look at THIS in your FACE!"-style, or over-dramatic shots to show depth and layers. I absolutely HATE all of it. There's a good deal of this in Alpha and Omega, espcially right at the beginning of the film. Frankly Coraline did this too, as did the run-from-the-dogs-over-cliffs chase scene in Up. (Which also felt like a videogame tie-in.)
Films that do it right? Yes, you can set up shots that work in 2D and 3D, that don't make you feel like you're missing out while watching the 2D version. Films that successfully did this: Toy Story 3 and How to Train Your Dragon. Excellent work, people!
(3) Full immersion. Very, very fleeting. Very rare, and hard to pull off. Something about the 3D atmosphere of the scene just clicks. You get goose pimples... and then it's gone. If 3D is going to continue, this is what I want. I've only experienced it twice. One of the forest scenes in Avatar, and a single point in Bolt. What did it? Blades of grass waving in a light breeze in the foreground.
Okay, back to the film. Alpha and Omega goes between (1) and (2) a lot. (3) is never achieved. Animation quality, enh. Could be a lot better, could be worse. I didn't personally like the character designs - but they're good enough to achieve their purpose. Only had two "WTF?" animation moments: when some of the wolves are doing a weird curvy dance early in the film; and a section near the end when the packs had been united, and all the background characters start doing a weird hopping-skip thing. I mean seriously, wha? Fur textures, passable, works better on some characters than others. Body language, passable. Two major fails: the CGI motion of saliva and mud. Seriously, get help.
Here's something that I liked: No one breaks out into song. THANK YOU. Bonding and cameraderie between wolves is done by howling, and it's not "Awoooo!", it's basically musical singing without words. Whoever's responsible for that decision in the film - you deserve recognition. It was an excellent choice. Sadly, because of songs in previous films, it felt like the characters were about to break into song. Such relief when they didn't!
Script dialogue: nothing special. Voice acting: good work. Also nice touches: Garth isn't a jerk. He's a nice guy as it turn out, no idiotic male rivalry. Closing credits: Looked more 3D than the rest of the film! Lots of the animators' sketches, 3D models, reference sheets - really nice to see the work behind the film shown during the credits like that.
Canadian goose and sidekick: boring. Their wacky dialogue wasn't; it lacked snapiness and pacing. As characters they were ok, but... yawn. This film takes no risks. All very formula, doesn't stretch boundaries or even experiment with them. The only thing in the film that surprised me was just how... vicious Kate's mother is. She was a bit scary, to be honest. The effect was enhanced by her facial design being worse than everyone else's. And given that "alphas-and-omagas-shouldn't mix" was the whole defining pivot of plot conflict, an attitude so well-entrenched in wolf society, it felt really weird for it to be dropped so readily to achieve the happy ending.
Worth watching? If you're an animation fan, no. Animation student? Maybe, to analyse and critique. A parent with 5-to-8-year-old children? Actually yes, if you need to fill some time. This is what I'd describe as a "babysitting movie". There's very little in it to appeal to adults except for the odd throwaway line here and there. None of the writing-on-two-levels that Pixar does so well.
But it's not a movie that'll have you writhing in pain for an hour and a half. Certainly a lot of eye-rolling, at worst an eyes-glazing-over moment or two. It's animated fluff that doesn't stand out, and would make a decent rental for young kids.
Sure, you could do better. But contrary to expectations, it could have been a LOT worse. It's cohesive despite the toilet humor. The kids in the theater laughed, they had fun. And for some it was their first 3D experience. Heck, all it took was a non-descript cloudscape at the start and a whole bunch of them went "Whoooooaaaaa!..."
For me, it passed the time I guess; no desire to watch it a second time, and I don't think the recent rise in 3D ticket prices was worth the experience. It's a run-of-the-mill, dumb "let's see if we can make some money from kids" formula movie. I don't think it's worth praising or demonifying; it will not stand out in the annals of animation history.
People can get pretty passionate about why they like or hate movies. On the CartoonBrew web site, when the original movie came out and they posted a talkback thread, they baited it with "C'mon Furries, I'm counting on you. This one's right up your alley... let us know what you think." Here was my reply:
Arright, you want a furry's opinion on it... well you DID ask. First thing to understand is that when furries go out to see movies like this, objectivity takes a major hit. There's not a tremoundous amount of anthropomorphic stuff to be found in mainstream culture, so it's often a case of grasping at whatever straws can be found, quality be damned. That's why it's a heavily art-based subculture: generating its own content is the only way to get the furry fix until the next sporadic movie or cartoon comes out. A lot of furries won't watch the film for the plot, they're looking for cute scenes, poses, clever species-related humor, symbolic aspects - if enough little fleeting sparks happen of whatever appeals to the viewer, entertainment has been achieved.
Initially I had no intention of watching this film. Actually I learned of it here on Cartoon Brew and agreed with the general consensus. I deliberately avoided telling my local furry community about it, because I didn't want to give it any additional publicity. As it turned out, someone else clued in and went all (and I quote) "OMG WOLVES!" This is the grasping-at-straws thing I'm talking about. What's sad is this person is over age 30, like me.
What's also sad is that I still haven't thrown off similar attitudes. I must admit to being partially interested in going to see Voyage of the Dawn Treader to see the CGI critters. But with age comes maturity. I didn't watch The Secret of Kells for the critters; I sat awash in the beautiful designs. Curious to see The Illusionist. I love animation, furry or not. If it happens to be anthropomorphic, great, icing on the cake, unless it's a complete piece of shit like Roadside Romeo. I need good writing, anthropomorphism be damned.
Anyway the reason I ended up going was that there was a get-together happening afterwards that I wanted to attend and I needed a ride, so it was part and parcel. First bad sign, in a city of over 600,000 people it was only showing on two screens, 3D only. Opening weekend Saturday matinee... 30-ish people in the audience, a very bad turn-out. Most of them were a large group of 5-to-8 year-olds. Of the local furries, besides me and the OMG guy, only two others showed up. So the trailer had not made much of an impression on our group either. Another over-30 furry friend of mine, living in a different city with 4 times the population, had only 12 people in the theater when he went. He too questioned why he was there to begin with, and described his experience using the words "pain", "make it stop", and the characters as "boring" and the design "gross".
Still, let's start at the beginning: Trailers. Yogi, most of which I missed (uuugh, thank god) because I was out getting a drink. The only thing I saw was BooBoo hanging onto the side of a vehicle while his butt was pummeled by the tops of passing fenceposts. As if the Cartoon Brew posts about it haven't been nightmarish enough. Second trailer, Tangled. Enh. (Personal bias.) And that was it - only two trailers. I was surprised.
Film plot: "alpha" and "omega" are class differences within the wolfpack. There are multiple alphas (trained hunters, duty, responsibility, seriousness) and omegas (lower class, who are supposed to ease tensions, by telling jokes, etc., their duty is to encourage fun in the pack; surprisingly didn't often use the clumsy-goof trope). Custom has it that alphas and omegas don't form relationships together. Main protagonists, Kate and Humphrey. What the trailer didn't show is that the two of them are long-time childhood friends to begin with, they're not especially adverse to each other's company; but now that Kate is becoming a trained alpha, she must move on. There is also a neighboring wolf pack, the "Eastern wolves". They have no more caribou on their territory, are beginning to starve, and are crossing territorial lines. An agreement is made that the two packs will unite to ensure survival and avoid war, to be sealed by an arranged marriage between Kate and the son of the Eastern pack's leader, Garth.
Kate is initially impressed by Garth's many skills until she finds out that his howling is epically terrible. In fact his howling is so bad, it stuns birds right out of the sky. (This is one of the few better jokes in the film.) Before she can reconcile what she wants to do, and before Humphrey gets a chance to express his feelings for her, they're tranquilizer-darted and carted off to a park in Idaho as part of a park repopulation program. Immediately they start heading back north, because without Kate, the two wolf packs will go to war. To appease tensions until the full moon deadline, Kate's sister Lilly (an omega) hangs out with Garth.
At this point we get the road/buddy film thing happening. Humphrey gets Kate to be a little less serious, and earns her respect by saving her life at one point. They travel with the occasional help of a French-Canadian goose golfer and his bird sidekick caddy. Meanwhile, Garth encourages Lilly's self-confidence, and she teaches him how to howl. In fact his howling gets so good that now he attracts birds to him instead.
Anyway, war is about to break out and Kate arrives in the nick of time. She appears to be sacrificing her own interests for the good of the packs, but at the last moment can't go through with it. Fighting starts to break out, interrupted by a caribou stampede that almost kills the two pack leaders, who are saved by Kate and Humphrey. Their deep friendship and Humphrey's mourning over Kate's near-death impresses them that maybe custom should be broken and alpha-omega relationships be given a try, so Kate hooks up with Humphrey, and Garth with Lilly. The end.
Sex jokes: surprisingly few, though a good bit of leering-at-potential-girlfriends. The word 'mate' (noun, not verb) is barely used, thank god. Toilet humor: a lot. I counted at least 14 instances, not including many butt shots. The toilet humor stops abruptly after the road-trip part of the movie ends; this was refreshing. The end portion gets a good deal more serious and dramatic.
I have to tangent here momentarily to talk about 3D. Personally I'm not a fan of the trend. I don't like how it causes directors to frame shots, it makes my eyes water, and the glasses make the lighting less vibrant. 3D animation falls into three categories for me:
(1) Innocuous 3D - this is the most common, and is the general state of affairs in Alpha and Omega. You forget the film is in 3D, can suspend your disbelief, and although nothing special is happening, it's quite passable as is. This was, in my opinion, the only thing that made Avatar in any way notable; the successful creation of a full CGI/live-action 3D world you could suspend disbelief in. Pity the rest of it was such a piece of crap. Unfortunately this effect is immediately ruined when...
(2) A film sets up a shot specifically for 3D purposes which will look all too obvious in 2D, making one's brain leave the film. Things flying out of the screen, "Oooh, look at THIS in your FACE!"-style, or over-dramatic shots to show depth and layers. I absolutely HATE all of it. There's a good deal of this in Alpha and Omega, espcially right at the beginning of the film. Frankly Coraline did this too, as did the run-from-the-dogs-over-cliffs chase scene in Up. (Which also felt like a videogame tie-in.)
Films that do it right? Yes, you can set up shots that work in 2D and 3D, that don't make you feel like you're missing out while watching the 2D version. Films that successfully did this: Toy Story 3 and How to Train Your Dragon. Excellent work, people!
(3) Full immersion. Very, very fleeting. Very rare, and hard to pull off. Something about the 3D atmosphere of the scene just clicks. You get goose pimples... and then it's gone. If 3D is going to continue, this is what I want. I've only experienced it twice. One of the forest scenes in Avatar, and a single point in Bolt. What did it? Blades of grass waving in a light breeze in the foreground.
Okay, back to the film. Alpha and Omega goes between (1) and (2) a lot. (3) is never achieved. Animation quality, enh. Could be a lot better, could be worse. I didn't personally like the character designs - but they're good enough to achieve their purpose. Only had two "WTF?" animation moments: when some of the wolves are doing a weird curvy dance early in the film; and a section near the end when the packs had been united, and all the background characters start doing a weird hopping-skip thing. I mean seriously, wha? Fur textures, passable, works better on some characters than others. Body language, passable. Two major fails: the CGI motion of saliva and mud. Seriously, get help.
Here's something that I liked: No one breaks out into song. THANK YOU. Bonding and cameraderie between wolves is done by howling, and it's not "Awoooo!", it's basically musical singing without words. Whoever's responsible for that decision in the film - you deserve recognition. It was an excellent choice. Sadly, because of songs in previous films, it felt like the characters were about to break into song. Such relief when they didn't!
Script dialogue: nothing special. Voice acting: good work. Also nice touches: Garth isn't a jerk. He's a nice guy as it turn out, no idiotic male rivalry. Closing credits: Looked more 3D than the rest of the film! Lots of the animators' sketches, 3D models, reference sheets - really nice to see the work behind the film shown during the credits like that.
Canadian goose and sidekick: boring. Their wacky dialogue wasn't; it lacked snapiness and pacing. As characters they were ok, but... yawn. This film takes no risks. All very formula, doesn't stretch boundaries or even experiment with them. The only thing in the film that surprised me was just how... vicious Kate's mother is. She was a bit scary, to be honest. The effect was enhanced by her facial design being worse than everyone else's. And given that "alphas-and-omagas-shouldn't mix" was the whole defining pivot of plot conflict, an attitude so well-entrenched in wolf society, it felt really weird for it to be dropped so readily to achieve the happy ending.
Worth watching? If you're an animation fan, no. Animation student? Maybe, to analyse and critique. A parent with 5-to-8-year-old children? Actually yes, if you need to fill some time. This is what I'd describe as a "babysitting movie". There's very little in it to appeal to adults except for the odd throwaway line here and there. None of the writing-on-two-levels that Pixar does so well.
But it's not a movie that'll have you writhing in pain for an hour and a half. Certainly a lot of eye-rolling, at worst an eyes-glazing-over moment or two. It's animated fluff that doesn't stand out, and would make a decent rental for young kids.
Sure, you could do better. But contrary to expectations, it could have been a LOT worse. It's cohesive despite the toilet humor. The kids in the theater laughed, they had fun. And for some it was their first 3D experience. Heck, all it took was a non-descript cloudscape at the start and a whole bunch of them went "Whoooooaaaaa!..."
For me, it passed the time I guess; no desire to watch it a second time, and I don't think the recent rise in 3D ticket prices was worth the experience. It's a run-of-the-mill, dumb "let's see if we can make some money from kids" formula movie. I don't think it's worth praising or demonifying; it will not stand out in the annals of animation history.