pvt-blasto's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[HELLBENDERS - Applooza]

it looks like a lot of work and effort was put into this cartoon, which is kind of a shame. This isn't nearly as well thought out as leo and satan and honestly i don't think there is a single joke in here. it is literally the bare bones of humor, with flailing appendages to pass of as "funny". This is what people accuse spongebob of being when in actuality, a lot of effort and love is put into each script. I feel like this was concocted in about an hour with the intent of making it entertaining through the animation style. The animation is clearly good, you dont need me to tell you that, but there is nothing else.

why is it even halled hellbenders? is there even 1 reference to religion in this? are you just calling it hellbenders because weird/stupid things occur around these two characters? or that they are sinful? am i taking this too seriously? am i not SUPPOSED to take writing in a childish cartoon seriously.

really dissapointed, 2 stars for the animation and sound, but that script needs to "burn in hell"

...get it? ha hah.

[Aminal Crossing]

this was just totally pointless, which would have been fine but it wasn't funny either.

so, how are the jokes in this movie in any way related to the game? you could have applied everything you did here to anything else, and guess what, it still wouldn't have been very funny.

you didn't even give the duck the trademark animal crossing speech impediment (ie "are you fishing HONK i love fishing HONK")

in fact the only things that clue you into the fact that this is supposed to be about animal crossing are the music and the characters hat.

seriously, why did you even bother?

[Sketchy Stories]

that's just silly

alright, the animation isn't really that fantastic but i realize that was the intention, however it being simplistic did not help the fact that you were really just pulling things out your ass. which might have been funny but I can't say you have a very vivid imagination.

wow that sounds really negative, so lets make this less personal and break this thing down:

animation:
3 - as i said it's pretty simple, but simple can be good. simple can be creative and funny. it is neither in this case. it seems you were uninterested in doing anything but animate your story, it felt very static and lazy.

story:
0 - note i had to stop the movie when you started going on about how the guy ate the icecream truck, christ, stop that, it's not funny.

voice acting:
5 - you have a very expressive voice, i would suggest you start with a script next time, you could do some very comical stuff, especially for cartoons

you could have done with some background music also, and maybe tone down the voice volume just a tad, i feel like you are screaming into a mic.

congrats on daily second.

[The Dragon Girl]

pretty darn good

i usually don't give good reviews, generally because if a movie ends up on front page there will be so many meaningless 10 out of 10s that it seems kind of pointless to jump in, that could indeed be the reason i feel compelled to resist giving you a straight-up 10/10.

however i genuinely liked your movie, even enough to have a look at your first one.

are you in any way influenced by CCC? it has that kind of light-hearted feel to it.

anyway, i liked the style, the animation, the song you chose (much better IMO then she-spider but that is a matter of taste) the design of the mountain king and the over all atmosphere of the whole thing.

comparing it to she-spider, i don't need to tell you your animation has become much more sophisticated, and there definitely seems to be a lot more care put into the crafting of this piece.

that is not to say, that she-spider is not also a very good piece, just in different ways, I'd say it was less atmospheric, more brick-to-face action, with a love story after taste.

why a 7? i feel a 7 is appropriate. one thing she-spider had over this, was substance. the artwork was more crude but you had much more going on, even if it all lacked explanation. but i think i understand what you're trying to say about the mountain king so i suppose an explanation is unnecessary.

if this movie is a strictly visual piece, then it is a success in being very visually pleasing. but if you are trying to tell me something about your character, then i would say more would be nice.

all in all i enjoyed this very much and if you do make another in the series i will make a point of watching it.

MrGUS responds:

I agree, on she spider I was much more focused on a story, this was more about other elements. I really appreciate you're well thought out review and will take your points into consideration. Now that you mention it, even though in my opinion it's different in many ways to CCC of course, vinnie's light-hearted atmosphere probably got stuck with me. Having said that, there are many sources I took inspiration from, the music I use for example tends to be an important one, and it's also related to my personality and thoughts at this moment.

Again I appreciate the review, Thanks

[Don't Wait, Jeremiah]

i understand

but that doesn't mean much.

this was really predictable, that's probably the worst thing i can say about it. but since it's predictable we know what to expect, so i can't be too hard on it.

honestly i was expecting his wife to be killed or something just as pointless. but his cat? oh man that's even better, way to tug on our heart strings. probably the thing that annoys me the most about this, is you could have just shown me a dead cat through-out, and evoked the same emotion. dead cats are sad, no matter how you pretty them up.

so, i get what your saying, but let's be honest your not saying much, and it's a cheap way to be evocative.

so as i can't redeem myself at this point, let me pick it apart.

the jitter-vision. it works 95% of the time, but in your movie it actually made me kind of sick, which isn't fair to say because like i said it work most of the time, but maybe you should have aligned the frames up a bit more, they feel kind of jumpy.

lastly jeramiah's walk cycle was great, but didn't sync with the ground, this is really nit-picky, i realize that, and chances are, you did that on purpose. but, it's necessary. please do it right, sync his feet with the ground, this is not adding to your style, it's distracting.

but these few nit-pick's don't get you the 6, the cat does, if you wrote this whole thing down, maybe a re-write was in order.

other then that, i liked the style, the animation itself was very nicely done, and indeed the music was appropriate, so no hard feelings.

Foxcato responds:

Thanks for your critique.

[A New Place]

disconnected

i felt the animation was good, and the music was good, but they didn't feel right together. In my opinion the animation and the music have nothing to do with each other. there was no reason to use donkey kong sprites and there is nothing going on in the animation that justifies the music.

why is this a problem? it's your movie and you can do it how you like right? well to me it feels distracting. i really can't take this animation seriously when all along im looking at diddy kong singing about something totally unrelated.

i understand why you put it in a lava cave, even though it's a bit of a stretch, i just feel the characters were badly suited for the music.

but like i said, nice music, and good animation, just bad together.

[Sparkles & Spyglasses]

excellent!

i dont usually post good reviews, because usually movies here dont impress me enough to post a good review.

but this was awesome! i loved the visuals, the music, the animation, the story, it was choreographed beautifully!

character designs were good, this whole thing was really solid! good stuff! cant WAIT to see more from you!

[Blue Lotus]

decent...

i was really impressed by the colors you chose, i liked the contrasts, and even the gradients didnt bug me, where they usually do...

the music was good, altough i find it really adds a lot to kick up the quality, it makes it sound like it should, and it really doesnt add much to the size of the swf

there arent really any sounds to speak of, so bit a downer there...

what kills it for me, is there really isnt anything here as far as content. i understand you were probably aiming for something ambient. and if not, i think thats what you should have gone for... build on atmosphere, make me feel like im in the ocean.

i believe that would have been a better choice simply because it would have been easier and stronger.

as you have it now, you introduce two characters (neighbors really) and do nothing with them. they share a wave, reminiscent of the one people give to their neighbor (hence the neighbor part) and thats it...

where were you going with that? anyways that part didnt work out for me, but as far as animation is concerned, it was decent.

look forward to seeing more from you!

[[ Prototype Parody ]]

half a movie--

half a good review

honestly what i saw was great! it was funny, well animated, the sound was good and all the jokes were good! (all 2 of them)

but this movie obviously isnt finished yet... so i would say, finish it, and you'll deffinetely get a 10 from me...

[Sketched - Babies]

lame

god is this lame, right around "whats a kid?" but with sure will power i got to the description line.

i dont know what to tell you, the art is fine, the voice actors are ok, whoever is writing this must be amazed by shiny objects...

i mean that with the highest respect....

so what am i saying here? how am i justifying such a low score? personal opinion? i cant agree there, the script is BAD! so HORRIBLY BAD! how could one improve from this? write a new script i guess... im sorry if that seems unfair but i cant let it go unsaid, the jokes arent funny and this cartoon isnt cool.

sirjeffofshort responds:

Well, at the very least you're honest, haha. Our style certainly isn't for everyone, but the one thing I will point out (and it's not really a rebuttal, just a correction.) is that there actually WAS no script. It was something silly we recorded at the end of an actually scripted session and we were like, well, let's animate it. So yes, it doesn't have the same flow that one would expect from a scripted short, as it is literally three guys making it up as they go along, but that's a bit of the charm of improv. Not everyone gets it so I respect your opinion. Maybe you could check out some of our other stuff and see if you like that better.