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Description
UPDATE (10-25-2023): I tried to make the description more compact.

I thought the Mario movie was great for how it made use of its source material and worked to make it feel like it was all for a movie and not shoved in by all means. The fact that I was engaged in a movie with a fast pace and plenty of character development that doesn't require going to something else to understand is one plus. If I'm being honest, I was more into the characters than I was with Treasure Planet from 2002, another fast-paced film. Though Hercules from 1997 still did just fine with the fast pace for me. Overall, I think the only thing the movie needs is a sequel like Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back is to New Hope, but it's still a movie I wouldn't mind re-visiting. And while I did point at some of the elements in a bit of a way that's similar to fan service, I do think they'd still be interesting parts of the movie to even people that don't know about Mario.

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, however, felt a little too fast for what it was trying to do. I liked the fight scenes, found none of the characters to be super annoying, and thought the the Primals were a nice addition to the cinematic Transformers films. Also, the voice acting is pretty cool. That said, I really think there could've been more character development in a somewhat slower film. You can't always have it so fast, especially if you need time to build characters into ones that your audiences should care for. With that out of the way, I hope Noah Diaz gets more development, especially given that mid-credits scene and the final battle with him going full-on Mega Man. When Mirage became a suit for Noah, I was so hooked into seeing the man kick butt like the robots did. Too bad it wasn't much. Overall, I'd give this movie a B.

I think TMNT: Mutant Mayhem has its own problems. Let me start with what I did like. I thought the voice acting was pretty solid without a lot of over-the-top or soulless-sounding voices, the action was mostly tight during the ending, and Superfly was a pretty interesting choice for a villain that wasn't Shredder. That said, not everything was great for me. First off, the portrayal of the turtles was clearly not for me. Why the cell phones? I get that young guys are known for using cell phones, but a few mutant turtles mostly living in a sewer (I always they deserve to live in a village)? NO! Anyway, why is Donatello wearing glasses and doing ninja stuff with the other bros? And for a group called the TEENAGE Mutant Ninja Turtles, why does Donatello sound 10 years old? How/why are they learning from martial arts movies? Even Monty Python movies make more sense than that. Plus, not enough characters had development besides Leo and Superfly. But Splinter bothers me the most. Even as someone who doesn't know much about the franchise, I despise his character. And no, it's not because a Hong Kong actor is voicing Splinter in a movie about Japanese ninjitsu. It's because Splinter is a bad dad. He tries to use his hatred for humans to not allow the turtles to meet humans themselves (which isn't natural), he grounds them for a month when they weren't even causing any trouble outside of stealing, and he doesn't give them advice on how do their "ninja" duties better. Lastly the animation is mostly awful. The crayon-pencil-like aesthetic, especially during thought buble bits? Sure, go for it. But the intented low framerate and overall style mostly ruined my experience. For a lot of the time, I couldn't figure out what was going on, because the style can't keep up with the fast movements of the characters. Honestly, fight scenes in the 3D-animated Nick show were a lot easier to understand.

I guess I was less bored with that movie than I was with Across the Spider-Verse. I'm not exaggerating when I said I was so bored, and I wish I was joking. The film did actually start promising. The family tension, the difficulty Miles has being Spiderman and a regular dude, it was all there. Then I was hooked when they had Miles kicking butt and saving people with some spider people. And I already loved Hobie the Spider-Punk to the point where I hoped he, Gwen, Pavitr and Miles would continue to do cool stuff in the film. Plus, while I'm not a fan of low framerates in 3D animation, I do think the animation style was easier to watch than Mutant Mayhem. But after Miles escaped from Miguel in that crazy chase, the film took a huge nosedive for me. The development took way too much time before Prowler Miles came in (the only part my mom liked) at the end, so I was left with little to nothing. Even before that, there are some complaints I have with the film. Can't Jess Drew be a bit of a better mentor to Gwen than just getting mad? At least Gwen isn't motorcycling when pregnant, which is literally what Jess Drew is doing. What if the baby can't survive? This is just fetish-y. You could've had her not be pregnant, and very little would change. And what did the screenwriters do to Peter??? Why is he less competent as a Spidey than in the first Spider-verse film? Why is he taking his daughter out on these missions instead of letting MJ watch over her? It's awesome that he re-grouped with MJ and has a kid, but he basically didn't take great responsibility. To conclude this rant, I honestly feel bad for the multiple animators who were seriously overworked for the film. I heard reports saying at least a hundred animators quit working on the film during its development, and the conditions were insane. That is just terrible, and I guess it doesn't help that we have too much cinematic content being made from many different studios. Regardless, the fact that so many animators quit a production with heavy conditions truly speaks for embarrassment.

Now for the Barbie movie, I thought it was eh. A great beginning and ending, but a very off-putting middle. Did we really need a thing about patriarchy at all? That's a shame, because I did like the big dance with all those Kens at the near-end, and the Ryan Gosling variant was actually pretty silly in a good way.

So I still have to watch Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning - Part 1, Oppenheimer, and Elemental. I really hope I'll like them more than the 2023 films I wasn't happy with. With all of this being said, I never thought I'd be this critical about movies. At first, it was only Black Widow, Highlander (sorry, I thought that film felt wooden), Captain Marvel. But no.

Models used in this render are from , , , and
www.deviantart.com/wolfblade11…
www.deviantart.com/sticklove/a…
www.deviantart.com/sab64/art/M…
www.deviantart.com/sidgara/art…

Description
UPDATE (10-25-2023): I tried to make the description more compact.

I thought the Mario movie was great for how it made use of its source material and worked to make it feel like it was all for a movie and not shoved in by all means. The fact that I was engaged in a movie with a fast pace and plenty of character development that doesn't require going to something else to understand is one plus. If I'm being honest, I was more into the characters than I was with Treasure Planet from 2002, another fast-paced film. Though Hercules from 1997 still did just fine with the fast pace for me. Overall, I think the only thing the movie needs is a sequel like Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back is to New Hope, but it's still a movie I wouldn't mind re-visiting. And while I did point at some of the elements in a bit of a way that's similar to fan service, I do think they'd still be interesting parts of the movie to even people that don't know about Mario.

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, however, felt a little too fast for what it was trying to do. I liked the fight scenes, found none of the characters to be super annoying, and thought the the Primals were a nice addition to the cinematic Transformers films. Also, the voice acting is pretty cool. That said, I really think there could've been more character development in a somewhat slower film. You can't always have it so fast, especially if you need time to build characters into ones that your audiences should care for. With that out of the way, I hope Noah Diaz gets more development, especially given that mid-credits scene and the final battle with him going full-on Mega Man. When Mirage became a suit for Noah, I was so hooked into seeing the man kick butt like the robots did. Too bad it wasn't much. Overall, I'd give this movie a B.

I think TMNT: Mutant Mayhem has its own problems. Let me start with what I did like. I thought the voice acting was pretty solid without a lot of over-the-top or soulless-sounding voices, the action was mostly tight during the ending, and Superfly was a pretty interesting choice for a villain that wasn't Shredder. That said, not everything was great for me. First off, the portrayal of the turtles was clearly not for me. Why the cell phones? I get that young guys are known for using cell phones, but a few mutant turtles mostly living in a sewer (I always they deserve to live in a village)? NO! Anyway, why is Donatello wearing glasses and doing ninja stuff with the other bros? And for a group called the TEENAGE Mutant Ninja Turtles, why does Donatello sound 10 years old? How/why are they learning from martial arts movies? Even Monty Python movies make more sense than that. Plus, not enough characters had development besides Leo and Superfly. But Splinter bothers me the most. Even as someone who doesn't know much about the franchise, I despise his character. And no, it's not because a Hong Kong actor is voicing Splinter in a movie about Japanese ninjitsu. It's because Splinter is a bad dad. He tries to use his hatred for humans to not allow the turtles to meet humans themselves (which isn't natural), he grounds them for a month when they weren't even causing any trouble outside of stealing, and he doesn't give them advice on how do their "ninja" duties better. Lastly the animation is mostly awful. The crayon-pencil-like aesthetic, especially during thought buble bits? Sure, go for it. But the intented low framerate and overall style mostly ruined my experience. For a lot of the time, I couldn't figure out what was going on, because the style can't keep up with the fast movements of the characters. Honestly, fight scenes in the 3D-animated Nick show were a lot easier to understand.

I guess I was less bored with that movie than I was with Across the Spider-Verse. I'm not exaggerating when I said I was so bored, and I wish I was joking. The film did actually start promising. The family tension, the difficulty Miles has being Spiderman and a regular dude, it was all there. Then I was hooked when they had Miles kicking butt and saving people with some spider people. And I already loved Hobie the Spider-Punk to the point where I hoped he, Gwen, Pavitr and Miles would continue to do cool stuff in the film. Plus, while I'm not a fan of low framerates in 3D animation, I do think the animation style was easier to watch than Mutant Mayhem. But after Miles escaped from Miguel in that crazy chase, the film took a huge nosedive for me. The development took way too much time before Prowler Miles came in (the only part my mom liked) at the end, so I was left with little to nothing. Even before that, there are some complaints I have with the film. Can't Jess Drew be a bit of a better mentor to Gwen than just getting mad? At least Gwen isn't motorcycling when pregnant, which is literally what Jess Drew is doing. What if the baby can't survive? This is just fetish-y. You could've had her not be pregnant, and very little would change. And what did the screenwriters do to Peter??? Why is he less competent as a Spidey than in the first Spider-verse film? Why is he taking his daughter out on these missions instead of letting MJ watch over her? It's awesome that he re-grouped with MJ and has a kid, but he basically didn't take great responsibility. To conclude this rant, I honestly feel bad for the multiple animators who were seriously overworked for the film. I heard reports saying at least a hundred animators quit working on the film during its development, and the conditions were insane. That is just terrible, and I guess it doesn't help that we have too much cinematic content being made from many different studios. Regardless, the fact that so many animators quit a production with heavy conditions truly speaks for embarrassment.

Now for the Barbie movie, I thought it was eh. A great beginning and ending, but a very off-putting middle. Did we really need a thing about patriarchy at all? That's a shame, because I did like the big dance with all those Kens at the near-end, and the Ryan Gosling variant was actually pretty silly in a good way.

So I still have to watch Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning - Part 1, Oppenheimer, and Elemental. I really hope I'll like them more than the 2023 films I wasn't happy with. With all of this being said, I never thought I'd be this critical about movies. At first, it was only Black Widow, Highlander (sorry, I thought that film felt wooden), Captain Marvel. But no.

Models used in this render are from , , , and
www.deviantart.com/wolfblade11…
www.deviantart.com/sticklove/a…
www.deviantart.com/sab64/art/M…
www.deviantart.com/sidgara/art…