Bezman's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[The Last Hour: Chapter 6]

Unintentionally funny.

The whole intro seems unintentionally funny with the overacting when saying 'The Last Hoooooooooooooooowwwwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aaar...', the mess-up when going through the titles... and how is it award winning? Just because the previous episode got a daily 3rd? Do you need to harp on about it so much? And why is it 'legendary'? It just seems like needless hyerbole to me.

The spaceship, asteroids, starfield and planet looked decent.

The 2 frame 'lip synch' smacked of laziness though, as did the way you refuse to change the camera angle when the father speaks.

We've already seen him, so there's no tension.

And if you're showing a frame for so long, like you did with the guy/nun, it might be an idea to spend longer drawing them. The noses specially look kinda awkward - don't have lines around the entire noses - just around one side and around the nostrils. And maybe add in some shading.

It seemed like you were just trying to do the minimum amount of work but all the cut corners show.

Maybe if you cut out the intro, got better voice actors and spent more time doing animation that's not just simple tweens, I might be able to get wrapped up in the story. Currently, it's just ridiculous and made me chuckle. Probably not in the way you want, but there you are.

[Wegra Adventure 5]

Made me chuckle

There was animation! I kinda liked the starting bit with the snot-bubble and the opening eyes.

I liked the story here - the sudden jumps in subject matter and leaps in logic made me chuckle.

You should give the subtitles a drop-shadow to let them stand out a bit more and maybe put them in a consistent place. Or use speech bubbles...

The lack of sound for the first half was odd and the choice to use speakonia for 2 lines and no others was kinda odd. Maybe consider using voices for everything?

It did make me chuckle the first time I watched it, but I feel you could do a lot better if you just spent a bit more time on this - think more about the narration/dialogue, spend more time on drawings and animation, etc.

-Review Request Club -

[Wegra Adventure 4]

Seriously lacking

Well, on the upside, there's some cheap 2-frame animation here and simple movement. It's a step up from the 'slideshow' format, I suppose.

The music was cheery and fun. Sounds like it comes from a Nintendo game, though I'm not sure which one. Wario's Woods?

Now, though there is some animation, everything seemed kinda sloppily done, with the scribbled-on 'acid', the thin rectangle around the pixel guy and the crappy bullet bit. Seriously, would it have been that hard to tween a bullet flying across the screen?

Let's put that aside, though. Checking the previous ones, the thing I actually enjoyed about them was their story. They were bizarre and surreal enough to get me smiling. This one just seemed far more derivative, with the fight being the only plot point, and the text was at times too fast too read - specially right at the start and right at the end, from the time the pixel-guy hits Wegra.

I really suggest you go back to your more expansive and surreal stories.

- Review Request Club -

[The Very Best of Bahamut]

I specially liked the parts that flowed

I loved the way you sorta had the clips blend with each other. Though it only really worked with the first two clips, (A_S 'responding' to you) and the 'people often ask me...' through satan though graham's present through newsreporter being thrown out. Still, that second mash was a lengthy bit and worked well.

My favourite parts were the track titles, 'you like village people' and A_S's new voice in general.

When watching this, I noticed how good the futurama parody bg was compared to other bgs. Had you traced that? I just vastly preferred your colour use and use of curves to your normal overly saturated bg colours and strictly straight lines.

This was a fun watch, but hardly had the same effect as a band's 'greatest hits' album - your movies are, for me - somewhat about the plot or element of surprise as well, after all.

-Review Request Club-

kinggila responds:

Yeah, I did trace the Futurama BG, but for the majority, I just draw on my own, so that explains why the Futurama BG looks better than my average BG.

[ÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆÆW]

Meta-humour

This and A_S's work both work on the same kinda level. It's not that anything particularly funny happens here, or in his neverending-yet-curtailed series, more that it's just funny that they even exist.

What kind of person would make a daily-updated series with 300 episodes with such minimalist elements. What kind of person would make a regularly-updated series that updates in intervals of 1 year (and manages to stick to that schedule and bring the series to a conclusion)? You two.

That's just crazy and the concept itself makes me laugh.

'Spinning the wheel'? Apt name. I wouldn't have thought you'd be a George Michael fan. That was aa cool song though - hadn't heard it before.

The series ended in probably the best way it could. Simple, minimal and conclusive.

I rewatched episode 3 before this and really got a lot out of it but can't imagine anyone who wasn't along for the ride previously enjoying it.

Well, consider this 9 more for the overall 'meta-humour' of the series rather than this particular episde in itself.

You and A_S may be pioneers! Though I'm sure there are examples, I can't think of other examples of meta humour. Maybe I should go into an open mic night and just feign death? Or maybe that'd be dickish and boring/annoying rather than funny. Hrm.

kinggila responds:

Actually, Afro_Stud suggested Spinning the Wheel song to be put on this flash. I didn't have much other song ideas, so I gave that song a try and thought it would work out. I'm not a George Michael fan, but his songs are ok.

Thank you very much for those comments Bezman. :)

[Do I eat the...? STWPT]

Made me smile

really short, but it had a couple of decent visual gags going.

I liked the koala wave, raised eyebrow, head-in-bowl, glass hitting him. Full of little touches that really matter!

The backgrounds could be better - the one when you zoom in on the koala looks specially bad - like there's something odd going on, with objects floating in the bg.

Maybe you could have taken a minute to delete those and sketch out an actual bg in the colours you use for the large symbols?

The green one looked cool though.

Lazyfeet responds:

I have to admit I'm appalling at backgrounds, I tried to get away with going for a stylized one. I guess that really didn't work. Thanks for the review blah blah :) I always appreciate them.

[asdfmovie]

Never a dull moment

My favourites were probably the nose and flower-smelling ones. (I loved the pacing in the latter.)

Some of the jokes I'd heard before (like the tree) but still kinda made me smile. Some didn't work too well.

The graphics were simplistic, but had a fun style.

Overall the density of jokes was awesome and It was generally a fun watch.

[Kill The Zombies]

The loop was vaguely funny

The drawings were kinda simple and messy - as if you just hadn't taken enough care with your lines.

The guy in the blue top holding the gun looked specially odd.

And learn to use consistency in graphics - having those straight lines for buildings/tables/chairs against the thick brush lines lines for characters seems odd.

The song was kinda simple and didn't actually make me smile much. I did like the beats, I suppose.

I liked the zombie biting the guy's head and the fact that you looped that one line at the end was pretty funny. Took me 5 repeats to realise what was happening - Until then, I thought maybe it was the song repeating - with maybe a chorus at the end and one at the start.

All in all, this'd be totally forgettable if it wasn't for the loop and it never made me smile much.

[Jammy Jam #1]

Fun, fast-paced vibe.

Great song choice.

I liked the fast-pace of the changing scenes.

The morphing fat dude was specially cool.

The lip-synching was generally great, though the baby (after the wierd creatures) was a drop in quality. Also, the fact that you lip synched so much of the song made it lose some of its eclectic nature - watching a human face lip-synching just isn't as interesting to me as seeing a wierd creature or seeing some shapes or a visual gag.

And the end was badly chopped, of course.

Still, it had a fun vibe.

[Less Than Three]

Brilliantly cute visuals.

The simple flat shapes were so cute and the various depictions of the 'computer world' were really imaginative, constantly surprising us! You took the basic theme and spun it into a fuller, entertaining story.

There were a couple of bits where I felt you could have done something to better match the tempo of the music - like in the b&w section near the end and a bit of the sections that follow, it feels like having more usage of your 'slow frame advance' technique would better match the glitched vocals.

Loved that '2FPS' technique btw.

I felt the song got a bit repetitive by the end and actually preferred your visuals to the audio. Regardless, it was a strong package overall and a fun watch.