02/06/2016

I saw the Warcraft Movie!

... and it wasn't bad. It wasn't fantastic either, but overall I enjoyed it.

It manages to bring the cartoony world of Azeroth to life in a convincing manner while maintaining its colourful charm. Everything from the acting to the effects is at least solid (though I thought the orcs' voices sounded a bit hollow and hard to understand sometimes).

I could tell that they made a lot of changes to the lore, though I was never that good with the details from the RTS games as I never actually played them. So most of the changes just sparked a "hm, I'm pretty sure that's not how that went in the original version" while I scratched my head a little as I couldn't actually remember just how that particular part of the plot was supposed to go. At least I could usually make a good guess as to why they made a change at that particular point (e.g. to make a character look more sympathetic or to provide a simplified explanation for something that's pretty convoluted in the "real" lore).

I think the film's biggest problem is that while it keeps events moving at a brisk pace and never gets boring, it fails to really get its claws into the viewers on an emotional level and get them to care about what's going on. To make a Lord of the Rings comparison, it's missing its "Shire", the part where we get introduced to the beauty of the world of Azeroth and develop a connection to it, seeing it as something worth fighting for. There is a lot of jumping back and forth between different characters, but few of them get enough screen time that you can really connect to them. And the few that do either aren't all that likeable (in my opinion) or end up dying. (Khadgar is the notable exception here.) It's not so bad if you already know who all these people are and have a previous investment, but I can definitely see how this could cause the film to fall flat for uninitiated audiences.

1 comment:

  1. Warcraft movie is not bad, I think. I watched it and there were some moments which I didn't like, but my impressions were good at the whole. Frankly speaking, I like all things related to Warcraft - movies, books, games etc.

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