Escape to the Movies: Halo Legends

[Premonition]

So basically this is The Animatrix. Nothing special and totally worth missing out on except for one, maybe two shorts. Oh and by the way, the Duel sucked xD It looked pretty in the beginning, but it only got more and more confusing until it was ridiculous. Not to mention the story is a rehash of every samurai cliché ever invented.

 

[Bors Mistral]

This has officially made me interested in seeing Halo Legends...

Good job, M-Bob...

 

[simmeh]

Also rememer: Anime is not a genre. It's a medium.

Sorry for being slow, but what do you mean by a medium in this case?

I mean it's no different than books, movies, or games. It's just another medium for storytelling. There's lots of different genres for it, where everyone seems to think they are all about little girls with breasts larger than their bodies in giant robots.

To contrast: Baccano is about mobsters. Oh, and the first episode is a bit confusing, so don't be turned off by it.

Quoted for truth. Here's another way to think about it:

Imagine filling a burlap sack with every single cliche you've come to accept about anime: giant robots, superpowered samurai, teenagers wielding weapons of mass destruction, legions of women fawning over sexually inert men, gratuitous and unecessary diversions to the beach/pool, etc. Then, imagine a show that takes that sack, ties it to a cinder block, and then throws it off the end of a pier. That show is basically Baccano!

 

[malestrithe]

I can't wait to see it. As soon as I get home from work tonight, I'll scope it out on netflix.

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

b-b-b-but Valve is over-rated.

 

[DoctorDisaster]

There's gonna be a massive fallout about your view of all Western character designs being bald generic space marines, that's for sure.

Sadly, western character designs are largely generic macho space marines. These days it seems to be either that or custom characters a la Mass Effect. (I know which one I prefer.) The only fallout I think you'll get there would be of the "but I like generic macho space marines!!" variety.

I do object, though, to the assertion that Japanese designs are any more varied. Few recently introduced japanese game characters don't fall into the "spunky, hair-gelled pubescent" or "anthropomorphic cartoon fantasy animal" categories. (Keep in mind that legacy characters like Mario don't count.)

Also rememer: Anime is not a genre. It's a medium.

With due respect, animation is the medium. You could argue that anime is a movement rather than a genre (which is kind of a silly distinction to make), but it's demonstrably not a new medium.

 

[Archaon6044]

good job MB, you made me care enough about Legends to actually take a look at it when it comes out in the UK (assuming there's a delay in release as per usual)

my argument for "b-b-b-b-but FPS" is "i play FPSs to shoot up, kill, destroy and otherwise bring ruin to shit" i don't give two tugs of a dead dogs cock about story in an FPS, be it in single or multiplayer

 

[A random person]

Moviebob, I officially love you now. Granted, I loved your videos before, but your absolutely dead-on commentary on the "ghey anime will ruin our Haloz" brouhaha, not to mention the general East vs. West thing, is nothing short of brilliant, even moreso a much-needed necessity.

As for Halo Legends, I wasn't interested before, but I kinda am now since it seems to take the piss out of the aforementioned Halo fanboys.

 

[Susan Arendt]

TimeSplitters 2, buddy. That's all I'm sayin'.

Also, please use the picture that accompanied "you mean there's a single player" every chance you get. It adds to my happy.

 

[the_baku_eats_dreams]

With all due respect movie bob you review movies keep reviewing movies. Im sorry to say that you do not know much about video games. While I think halo legends does not look good that does not give reason to go after US made games and stereotype them since the west has a large range and variety of games. Not to sound rude but stick to reviewing movies and leave video games alone

you obviously don;t know much about moviebob, he has a whole other blog and series of videos on screw attack called "The game overthinker" you're kinda late to tell him to stay out of games by about, 2 years or so.

 

[Epictank of Wintown]

I have to admit, I've seen Halo: Legends and, really, I enjoyed the hell out of most of it. Yeah, there were a couple duds in there. For me, one of them was The Duel. I was interesting and had interesting concepts, but the art style just didn't work for me. Plus, I find it rather odd that apparently the Sangheili had a society who armored its warriors exactly the same as Japan did a couple hundred years ago. But maybe that's just me.

And if you think Halo is all about a bunch of super manly men grunting super manly thing and being the manly epitome of manliness whilst wielding manly guns and giving each other manly man pats on the ass like manly football players at the MANLIEST SPORTING EVENT IN THE WORLD, then you've not read either of the books that Eric Nylund wrote. They're both all about the humanity of the whole thing and, really, the paradoxical tragedy and salvation that was the SPARTAN-II project.

As a note to all of you itching to call me a rabid fanboy: I loved Halo:CE. Halo 2 was bad. Halo 3 was meh. They'd both been done before, and better, by their progenitor.

 

[Odoylerules360]

It was really hard to hear what he was saying over the sound of Japan's balls furiously smacking against his chin.

But however, in all seriousness, Fuck Japan.

 

[the_baku_eats_dreams]

It was really hard to hear what he was saying over the sound of Japan's balls furiously smacking against his chin.

But however, in all seriousness, Fuck Japan.

oh ho? what excatly are your problems with the country from which half of my family comes from? awfully chauvinistic statement you're making there buddy

 

[Chipperz]

I love that you use the term "Halo trolls" in the same point as an image of someone crying with the whole "waah" thing going on, which is pretty much the biggest example I can think of being a troll. Only you're doing it to the people you call trolls. I love the sense of irony you are conjouring up. Hilarious.

Of course, I've never actually seen one of these mythical Halo trolls, which leads me to believe that you're talking about the anti-Halo trolls who pop up so regularly and with the tedious inevitability of a dick joke in a Zero Punctuation episode. With that in mind, I can at least see how you connected trolls and Halo, but I thought you were smart enough to work out that all the trolls think hating Halo is cool, not the other way round.

 

[comadorcrack]

Wait Wait Wait....

Halo has a single Player!!

I do not accept your challenge!
But I will say while Halo is nothing more than Aliens Knocking up Starship troopers. Can;t really claim its cliche in gaming terms... Since it pretty much defined those cliches in games.

 

[Crunchy English]

Ugh, my two least favourite things. Halo story telling, and Japanese art direction. God I hate anime. And Halo is boring in the extreme. It just goes to show you how far personal opinion can differ. Someone who enjoyed Halo AND anime could not be further from me on any scale.

Sorry if this comment didn't add much to the discussion, but I think its amazing that someone out there enjoyed this.

 

[ccesarano]

at least PC online is a bit better.[/b]

Counter-Strike begs to differ.


Anyway, I'm renting Halo Legends from Netflix after I've shown my family Citizen Kane. I've got a minor interest in it, but considering I only really liked one story out of the Batman shorts I'm not going to assume this is going to be all that good.

Halo does have the opportunity for some great story-telling. The plot for the marines is, for the most part, boring as opposed to the more interesting Covenant (the side that, for some reason, no one ever wants to explore and in fact hated seeing explored in Halo 2). Halo 3 completely dropped the ball and had an ass for a story altogether.

What gets me is that whoever they get to do the commercials captures the real potential of the franchise better. I absolutely love the full advertisement for ODST, how it begins with the funeral of a young man's father, shows him training, going to war, nearly dying, and then the very last shot that says it all without words. He's older, buried yet another of his friends in an endless fight. Gun fire is heard in the distance, and the man dons his helmet as if to say "same old song and dance" while the younger marine, not yet embittered by the experience, gears up with purpose, believing that they can still make a difference.

It's a series of depressing emotions that the Halo universe COULD capture incredibly well, and the ODST game ALMOST captures (seriously, ODST >>>>>> Halo 3). Unfortunately, the game has to instead focus on the Master Chief being some sort of bad ass.

Holy shit I just realized they didn't just steal the Halo Ring from Larry Niven's Ringworld, but even that one chick's "special ability" being how incredibly lucky she is. Wow, good job Bungie. You didn't even make good use of that plagiarization.