Escape to the Movies: Halo Legends

[Sir Kemper]

I think I'm going to rent it. See, I am one of those few Halo fans that actually have both common sense and a sense of the ridiculious. I don't play Halo because it's a FPS, I play it for the story. I play it multiplayer, but not XBL because I detest Halo fans and the kids on XBL in general.


Btw: OMFGBBQWTF, there ARE female spartans.....as they have already established before. So if anybody is surprised....then they are mentally retarded.

Really, this comment said it the best for me.

Anyway, i'll probably pick this up, mainly since Halo holds a special place in my heart, and partly becuase alot of these stories seem rather interesting. (Although some seem, Bleh...)

 

[SimGrave]

I don't like that trend started by Animatrix and followed by Gotham Knight.
In the later case, they totally ignored what Batman is in favor of putting their anime signature style to it. It brought nothing worthy to the batman universe.
At least Animatrix brought us deeper in the Matrix universe (wheter you like the Matrix movies or not, it doesn't matter, because it really did brought something new to the story).
An now this? It's all hell breaks loose! Halo as no story to begin with... basically what Legends seems to be is just "Let's take the characters, stick our visuals to it and come up with whatever silly story we can!"... well, I'm not buying it. At all.
I'm not saying there is no enjoyment to be found here... simply that if you like Halo... it's not going to bring something that goes with the reasons why you like it and if you like anime... there are probably better one than this one.

 

[Crunchy English]

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

I don't think you mean "Chauvinistic"... prejudiced maybe, or racist even. I think Chauvinist only refers to an assumed superiority of one's own nation, not an irrational dislike of another culture. I would like to throw it out there though, that Japan is one of the most Chauvinist nations going, which makes your statement pleasingly ironic.

Also, I think Moviebob was fairly clear in his bias, it doesn't necessarily act as a detriment to a piece rooted so firmly in his personal opinion to begin with.

Personally, I agree with an anti-japan sentiment mostly, their entire culture scares the shit out of me. Then again, I don't hold my personal opinion to be the end all, be all. More than likely, I'm just too set in my western ways to "get it".

 

[DoctorDisaster]

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.

Genre refers to storytelling, not style. Granted, movement is more accurate, but even in anime there's numerous different styles. And that's not even getting into the numerous different artstyles in manga.

Anime certainly does contain different storytelling styles! But give genres some credit; many are quite broad. "Action" is a genre which encompasses everything from bare-knuckle beat-em-ups to balletic wire choreography. I'd go so far as to say that the nice thing about the word "genre" is that it can refer to something as specific as "German abstract impressionism" or as all-encompassing as "romance." It's just a way of finding connections between different works of art.

I guess the reason I bring this up is because it's unnecessary to set certain kinds of work apart and say "this is special and different; it warrants unique consideration." It's much more interesting to treat everything as interconnected, regardless of the quirks of style, story, geographic origin, and what-have-you.

 

[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.

implying you can hate an entire medium and that you haven't just seen an episode of Lucky Star and declared the whole thing moot

Now that's not fair. I've been exposed to a LOT of this shit. I am a gamer after all. And it's not as though I haven't given anime a fair shake. Trigun, a couple Gundam series, and that weird World War one where all the countries are personified? DBZ, if that counts? The point is, I don't like it. And that's ok man. That's my whole point. Obviously someone likes it, and that's enough to justify its existence.

The fact that I hate it is completely irrelevant.

 

[Stabby Joe]

Roger Ebert, is that you?

 

[Aptspire]

agreed, most of them are worth watching, although I liked "The package" best canon-wise and yes, "Homecoming" plot-wise

 

[Tri Force95]

I loved Halo legends, personally. then again, Im a huge Halo fanboy and i love teh animez.

 

[Jared]

I actually agreed with this 100%.

Awesome review

 

[RyePunk]

So you liked the ones that slapped Halo into different mindset, and disliked the ones where it remained just Halo.

I agree.

 

[HardRockSamurai]

I must say I like the way MovieBob approached this review. While Halo Legends certainly isn't anywhere near as good as Animatrix (particularity owing to, lets face it, the dull source material that is the Halo franchise), it's an interesting experiment and bizarre social turn-around. I can't even remember the last time Japan took a crack at an American franchise (at least, since the Animatrix).

It's almost as if Japan is getting revenge on the West for turning it's numerous franchises into dull Americanized remakes, a revenge that we've admittedly had coming for quite some time (see Silent Hill: Homecoming and the U.S. remake of One Missed Call if you're not convinced).

Despite MovieBob's discrepancy for Halo (which I'm willing to tolerate because, quite frankly, who on earth plays Halo for the story?) I think he nailed this review. Well done!

In addition to MovieBob's statements, I'd recommend Halo Legends to any Halo fan who wants to convince himself that the franchise still has some storytelling merit. It's no masterpiece, but unless you're a brainless idiot (like the majority of the underage Halo populace) you might enjoy it, or at least recognize it as a decent work of animation.

 

[Talo_AML]

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

Ha, your starting to sound like that goth girl.


"Leave video games aloooone!" Lawl.

 

[Eagle Est1986]

Yay! You said "Ender's Game". Otherwise, Halo Legends is in the exact same place on my rental list as it was, with the other 100 "wouldn't mind watching" titles.

 

[Crunchy English]

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.

Genre refers to storytelling, not style. Granted, movement is more accurate, but even in anime there's numerous different styles. And that's not even getting into the numerous different artstyles in manga.

Anime certainly does contain different storytelling styles! But give genres some credit; many are quite broad. "Action" is a genre which encompasses everything from bare-knuckle beat-em-ups to balletic wire choreography. I'd go so far as to say that the nice thing about the word "genre" is that it can refer to something as specific as "German abstract impressionism" or as all-encompassing as "romance." It's just a way of finding connections between different works of art.

I guess the reason I bring this up is because it's unnecessary to set certain kinds of work apart and say "this is special and different; it warrants unique consideration." It's much more interesting to treat everything as interconnected, regardless of the quirks of style, story, geographic origin, and what-have-you.

And I wholeheartedly agree. My point is that a lot of people think that just because something comes from Japan, it's going to be pedophilia or about giant robots (also apparently there are people that consider the latter a bad thing).

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.

implying you can hate an entire medium and that you haven't just seen an episode of Lucky Star and declared the whole thing moot

Now that's not fair. I've been exposed to a LOT of this shit. I am a gamer after all. And it's not as though I haven't given anime a fair shake. Trigun, a couple Gundam series, and that weird World War one where all the countries are personified? DBZ, if that counts? The point is, I don't like it. And that's ok man. That's my whole point. Obviously someone likes it, and that's enough to justify its existence.

The fact that I hate it is completely irrelevant.

But those are all more or less the same genre, except Hetalia (which I can only wonder how you saw it). Try Tokyo Godfathers, Metropolis, Baccano, or Princess Mononoke.

Oh I totally saw Princess Mononoke on TV! and my girlfriend made me watch Metropolis too. See, I work in a video game store and my girlfriend and my co-worker (it's a small store so it's just us and the manager) both watch and read a ton of this stuff. In fact my co-worker was a japanese studies major in university. I can't say I've seen Tokyo Godfathers though, or Baccano. I probably never will, in fact.

But I just mean to say, I didn't make a snap decision about it, I really don't care for it. And that's not a big deal. I like Batman: TAS, Batman Beyond and old episodes of Darkwing Duck. I like MST3K and and James Bond Movies. I bet you a dozen people will happily volunteer right here and now to say they HATE all that stuff! The great thing about the internet is that we're all exposed to view points that are radically different from our own.

 

[thublihnk]

I had one issue with this review--when Bob was discussing Western Vs. Japanese character designs, he totally glossed over Western comic books (Superheroes), which would've been forgivable if right before then he hadn't shown art from Marvel Vs. Capcom. 'Cause, you know, the MARVEL part is important there.

Otherwise, I thought this review was pretty good, though at some points it seemed that he was cycling through the stories quickly, only to return to each of them over and over. (Did that make sense?)

Also--and maybe this is just me being the jackass I am, but does this review strike anyone as a pretty cynical attempt for a movie critic to stay relevant on a site based around video games whose members are all pretty jaded to the Halo games? Not that bashing Halo isn't justified, I was just pretty surprised as to the subject of this week's review and was wondering about the reasoning behind it.