Ain't it Cool News had 2 reviews up for the new Clone Wars animated film, both Harry Knowles and Masswyrm gave highly negative reviews of the film. Now both reviews have been taken down. This is what I found on WikiOn Aug. 10, 2008, Harry Knowles of Ain't It Cool News posted a very scathing review of the film, decrying the soundtrack, characters and other aspects of the movie. The review was almost entirely negative, but was pulled the same day following pressure from Warner Brothers. The Hollywood Reporter also published a largely negative review, but that review was not pulled.
UPDATE
The report on AICN says that there's an embargo on reviews by Warner Brothers, and even though some sites still have reviews up Harry's pulled his stuff until Friday.
16 comments:
Happens all the time. It's not the first film to introduce a Review Embargo agreement.
Personally, I like to make up my own mind.
"Personally, I like to make up my own mind."
So do I, it's just a bit of a sod when they'll take down the bad reviews and leave up the good !! I liked the Animated Clone Wars show but I fear everything that can be told about the War now has been told. And as one review said when you see Anakin fight Dooku you know both are going to escape unscathed, so there's no real drama !
Still we'll see.
My boys can't wait to see this and unfortunately both are huge into the 'toys'. My oldest (10) has been saving for months to buy an electric guitar but now he wants to blow his money on the new toys! ARRRG!
Are there good reviews left up? Generally a review embargo means no reviews whatsoever doesn't it?
There are 3 or 4 people on IMDB who've posted reviews who seemed to find it fun and I found a link of media stuff from The Force.net and found some positive reviews on a few sites that are still up also !
Does George go round personally to sort the reviewers out? That I'd like to see.
Looks like Order 66 only went out on the bad reviews then. At this stage in the star Wars game however I really don't see how reviews will affect things. It's a cartoon about spaceships, aliens, robots and jedis. Kids are going to lap it up (and rightly so) and the Star Wars fanatics will no doubt see it out of morbid curiosity or unfettered love.
I made my own mind up the minute I walked out of RotS, so there's no way I'm seeing it (though if my eldest shows an interest I'll take him)
In a previous post someone compared our knowing the outcome of the Clone Wars to knowing the outcome of WW2 and still being able to enjoy War films. I think, however there are a few differences there -
In a War film, though we know who wins the war, we never can guarantee who will win the battle or more importantly who will survive. Private Ryan, The Dirty Dozen, The Big Red One are all great War films because a tension is created about the success of the particular mission they are on, and what casualties there will be.
In the Clone Wars, there was no 'victor' as such, no one won, there is no heroic outcome. This isn't like watching a movie about Nazi's, such as Cross of Iron, this is like watching Saving Private Ryan in the knowledge that at the end of it all they all turn round and shoot Tom Hanks in the back and reveal themselves to be Nazi's.
However saying all of this, I know that the Clone Wars isn't aimed at me, it's for kids and on that level I think it will succeed. Afterall I went to, and enjoyed, the Ewok movies as a child so it's very easy to dismiss these things. And after sitting through the last two Pixar movies, I think it would be nice for kids to see something with a bit more crash, bang, wallop.
"These are not the reviews you're looking for - move along".
"In a War film, though we know who wins the war, we never can guarantee who will win the battle or more importantly who will survive. Private Ryan, The Dirty Dozen, The Big Red One are all great War films because a tension is created about the success of the particular mission they are on, and what casualties there will be."
Exactly. A war movie. It's not the bigger picture in that they turn bad in the end. It's in whether they can take out a gunnery tower etc. The yard by yard approach. Which is also why individual clone troopers now have names (and some even sport individual hair styles) in this one. Most of the Dirty Dozen die by the end (that's what happens on a 'suicide mission', but its not a story about their deaths, rather the lives they lead leading up to those deaths. The smaller victories along the way. We know the Clone troopers turn bad, but its the lives they lead leading up to turning bad.
Ergo, its a war movie. Same principle.
I was looking at this Star Trek Online thingy they have coming from Cryptic Studios (the guys and gals who did "City of Heroes"). It's yet another Massive Multi-Online that's coming soon. Now in the presentation for Star Trek Online (go see it on gametrailers.com), Nimoy walks on stage and acknowledges how Star Wars helped the Star Trek franchise pick up again what with the release of those movies. I'd say that as a universe, Star Trek is vastly richer (and I speak not as a fan but a casual observer, I was a fan of the original series as a kid, and rather like it now cause I like Shatner, being as I'm a Twilight Zone fan, but I never watched Next Generation, saw only the first season of Deep Space 9 and couldn't keep up with Voyager, so I wouldn't really class myself as a 'fan'). I wonder if its better 'sustained' or 'nurtured' than the Star Wars universe?
As I see it the key difference in audience approach is Lucas has aimed his squarely at the target audience of the day, and thus far appears to have nailed it each time (yeah, I know there's the old generation who hate the new stuff, but the point here is it's aimed at a new generation of kids, not an old generation of fanboy thirty/forty-somethings). Star Trek on the other hand seems to be very much aimed at the fans, and yet somehow doesn't alienate new generations of fans along the way.
I know this was made for TV and they've stitched 3 or more episodes together but I wonder what the budget on this is ? I bet it'll take a fortune at the box-office for what they've spent on it.
May see this at the cinema, but won't be too sorry if I don't.
I'm a tad confused about this embargo malarky...
EMPIRE (in the UK) already published a 3* review in this month's issue...which I've had here, in the Land Of Song, for the last week.
Is this a US-only thing arm-twisting thing?
Poor buggers...
BTW: I'd much rather look forward to a HellBoy III than a Star Wars anything, nowadays.
Just FYI :)
Embargos are for every movie and video game these days...even books have them...they took down good reviews and bad reviews. and at 12:01 tonight anysite can post anything they want about it without consequence...just wait a few days, if you need a ton of reviews to make your decision.
And its not censorship unless the govnerment were to do it..
Freedom of the press? Power of the studios! Sucks big time, the sensitive little sods.
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