Warning: these articles are originally written in Spanish.
Therefore, some things might have changed because of translation issues, use of
synonyms and paraphrasing, or to keep a joke and whatnot; however, the context
of the article remains intact. You may see a couple of mistakes too, do warn me
so I can fix them. If you do know how to read Spanish, I highly suggest looking
at the real deal just in case you missed something. Have a nice reading!
I thought that if I was to write my first article,
it’d have to be about the series/movie that planted the seed in the first
place. I want to clarify that I’m not the greatest fan of The Lion King: I do
know the characters and the plot to a T, and if the movie’s on I do watch it,
but it’s not like it’s my one true and pure love to the point I’m blind to its
defects. In fact, between you and me, I once found the original script, the
first one ever presented to Production, and I reached to the conclusion that it
was far more interesting than the final product we all got to see (though I
understand whatever changes they made were to make it less heavy, because it
was far more dark and realistic when it comes to the cruelty of the Circle of
Life).
Even so, when I learned Disney was planning on another
sequel, I couldn’t avoid the horrible chill that crept up my spine: I’m
perfectly conscious of how the most famous animation studio in the world has to
renew its number of “believers” on certain franchises that, if it were any
other way, would disappear due to the lack of public. The kids that got to
watch TLK on premiere are already adults, so they need fresh blood in the
market or animated heads will certainly roll and, in their stead, a bunch of
tridimensional Ice Queens shall rise. The thing is, The Lion King is one of these
Disney movies with which not even they get to mess with; not only is it the
most successful 2D movie of the studio, it’s the most successful one in the
world… and with it comes a horde of monstrous fans that have no qualms in
whispering “Long live the King” while they push you of a cliff if you so much
as touch a hair on their dear talking lions’ heads. It’s not the first time
Disney tries its best to exploit Simba and company, before the current
cataclysm there were others that even to this day have an echo in the memories
of the younger fans of the franchise: a children books series about Kopa (back
then the name of Simba’s cub shown in the flick’s ending), an animated series
with Timon and Pumbaa, a sequel oh so painfully obvious it’s referring to Romeo
and Juliet and with Kiara as main character (now Simba’s official daughter,
screw Kopa), and a mid-quel (term invented in the US used to refer to a movie
that takes place in the middle of another, in this case TLK1 from Timon and
Pumbaa’s point of view). Of course I’ll limit myself to TLK1 and 2 through this
thing. I need to remind you that none of these expansions to Disney’s African
universe was especially memorable or successful (except for Kopa’s books, that
for some reason are adored on top of altars by some rabid fanatics that insist
on how their cub Simba clone is almost Jesus reincarnated as doodle).
I decided to save my opinion on Lion Guard until it
finally aired, first with a 40 minutes flick, then with an animated series.
Months went by and the premiere date was close, so I decided to do a quick
check on the internet; what was my surprise when I learnt LG was going to air
through Disney Jr, it’s actually a mid-quel that takes place between TLK1 and
2, and the new eyesore of a Simba clone has a super roar represented by a Final
Fantasy-like tribal tattoo on his shoulder. I thought it was especially awful,
not because Disney’s apparently incapable of understanding that most of TLK
fans are around their twenties or at least not toddlers that watch Disney Jr,
but because they practically wanted to over-write the entire base material of
the first two movies (even if the sequel was bad, they should affront it with
dignity and respect their own screw-ups). Anyways, the next day the new flick
aired, so I decided to take notes just in case I ever had to do an analysis…
Today is that day.
- Plot
Simba has two cubs, Kiara and Kion (the new clone).
For some reason Kiara’s the future queen (it doesn’t matter if “she’s the
oldest”, they were born from the same litter and it’s against lion nature and
basic monarchy rules, so you didn’t do your homework Disney). Kion on the other
hand is the playful and carefree deadweight of the family, with no clear
purpose besides being scolded and ignored by Simba who clearly favors Kiara
throughout the whole flick. Because the writers couldn’t come with anything
better, Kion and his honeybadger friend Bunga share a musical number and end up
in the Outlands (where the bad guys lived during TLK2, even if it looks nothing like it),
and fight against a group of hyenas leaded by the male antagonist Janja (didn’t
do your homework again Disney? Hyenas are socially structured around
MATRIARCHS). When I say fight, I mean Bunga “the antigravity” badger jumped to
the bottom of a canyon with no regards for terrestrial physics and the hyenas
only threatened with eating him until Kion, from the safest rock on top of the
gorge, used his new Fus-Roh-Da accidentally and scared the hyenas away.
Simba and Nala’s super-hearing (by the way she’s now
delegated to trophy wife) allows them to identify the magical roar and think
that their baby boy is too irresponsible to carry on with the powers of his
Cutie Mark (oops, wrong show), but still papa lion decides that letting a kid
keep the Fus-Roh-Da is a good idea and then shows him a secretly obvious cave
covered up with three vines and a half and all, along with Rafiki. There he
tells Kion the not-so-secret secret about how his grand-uncle Scar was the
second son just like him, and he also had the Power of Grayskull or whatever,
also his own lion version of the Masters of the Universe too; however Scar felt
too confident and tried to become King by using his Fus-roh-Da, but when his
bros didn’t support him he “destroyed” them (Disney’s special code word for
genocide) and that’s what made him the weak anorexic we saw on the first movie.
Simba then asks Kion to recruit lions to form the new Guard, (despite the fact
that apparently there’s no other male lions in the pride which brings me to
remind Disney of their homework), and that it’s a great responsibility so he
expects his neglected son with a mental age of eight to do a great job without
adult supervision. Kion of course is socially awkward and isn’t used to talking
to his father for more than five minutes per day, so he believes he can bring
in anyone and recruits the aforementioned Bunga, an egret named Ono, Beshte the
hippo and Fuli the cheetah (also the only girl on the team). All of this with a
musical number in the middle that tries to replace Hakuna Matata with Bunga’s
catchphrase, Zuka Sama, right in front of timon and Pumbaa’s faces. Also Kion
boasts to Kiara how he’s not the deadweight anymore and of course just like any
other Disney sister she behaves like a snot in your underwear and goes tattle
on him to daddy. On the other hand Janja the transsexual hyena decides through
another musical to sneak to the Pridelands at night and then “destroy” animals
in the morning just for fun, not even to eat… then he does the EXACT OPPOSITE
and takes the boys there during the day and attack at noon.
Simba, father of the year by lion standards, tells Kion
how disappointed he is after the five seconds he delegated some responsibility
on him, showing that apparently Disney lions are racist pricks or something and
they don’t take in non-lions on their Masters of the Universe clique. Kion’s
friends try to cheer him up but because the script says that every Disney flick
needs a minimum quote of four songs, Kion bursts into a solo that should live
him with a cramped neck after bending it that way when suddenly the clouds show
Mufasa, who died for our sins, and he tells the kid in a semi-ambiguous
way to “listen to his heart” (aka Simba’s retarded so he shouldn’t listen to
him). Meanwhile Kiara and one of her friends are tracking gazelles (for the
love of God, cubs don’t track, just observe hunts and under lionesses’
supervision! Disney, DO your homework!), but then the nocturnal-afternoon-y
hyenas cause a stampede where Kiara breaks something and gets stuck in the
middle of it. Simba and Nala, exerting their roles as negligent father and
trophy wife respectively, decide to remain there like desk paperweights until
Kion arrives with his gang and chase the hyenas away using his Fus-Roh-Da. They
save Kiara in the process and Simba and Nala show how “Hakuna Matata” they are
as long as daddy’s little princess isn’t the one in danger of being eaten by
the second most dangerous predator of Africa. Everything comes to an end when
Simba accepts Kion’s progressive ideas and decides not to be so racist about
it, so now everyone’s got their own Final Fantasy- like Cutie Mark. Cut, print,
roll credits!
- Animation
At first I thought it was pure 2D, then I noticed
certain planes on 3D masked up with CGI. It kind of broke my heart for a bit,
then I remembered it was Disney, the world’s most famous 2D animation studio
that had the audacity to close their 2D department. They don’t deserve mercy,
oh no… I understand perfectly well it’s a series aimed to 10 year old kids or
lower, but I have to insist on how most of the people actually interested in
seeing this are all 20 or older; somebody explain to me, how the hell did they
manage to make the characters, ALL OF THEM, move in such a way that they’d made
me feel sick each time I saw them do so? Especially those who already had their
character models and movements perfectly established from the previous movies,
they weren’t short of references. Lions, hyenas, gazelles, Timon and Pumbaa,
even cheetahs, all of them had meen established clearly in the previous flicks;
it’s not like I was expecting the quality of the greatest 2D animated movie of
all times, but this was just embarrassing. Just compare Simba and Kion’s sizes
with each other and the rest of the cast, what kind of zebras are you feeding
those monsters? Why do the hyenas look like a cross of bulldog with chihuahua?
Why does Timon’s head move and bounce like a water-filled balloon each time he
moves? Why does it seems like Bunga is the only character they actually put
effort into animating, not to mention he’s the first badger in the franchise so
they didn’t have references? Why is it so hard to make running and walking
cycles that don’t look like muscle spasms with cramps? Why is Fuli’s design so
out of place when cheetahs’ designs were actually shown and used in the very
first movie? All of this can be pinpointed to the one thing I’ve been repeating
over an over throughout this review: Disney doesn’t know how to do homework.
The most basic things, like lip-sinc and sound are OK;
the colour palette is OK (although Janja’s song was kind of an eyesore and
wasn’t even close to Scar’s epic one); facial expression and body language is
OK (although the characters get extremely deformed when sitting down, for some
reason); the twelve principles of animation are present and well executed in
general… But really, Lion Guard doesn’t stand out on absolutely anything at all
when it comes to animation, and this is mostly because Disney seems to ignore
the fact that you can’t pretend a toddler show to fill the giant shoes of TLK.
Anyone who’s seen the first two movies knows that Simba and company don’t work
well with a smaller scale of narration: scenography, music, villains,
EVERYTHING in The Lion King is big, even the sequel. If you’ve seen it, then
don’t tell me Zira wasn’t a crazy, delirious sociopath with satanic cult leader
tendencies; she’d be perfectly capable of mauling Kion and friends with her
army of militarized lionesses. The chase scene with Kovu and Simba in the burnt
lands was pretty dramatic and well executed, considering the budget. When it
comes to a protagonist, Kiara might be a hopeless idiot, but at least she had
good intentions and actually ended the conflict peacefully and by herself.
There’s really no excuse for Disney if their intentions are those of creating
“Avengers but with lions”, like somebody from Production said in an interview.
The Lion Guard has potential when it comes to the
story, even with Disney refusing to do homework or respecting their own base
material, but the animation needs to be polished. My only ray of hope is that
this was only the flick, so TLG has time to become better and stop thinking
that making useless small references to the original two is enough to satisfy
the public. I do hope they manage to balance out their two demographics (adults
and kids) in what’s to come, and at least reach the quality of TLK2 (I didn’t
set the bar too high, go for it Disney).
- Conclusion
In general, I do think that TLG is trying to be an ice
pack for a too big of a fever, in every sense: before reaching greatness, you
need to accept you’re under your teacher’s shadow and you need to start from
scratch to overcome them, even if your teacher is a record-breaking,
ticket-seller, Oscar-winner. As something aside, I’m especially hurt for
Disney’s decision to change Kiara’s personality from nice retard to smart
cretin. The apparent bad blood between Kion and Kiara is present in at least
90% of Disney’s material, because apparently the concept of two siblings being
nice to each other is alien or taboo (Phineas and Ferb don’t count, they’re
step-brothers, and Candace isn’t any better). Kiara might have been utterly
retarded in her movie, but she never had bad intentions nor wanted to get
anyone in trouble or belittle them; this new Kiara seems intelligent, but has a
special malice towards her brother and those who surround her that makes her as
distasteful as a baby painting the walls with diaper crap. Also, inserting TLG
as a mid-quel to TLK2 only increases the number of plot holes it already had,
was it so hard for Kion to be born after TLK2? I have friends with 40 years of
age gaps between them and their siblings, the gap between Kiara and Kion
wouldn’t have been nearly as dramatic. Anyways, now I’ll just have to watch the
series and wait to see if it’s nearly any better than those 40 minutes I just
wasted watching this movie.
Signing out!
-Gatt
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