#(yes this is an extremely obscure reference but its so fucking funny. to me at least)

[firedjinni]

PRIVATE [LIVE BROADCAST] Three Rivers, First/Third Quarter

FTQ: What is that? TR: That's my new junior administrator! FTQ: … ha ha, very funny. FTQ: [F] Did you really give it a little ID drone and everything? FTQ: [T] I don't know what you see in these animals, Riv. TR: Yep! And I'm not joking. It really is my administrator right now. FTQ: … FTQ: [T] What. FTQ: [F] Rivers. Explain. TR: So, remember about a thousand cycles ago when I was spit-balling that idea about privilege escalation via council bylaws to access previously disabled levels of structural permissions? TR: This was my solution! TR: I gave enough organisms ID drones to legally form a new Council of Houses, then rigged the election to promote one of them as my new lowest-tier administrator. TR: Then I just had to walk it through disabling the security system and running the taboo-removal retrovirus, which was honestly easier than I thought it would be. They're really smart little guys! TR: Anyway, due to some unforseen side effects that are, to be clear, totally unrelated to my choice of administrators, I might be needing to ask you for a favor in the near future, so I thought I'd give you some advance notice~ FTQ: . FTQ: … FTQ: ... FTQ: YOU GAVE THE ANIMAL ROOT?!?!

Finally drew some nice rendered stuff of Three Rivers and Mini! Also cameoing First and Third Quarter, one of my other even less fleshed out fan-iterators from from Rivers' local group. I've had this one percolating for a while, mostly because I wanted an excuse to caption something with this conversation, lol.

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

The LEGO Batman Movie review

The LEGO Movie is one of the best, funniest, and smartest animated films in recent memory, and easily one of my all-time favorite films. It’s nostalgic without being exploitative, it’s emotional in a resounding way, and it constructs and deconstructs tropes inherent with the “Chosen One” story with gleeful abandon. It’s simultaneously smart and funny, something very few animated comedies seem to be able to do.

But we’re not here to talk about that movie. We’re here to talk about The LEGO Batman Movie and… it was kind of a disappointment. Not to say that it’s a bad film by any means, but with the bar set so high it had a lot to live up to, and it just doesn’t manage to fully deliver.

Watch your feet, we’re stepping into the story now, and there’s a shitton of LEGOs: Batman is the incredibly cool hero of Gotham who is able to beat up all the villains and save the day all the time… which new police chief Barbara Gordon isn’t 100% for. She’d rather work together with Batman as a unified force, but Batman is deadset on being a loner all the time. Then Batman accidentally adopts a kid, and THEN he tries to send Joker to the Phantom Zone because Joker’s got a scheme brewing in his crazy, mixed-up head… Can Batman stop him before the scheme comes to fruition? And more importantly, can Batman actually be a good parental figure to Dick Grayson, the little kid he just adopted?

So let me tell you what works well first: the characters. These are some of the best interpretations of the characters ever. Michael Cera as Robin and Zach Galifianakis as Joker deserve special mention. Here, Cera is almost unrecognizable from his normal self-conciously awkward and nerdy characters. Robin is very gung-ho, excitable, and while he’s just as awkward as any Cera character, he’s an adorably wide-eyed, idealistic character who just wants the love of a family again. He’s very sweet and leads to some great emotional moments… and aside from Burt Ward, he’s the best Robin ever seen in a feature film. Galifianakis as Joker is just perfect; he truly gets the romantic undertones of Batman and Joker’s relationship and helps take it to the parodic extreme. This Joker is a clever schemer, and the plan he hatches is quite brilliant, and shockingly enough he can also be quite scary when he wants to be. Ralph Fiennes as Alfred and Rosario Dawson as Barbara are just absolutely perfect choices, and not much can be said besides the fact they are excellent and that goddamn is it good to see Alfred suit up and kick some ass like he does late in the film! And now, onto the big star: Batman, as he was in The LEGO Movie, is an egotistical jerk with a heart of gold, and he’s so arrogant and full of himself he’s hilarious… and even with that rough exterior, we get a lot of truly great emotional moments out of him.

That’s another thing this film does really well: emotions. There’s a sequence of long, lingering scenes that highlight Batman’s absolute loneliness, there are scenes where Batman longingly stares at a photo of his parents and, late in the film, there is a scene where Batman is confronted by every asshole thing he has done over the course of the movie and is forced to realize he may in fact be a bad guy. These are all so effective, well-done, and genuine! And the humor, too, is great, mostly. From some very great visual jokes to some hilarious potshots at the DCEU (Suicide Squad gets quite a few jabs), this film does generally have good comedy… why then, is it so disappointing to me?

The problem is, shockingly, the same problem that Seltzer & Friedberg’s movies have, and while this movie is definitely good and I would never say it’s down to their level, it does have the problem where it just tries to shove so many references in your face at once it forgets to stay focused or give everything the attention it needs. The fight at the start is a minor example; so many Batman villains appear, including really obscure ones, but they never get personality beyond a couple of lines and a few quick cameos later in the film. Hell, they got Billy Dee Williams to FINALLY play Two-Face after all these years… and he gets five lines tops. Harley Quinn is also criminally underutilized. But the true example of this, the true Seltzerberg level screw up, is when it comes to the prisoners of the Phantom Zone.

You see, the Phantom Zone prisoners are crossover characters: We have Lord Voldemort, Sauron, theWicked Witch of the West, the gremlins, the Daleks, Medusa, the kraken from Clash of the Titans, the shark from Jaws, and KING FUCKING KONG! This is a squad and a half, and it turns the film into an ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny… or it would, if these characters were given any development or screentime. Voldemort and Sauron are really the only villains with a major precence, as Voldemort is Joker’s right hand man and casts a lot of spells, while Sauron acts as a major roadblock for most of his appearance. The other villains get shafted or relegated to a couple of quick jokes. In a lot of ways, this film is repeating the problems of Dawn of Justice: It’s cramming all these references and cameos in your face, but ultimately they’re just there to be references and nothing more. At least there’s a funny Shark Repellent Bat Spray joke used was funny.

And yes, I know a big thing in The LEGO Movie was the crossover element, but the biggest crossover was Batman who was a major character, and a few crossovers that were at best cameos relegated to jokes. Here, it expects you to accept that a lot of these crossover or Bat-mythos reference characters are both important to the plot AND joke cameo characters at the same time. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, and it just makes me feel this movie lakes the same genuine charm as the first film, even if I know that’s wholly not the case. I suppose I can accept this as the child from the first film playing with the LEGOs again (and that is subtly implied at a few points), but that doesn’t totally wash my disappointment away because it doesn’t fix how slapped together the whole plot is; as silly and childish as the first movie’s plot was, it was still mostly coherent and less cluttered.

Look, when this film works, it really works. When it’s trying to parody the Batman mythos or showing us some character interactions with the main Bat-family and Joker, it’s excellent. When its trying to bite off a bit more than it can chew or just failing to utilize all the great ideas and characters it’s throwing at you, it starts to fall apart. It’s a damn shame, because this should be an awesome and fantastic parody, and a truly great Batman and LEGO film. As it stands, I can honestly only say it’s a good Batman film and a good LEGO movie. Its at its best when it’s being the affectionate parody it should be… otherwise, it’s just too bloated and unfocused for its own good.

Maybe the bar is set far too high for animated Batman films; Under the Red Hood and The Dark Knight Returns really raised the bar for animated films about Batman, after all. Still, I can’t say I absolutely hate this movie, and it has a lot to enjoy, from its great characters to its incredible animation… and hey, while it may not be as good as those films, at least it’s way better than The Killing Joke and Mask of the Phantasm.