#though Sister's english voice is unintentionally hilarious

[diseasedcube]

just some unhinged rambling about Cutthroat’s VAs

Starting with his English. I don’t haaaateee it, but something abt it rubs me the wrong way. Like the acting is really good, it’s just the voice direction that’s awful. Hard to describe exactly, but he’s like, whiny? There’s a lot of weird inflections and tremors in the acting, esp in episode 9. It’s like Matt was told ‘‘you’re playing a crazy insane serial killer, do the stereotypical psycho voice’’. I once heard someone describe it as ‘‘too horny’‘ and yep, I think that sums up my issue with it. Like there was no balance here, too much ‘‘serial killer’’ voice and not enough ‘‘normal dude who’s kinda childish’‘ voice. There aren’t really any specific line changes I have any issue with (although ‘‘yum ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) ’‘  instead of ‘‘ah, blood’‘ when he licks Swindler definitely caught me so off guard) 

4/10 not bad but it doesn’t feel good

Then his German voice, this one has the opposite problem than the English. It’s a little too normal and lackluster. A sort of deeper voice that removes the childish element and makes him feel more his age. He does a better job at matching the tone of the Japanese though. It feels like he’s not really trying very hard until ep 9, that’s where he goes all out on the acting. Like if he needs to yell/scream, he puts his whole heart into it and I appreciate that. There are a few line changes that I really appreciate, and probably a lot more that I’m completely missing due to the fact that I just pretend to know German without actually knowing anything. But namely, actually making a ‘‘Here’s Johnny’‘ reference, so good, thank you for putting in the actual reference. The voice is relatively nice, I like the line delivery in quite a few scenes.

7/10 does the job and I like it well enough

and Russian.... uhhh.... I appreciate the fact that even a modicum of emotion was portrayed in the acting (if you’ve ever listened to a russian dub of anything, you’ll understand that this is high praise). Are there line changes? Dunno, stopped learning russian when I was 4 years old so I only know about 5 words

2/10 thanks for trying

I couldn’t find a french dub and didn’t check for spanish, nor do I really care about those bc haha I don’t speak those languages in any capacity, uno dos tres amirite?

Onto the original, the Japanese. Happy bday Mr. Sakurai! What can I say, it’s the og acting, ofc it’s gonna be my favorite, it’s how the lines were originally meant to be said. This man is so good, his voice is so pleasing to listen to. He strikes the perfect balance between Normal, Killer, Yandere and Child. Just the right amount of everything, a perfect voice for Cutthroat.

11/10 I love this man

[tearlessrain]

time to subject myself to Dracula: The Dark Prince, aka another bad movie starring another dude from black sails. this time with 100% less horny on main because my only real motivation for watching it is it truly looks to be a whole new caliber of horrible and I have to see it.

witness my standards for incomprehensibly bad movies being raised prohibitively high in every way imaginable under the cut

I seriously doubt that.

this was made in 2013 by the way, not 1994 as the graphic design of that logo might suggest

oh good, once again we’re opening with an exposition narrator. except this time it’s a woman and she has less vocal inflection and emotional investment than an amazon echo.

I feel like she’s gonna tell me to turn left in 800ft

it feels like a dragon age epilogue, but just. worse.

WE ARE WATCHING A TRULY HIGH QUALITY MOVIE TONIGHT MY FRIENDS

I can’t even describe how bad this is, you really need the sound. that’s where the true lack of quality shines through. siri’s depressed sister is talking about pre-vampire dracula’s epic feats in battle to more weird sepia dioramas and the dying soldiers sound like they hired muppets to voice them

HOLY WIG BATMAN

also this dude is obnoxiously jovial considering he’s supposed to be dracula, even if this is pre-vampire

oh no dracula’s advisors, who all wear black hooded robes and scowl ominously, have betrayed him and killed his wife, how unexpected

someone drew these, looked at them, and thought “yeah that’s good enough to go in the final movie”

the characters are speaking both english and what I assume is... romanian or something? transylvanian? it’s not spanish or welsh I can tell you that much. anyway there are no subtitles and also no rhyme or reason to which they’re speaking at any given time so I hope I’m not missing anything important. probably not.

so like... they killed his wife, yes. and he went on a murderfest in what appears to be a church in revenge, makes sense. now a dude who... I think maybe he’s supposed to be a priest or something? but he wasn’t speaking english so I can’t be sure, then a voice over said “I have killed for god, the hand that fought for him will now be turned against him” but I’m unclear on who was speaking. this movie is an absolute clusterfuck and we aren’t even five minutes in yet. this is still the prologue.

now zombie alexa claims dracula was cursed with immortality “in punishment for his defiance” but I’m still not sure... what defiance. he killed the dudes who murdered his wife and that’s somehow not okay despite his apparent status as a war hero, a designation that implies a LOT of killing has already happened?

fucking finally, the title screen. usually a prologue clarifies what a movie is about but I went in thinking I knew and now have absolutely no idea what I’m watching.

a carriage drawn by friesians is rolling through a misty forest with wolf howling sound bites playing at random in the background to vaguely urgent music, now this is what I’m here to see.

nevermind the carriage is too slow so they’re leaving it because that’s a thing people do (?????)

“Lady Arwen, we cannot delay”

seriously though everyone’s mumbling so much I can’t understand them much better than when they were speaking whatever the other language was

BOOTLEG XENA RIDES AGAIN

but this time she’s accompanied by esme. we don’t know who esme is yet either.

there she goes

and now the knights are being attacked by hilarious squeaky goblin things? who I guess are led by this power rangers villain with, again, an unintentionally hilarious voice. it’s like a bad batman impression.

with every minute that passes I become less certain of what I’m actually watching.

they’re looking for the “light bringer” and telepathically overseen by the world’s most halfassed lestat dracula

they’ve also got some random prisoners in a cage wagon

okay the prisoners are being taken to dracula’s castle and I’m sorry for such an image-heavy post but I NEED you to understand the community theater level of set design/quality we’re dealing with here

“what is that?” cardboard and mod podge is my guess

so far the only thing esme has done is fall off her horse and be knocked unconscious, and now a Roving Band of Misogynists has appeared to harass Bootleg Xena 3.0 in the most generic way possible (the words “what ‘ave we got ‘ere” accompanied by a chorus of malicious cackling and some whistles have been spoken)

oooh no the ringleader of the Roving Misogynists has been given a name, and it’s ~Lucien~. I have a horrible feeling that I’m about to bear witness to the worst romantic subplot in the history of cinema.

oh for... I thought at least bootleg xena 3.0 would be a Strong Female Character and fight them off, but she just rapped lucien on the head with her sword and then they stole her very important box and left as obnoxiously as they came

OH NO SHE’S ASKING TO GO WITH THEM, SOMEHOW THAT’S HER PLAN I THINK I’M RIGHT SHE’S GONNA HOOK UP WITH LUCIEN AND IT’S GOING TO BE HORRIBLE.

“trust me” she says to esme, who, wisely, obviously does not.

I appreciate the timely thunderclap every single time the castle comes on screen

who the fuck are you, did you wander onto the wrong movie set

nope okay they’re not gonna explain that shot at all we’re just moving on to a shot of a weird angel shadow doing slow flamenco moves on the ceiling while ominously gurgling, and the prisoners being led into the throne room

“what’s happening to us?” I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW THE SAME THING, PRISONER #3

oh never mind that guy from before wasn’t a priest, he is remfield, chancellor of this kingdom, which means the last scene he was in makes even less sense

AKSLDGHJFGAKDLFJGHKAJGHFDKLFDS;GJokay so. remfield introduced himself then said “I will see that your needs are tended to.” then dracula in his new white contacts gets up from his shadowy throne, circumnavigates the cluster of prisoners, sniffs them dramatically, and walks back to his throne. remfield then says, “come, I will see that your needs are tended to” because proofreading is for COWARDS

now remfield is... literally giving the prisoners a tour of the castle and going on the “oh you’re our guests and many pleasures and adventures await you” speech and somehow the prisoners are accepting this despite the fact that they were just carted in on a barred wagon in shackles and got sniffed by a bad alucard cosplayer. they have a fucking harpist.

seriously, who the fuck are you

she’s just been twirling around in the background of this entire scene for no discernible reason no matter what rooms they go into

what the hell am I watching

yeah they’re just going for that incredibly suspicious food and also seem weirdly okay with the ambient clusters of scantily clad lesbians no one will explain okay they deserve whatever happens to them

WHOA TITS apparently this movie is a different rating than I thought

remfield: the newcomers have settled in

dracula: I  d o n ‘ t  l i k e  s t r a n g e r s

then why pray tell have you brought them directly into your home in chains. I cannot stress enough how avoidable this situation was for you my dude

“just think sire, once the light bringer is in your possession no one need die again” “except those who defy me” [ominous chime as the angel shadow on the ceiling continues its sensuous flamenco dance]

meanwhile in the misty blue filter forest of eternal night, some guy in a tricorn finds a gold amulet that I think bootleg xena 3.0 dropped, and the power ranger villain rides menacingly in a random direction for a few seconds

I’m still waiting on whether this masterful display of cinematic calvinball has any cohesive story to it.

ah joy and we’re back to The Non-Adventures of Xena 3.0, Esme, and the Roving Misogynists

as an aside, I’m not calling her that just to be dumb, I’m calling her that because they still haven’t given her a name even though her sidekick got one in the first five minutes

they’ve opened the box and revealed... the light bringer, which is a wooden staff. because it is not shiny gold, the roving misogynists regard it with confounded disgrunglement and scoff at xena 3.0′s insistence that it can defeat dracula

these guys sound like what an eleven year old thinks gangs of ne’er-do-wells sound like. like cartoon weasels, if the weasels were also mediocre pirates who have heard of women, conceptually, but never seen one. like goblins in a pre-written D&D campaign run by a slightly overwhelmed first time DM.

HUR DUR WALKING STICK NOT TREASURE, WOMAN DUMB

it’s what cain used to slay abel, apparently. given that zombie alexa mentioned that dracula is the descendent of abel, this leaves us with the terrifying implication that someone did put at least some vestige of effort into writing this movie.

oh good she’s finally gonna fight lucien

no she failed again. please someone just punch the shit out of lucien so he’ll stop.

NO WHY ARE YOU MAKING OUT STOP IT GOD HAVE SOME STANDARDS WOMAN. STOP PLAYING FLOATY ROMANTIC MUSIC IN THE BACKGROUND THEY ARE LITERALLY STILL STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ENTIRE BAND OF ROVING MISOGYNISTS

I thought it might at least be a trick but no she is actually, genuinely starstruck over this profoundly mediocre olde-timey frat boy who called her “sweetheart” while she was trying to explain to him why the ancient dracula-defeating relic was important.

this guy.

we did it boys, we found a worse love story than twilight

also I just. I wish I could convey with words the way the roving misogynists react to every single thing lucien and sometimes xena 3.0 says like the world’s worst greek chorus in a literally neverending stream

lucien (post makeout and xena 3.0 explaining again that the relic is ancient and powerful and they’ve searched for ages to find it): well we may not be knights but we can respect that

[cacophony of rowdy but understated agreement]

lucien: what do you think boys, should we give it back?

[assorted grumbles of assent]

xena 3.0: hm, a thief with a conscience

[gruff mercenary-esque chuckling]

lucien: maybe even a heart

[chorus of “ooooooOOOooh”s and some whistles]

it just goes on like that in every scene they happen to be physically adjacent to, they never shut up but also never actually contribute or say anything meaningful

ah, the mysterious leonardo has appeared. I think he was the one they were trying to take the light bringer to so that’s handy

“what is happening here? what is this flirtation?? is this the people to share your sacred secrets with???” - leonardo, the only remotely rational person in the entire movie

oh he is schooling these idiots, finally someone with sense. it’s bouncing right off of lucien, but at least he’s saying it.

“the scourge” - leonardo

“scourge!” “scourge!?” “scourge?” “hrgghhg??” “hrrm...” - the roving misogynists

power ranger villain and his squeaking goblins vs leonardo, the most useless female leads of all time, and the roving misogynists. who will win.

not the people watching this movie, I can tell you that much.

oh no, the lightbringer isn’t working. this will do nothing to convince the roving misogynists that it isn’t a walking stick

oop, wilhelm scream

oh no lucien has picked up the light bringer

goddamn it he’s the chosen one isn’t he

yep he activated the stick and now we all have to suffer

oh xena 3.0′s coming for power ranger villain maybe she’ll actually do something

nope she bounced off him and now he’s grabbed her and hauled her onto his horse

“you’re coming with me” he says in his weird batman voice, to make sure the audience can tell that he is in fact taking her with him

and esme has yelled “no” to make sure we remember that she’s in the movie

wait what the. did lucien just yell “xena” is that her actual name what the fuck. what the fuck. I had to have misheard that. okay I can’t tell what he’s saying for sure but someone’s bound to say her name again at some point in the movie so I’ll revisit that.

and on that note, I think I’ll end here, because there ended up being a LOT more to unpack in this movie than I expected, it’s after midnight, and I’m tired.

tomorrow, we follow lucien as he presumably goes to save some lady he wildly disrespected and then made out with one time whose name may or may not actually be xena, and hopefully figure out what the hell is even going on with dracula, remfield, and their castle full of artfully strewn half naked harpist lesbians and dancing ceiling shadows. because right now I really don’t have time to unpack all that, and I have a feeling it will only get worse.