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Thank you man, A decent contrictive post about the movie in its entirety, i feel the same way you do on most matters, and on the ones i dont feel the same there too trivial to bring up further. Now, im going to go watch it for the 6th time.
I don't see why you had a rant at people that don't like the movie at the end of the day I paid £35 for something that was worth about £5 IMO. I am perfectly entitled to think that it was not up to scratch regardless of the fact that it was a small company doing a good job without support - how sad, so sad - get better. I have no sympathy what so ever if you put a product out on the market at an inflated price then expect criticism that is what happens in a free market. I have read the comic and I still think there are gaping floors in the fluff.
Glad some people liked it.
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Ed_Bodger wrote:I don't see why you had a rant at people that don't like the movie at the end of the day I paid £35 for something that was worth about £5 IMO.
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I cant wait to see it.. but the bastards havent given it to me yet!! :(
We are arming Syrian rebels who support ISIS, who is fighting Iran, who is fighting Iraq who we also support against ISIS, while fighting Kurds who we support while they are fighting Syrian rebels.
for the heretics... guess what just landed on D...oid
Mik
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In a surprise of all surprises, it actually arrived today.
Came in from Guernsey in a Standard Delivery 'jiffy bag' (or packaging envelope to those that don't know the word.
The card sleeve is actually fine although the cardboard box has a bit of a gouge bumped out of it above the 'Special' in 'Special Edition Collectors set.'
The comic seems fine, short of course, but that's no real surprise. And amazingly, I actually have both disks.
I'm just about to go downstairs and put it on now.
As for the physics in the movie, primarily during the big final fight scene, they are basically "comic book" super-hero physics and since 40K is basically comic-book super-hero material at its core I really didn't have a problem with it. The strength and abilities of huge supernatural monsters are whatever the creators want them to be, it's fantasy.
This message was edited 6 times. Last update was at 2010/12/18 14:53:58
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One of my gaming buddies held a viewing party for it last night; about a dozen of us quite enjoyed it accompanied by beer and snacks and a fair number of MST3K style comments.
Overall I agree with Yakface and HBMC's reviews. A bit better than expected; disappointing mostly in minor ways. Overall not bad considering the budget, and definitely a fun watch with friends over beer.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2010/12/18 14:51:21
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Manchu wrote:Between the missus and your mates, the missus is the more captive audience (not to be all Borat about it). It might do to have her read an especially good short story. As much as I like this movie myself, I can't imagine it being enjoyable to adults who are not already interested in 40k whereas some of the 40k short fiction could turn on mild scifi fans otherwise innocent of the grimdark. My advice is that if she like a short story then show her the film. Of course, this only works if she's willing to read scifi at all.
I got to watch it at my local gaming hangout- My personal copy is under our tree. I hope my family will watch it with me. I know my youngest daughter is interested (we'll see) and my oldest .... we'll maybe if there was a boy her age watching it too....
I doubt my Mrs. will give it all her attention.
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BrassScorpion wrote:As for the physics in the movie, primarily during the big final fight scene, they are basically "comic book" super-hero physics and since 40K is basically comic-book super-hero material at its core I really didn't have a problem with it.
Yeah, but no. That was due to bad animation, not 'comic book style' combat. As I said, you see this in a lot of animated things and especially in amateur or low-budget shows (even Roughnecks and some Clone Wars eps have this this problem). It doesn't take much to give your animated characters some weight and make them feel real rather than 3D models slipping through a frictionless environment. Hell even I've done that in animation and I'm about as amateur as you can get.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Rhich wrote:I know my youngest daughter is interested (we'll see) and my oldest .... we'll maybe if there was a boy her age watching it too....
I doubt my Mrs. will give it all her attention.
How old is your youngest daughter? I ask because there are Chainsword scalpings and squirting head-wounds in this film.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2010/12/18 15:37:56
BrassScorpion wrote:As for the physics in the movie, primarily during the big final fight scene, they are basically "comic book" super-hero physics and since 40K is basically comic-book super-hero material at its core I really didn't have a problem with it.
Yeah, but no. That was due to bad animation, not 'comic book style' combat. As I said, you see this in a lot of animated things and especially in amateur or low-budget shows (even Roughnecks and some Clone Wars eps have this this problem). It doesn't take much to give your animated characters some weight and make them feel real rather than 3D models slipping through a frictionless environment. Hell even I've done that in animation and I'm about as amateur as you can get.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Rhich wrote:I know my youngest daughter is interested (we'll see) and my oldest .... we'll maybe if there was a boy her age watching it too....
I doubt my Mrs. will give it all her attention.
How old is your youngest daughter? I ask because there are Chainsword scalpings and squirting head-wounds in this film.
My youngest daughter is 12… and believe you me.. she’d watched movies that I would “flinch at”
My oldest is 19 and it’s either “boys” or Facebook or, boys… or …. Facebook.
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Ed_Bodger wrote:Furthermore what is all this bollocks about first time combat Marines have seen years of combat before they are ever a full battle brother. This just seems far away from accepted fluff to me but on we go
I am not sure if what side you are on with this. It's more than one option in a sentence. Are yo saying that a recruit does not get to be a Battle Brother or what?
It is a shame GW did not support this company because I think that there was the potential for an excellent movie with a bit more funding and a better understanding of 40K. Maybe it is me maybe I am wrong about fluff but I doubt I would buy anything else from codex pictures unless they receive a lot more support from gw.
I am bothered by this. How do you know GW did not support this?
Considering that Codex Pictures could never be given the go ahead to do a film without GW permission the statement you give is slightly bewildering. Plus they released statements which said
Commenting on the news, Erik Mogensen, Licensing and Acquired Rights Manager for Games Workshop, said, “Over the years, we have been approached again and again by all sorts of producers and film companies wanting to take our intellectual property to the screen. We have always believed that, in the right hands, the stories, themes and characters from the Warhammer 40,000 universe would lend themselves perfectly to the movie genre. We’re working closely with the talented team at Codex Pictures, who have an excellent understanding of the Warhammer 40,000 intellectual property and an inspired vision for the movie. We can’t wait to see our universe come to life on-screen.”
“We’re hugely honoured to be making Ultramarines,” said a spokesman for Codex Pictures. “It’s taken a lot of research and development to get to this stage – and it’s such an exciting challenge to be able to bring the depth and power of the Warhammer 40,000 universe to a brand new medium.”
Ok first point I am saying the film makes it quite clear that the newly created battle brothers are all nervous about going into combat for the first time despite the fact they have been scouts. It is widely accepted that a marine will see years or combat as a scout before they are raised to the status of full battle brother so these nerves are unrealistic.
SecondCodex pictures were permitted to make the film by GW but were given very little support by GW in terms of finance and resources. This was expressed in several interviews with staff members. Unfortunately I can't find the link for these or I would post them.
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Ed_Bodger wrote:Ok first point I am saying the film makes it quite clear that the newly created battle brothers are all nervous about going into combat for the first time despite the fact they have been scouts.
Is it unreasonable to think they'd be nervous about going to into combat for the first time as Marines?
I would say so, they now have better armour, better weapons etc and it is not portrayed as a few butterflies but as a group of rookies being in a dangerous situation for the first time.
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Ed is correct, they have, according to the fluff, served in hundreds of battles as scouts, then in many engagements on Bikes, THEN they serve as part of a devastator squad! Hardly going to be nervous after all of that are you?
The resources are all out there in the land of Games Workshop in terms of hundreds of books and codices, Dan Abnett was the writer of the script for the film so it is hardly a case of being left with no resources considering he IS the main resource of The Horus Heresey and Gaunts Ghosts. Arguably what he doesn't know about 40K hasn't yet been written.
Don't forget the business aspect, Codex Pictures says "Hi, I want to do a Space Marines movie, give me money". ANY business, no matter how big will say "Poke off, you want to make a movie, risk your own money but here are the legal rights to use our brand."
There is a lot of speculation over how much GW make from this but people need to understand how business works before they jump in and say GW haven't helped.
Why should GW risk money on a venture thay don't particularly need in this economic climate? Plus the profit margins will be tight to say the least on such a first time venture. The disc price is ridiculous considering a big budget brand new film release is half the price of this but that is what they need in order to recoup the costs!
Elmodiddly wrote:Ed is correct, they have, according to the fluff, served in hundreds of battles as scouts, then in many engagements on Bikes, THEN they serve as part of a devastator squad! Hardly going to be nervous after all of that are you?
Except these one's clearly did not serve in a Dev Squad. This is their first mission in Power Armour, and I don't think it is unrealistic to have a group of Marines being nervous about their first combat in power armour, especially one where they've been chosen to act as a retinue for their Captain.
Linkdead wrote:This was one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
Hooray for Internet Hyperbole!
The plot was horrible
The voice acting horrible
The animation horrible
Normally you would only need one of the above three to be considered a decent movie. The animation is just laughably bad for this day and age. As for the plot, I didn't think it was possible to make Space Marines shooting Spikey Space Marines boring and outright tedious. If you enjoyed this movie their is a lot of fine cinema on the Sci-Fi channel that you would love to watch.
I saw it, it was better than I thought it would be, but considering I thought it would be a steaming pile that isn't saying much.
Spoilery review specifics -
Spoiler:
Story: Basic but servicable. However, I really felt a lot of it was out of character, UM's being bratty and pretty much insubordinate does not sit too well with me. Not to mention being nervous when they should have years upon years of experience as scouts. I also felt that they could have been a bit more explicit with some backstory elements, without my pre-existing knowledge, I don't think the movie makes much sense to the uninitiated. My wife sure as hell had no idea what was going on lol.
Graphics: Some spots were actually pretty serviceable if the lighting was right! Others were pretty horrendous. Transformers: Prime CGI was better and more consistent. Major problems included overall texturing, especially on skin and rocks, lighting glitches and low detail on many objects.
Worst part of Graphics: The 2D compositing was horrendous. The fire and smoke effects were overused and visciously cropped and poorly blended into the scenes. 2 or 3 parts had me really wondering how the hell they let it through like that, I know how to do this stuff, fixing it would NOT have been that hard, a few hours work, literally.
Animation: Same as graphics, some descent stuff, some horrendously poor mocap and scene integration. Really a mixed bag.
Voice acting: Overall very well done. Not gonna lie.
Voice Scripting: If they said 'And we shall know no fear' one more time I was about to hurricane kick my screen. Overall, not too bad either, although I had problems with a lot of it not because it was inherently bad, but because it didn't fit my idea of how marines would speak and interact based on my years and years of Fluff and BL fluff. That's just me though.
Niggling things that bugged me - Bolts did not explode. No noises when helmets were put on, 12 man squad with company standard? huh? Black legion were a faceless and wasted enemy for me. Captain possessed, but how? Doesn't seem consistent with Daemon fluff to me. Complete lack of outside characters, would have liked to have seen some more non-marine people running around. Wtf was up with the 'spell' the chaplain cast with his Crozius, am I missing something? Apothecary and Captain looked too damned old. Faces were not particularly muscly or enhanced human looking, as mentioned in most fluff. Power Armor did not seem to make noise or enhance the users much, any hit shown pretty much pierced the armor and gibbed them.
Despite what may seem like an overwhelmingly negative review, I think most 40k fans will probably enjoy the movie (and will pretend to like it a lot more than they did though), with a lesser but not insignificant proportion despising it (and not pretending at all).
Favorite moment:
After the DP cored that UM's brain out of his head, along with the entire back of the skull, and the Apothecary examines him and says 'Head Wound..."
No Gak Sherlock LOL
D at it's worst, C- at it's best for me. To those who enjoyed it, good on ya I'm glad you got your money's worth!
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2010/12/19 22:53:32
Elmodiddly wrote:Ed is correct, they have, according to the fluff, served in hundreds of battles as scouts, then in many engagements on Bikes, THEN they serve as part of a devastator squad! Hardly going to be nervous after all of that are you?
Except these one's clearly did not serve in a Dev Squad. This is their first mission in Power Armour, and I don't think it is unrealistic to have a group of Marines being nervous about their first combat in power armour, especially one where they've been chosen to act as a retinue for their Captain.
I'd be nervous too about going into combat in a bulky suit of power armor when it can't even stop a bolter round. At least in Scout carapace armor,you present a smaller target profile and can make better use of cover. As ineffective as power armor is in the movie,it's hard to understand why they'd bother with it at all.
Ah good it wasn't just me that thought the marines looked to old, the crozius didn't work as a power weapon, the animations was the equivalent of computer games five years ago and as I mentioned numerous times Battle Brothers looked like a load of naked 18 year old virgin school girls released into an army barracks at the end of WW2. Regardless whether it was their first time in power armour after years of fighting they should not have been that rookie. Finally why did they have the company banner? If Captain whatsisname had left the bulk of the second company on the other planet why wasn't the banner with them? There is no way a rookie squad would be carrying it.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2010/12/20 00:32:57
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Finally got around to watching the movie myself... While his lack of "spoiler" tags is lamentable, I have to agree with a lot of Majortom11's comments.
I wasn't put off as much by the graphics as he was. Although, to be honest, I wasn't as concerned about that as others going in. A good story and good acting can make up for a lot on the graphics side. Unfortunately, they didn't quite nail the story part.
But I'd agree with the concerns about "niggling" issues...
Spoiler:
As others have pointed out, you'd expect less "nervousness" on the behalf of Ultramarines, even those recently promoted from the scouts. The scars on all the newbies certainly attest to a great deal of fighting as scouts. They were "gun ho" enough, I guess but even if they didn't stand a stint in the Devastators, you'd expect a little more in the way of confidence and steadiness.
An Apothecary talking back to, and openly questioning the orders of, his Captain?!?! Really? I could see that on a private chat circuit between the two if they had come up through the ranks together, but we don't have the backstory to know if they have that sort of relationship. And regardless, I just can't see an Apothecary challenging a Captain like that.
The preliminary battles were, uh, odd. The Land Speeder crew getting capped without any warning? And then, after each engagement, all of the UMs kind of stop and chat. I guess they saw the script and knew that engagement was over and there was no enemy in the area. Perhaps, a la Space Balls, they had a bootleg copy of the movie... But that really contributed to a sense that the Ultras weren't in mortal danger. I know Marines know no fear and all that, but it just didn't feel like they were in (or recognized that they were in) and real danger. Without that sense, the plot rings a bit hollow.
That was complicated by the, basically, ad hoc nature of the engagements the Ultras fought in. There was no real rhyme or reason to how/when the battles started/stopped. A couple of Black Legionnaires ambush the Ultras, but then there's a complete break in action. Until the Daemon ambushes them. Then there's a complete break in action until the Black Legion makes it's en masse charge. There was no real sense, to me, that they were all tied together into a coherent story. Far to much like a bad game of old-school Dungeons and Dragons where the DM just rolled on a chart to see what was in each room the adventures entered without any real sense that they were in a "real" environment.
Then there were the amazingly poor tactics by the Ultras. Like when the two were sent ahead to find a way into the Fists' fortress, they acted as if there was no possibility of enemy action, to the point of taunting each other without keeping an eye out for any enemy. I half expected to see the lead guy (apologies for not remembering his name) to get his head removed when he made the last leap across that ruined bridge and then didn't even stop to check out the road ahead before turning his back on the way ahead. From their depiction in the movie, I just couldn't buy that they were humanity's ultimate warriors.
As others have pointed out, Power Armor looked pretty much useless. I'd've liked to have seen some (say, 2/3rds worth?) "hits" that the armor stopped. Especially in the charge by the Black Legion. That was also complicated by the Marines not really showing the durability you'd expect from Astartes. Just about every hit was a kill it seemed.
Speaking of which, how many BL did the Ultras kill as the BL blindly charged in? Black Legion is not World Eaters. Why would they charge blindly forward. It's not like the Ultras had lots of cover or anything. You'd expect Heresy-era Traitors to die a bit harder than they did. If the Ultras were fighting Orks, that scene would have worked perfectly. But Black Legion? Not so much. Just smacked of Uzi-jitsu. And that's lazy writing.
Then there's the Crozius thing. Perhaps the Chaplain was a Librarian at some point in the script development but Mr. Abnett forgot to tell the animators he changed things up? I have no idea. Silly choice from someone who knows the 40k universe that well. Or did C S Goto ghost-write some of the script?
I'm sure there are others that I'll remember after I wrap this up. None of the niggling details, alone, were that bad I guess, but for a movie whose claim to fame is it's unstinting devotion to the 40k universe, they really add up and really served to distract, at least for me, from the movie.
Not sad that I got it, but it was definitely not as good as I was hoping for. Animation was okay, and certainly for me not worth complaining about. The story was so-so, but fatally undermined by those little points where it just didn't "feel" like it was completely faithful to the 40k universe. The voice acting, considering the limitations of the medium was pretty decent.
There were details that I really did like, but they weren't frequent enough to outweigh the issues...
I'd probably give the movie a C- overall. As I've said, the graphics didn't pose a problem for me, so no knock on points there. The main thing that dragged it down were the details that failed to keep true to what one might expect in a movie that was supposed to be unstinting in its goal of being "true" to the 40k universe.
I hope Codex makes some more movies, and I'll probably buy their next effort (if it happens), but almost certainly not as the LE release. I'll be happy enough to wait.
Valete,
JohnS
Valete,
JohnS
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it arrived. I watched. Film was ok, generally enjoyable and happy to have spent my money on the nice box set. However, £8 for the postage and packaging!!!
"We didn't underestimate them but they were a lot better than we thought."
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Additionally if you had read the comic you would realise these scouts have NOT trained on bikes nor as devestators, but are last minute replacements for Ultima squad. The comic also explains why the Strike Cruiser (not BB, ugh) is only transporting them - it was all tehy could spare from the Forgeworld 2nd company was defending. Yes, this could have been explained in-story, but it didnt need to be...
Link - you think the voice acting was horrible? Really? Thankfully your opinion is in the minority, as it really *wasnt* bad quality - it was actually very good. Not just "good for a low budget film" good, either, just VERY good. If you watch the extras you also see that the actors all got into their parts very well, which explains why the acting was good.
Age - the captain and apothecary are listed as 300 years old. Guess the service studs were wrong
The big problem they would have have with graphics is cost - the plugin by Square for Maya, which would have made the faces really "pop", is too much £££ AND has a steep learning curve. Given the resources they had that would have been too much of a stretch.
O verall this was a very good start - hopefully they will more than recoup costs, and can then look to build on this for the next film. It might make GW loose a little of the purse strings and help them more financially rather than jsut with studio time.
To people waiting: remember this is coming normal post (well, mine did) and the RM has a huuuuuge backlog due to the weather.
nosferatu1001 wrote:Ed - how did you pay £35? I paid £26....
Additionally if you had read the comic you would realise these scouts have NOT trained on bikes nor as devestators, but are last minute replacements for Ultima squad. The comic also explains why the Strike Cruiser (not BB, ugh) is only transporting them - it was all tehy could spare from the Forgeworld 2nd company was defending. Yes, this could have been explained in-story, but it didnt need to be...
I did read the comic and it does explain the strike cruiser point but it does not explain why they were so nervous. If anyone was nervous it should have been the newly promoted Sgt who had just had everyone else in his squad killed but as they keep banging on about 'we shall know no fear' I would assume nerves would have been a private thing they did not broadcast.
Where does it say the Captain and Apothecary are 300 years old?
Having watched it again it was a gak film that was not worth the money. Why it cost you £26 I don't know.
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