Progressing onwards with the tributes we come to those we lost from July-September.
Dick Jones 1927-2014
Veteran voice actor who voiced Pinocchio in Disney's adaption among hundreds of other roles.
Shuusei Nakamura 1935-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include Star Blazers and Gatchaman.
David Weidman 1921-2014
Animator whose works included Popeye and Wacky Races.
Scott Ciencin 1962-2014
Novelist who wrote novel adaptions of Kim Possible, Transformers, Buffy & Angel, Jurassic Park and Silent Hill.
Liz Holzman 1953-2014
Award winning Film Producer, Director and Writer whose works included Animaniacs and Pinky and the Brain.
Buster Jones 1943-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include Doc from GI Joe along with roles in Captain Planet, Tranformers and Real Ghostbusters.
Douglas E. Smith 1960-2014
Video Game Designer of Lode Runner and one of the pioneers of Level Editing in games, also key player in the localization in the west of the Secret of Mana series and Chrono Trigger.
Robin Williams 1951-2014
Legendary Comedian whose roles include the Genie in Aladdin, Fender in Robots, Batty in Ferngully and Ramon in Happy Feet among many other memorable film roles including Patch Adams, Flubber, Good Morning Vietnam, Hook, Good Will Hunting and Mrs Doubtfire.
Stan Goldberg 1932-2014
Comic Book Artist who worked for Marvel and Archie Comics. Also helped design the default color schemes for the Fantastic 4 and Spiderman.
Iemasa Kayumi 1932-2014
Veteran Voice Actor whose Japanese Dub roles include the films of Frank Sinatra, Donald Sutherland, Christopher Lee, James Stewart, Ian McKellen and David Carradine. Also voiced numerous anime roles.
Happy New Year everyone, at time of writing I'm in the future that is 2015 as Britain goes into the New Year before America. But there are a number of people we will miss who didn't make it this year but since 2014 was so cruel to celebrities, this has to be split into several parts starting with those we lost from January-March
So lets give these people a last goodbye.
James Avery 1945-2013
Before 2014 even began we lost the voice of Shredder, main villain of the Ninja Turtles as well as performing a memorable role as Philip Banks in the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
Hal Sutherland 1929-2014
A prominent animator for Disney throughout the 50s whose credits include Sleeping Beauty, Lady and the Tramp, Peter Pan and the last theatrical Donald Duck cartoons; he would later provide animation for 70s Filmation super hero works including Flash Gordon, Batman, Aquaman and Superman. His last work was on He-man.
Seizo Katou 1927-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include the Japanese voice of Megatron from the Transformers franchise among hundred other roles.
Ichiro Nagai 1931-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include Happousai from Ranma 1/2 among hundreds of other roles along with Japanese dub roles as Yoda and Dumbledore.
Masaaki Tsukada 1938-2014
Veteran voice actor whose credits include Yamamoto Genryūsai from Bleach among hundreds of other roles.
Arthur Rankin Jr 1924-2014
One half of Rankin/Bass productions responsible for Thundercats, numerous Christmas Specials and animated versions of the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.
Gordon Bell 1934-2014
British Cartoonist whose works were featured in pretty much every British comic from Beano to the Dandy. Works include Dennis the Menace (British version) along with numerous others.
Jimmy Murakami 1933-2014
Animator for Christmas short film the Snowman as well as other books by author Raymond Briggs, also provided animation for the cartoon adaption of The Chronicles of Narnia.
Harold Ramis 1944-2014
While not animation related, Harold Ramis was still an important part of geek culture as writer and acting role as Dr Egon Spengler for the Ghostbusters films.
Runa Akiyama 1954-2014
Veteran voice actress whose roles included many characters from the Time Bokan franchise.
It's Christmas time so it's time for some special reviews, I'll be doing three this year along with a special Walk of Fame entry and a Christmas themed UAFC battle over on Fantasy Zone.
You're in for a treat as I start with Disney's latest juggernaut, Frozen.
Frozen begins with two princesses, who during a routine playtime using the elder sister Elsa's winter powers goes horribly wrong when younger sister Anna gets struck by Elsa's powers; she doesn't die but some nice enchanted trolls were kind enough to wipe the incident from her mind but it serves as a catalyst that separates the sisters from each other for many years until a storm kills the King & Queen. Through virtue of being the eldest child, Elsa is crowned Queen, but is still nervous about her powers which seem to not only be getting stronger but getting harder to control. During the coronation, Elsa's first confrontation with her sister for many years goes horribly wrong when Anna's attempt at a fairy tale romance with Prince Hans not only gets refused but a trigger phrase from Anna causes Elsa to snap and nearly kill half the people in the ballroom with an ice attack, this actually gets much worst as her over blown emotions freezes all of Arendelle as she runs away to the mountains which she seems to get to rather quick; after the show stopping song from the "Wicked" Snow Queen, (Cookie for guessing the reference) Anna gives chase to her sister along with an Iceman named Kristoff, his reindeer Sven and a live wise cracking snowman named Olaf; but as soon as she confronts her sister in her makeshift ice castle, Anna is struck again but this time more serious as the effects begin to freeze her permanently so it's a race against time to save Anna's life while Elsa avoids being killed by the bad guys.
From there it's spoiler territory and believe it or not there are some people who haven't seen the film.
So the big question is, does the movie deserve it's hype?
No. It doesn't. It's over hyped majorly and here's why.
Don't get me wrong it's a decent film but there are many points where the film loses itself and it's mostly around the fact that there are too many songs and not enough story, not made any easier when you consider that this wasn't billed as a musical, it is a strange criticism but most Disney films knew when to draw the line; in Frozen there is clearly a time limit before Anna freezes to death yet some of this time is wasted when the trolls try to pair her up with Kristoff, it comes out of nowhere and is not needed.
So why is Frozen so popular that it easily outsells most other franchises in the Disney universe?
Well it's because the lead characters Anna & Elsa are so well made that they made this average looking movie look like an Oscar winner; it also helps that "Let it Go" is one of the best and catchiest songs Disney has ever made, not to mention that Disney successfully made a winter film that can hold it's own on Christmas and as some song writers know, a good Christmas product is enough to retire on and the stars of Frozen will never need to work again and Disney would of made more than double it's losses from the Lone Ranger flop.
So it's less the actual film but more everything else around it that make it so popular with pretty much anyone, even it's harshest critics cannot help but utter "Let it Go" whenever it's on, it serves a purpose over the Christmas period and like it or not, it's here to stay.
I am finally back after a long unannounced hiatus, this is due to ongoing life issues that won't bugger off, which is annoying because I missed posting on Halloween but no worries, this movie kinda falls in between Halloween and Christmas. Today's vault entry is the Nightmare Before Christmas.
Jack Skellington is the Pumpkin King, the supreme master of the holiday of Halloween in the town of the same name and this year's Halloween went successfully with a great opening musical number, however Jack has become tired of the same routine every year and goes off on a walk to see if he can get some inspiration only to stumble upon Christmas Town which gives him the bright idea of taking on Christmas so he decides to replace Santa Claus and deliver his horrifying brand of Christmas to the world only to be rejected by human kind which prompts Jack to return to being the Pumpkin King and restore the natural order.
This is not just a stop motion piece but a full blown musical to boot and it does a really decent job of it, from it's musical numbers to it's unique characters, Nightmare Before Christmas manages to deliver on all levels.
It's not perfect by any means, some minor character designs need a rethink and the romance sections weren't necessary but those are minor and doesn't interfere with the story too much.
But it's the film's legacy that managed to pull off something much bigger, the film is the most popular Disney animated feature outside the Disney Canon and Pixar; Jack Skellington pretty much invented goth fashion from it's release and even now is still a staple of the goth fashion world, it's unique brand of styling even gave inspiration to the likes of Corpse Bride and Coraline.
It's that type of charm that manages to keep Halloween in business.
I've been doing some clean up on Retro Retrospective and unfortunately the Top 100 cartoons project has been cancelled, but to make up for it I shall review five cartoons to send into the Vault, starting with Disney's Ice Hockey venture, Mighty Ducks.
First a little history; Mighty Ducks originally began as a live action film in 1992 about an out of luck Ice Hockey team becoming champions under the command of a former pee-wee player, turned lawyer named Gordon Bombay (Emilio Estevez) who only ended up in this position because of community service which happened because he was drink driving. The film was a surprising commercial success and a year later an actual NHL Ice Hockey team named the Anaheim Mighty Ducks was formed under Disney ownership. Disney sold the team in 2005 and the team actually won the Stanley Cup the following season; in between that time in 1996 the cartoon series came about which was interesting so to speak.
It begins on a distant winter planet called Puckworld, whose inhabitants are not only humanoid ducks but their lives are centered around Ice Hockey. The peace is then broken by the Saurians who escape a place called Dimensional Limbo and lay waste to Puckworld as part revenge, part conquest led by Lord Dragaunus.
A resistance group led by Canard Thunderbeak battles bravely but ends up on the brink of defeat as Canard ends up trapped in Dimensional Limbo, assumed dead. In a desperate bid to escape, the remaining six ducks end up in Anaheim and become an NHL team under the ownership of Phil Palmfeather, and so begins their new life as an Ice Hockey team while continuing to fight off the evil Saurians.
As a kid, I liked it because I like Ice Hockey and I like a good action show; looking back I barely remember it and even question why I liked it. It's one of those bizarre sci-fi furry shows made popular by the likes of Bucky O'Hare and Starfox but the difference here is that Disney wasn't exactly discrete about the fact that this was a marketing cartoon for their Ice Hockey team, which I remind you didn't actually win any trophies until after Disney sold them.
Also it doesn't do much to evolve beyond it's formula, tell me if you've heard these characters before.
Wildwing Flashblade: Brave Leader, defined by an iconic item. (Hockey Mask)
Nosedive Flashblade: Impulsive, immature youngest member.
Duke L'Orange: Reformed thief who will likely be the first to betray the team.
Mallory McMallard: Tomboy, fiery redhead, tough girl.
Tanya Vanderflock: Genius, tech character.
Check "Grin" Hardwing: Gentle giant.
Mind you the villains aren't much better.
Lord Dragaunus: Typical power hungry villain, voiced by Tim Curry for good measure
Siege: Typical muscle bound number two
Chameleon: A creepy little villain with an annoying laugh
Wraith: The wisest one who more often than not speaks with the most common sense
Yeah breaking the mold is hardly this cartoon's strong point but if not for the actual Mighty Ducks franchise of bad movies and okay Ice Hockey team at the time then the Mighty Ducks may have been viewed more favorably. But sadly it wasn't a success nor as well remembered as the likes of Gargoyles and signaled the end of what was a decent run of TV cartoons for the Disney Channel.
