WARNING: Opinion ahead.*
We're in the run-up to Disney's Beauty & the Beast 3D and the Tangled sequel, Tangled Ever After. This time next week (January 13, 2012) the Beauty & the Beast remastered-and-tweaked feature will be in playing theaters with Tangled Ever After showing at the start.
I feel a little odd posting this video, I must admit. There's really nothing left to relate it to Rapunzel.. we could always stretch the idea and say the gigantic train is supposed to remind us that she was stuck with crazy-long enchanted hair until recently but... yeah.
I didn't ever blog what I thought of Tangled and I'm probably not ever going to write a proper review (or recommend it to anyone who likes fairy tales or a well told story, although it's very pretty, the horse was inspired and the "Art Of" book is great) but one of the disappointments for me was that this pair...
... seem very different from this pair...
... which is a real pity since I was hoping for the far more layered characters promised on the initial Rapunzel-slash-Tangled (yes, I wrote it that way on purpose) teaser poster. Any layering they had in Tangled seems totally absent in Ever After but unfortunately I'm no longer surprised at that.
It IS nice to see Maximus again (who was the whole reason I actually made it through the feature), though it appears his crafty savviness, which stayed almost completely intact through the movie, has now drunk whatever Kool Aid is being served at the castle. Sigh.
By the way, did you ever see this? The Japanese poster for Tangled also promised great fairy tale things. Somehow, after all my disappointments, I still want to see "that" movie (as long as Maximus stays in it).
*I don't mean any disrespect to the people who worked hard on the film or those who loved the movie. I just... didn't like it. I thought it had much more potential, considering the story source. The art is beautiful - no question about it (although the distractingly huge size of Rapunzel's eyes obviously left no room in her head for much in the way of brain matter) - and the techniques developed, and ultimately used for the film, were incredible (really and truly amazing stuff!). I simply find all those achievements hard to appreciate in the middle of a mangled mess of storytelling. Sorry.
I agree that the initial conception art of Tangled was pretty far from the final product. I'm really hoping that what they've done with the first looks at Brave will be somewhat closer to how they are portraying it. They needed another redhead lead/princess/role model, and I like the fact that there isn't a male shown in the trailers (as having some effect on her well-being, that is). I'm not sure how this movie plays into traditional fairy tales, but knowing Disney, they have probably tied some type of folklore into it...however loosely.
ReplyDeleteThat sequel looks horrible! I'm not a big fan of Disney Masterworks sequels, anyway, but this is even worse than what I saw of "Sleeping Beauty 2".
ReplyDelete(And I don't like Rapunzel's short hair, but that's personal.)
Err, not "Sleeping Beauty 2", of course, "just" the "Keys to the Kingdom"-thing.
ReplyDeleteBut somehow the thing they created for "Tangled Ever After" reminds me of the X sequels of Shrek, it's like seeing Donkey in horse form (and pantomimic?), and I dare say we didn't exactly need another of those.
Hah, you and Kate W. both have a strong dislike of Tangled. I agree that it has nearly nothing to do with the original fairy tale, but somehow it won me over and I found it whimsical and charming.It also helps that one of my good friends looks EXACTLY like Flynn Rider, so the entire movie I was laughing at seeing a cartoon version of him on screen. I went into the theater with low expectations after Princess and the Frog hadn't impressed me, so that also helped me enjoy the movie more. Hey, I'm just impressed that you can dislike a movie so strongly, but be very humble and gracious about it and still acknowledge the parts you liked. So *applause* for not giving into the urge to rant :-D
ReplyDeleteI agree. Tangled was cute the first time I watched it but that's all I thought of it. It's also a shame that the sequel has to do with Rapunzel getting married. Why?!
ReplyDelete