Big Hero 6 Review

Disney's latest animated feature film is the first one I can think of that features super heroes. I suppose this shouldn't be much of a surprise, since Disney bought Marvel back in 2009 and has been making tons of money with their Marvel Super Hero/Avengers movies. They have been championing Big Hero 6 (2014) as being from the creators of Frozen and Wreck-It Ralph, and those are some pretty good titles to compare to their new release. Does their first animated Marvel super hero feature hold up?

Hiro Hamada (Ryan Potter) is a fourteen-year-old robotics genius who lives in the futuristic city of San Fransokyo, and spends his time participating in back-alley robot fights. Hiro is learning to harness his genius, thanks to his brilliant brother Tadashi (Daniel Henney) and his like-minded friends; adrenaline junkie Go Go Tamago (Jamie Chung), neatnik Wasabi (Damon Wayans Jr.), chemistry whiz Honey Lemon (Genesis Rodriguez), and fanboy Fred (T.J. Miller). When a devastating turn of events catapults them into the midst of a dangerous plot unfolding in the streets of San Fransokyo, Hiro turns to his closest companion, a medical robot prototype created by Tadashi called Baymax (Scott Adsit). Hiro transforms the group into a band of high-tech heroes determined to solve the mystery.

I didn't know it at the time I saw the previews, but after Big Hero 6 hit theaters everyone started talking about how it's based on a Marvel miniseries. The team of heroes called Big Hero 6 are fairly obscure within the Marvel universe, but have had their own miniseries of comics. Spider-Man has called upon Big Hero 6 to help him fight Doctor Octopus, and for a time Wolverine's enemy, the Silver Samurai, was a member of Big Hero 6. Since this is technically a Marvel movie, you should stick around for a traditional post-credits scene, and watch for the king of cameos to make an appearance.

The characters in Big Hero 6 were adorable to say the least. I have no idea how they measure up to original comics, but I like the ones that were depicted in the movie. I said in my Real Steel review that child prodigy characters are very unrealistic and often indicators of bad writing. Hiro occasionally pushes credibility here, but he is still a kid; he's got the attention span, emotional maturity, inflated confidence, and insecurities of any adolescent, and these are incorporated into his character beautifully. Sure he's got a well-above-average skills with robotics, but he's still just a kid and the movie doesn't forget that.

Tadashi acts as more of a role model for Hiro than an actual mentor. Hiro has to learn some pretty tough lessons on his own. At one point, Hiro's desire for justice goes overboard and he makes some very serious mistakes, but he still didn't have a mentor to teach him what to learn from his mistake. I thought this was a particularly interesting bit of character development since Hiro had no one to help him figure out what to do with the experiences, and yet we still see him learn and mature as a young man and as a hero.

The other major character is Baymax. There is nothing about this character that isn't superbly lovable. The way he moves, talks, and interacts with the world around him is absolutely adorable. He resembles a semi-inflated balloon and looks so huggable. There were several clusters of small kids in the theater when I saw Big Hero 6, and nearly every time Baymax did anything at all there was an eruption of giggles from them. Baymax offers a compassionate and healing voice for those suffering, and a hug that can be felt through the screen. He sells the movie; it wouldn't have been nearly as fun without this irresistible blob of a roly-poly robot charisma. 

Big Hero 6 is a PG animated Disney movie and was chockfull of physical gags, funny characters, and silly jokes. There's also a lot of exciting super hero action and villain combat. There are also lots of hugs and love. It also features the kind of stellar animation we've come to expect from Disney. Big Hero 6 combines Disney wonder and charm with Marvel awe and action to deliver a movie that exhibits the best of both studios. While the action is good, it's the central character's heart that is the real appeal. Big Hero 6 has got something for everyone; there's a lot to enjoy in this movie. Kids will love the fun characters and silly stunts, older viewers will appreciate the action and animation, and everyone will love the heartfelt, genuine emotion these characters exude. I recommend seeing Big Hero 6 in theaters if you can. It's worth the ticket price. It's also worth getting a copy of on Blu-Ray when it becomes available.

Here's the trailer so you can get a feel for how Baymax was animated:

So, what do you think about Disney's first animated Marvel movie? I think it's good, but out of sorts with Disney's usual fare. Comment below and tell me what you think!

Movie Review: Sucker Punch

Zack Snyder is responsible for an iconic cult classic movie, 300 (2007). He later produced a movie version of a classic graphic novel, Watchmen (2009). His subsequent movies have declared that it is from the director of one of these two movies. We’ve come to expect over the top visual effects from Snyder’s high budget movies releases. Frankly, that is exactly what we get in Sucker Punch (2011).

In the 1960’s, a twenty year old girl nicknamed “Babydoll” (Emily Browning) is institutionalized by her abusive stepfather (Gerard Plunkett) who frames her for the death of her younger sister. Blue Jones (Oscar Isaac), one of the asylum’s orderlies, accepts a bribe to forge signature of the asylum’s psychiatrist to have Babydoll lobotomized which should keep her from telling the authorities about real conditions of her sister’s death. Upon being institutionalized, Babydoll retreats into a fantasy world to cope with her new circumstances; she envisions herself as newly arrived at a brothel owned by Blue. She befriends four other dancers: Amber (Jamie Chung), Blondie (Vanessa Hudgens), Rocket (Jena Malone), and Rocket's sister, Sweet Pea (Abbie Cornish). The brothel’s dance instructor has Babydoll dance during which Babydoll pretends she’s in feudal Japan. Here she encounters the Wise Man (Scott Glenn) who tells her of the five items she will need in order to escape from the brothel. To get each item Babydoll dances, the five girls share an imagined scenario, and cooperate to get the item. Led by Babydoll, the girls engage imaginary warfare against everything from giant samurai, to Nazi zombies, to dragons, and robots. If they succeed, their journey will set them free.

Zack Snyder is a very detailed, visual director. At any point in the film there is a great deal to visually take in. Snyder doesn’t put in so much motion and nonessential details that it becomes visually distracting or even annoying to watch. Snyder is known for spontaneous moments of slow motion during action scenes. It is a neat visual effect, but is almost becoming a cliché for Snyder movies. It adds a dramatic edge, but is used with such frequency that I think the edge is becoming dull.

The synopsis above makes Sucker Punch sound a whole lot more dynamic and fascinating than watching the movie was. After you become accustomed to the visual sensory overload, your brain kicks in and you realize there isn't really anything happening and there's no real point for any of the over-the-top action. You realize that Babydoll is dancing to distract the imaginary Brothel and this is symbolized by something completely unrelated. I think Jeremy Jahns (link in the side margin) worded it best:

It’s all about proper paralleling. For something to parallel something it has to represent something else. Example: like the zombie World War II war scene would have made sense, if it was a dude in war who was afraid to kill things so he imagines his enemies were a bunch of zombie Nazis so he can get through it and kill them. And the Mechs could have represented something else. You know, that’s a parallel. Going into a boring office and stealing a map only to have the parallel of that be this crazy World War II scene with zombies? I don’t see it.

Was the World War II Nazi Zombie scene good? Sure, it was pretty neat. Did it make sense after the fact? Not at all. Each of the subsequent imaginary scenarios didn’t really make sense in the scope of the story. There are basically four imagined scenarios that take place within an imagined scenario. The movie had potential to have some interesting psychological aspects incorporated, or some creative parallels and symbolism--so much, in fact, that I was actively searching for it throughout the whole movie. It just wasn't there.

The characters were very flat and uninteresting; they had uninspiring, predictable lines; and acted feminine and delicate in the “real world,” but acted tough and powerful in the fantasy worlds. The movie had some potential for social commentary about women’s empowerment, but it seemed like it was portraying the idea that the objectification of women is what makes them stronger. That’s just wrong.

I know people who watch movies for no reason other than visual stimulus; they don't care what they are watching. Sucker Punch was tailor made for this kind of an audience. It’s like visual bubblegum; it just gives your eyes something to look at but has no real value. It's got neat visuals that are fun to watch; but overall was little more than fantasy fodder for 13-year-old video-gamer boys. I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone unless they greatly value special effect over characters, cinematography, and plot.