Tag: goblin

Elves (1989) [REVIEW] | Nazicest Gobbo-Grizzly Conspiracy

This is a quasi-well known one, it has a certain reputation, but i’m willing to cover it anyway because it’s still one of the strangest fuckin horror film i’ve ever seen, it’s still unique, as in “who the hell comes up with this stuff” kind of unique, sure as shit there’s nothing quite as absurd, even with the plenty batshit delirium that comes with vintage holiday horror films, Christmas related or not.

It’s just not everyday you get a movie about Christmas elves that’s also about Nazis, has a demonic conspiracy to breed the Aryan “Master Race” which involves incest and blood rituals, and just calling it “Elves” it’s a great Trojan-horsing manouver, how the fuck can one expect this level of obscene and absurd with such a simple, direct title?

It’s a deranged mish mash in many ways than you both and would not assume, because you’d expect a creature feature movie following in the vein of Gremlins, like Critters, Ghoulies, Munchies… and to an extend that is correct, as we’ll see later.

Strap in, because we’re in for quite the ride, one that Dan Haggerty (of The Life and Times Of Grizzly Adams’ fame) wasn’t happy to partake in one bit, despite being the protagonist, as sometimes you can almost see his genuine stunned yet unamused, baffled reaction to the dialogues he’s forced to hear coming from the other actors’ mouths.

Continua a leggere “Elves (1989) [REVIEW] | Nazicest Gobbo-Grizzly Conspiracy”

[EXPRESSO] Goblin Sword NSWDDL | Good Mobile Sorcery

Mobile games get a bad wrap, and while the industry itself is guilty as hell for it…eventually you get a mobile game that actually wants to be just a game, made for enjoyment instead of retention (followed by the game testing your resolve against your wallet)… which you probably didn’t even knew exist until it gets a PC and/or console port.

Yeah, Goblin Sword is a mobile game that found its way to the Switch’s eShop earlier this year, and despite some asset flips (and similar crap from malingering homunculi) from Steam starting to surface here as well, you can still get proper esposure on it, especially since it’s a 2D retro styled Metroidvania-sidescroller hybrid……lacking the random ass rape in the beginning, now we have to warn people of that due to a certain series with “goblin” in the title.

Then again, there isn’t much of a plot, it’s basically you against an evil wizard that wants the titular “goblin sword”. And… that’s it. Gameplay itself it’s a basic sidescroller with a Metroidvania twist, as in you get power-up needed to reach previously unaccessible areas, but progressing in the levels it’s done in a traditional side-scroller gameplay, go right until you reach the end of the level, with double jump being the fancier ability available, and collect all treasure chests and crystals you can.

Gelato Games (oddly not an indie italian videogame studios, despite the name) did cook up a good sidescroller, with a pleasant but a bit generic art direction, and you can still kinda tell this was made for mobile first, but you’ll soon forget that, thank to good level design, the tight controls, the great difficulty curve, a good amount of content and replayability.

I’m glad this one was ported to Switch, because it deserves more attention.

[EXPRESSO] Onward (2020) | Dad Quest

Onward 2020 poster.jpg

Yeah, due to the COVID-19 lockdown, this was delayed… until theathers reopened yesterday in Italy, pretty much. For U.S. moviegoers, this will old hat, as the movie debutted there in march, but eh, what you gonna do?

After the fun but kinda pointless rethread of Toy Story 4, Pixar here treats us to a story about two brothers in a quest for an artifact to make their deceased father exist – completely, that is – for one more day, all set in a fantasy suburbia world of elfs, cyclops, goblins, station wagons, smarthphones and convenience stores, as technology advanced and made magic basically obselete over the millennia. Yes, still a better modernized fantasy world than Bright, let’s just get that out right away.

And there’s a token minor LGBT character (a cyclops cop), so token it’s made so by a single line, not bad or offensive, the character isn’t completely pointless to the plot, to be fair, it’s just….yeah, nothing to really brag about, given it’s ancillary status, but Pixar needed some social media icons for Pride Month, so…

That aside, it’s good mix of family drama and road movie, with some fun characters design, likeable characters (even if it’s another tale of getting over feelings of inadequacies, this time exploring brothers and fathers relationship), funny spins on fantasy and GDR clichès leading to some pretty good visual jokes, pacing is perfect, the moral becomes obvious but still feels earned (and the lesson at the end actually gels together with the themes), there’s even some action with swords and dragons and stuff.

Definitely a step up from Toy Story 4, and better than one would reasonably expect from Dan Scanlon, who previously directed that Cars supernatural-ish spin-off short…. and Monster University (the only review i still regret writing). Good one.

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