detective pikachu
(another thing about detective pikachu, just what everyone hoped for)
I'm not so into Pokemon, but my sister loves it so when I saw the trailer for this released, I asked her what she thought. Her exact words were "there's a fury jigglypuff and I do not approve", overall our consensus was the whole thing gave off an uncomfy vibe (or more of an uncanny valley vibe if you've got a fancy vocabulary). I think my main problem with the pokemon in the film is how textured and animal-like they are. 3D models of the creatures are nothing new, they've been the models in the games for a few iterations now, but always as either sharp or rounded edges, more like in the style of anime than resembling anything real. It's really the fact that they are so fully realized, to the point where you know what they would feel like just by looking at them, that deeply unsettles me since until now they've just been smooth looking things.
I'm not so into Pokemon, but my sister loves it so when I saw the trailer for this released, I asked her what she thought. Her exact words were "there's a fury jigglypuff and I do not approve", overall our consensus was the whole thing gave off an uncomfy vibe (or more of an uncanny valley vibe if you've got a fancy vocabulary). I think my main problem with the pokemon in the film is how textured and animal-like they are. 3D models of the creatures are nothing new, they've been the models in the games for a few iterations now, but always as either sharp or rounded edges, more like in the style of anime than resembling anything real. It's really the fact that they are so fully realized, to the point where you know what they would feel like just by looking at them, that deeply unsettles me since until now they've just been smooth looking things.
I completely agree with the "uncomfiness" of the animation style. I think that this film--based on the trailer--misses the mark when trying to translate a 2D animation into 3D. They filmmakers seem like they're trying to add their own flare to the pokemon characters instead of enhancing the already great 2D animated pokemon. They could've done something very similar to the Captain Underpants movie by using the same animation style, just using a 3D medium.
ReplyDeleteI thought the same thing when I watched the trailer. Pikachu looked very fuzzy and soft which does not fit anime at all. However, I think this was very deliberate as they are obviously trying to do something very different by making detective pikachu and not using any of the usual storylines. I think the texture on pikachu might be a way for them to separate it from anime because live action and anime never seem to mix well.
ReplyDeleteI think the problem with the designs of the 3D pokemon is that they're too in between cartoon and realism? Like they couldn't commit to one or the other, so we ended up with cartoon shapes with realistic textures and it's REALLY weird. RJ Palmer does incredible illustrations of realistic pokemon (https://www.rj-palmer.com/realistic-pokemon/) and I think it would have been cooler if they had gone more in that direction. But I'm still gonna be first in line to see Detective Pikachu so I can't really complain.
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