FILM

Even Keanu Reeves Can't Save "The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run" from Weird CGI

Keanu Reeves in a tumbleweed will still earn my ticket money, though.

Paramount Pictures

The trailer just dropped for the newest SpongeBob Movie, Sponge on the Run, and oh boy, it's a hella mixed bag.

Now I'll be totally upfront here, I almost always prefer 2D animation to 3D CGI. This holds doubly true for series like SpongeBob that started out as 2D, which makes changing everything to 3D for a big budget movie feel especially odd. 3D SpongeBob looked awful in the last SpongeBob movie, Sponge Out of Water, and while Sponge on the Run does a much better job fusing CGI with the cartoonish 2D vibe of the original series, I don't think I'm ever going to like CGI SpongeBob. But you can decide for yourself:

The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run (2020) - Official Trailer - Paramount Pictureswww.youtube.com

Weird CGI aside, there's a lot to be excited for here. For one, a sage tumbleweed with Keanu Reeve's face in the middle of it is now official SpongeBob canon. That's nothing short of amazing, and no, I will never, ever, ever get tired of seeing Keanu Reeves in everything.

Another huge plus: Sponge on the Run, which centers around SpongeBob's quest to rescue his beloved pet, Gary, after an alleged snailnapping, features the entire original voice cast. Normally this would go without saying, but considering all the disappointment surrounding Shaggy's voice in the new Scooby-Doo movie, keeping the original voice actors for the blockbuster version apparently needs to be lauded now.

And I guess if I'm being totally honest here, weird CGI SpongeBob isn't the worst official interpretation I've ever seen of the nasally sponge. That pedestal will always be reserved for Broadway SpongeBob, who was just an annoying man in suspenders.

SpongeBob BroadwayNickelodeon

And oh God, look what they did to Mr. Krabs.

Mr Krabs BroadwayNickelodeon

So I guess if I want more SpongeBob (of course I do) and I need to choose between loosely dressed up humans or kind of off-putting CGI but also Keanu Reeves, I'll go with the latter.

The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run comes to theaters May 22, 2020.

FILM

The New "Sonic the Hedgehog" Trailer Is Actually Fire

They fixed it. They actually fixed it.

Sega/ Paramount Pictures

After the Internet at large rightly condemned the original Sonic the Hedgehog movie design as an utter abomination, the animators went back to the drawing board.

Now they've returned with a whole new trailer and...damn, Sonic's actually looking fresh.

Sonic The Hedgehog (2020) - New Official Trailer - Paramount Pictureswww.youtube.com

It's hard to overemphasize how much better the new Sonic design looks compared to the previous one. For those of you who forcibly removed the original trailer from your mind, perhaps through intentional brain injury, here's a side-by-side comparison.

Sonic movie before and afterNew (left) and old (right)Sega/ Paramount Pictures

The new design actually resembles the Sonic we've always known and loved, with his big cartoon eyes and lack of over-sized nightmare human teeth. The old one is an actual war crime.

But Sonic's updated design isn't the only spot where the new trailer shines. From the opening shot set in the immediately recognizable Green Hill Zone (the first level of the original Sonic the Hedgehog for Sega Genesis) to the clip of Sonic dashing along the Great Wall of China, the new trailer makes a convincing argument for how fun Sonic could be in the real world.

With the exception of Jim Carrey as Dr. Robotnik, the original Sonic trailer failed on every conceivable front. As a lifelong Sonic fan, I was dreading the movie's inevitable release which, I was sure, would completely bastardize a character I grew up with. I'm happy to say that my opinion has done a total 180. The new trailer made me feel hopeful in the same way I felt when I watched the first trailer for Detective Pikachu (I ultimately thought the movie was just okay, but the real-life Pokemon designs were fantastic), and it's great to see Ben Schwartz's excellent Sonic voice acting come through, too.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm really looking forward to the live-action Sonic the Hedgehog movie.

Film Lists

7 Movies to Look Forward to in 2019 (That Aren't from Comic Books)

Look, "Pokémon: Detective Pikachu" looks like it could be really, really bad; but a true pokemon fan shouldn't care at this point.

Movie

Photo by Jeremy Yap on Unsplash

From new seasons of binge-worthy favorites to horrible reboots of reality TV, 2019 will bring some of our dreams and nightmares to the small screen.

On the silver screen, this year will bring a record-breaking number of superhero movies to theaters. But a windfall of new features from masterminds like James Cameron, M. Night Shyamalan, and J.J. Abrams are also slated for release. Here are seven upcoming films on which to pin all your hopes for the future of cinema:

1. Alita: Battle Angel

Release date: February 14

Most of America had probably never heard of Alita: Battle Angel before the teaser trailer dropped a little over a year ago, but heck, the visuals look darn good. Apparently this film has been a passion project of James Cameron's for years, as the director first announced it was going into development in 2003. The movie was held up due to Cameron's work on Avatar, and after proving his talent with some impressive rewrites, the reigns were handed to action film auteur Robert Rodriguez. This movie looks like an epic cyberpunk sci-fi classic in the making.

2. Us

Release date: March 22

Get Out was a perfect horror movie, and no one saw it coming. Us gives us the return of Jordan Peele as writer and director, and this time we're ready for it from the get-go. The trailer is a work of marketing genius, notably taking the Northern California hip-hop classic by Luniz, "I Got 5 On It," and weaving it into a haunting, ambient backdrop. The twist of the film seems to have already been revealed in all of the trailers, but for brevity: a family moves to a new beachfront home in California and are soon visited by shadowy figures. The film seems more like a straight-forward slasher film than the psychologically stimulating Get Out, and everyone should be pumped.

3. Glass

Release date: January 18

Okay, okay, so this is kind of a comic book movie—but not really! M. Night made these guys up all on his own, and as a sequel to his beloved sleeper-hit Unbreakable and Split, we should all be excited. It's uncharted territory for both the fans and M. Night himself, so we're all in this together. The trailers have been hyping the movie for months, and the cast is brimming with fan favorites, like the unparalleled Sarah Paulson, the ghoulishly talented James McAvoy, and the legend himself, Samuel L. Jackson. Oh, and Bruce Willis looks like he'll be in this too, but who knows if he'll be acting, or just kind of…there. Check out the trailer below.

4. Star Wars IX

Release date: December 20

Can the Star Wars sequel trilogy be redeemed from the abysmal fan response to The Last Jedi? Well, Disney scrapped the underdog director strategy and put the King of Cliffhangers, JJ Abrams, back in the saddle, so at least we know we're going to get something we're used to. Promotional material for this final chapter in the trilogy has been sparse, and the beloved main characters from the original trilogy are effectively un-reprisable. At this point, the fans are all just wondering what could possibly be next. Well, one bit of good news is we're getting the original Lando back!

5. Pet Sematary

Release date: April 5

Of all the horror movies that have been rebooted in the last 10 years, none has better deserved a revamp than Pet Sematary. The remake looks dark, eerie, chilling, and refined. From the trailer, Jason Clarke seems to bring a much more nuanced approach to the character of Louis Creed, and it also looks like they've done away with the distasteful element of the "ancient Indian burial ground." As far as horror movie remakes go, this one looks like it's worth the facelift.

6. Godzilla: King of Monsters

Release date: May 31

Alright, almost everyone in America was monstrously disappointed by the 2014 Godzilla reboot. The pacing was sluggish, and we didn't get any of that sweet, sweet Godzilla action until the last 15 minutes of the movie. Well, the producers at Warner Brothers heard our pleas and answered with Godzilla: King of Monsters. With two trailers promising epic monster brawls and dramatic existential conflicts, both the hardcore and casual Godzilla fan should be excited.

7. Pokémon: Detective Pikachu

Release date: May 10

If you were born in the 90's and had a halfway decent childhood, odds are you played a lot of Pokemon growing up. For us now-adult poke-fans, the idea of a live-action, feature-length film starring our favorite magical monsters seemed to be relegated to the world of cheap but excellent fanfiction. But no more. Our dreams have been made real, with the confusing (and potentially disastrous) casting of Ryan Reynolds as everyone's favorite electric mouse, Pikachu. It looks like it could be really, really bad; but a true pokemon fan shouldn't care at this point. We just want to see Pokemon in the real world - if we have to suffer through Reynold's annoying yammering for an hour and a half, so be it.


Ahmed is a media writer, tech enthusiast, and college student. He has a Twitter: @aahsure


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