Double Trouble #8: Robin Hood vs. Ralph Breaks the Internet

    Welcome once again to the eighth Double Trouble segment here at You Can’t Unwatch It. This week we look at the certified flop that is Robin Hood (2018) and the sequel to the pleasant surprise of 2012, Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It-Ralph 2. Need I say any more?

(*Pssst! If you’d prefer to listen to this review as a podcast, you’ll find that HERE)

Robin Hood (2018)

Robin Hood - In theaters November 21, 2018. Starring Taron Egerton, Jamie Foxx, Ben Mendelsohn, Eve Hewson, Tim Minchin, and Jamie Dornan.

           You don’t need to be an experienced film goer or even need a crystal ball to know that this latest version of Robin Hood is going to bomb. First, like any modern film made about King Arthur, audiences nowadays have no interest in those tales. It may be a pity that it has come to this but it’s the truth. The Robin Hood tale has been told to death and I don’t know why studios keep trying to lure audiences back to those tales with gritty re-imaging’s or unusual twists on the tale but it hasn’t worked for a very long time now and in the age where Marvel/DC movies and frequent remakes of Disney films rule the megaplex, that is not about to change.

           Second, this new Robin Hood is very much a trend follower. The people who made this one clearly said to themselves “Hey, those Assassin’s Creed games are popular and that Antifa movement is making headlines so let’s put those in our Robin Hood movie. And what was that Christopher Nolan movie…oh right! Batman Begins! Let’s borrow from that. Oh, and let’s also take from Ridley Scott. His Gladiator, Black Hawk Down and Kingdom of Heaven all looked great and had great action so let’s borrow from those and craft scenes with no real finesse or unique style accompanied by tons of shaky cam to give the illusion of intensity and suspense.” Ok…I’m sure they didn’t say the last portion of that sentence, but the point still stands.

           Third, the acting is…I hesitate to say passable. The actors look as if they are just there to pass the time. Taron Edgerton still thinks he’s playing Eggsy from Kingsman (the first one hopefully) when portraying Robin, Jamie Foxx is…well…Jamie Foxx.  Eve Hewson I’ll admit looks gorgeous but is a pretty forgettable Maid Marion and I kept forgetting Jamie Dornan (yep Christian Grey himself) was in the movie. At least Ben Mendelson looked like he was having fun as the Sheriff of Nottingham; chewing the scenery and shouting at everyone who aren’t the heads of the Church who are as cartoonishly evil as he is.

           Fourth, there are tons of other dumb things. Does Robin’s psychopathic old commander during the Crusades actually serve as a real threat when he is brought to Nottingham to execute the Sheriff and the Cardinal’s plan to usurp the King and to kill the Robin? No. How dare you expect such a thing to come about! Does the film at least look good? Not really. Like the action, it is very subpar compared to the aforementioned Ridley Scott films it is borrowing from accompanied by some extremely spotty CGI especially with the catapults in the Crusade scene at the beginning.

And last but not least, they really did a revisioning/redesigning of the look of the Robin Hood story in the set design and costumes. It’s an odd cross between modern and medieval aesthetics. I wonder why they even implemented those changes at all if they never factor into the story. The story still plays like a Robin Hood story that one would be familiar with but the changes made have so little to do with how it plays out that they might as well have made it hard sci-fi and set it on another planet for all the difference it makes.

           I could go into the story and characters but really, why bother? Apart from putting this on my worst of 2018 list, I won’t really remember this one. In fact, I am going to borrow a rating from famous YouTuber Jeremy Jahns and state that you won’t remember this one in T-minus one hour.

Ralph Breaks the Internet

Watch the official trailer for Ralph Breaks the Internet, and see the film in theatres November 21! "Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2" leaves Litwak's video arcade behind, venturing into the uncharted, expansive and thrilling world of the internet-which may or may not survive Ralph's wrecking.

           When game Sugar Rush breaks due to the steering wheel on the console getting torn off and leaves all the characters inside homeless, Ralph (John C. Riley) and Vanellope (Sarah Silverman) head to the internet to get a replacement on eBay. When they bid far too high (around $27,000) and have only 24 hours to pay for it, a spam advertiser named Spamley (Bill Hader) tells them to steal a super-duper car from a game character named Shank (Gal Gadot) in the game Slaughter Race that is valued at $40,000. They fail to steal it but Shank sets them in the direction of a video sharing site where they can turn Ralph into memes and get money that way. While that is becoming successful, Vanellope begins to feel like she belongs more at home in Slaughter Race with its more unpredictable tracks and dangers that make her racing more fun. This makes Ralph very insecure and leads him to do something stupid that could harm his relationship with Vanellope and could damage-if not totally destroy- the internet.

           I’m surprised to say that I walked out of this one viewing it as a bit of a mixed bag. The story is a good one and lent itself to some genuine heartfelt moments, the voice acting is top notch, the visuals are gorgeous and very clever with its portrayal of and jokes against the internet and ends in a way that feels logical to how it picked up from the first one. So…why don’t I love this movie as much as the first?

Well, from the first trailer and seeing that it was going to take place in the Internet, what I feared would happen happened. The movie works in a ton of the popular sites and contemporary workings of the internet into the movie and in doing so the film begins to slow to a crawl about midway through. I really enjoyed the first half hour and was intrigued as to where it would go. But once it gets into the portion where they make Ralph into a meme, it loses any real narrative thrust. At some point the problem with the steering wheel gets resolved and then we are just waiting for the one surrounding Ralph and Vanellope to get resolved as well. The conflict between them, where Ralph needs to learn to let Vanellope go to pursue her dreams, is a good one but it is somewhat drowned in all the Internet surrounding it.

The original film was set in arcade games but that was all in the background and Ralph’s quest to get a medal and realizing being a “bad guy” in a game setting doesn’t mean he can’t be a good guy was purely in the foreground. It had its share of Easter eggs and friendly jabs at beloved games from the past till now but that was all icing on the already delicious cake. Ralph Breaks the Internet feels like a cake with far too much icing. It may be delicious, but it will probably give you a headache if not a few cavities along the way. Also, apart from the very end, the story isn’t as poignant and doesn’t quite have the emotional resonance as the first given that the road to it became quite rocky after a half hour. But that may be just me.

Apart from my personal complaints, there is a pretty big flaw in the narrative which leads the overall conflicts to feel a bit manufactured…at least in the area with Ralph and Vanellope needing to raise money to pay for the wheel. When Ralph and Vanellope bid on the steering wheel on eBay it starts off at $250 or so. After it gets to around $400, they start to bid in the thousands, ten thousand until they ultimately reach $27,000 as the amount they have to pay. That is not how bidding on eBay works. After the get into the thousands range, the opposing bidder backs off and doesn’t place anymore bids. When they keep raising their bids, that doesn’t mean that is the amount they will have to pay. That only happens if other bidders counter bid over and over to raise the value of the item on sale. So really after Ralph and Vanellope win, they would only have to pay about $400 or so. So they could have just done a few item hunts for Spamley and that would be that. It’s not that the eBay thing wouldn’t work at all. If the steering wheel was an exceptionally rare item and probably worth in the 20 grand range with Ralph and Vanellope having to compete against a few other bidders for it, that would have worked better and the narrative would have gone more smoothly.

Ralph Breaks the Internet isn’t a bad movie. It’s just an uneven one. Its heart was in the right place with the conflict between Ralph and Vanellope and did serve as a good way to help Ralph grow more as a character. I’m glad I saw it and I’m positive that kids will love it as well as their parents but for me…this is one I would only watch when someone is already watching it and likely won’t get it on Blu-ray.

Look, the clear winner here is Ralph Breaks the Internet. Spend your money on that and let Robin Hood rot in DVD/Blu-ray bargain bins.

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