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BEAT

LOUDSKULL
(DUDE/BRO)
Anyway here's where I repeat my theory that the Moon Knight Team REALLY DID BELIEVE they were doing some incredible next level action shit in that show, and, that Kevin Fibby, prince of lies WASN'T ACTUALLY LYING when he claimed that everyone was like "HOLY SHIT THAT'S SO BRUTAL YOU'RE GONNA EDIT THAT OUT RIGHT?"

The sad excuse for a "hallway fight" here? I genuinely believe they expected us to go "OH MAN A REAL DAREDEVIL HALLWAY FIGHT!"

I think the entire marvel TV team just has no fucking idea how to choreograph and shoot an actual goddamn fight scene.
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
BEAT I have to disagree with you on this. The point of the first half of the hallway fight is to just be a taste of Netflix Daredevil. It's a warm-up for both the character and the punchline. It's not supposed to be totally badass, peak-fight scene Daredevil action. I don't know why you thought it was supposed to be a "HOLY SHIT this is the best action ever" thing.
 

BEAT

LOUDSKULL
(DUDE/BRO)
I want the fights in these shows to look like FIGHTS. As in situations where people are trying to hurt eachother, and do so. With a sense of weight and damage and physicality.
 
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ASandoval

Old Man Gamer
(he/him)
But okay sure for the sake of argument, I'll say it again.

I want the fights in these shows to look like FIGHTS. As in situations where people are trying to hurt eachother, and do so. With a sense of weight and damage and physicality.
Normally I'd agree but that's not really what this show is or even pretends to be. Almost every fight in this show has been lampshaded in some way and it's all very intentional. It really can't be compared to Moon Knight or whatever.
 

BEAT

LOUDSKULL
(DUDE/BRO)
I think Moon Knight is a fine point of comparison because it's fights were bad in the exact same way.

This was also a problem with the fights in Loki.

All of these shows have the same problem. If the fight looking weightless and over-sanitized was a joke, (and it wasn't, the joke was She Hulk smashing through the wall and ending it prematurely) then the the "joke" fight was totally indistinguishable from the ones that weren't supposed to be jokes.

And that's a problem.
 
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Vaeran

(GRUNTING)
(he/him)
Staff member
Moderator
I get what you're saying but it doesn't bother me in the least. The fights in Daredevil were certainly impressive but also kind of exhausting and unpleasant to watch, and I don't really need that level of realistic violence in every MCU show and movie. Least of all in a sitcom.
 

YangusKhan

does the Underpants Dance
(He/Him/His)
I get what you're saying but it doesn't bother me in the least. The fights in Daredevil were certainly impressive but also kind of exhausting and unpleasant to watch, and I don't really need that level of realistic violence in every MCU show and movie. Least of all in a sitcom.
This. It's especially true in She-Hulk, where there's been like... 2 fights in the whole show? before this episode. And the first one was just Jen and Bruce doing a Hulk fight. I can understand being disappointed with the fight scenes in all these shows, but She-Hulk is where none of that matters at all.
 
I've spent the last 3-4 months watching approx 100 different Hong Kong Kung Fu movies from the 70s thru the 90s coming out of Shaw Bros and Golden Harvest. So I get the impulse to turn your nose up at milquetoast action choreography. But if I had the attitude you have BEAT, I wouldn't be able to enjoy literally *anything* made on this side of the International Date Line. This is definitely a case of taking dumb action shlock way too seriously. I am all for being a Marvel-hater, but at least do it in a way that makes sense vs getting mad at a Ally McBeal for not being Daredevil. 😂
 

Purple

(She/Her)
I think Moon Knight is a fine point of comparison because it's fights were bad in the exact same way.

This was also a problem with the fights in Loki.

All of these shows have the same problem. If the fight looking weightless and over-sanitized was a joke, (and it wasn't, the joke was She Hulk smashing through the wall and ending it prematurely) then the the "joke" fight was totally indistinguishable from the ones that weren't supposed to be jokes.

And that's a problem.
I feel like good action choreography in general is a dying art form. Really struggling to think of a good action set piece from the past let's say 15 years that wasn't in a John Wick movie or an Edgar Wright movie. I guess Cobra Kai there has managed a few? But superhero stuff in general (well, American superhero stuff anyway) has always been particularly bad about it.

Almost linked to the big climactic fight from Gaim there but oh right part of why that one's great is it spoils 100% of the show, but another part of why is motorcycle jousting.
 

Sarcasmorator

Same as I ever was
(He/him)
I'm actually quite pleased that both this show and Andor aren't too reliant on action scenes.

I still do not really like the She-Hulk CGI though. It looks like something from 10-15 years ago. But the rest of the show is a lot of fun so I let it slide.

Fury Road still has the best action choreography of the last decade, at least in Hollywood.
 
I feel like good action choreography in general is a dying art form. Really struggling to think of a good action set piece from the past let's say 15 years that wasn't in a John Wick movie or an Edgar Wright movie.
You need to cross the International Date Line to find good action. There are Chinese/HK, Thai, and Korean film makers doing absolute bonkers stuff right now, and still carrying the HK torch from the 60s-90s. But those stuff don't typically pierce the bubble of your casual 'Western' audience. Some of it filters through like Andy Cheng's stunt/fight coordination in Shang-Chi, or the HK disciples in charge of the John Wick films. But it's not nearly enough.

Here's the thing though. It's not that the choreography is bad. All the choreographers in these big Hollywood productions have exemplary and accomplished backgrounds. What's bad is the filming and editing. You go back to the great HK classics directed by Sammo Hung, or Lau Kar-leung, etc, and they do 100 takes on just a single scene just to make sure it looks and is performed perfectly. So a scene will play out, and it's totally impressive and believable when you can see a whole fight sequence performed for an extended duration without any or minimal cuts.

Hollywood does not have that patience or diligence. So they'll do a handful of takes, and then smash it together in editing. Which is how you get action scenes that are unimpressive and discombobulated with the camera cutting every other second after every other punch/kick thrown. The choreographers involved would love to do things the right way, but they're not in control here. And you can really tell when they have been given more control in films like John Wick because you get a better product as a result.

This video is Jackie Chan-centric, but its criticisms can be applied pretty generally to "Eastern" vs "Western" film making ethos, and is a really solid visual representation of what I'm describing. Everyone should watch it to get a better feel about what I'm talking about:
 

Rascally Badger

El Capitan de la outro espacio
(He/Him)
I agree that She-Hulk is not really the show to complain about how good the fights are, because that is at best a tertiary consideration for the show. But MCU fight scenes kind of top out at adequate across the whole project.
 

Vaeran

(GRUNTING)
(he/him)
Staff member
Moderator
Werewolf by Night is my jam.

Just finished this, and it was the shit! Loved the set design and atmosphere, and it didn't outlast its welcome. (I think it still could have hung together as a full-length movie, but I'm all for weird, one-off specials like this.)

I had heard a rumor that they originally wanted to introduce Blade in this, but were unable to due to scheduling difficulties. Who knows if that's true or not. He'd certainly be a good fit, but I think it may have left the story feeling a bit overcrowded so maybe it's for the best.

Turbo surprised to see Michael Giacchino's name as director. I legit didn't know he did anything other than composing, but this turned out great.

Hey, Did You Know?: Moon Knight's first appearance was as an antagonist (not really a villain) in two issues of Werewolf By Night in 1975. He then bounced around between different books for a bit before finally headlining his own series in 1980.
 
…MCU fight scenes kind of top out at adequate across the whole project.
100%, with the sole exception being the first half of Shang Chi, before that film devolves into generic Marvel fights vs generic CGI-monsters being at least above average.

The video I posted earlier ironically uses a lot of Marvel movies as counter examples of what Hollywood continually gets wrong, compared to how to film fight sequences correctly.
 

Johnny Unusual

(He/Him)
100%, with the sole exception being the first half of Shang Chi, before that film devolves into generic Marvel fights vs generic CGI-monsters being at least above average.
Yeah, I wish the movie kept it up. I get wanting to up the stakes but it loses it's charm when that happens. I actually think it's possible to combine wild super power with cool martial arts but the latter half wasn't it.
 

Sprite

(He/Him/His)
My antidote to all these MCU flaws is just to watch Everything Everywhere All at Once again. On one hand I’m disappointed that the MCU isn’t more like that movie, but on the other hand I feel like the MCU paved the way for movies like that to exist in the first place.
 

Kirin

Summon for hire
(he/him)
I still do not really like the She-Hulk CGI though. It looks like something from 10-15 years ago. But the rest of the show is a lot of fun so I let it slide.
I certainly wouldn’t fault anyone for not particularly liking the She-Hulk character CGI, but I think you’re giving way too much credit to CGI from 15 years ago. I don’t think we could have gotten anything with this range of expression, this close up, in a nearly-realistic style back then. Nevermind on a TV budget.
 

Sarcasmorator

Same as I ever was
(He/him)
Ah, that's the thing though: these shows have set a bar for movie-quality effects. Now part of that is Disney overworking their FX houses to the point that the movie FX sometimes don't look great either. The shows have been a bit uneven, and word is that this one was given a smaller budget than some of the others. It's true I was thinking of movie FX from that long ago in the comparison (Gollum was 20 years ago, and while I wouldn't expect this to be at that level, I expected a bit higher, especially because Bruce still looks pretty convincing in this). But this is the centerpiece effect of the show and there's a lot of uncanny valley to my eye.
 
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Johnny Unusual

(He/Him)
The Werewolf by Night special was a lot of fun. Really it was more of a Marvel 70s horror special two-hander with a special guest. I will say I have mixed feelings about Man-Thing. In the context of the special, it's a good character. Loveable murder monster. But I have a real affection for the more enigmatic version who is merely quasi-sentient and probably wanders aimlessly around unless he picks up the sent of emotion and follows that lead. I'm willing to say he's doing solitaire because that's what Russell would do but all the same, he's clearly presented as much more cognizant than usual (not counting R.L. Stine's recent Man-Thing mini-series.) Again, I do like this version of the character a lot, but I have my preference to the creepier but still loveable version.

Hoping for more Halloween specials. I know they are doing an Agatha Harkness one but I'm hoping for The Living Mummy, the Zombie, Manphibian, the Hellstroms (this is probably a case where they can just say no thank you to the TV version), the Monster of Frankenstein and the Tomb of Dracula.
 

Adrenaline

Post Reader
(He/Him)
Another western director who knows how to shoot fight scenes is Gareth Evans. Watch the Raid movies and Gangs of London.
 

Octopus Prime

Mysterious Contraption
(He/Him)
Werewolf by Night was much more of an Elsa Bloodstone movie, with a special guest appearance by Werewolf by Night.

I can’t fully express how pleased I was to learn that.

Man-Thing kind of felt more like Groot than Man-Thing proper, which, as Johnny said, is a fine choice, but They already had a nice, monstrous plant guy
 
I know it's She-Hulk's entire thing to break the fourth wall, but having her lampshade MCU creative bankruptcy doesn't really change the fact that it's creatively bankrupt. It really just felt like the writers didn't have a satisfying way of wrapping up all of the plotlines for the season and instead just bailed themselves out with a silly skit. Which, whatever, it isn't the worst thing. It was just kind of a letdown when the rest of the season was just soooo good. It also was a weird moment of existential crisis to realize that as a Millennial, just how hard the show was pandering to me, when Jen confronts GLADOS Kevin Feige and then moves back in with her parents. Which in any other property might be cute, but felt kinda cynical coming from The House of Mouse. I'm pretty sure BEAT would have an aneurism watching the rest of this. Still, it wasn't bad. It just wasn't the greatest bookend to what was otherwise a terrific TV show. Looking forward to more!
 

SpoonyBard

Threat Rhyme
(He/Him)
Feels like the finale was more worried about being clever than being satisfying. Overall I'm fine with the fourth wall smash and everything up to that point (I'm especially happy that Blonsky and Hulk fighting WAS a misunderstanding) but everything that followed was far too rushed and didn't make a lot of sense.

And like, they hung a lampshade on that, but pointing out a thing is rushed and doesn't make much sense does not in and of itself make a good joke. (not to mention the "You're very expensive" comment, you are Disney and have Infinite Money, maybe don't make a 'joke' about how expensive the special effects are!) Which is too bad because I think just a couple tweaks and it all would have been fine. Mostly, I don't like just eliminating the blood plot because it raises far too many questions. Just have Todd's big plan to modify the blood to give him Hulk powers fail, or even backfire. No Todd-Hulk, but no plotholes regarding the missing blood plot either.

But I don't want to be like exactly one of those 'fans' the show is skewering, and overall I enjoyed the finale and really like the show as a whole.
 

Sprite

(He/Him/His)
I mean, if any show is gonna throw shade at the MCU at least it’s one that’s legitimately different from the usual fare. But yeah, much like with Chip and Dale I don’t think Disney can really make fun of itself in a way that feels genuine. Especially when they’re like “lol what if we don’t setup the next movie” and then do it anyway.

It’s fine! Episodic shows don’t need great finales, and this show stayed delightfully episodic for the most part. I will gladly watch however much of this show they decide to make.
 

Rascally Badger

El Capitan de la outro espacio
(He/Him)
I'm kind of in the middle on She-Hulk. I think I'm coming down on the side of the finale not working for me. Mostly because they did do work to set a lot of stuff up earlier, and then pulled the rug out from under just about every plot thread.

I hope next season they make the legal stuff more idk, not nonsense.
 
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