Elvira: Mistress Of The Dark Issues 1-4 Review

Hello there for the first time both comic book fans and horror fans if you've read my previous reviews you'll know that I love both comic books and horror but this is the first time i've reviewed a horror comic book and i've chosen a pretty solid one to get things started. The book that i've chosen has only just finished it's first story so my review as the title would suggest is based of those first four issues only so here is my review of Elvira: Mistress Of The Dark.

The plot to these first for issues is that while filming a movie Elvira finds her selfs being transported through time and meets up with various horror legends all while trying to defeat Vlad The Impaler. I'll admit the story wasn't what I was expecting from an Elvira comic book but at the same time it perfectly fits the character. However I would have liked the story to reference the fact that Elvira isn't as popular as she once was just because I think there's some comedic value there but that's just me.

What really bugged me about the first issue is that it takes a full seven or eight pages just to get to the first actual panel. Now the first issue is twenty eight pages so it's not that big of an issue but when your just trying to get to the first panel of a comic book you don't want to bugged down by tons of what I assume are variant covers for that same comic book. I know that's only a major gripe and i'm sure that not many of you will have that same issue but it's something that really did bug me and i'm glad that they didn't do it for the other three issues.

The writer of these first four issues at least is David Avallone who's works also include Altered States: Doc Savage , Altered States: The Shadow , Bettie Page and Twilight Zone The Shadow. I've not read any of those books so I can't say if he's a good writer or not but based of these first four issues i'd very much like to check out more of his work since it seems like he gets the Elvira character down perfectly.

Now since there's no comic book shop near me i've had to read this series online and the site i;m reading this from has David Avallone as both the writer and artist. That's not the case tho as the artist for the book is Dave Acosta I don't know what else he's worked so I can't say if he's a good artist or not I can say however that the art in these four issues was really good and alot better then what I thought it was going to be or then it had any right to be for that matter.

The book is being published by Dynamite Comics how publish the Red Sonja books and the Grimm Fairy Tale books. In my opinion they are the best company for this character since they are known for being a little bit more edgy then either of the main stream comic book companies like for example Marvel or DC so they can really push things further and for a character like Elvira is really fitting and it would have been seen as out of character if she didn't have those more mature moments in there.

As far as I can tell this series is released every two months or so which I think is a bad move just because people might forget where there up to in the story. Heck even prior to this review I had to re-read all the issues just so I had an idea of what I was going to write about but that's also because I read issue four on Wednesday but I couldn't write the review because I had a ton of other reviews to get through.

I will say that so far this year is a good year for Elvira fans not only do we have this on going series but it was also recently announced that Elvira actress Cassandra Peterson was considering a third Elvira movie as well as trying to work something out with Netflix for Movie Macarbe. Honestly i'm going to go as far to say that this is the best comic book out there just due to how well written these four issues are and how well it represents the character.

Each issue you'll always get one or two hand drawn covers and then you'll get a live action cover so you get to see how stunning Elvira is both in comic book form and in live action form. There is kind of a twist that happens in issue three I say kind of because it doesn't really read that way at least in my own personal opinion so that is perhaps something that they could have worked on doing since it's also kind of a plot point.

Now i've done some digging around and it turns out that we're getting two Elvira comic books we're getting this Mistress Of The Dark series and starting some time this month were getting The Shape Of Elvira so when I said it's a good year for Elvira fans I really did mean it. I really do hope that this series runs for a long time because it really is a fun read and I truly do believe that it's something you'll enjoy regardless if you like horror or not.

Now since this is a horror book we have to talk about if there's any scares or not and if you've seen anything from Elvira you'll know what the answer to this question is. To put it simply there are no scares to be found in this book but that doesn't bother me at all because the character wasn't about scaring you she was about telling jokes so the fact that there's no scares in this book is really fitting and it would have seemed out of place if there was anything scary in it.

As for the actual jokes there honestly not that bad as with anything to do with comedy the humour is subjective so what you find funny I might not. For me tho alot of these jokes really do work and once again they are in keeping with the actual character of Elvira so there's a lot of sex jokes , there's alot of boob jokes and there's alot of jokes about how Elvira at the start of each issue from issue two onwards would give the reader a repeat of everything that's happened.

I know this is a bit late in the review but incase you've been living under a rock for the past thirty or so years and you don't know who Elvira is well let me tell you. She was in the nineteen eighties the host of a horror show called Movie Macabre think Mystery Science Theatre only there's a stunning woman hosting the show and after a few years of doing that and becoming an icon in the local LA area Cassandra Peterson would write and star in the first Elvira movie called Elvira: Mistress Of The Dark which I highly recommend checking out and to cut  along story short she is now a pop culture icon.

Overall these four issues were a joy to read and they really are just a fun ride i'd highly recommend this series to both comic book fans and horror fans because there's something in there for both of you i'm giving these four issues a solid 9 out of 10 from me.

Reign of the Supermen Spoiler Free Review

Well then DC fans this is a review I wasn't expecting to be giving you this early (i'm writing this the day before the digital release) I was honestly expecting to do this review the day the film came out on Digital platforms since that's usually when i'd do it anyway but I don't know what the heck happened and the film popped up online a day early and well you know I never miss a chance to see a movie i've been dying to see early. So here is my review of the follow up to last years kind of hit movie The Death Of Superman with Reign Of The Supermen.

The plot of the movie is Six months after the events of the last movie the world is still mourning the death of it;s greatest hero when four new heroes all claiming to be Superman show up. As alot of you will know this film adapts the second half of The Death Of Superman storyline and while I personally havn't read that arc I can say that it's great that Warner Bros Animation decided to re-adapt the book this time splitting it into two movies.  How the film handles the storyline is pretty good the story is very easy to follow so you won't get lost at all.

Starring in the movie is Rebecca Romijn as Lois Lane , Rainn Wilson as Lex Luthor , Cameron Monaghan as Superboy , Black Lightning as John Henry Irons / Steel , Patrick Fabian as Hank Henshaw / Cyborg Superman , Jason O'Mara as Batman , Rosario Dawson as Diana Prince / Wonder Woman , Shemar Moore as Victor Stone / Cyborg , Nathan Fillion as Hal Jordan / Green Lantern , Christopher Gorham as Barry Allen / The Flash , Nyambi Nyambi as John Jones / Martian Manhunter and horror legend Tony Todd as Darkseid.

Now I know that I left out alot of actors but there's alot of people in this movie and I can't just name the ones crucial to the plot because alot of them are. That said tho the acting is actually really good Rainn Wilson makes for a terrifying Lex Luthor and Tony Todd is just great in anything he's in. There was one name that I left out on purpose tho and if you've read the comic book you'll know why but I will say that this actor has been alot of the recent Dc animated films.

Now I can't fond who did the animation for this film but common sense would dictate that it was the same company who did the animation for the previous film. If that is the case then I have to say that in my opinion the animation in this film is a huge step down from what was seen in the previous film. Don't get me wrong it's still great animation but by DC standards it's not that good which is a shame because this storyline really would require the best animation that you can get on a small budget.

I said this in my review of The Death Of Superman but I prefer Superman: Doomsday not only because it was the first DC animated movie I ever bought but because I think it's a great movie. I can see why they did split this story in half because there's no way in hell it could have been done as one movie. Even if your movie is a great movie there still would have been alot of stuff cut out so at here they won't have that issue and they could have included things that people thought was missing from Doomsday.

Speaking of doing this story as one movie that's kind of what DC are planning I say kind of because there re-releasing both films but now they'll be edited together and have new footage added to them. I have to wonder why there even doing that it makes no sense no sense at all and it now means that the people who already have both films on DVD or whatever now might have to go and spend even more money just to see what the extra footage is.

One of the other things that I didn't like about the film was the pacing for me this film felt alot longer then what it really was. This film really didn't need to be an hour and a half especially because it's a second half of a story so if anything it should have been around an hour and fifteen minuets long but that's just my personal opinion. Another kind of issue that I had with the film is that the emotional moments just don't work as well in this film as they did the in the first film and i'm not sure why that even is.

This film does have a lot of humour and rather fittingly alot of the jokes do go to Nathan Fillion's character. I say that because the guy has pitch perfect delivery and can make pretty much anything funny and it helps that the jokes he's got in this film are genuinely quite funny I mean there nothing special but there alot better then anything you'll find in the typical episode of Teen Titans Go and that is a huge plus.

This is a superhero film so that means we have to talk about the action scenes and I honestly think that the action scenes in this movie are kind of dull. There honestly not that bad to look at but when you think about how good that they could have been compared to what we've actually got it does make me feel disappointed and also because DC animated films usually have great fight scenes so to have action scenes here that aren't as good when they so clearly could have been much better is a huge let down in my personal opinion.

I know that this might not go down well with alot of people but I can't help but think that this would make a great live action film. I know they kind of did it in Dawn Of Justice and Justice League but imagine if dawn Of Justice didn't do that storyline at all and Justice League part 1 was basically The Death Of Superman except you don't do it in under two hours you make the film two and a half hours because don't forget you'd still have get the league together. You have part 1 end with the death of Superman and the death of doomsday and then for part 2 it's the return of Superman that to me just sounds awesome.

Like the first movie there kind of is a nod to the first Christopher Reeve Superman movie and unlike the previous film where it's used at a highly emotional moment here it's just done as a joke i'm not going to spoil what it is but if you've seen the 78 movie you'll know what I mean. There's also a rumour to another classic DC live action show and again i'm not going to spoil it but I will say it's not Batman'66 and it involves a WONDERful character and yes that is a huge clue.

Overall this film is not as good as the previous film it is still a good film but it could and should have been so much better and so with all of that in mind the film is getting a 7 out of 10 from me if you want to own the film it's out on DVD and Blu-ray on January 29th.

  

Green lantern: First Flight Review

Dc fans the company is known for making great animated movies in fact as of this writing the companies latest animated feature is due out on Digital release within the coming week. For this review tho we're going back to near the start of there animated movie line back to a time where it wasn't as popular as it is now and when Bruce Timm was a producer on all the films and the film i'm looking at is Green Lantern: First Flight.

The plot of the movie is Hal Jordan is a rookie Green Lantern who teams up with mentor Sinestro to find out who killed Abin Sur but during there quest they discover that one of them is a traitor. I admit that while the story is well told and fairly well paced if you know anything about the Green Lantern lore then you'll know right away for the traitor is so it isn't that much of a surprise when it happens and I have no idea why various GL movies keep trying to do this twist because we all know it's coming.

Starring in this movie is Christopher Meloni as Hal Jordan / Green Lantern , Dr. Martin Stein as Sinestro , Number Six from Battlestar Galactica as Boodikka , Michael Madsen as Kilowog , My Foot Up Your A*s as Kanjar Ro , John Larroquette as Tomar Re and Olivia d'Abo as Carol Ferris. I know that alot of people love Nathan Fillion as Green lantern but for me Christopher Meloni is a good Hal Jordan as well granted he might not get as many funny lines as Nathan but for the tone that this film is going for it really does work.

As for the rest of the actors I was honestly surprised at how many great actors were in this movie and I know that I made alot of jokes when I was listing who played who. I only made those jokes because I was honestly shocked that they were in this movie and there all really good in it as well altho Olivia is only in the opening of the movie and she was good so the movie could have used more of her somehow.

The animation for the film was done by Telecom Animation Film Company who are now TMS Entertainment and they did work on the 1994 Spider-Man series as well both the Batman and Superman animated shows. I can say that having them on board did give me some hope for the quality of the animation not like it was ever needed because the DC films are always well animated but here it honestly looked like this film belonged on the big screen.

What is surprising when you think about it is that even Wonder Woman is the more popular character she's only had one solo animated movie where as Green Lantern who isn't as popular has had two solo movies plus a solo animated series. That was honestly quite a shock to me altho given how poorly the Wonder Woman sold it does kind of make sense but still you'd think that Warner Bros would want to make more stuff with a popular character instead if focusing on a character that isn't as well known.

For those wondering if this is an origin story the simplest answer is kind of I say that because the opening few minuets is the traditional backstory. After the credits tho that does kind of continue as we see Hal joining the corps but it's not a backstory in the more traditional sense and that does make sense since apparently they did his backstory in Justice League: The New Frontier and director Lauren Montgomery didn't want to cover the same story.

There is a lot of CGI in the film and unlike the live action Green Lantern film it's not that bad but don't get me wrong it's pretty bad but unlike the live action film which had a huge budget here it's more understandable since the budget for straight to DVD films is alot smaller. So you can forgive them for having pretty bad looking CGI and also unlike the live action film Hal's super suit isn't fully CGI whoever made the call on that film to have the whole suit be CGI should have been fired because it was a dumb move to make.

This film was the fifth film in the DC Universe Animated Original Movies line up of films and for me this isn't the best film in that line up which I will always state is Wonder Woman heck this one wouldn't even crack my top 10. It is still a really good film tho and alot of that does come from the action scenes which are really well handled and to make things interesting the final isn't just a scene where the hero and villain use there super powers instead it's a hand to hand fight.

Anyone remember when this movies had opening title sequences because I do and they were always fun to watch granted alot of them where nothing special but they always looked visually interesting. For some reason the recent movies have got rid of the opening title sequence instead just opting to show the title of the movie can we bring back opening title sequences for these movies please when they look good there great.

Overall like I said this is a really decent film it does have a very predictable plot twist tho which is something that the GL movies should just stop doing because we all know it's coming but apart from that it's a movie that I really did enjoy so it gets a 6 out of 10 from me.

Back To The Future: The Animated Series Review

Back To The Future fans depending on where you read this review you'll know that i'm currently in the process of reviewing things from the Back To The Future franchise and that includes what i'm about to review today. What i'm going to review is something that not even fans of the Back To the Future franchise talk about and after seeing a few episodes I can kind of see why so here is my review of Back To The Future: The Animated Series.

The premise of this show is basically it's the further adventures of Doc , Marty and Doc's family so to say it's episodic would be an understatement. Unlike other episodic shows where you don't need to have seen the first episode to understand what's going on in this case you need to have seen at least the first and third film just because those films introduce alot of the characters that are seen in this series.

Returning as Doc Brown in the shows live action segments is the great Christopher Lloyd with the character being voiced by Homer Simpson yup you heard that right Dan Castellaneta is in the show. Chris isn't the only returning actor tho as we also have Mary Steenburgen as Clara Clayton Brown and Thomas F. Wilson as not only Biff Tannen but also every ancestor of the Tannen family. The new actors are Cathy Cavadini as Jennifer Parker , David Kaufman as Marty Mcfly , a young Josh Keaton as Jules Brown and Troy Davidson as his brother Verne Brown.

The returning actors are fine even tho Christopher Lloyd shockingly sounds pretty bad in the live action segments. Both Mary and Tom are pretty decent in the show altho none are really given much to work with which I guess makes sense since we did just have three films set in that world. It's with the new actors tho that in my opinion the acting works it's best even a young Josh Keaton is actually pretty good in the show.

The animation was done by Big Pictures don't worry if you havn't heard of them I havn't either and I can't even find out what they've worked on because there's nothing about them on the internet anywhere. As for what I thought about the animation it's very cartoony which normally wouldn't be an issue but the fact that the film series it came from was very mature in a lot of ways it really is kind of jarring.

Another issue I have with the show is that it's aimed at little kids which wouldn't be an issue but it trys to have it cake by having be set in the world of Back To the Future. From day one people should have realised that having a Back To The Future animated series aimed at kids is a bad idea and it's because in order to understand anything you need to have seen the movies they can't make a kids shows based on a film that had a PG rating and expect the kids watching the show to understand everything that's going on.

Unlike the film series which strictly follows the rules of Time Travel established in The Time Machine for some reason this series doesn't. Just so you know what I mean the rule of time travel is if you build and then use a time machine you can only go backwards and forwards in time not in time and space. For some reason this show doesn't follow that rule in fact it breaks it in the very first episode and that really annoys me because the first film did time travel really well so now to see those same characters moving in time and space in a time machine to me is really irritating.

This show first started airing on CBS on September 14th 1991 and lasted for two seasons airing it's final episode on December 26th 1992 and lasting twenty six episodes with each season being thirteen episodes. For you see this show went into production just after the third film came out and the world was craving more adventures and since Bob Gale and Robert Zemeckis didn't want to do a sequel they instead chose to make an animated series that way the world can get more adventures and they can work on other films. It's not a bad idea in theory but the issue is like I said they chose to aim a film which would have been seen by teens and adults at little kids.

To me what would have made the most sense was if they used the actual Back To The Future theme for the intro to the show since that's the theme that's most associated with the franchise or if not that at least "The Power Of Love" by Huey Lewis and The news. What we have instead is a pretty bad cover version of "Back In Time" which granted was written for the film but it's not a song that you think of when you think of Back To The Future and for some reason they reuse a scene from the end of the first movie and they remove the great score by Alan Silvestri and replace it with a terrible piece of music.

I have to say that I kind of hate that they made this show very cartoony it's not a bad idea but when it comes from a film is kind of grounded in reality it doesn't make sense and can be jarring. I think that they made it cartoony just to please the little kids but without realising that the people most likely to not only watch this show but also enjoy it are people who watched and enjoyed the movies so why they didn't take a more realistic approach is beyond me.

It seems that the animation wasn't the only thing done to please little kids because anything that made the movies more adult isn't present in this series at all. All of the jokes are jokes that little kids would have enjoyed. I honestly don't think that I laughed at one single joke all throughout the entire series which is pretty bad considering that this is meant to be a comedy. Heck even the characters seem like a more cartoony version of there movie counterparts how they managed to do that with established characters is beyond me but some how they did it.

Overall I can very easily see why fans of the franchise wouldn't talk about this franchise however at the same time it is still new adventures with our favourite characters so if your a fan of the franchise it might be worth checking out but if your not a fan don't even bother just avoid the fan inside me is giving this series a 5.5 out of 10 but if I wasn't a fan it would be getting at least a 4 out 10

Some Animated Films That You Might Not Have Heard Of

Animation fans i'm not going to lie i've been sat here racking my brain for a good few hours trying to think of something at least semi decent to give you guys and I think i've come up with it. It's something that's a little bit different and will hopefully expose you guys to some more animation which can only be a good thing so here we go so yeah i'm going to be looking at a lot of animated films that you guys might not have heard of and I hope that you guys go and check these films out.

Ethel And Ernest

Boys and girls i;m not going to go into to much detail about this one since I do plan on reviewing it very soon but I can say that this film is so little known that until I began writing this post I didn't know about it and that's a shame given that the cast is full of great British actors. The reason i'd say you might not have heard of it is because it's British and aired on British TV and as much as I hate this fact but British shows don't get as much attention as American ones unless it's Doctor Who or Downton Abby.

When The Wind Blows

This is on here for the exact same reason that Ethel And Ernest is on here and like that film I do plan on reviewing this one very soon. As far as I can tell this did get a theatrical release at least here in the UK but I might be wrong another reason why I think that this film isn't that well known is because it came out in 1986 so it could just be because of the passage of time that people have forgotten about the film.

Sgt. Stubby: An American Hero

Last year was one of the best years for animated films that we've had in a long long time yes there was one or two bad films but the overall majority of them were good if not great. That's where this film comes in because while people were focused on the major animated films there was this small little indie animated film doing the rounds and it was really good it's a film that I will continue to talk about because it deserves to be talked about and it deserves to be seen.

A Silent Voice

I was really freaking tempted to put Your Name here but I get the feeling that even if you don't watch anime on a weekly basis you've at least heard of that film and that's not what this post is about. I went with this film and the next film on this post because they both got overshadowed by Your Name and that's a shame because all three films deserve to be talked about heck when people were saying that Your Name should have been nominated for an OSCAR I was making the case for these two films they are that good.

In This Corner Of The World

While A Silent Voice was about a death girl and her former bully learning to be friends this film is about the struggles and hardships of surviving Hiroshima. When I say surviving I don't mean you see the military trying to get by you see the average people just struggling to get by day to day and that right there makes this movie ten times more heartbreaking then Your Name ever will be and this will most likely be the final anime you see on this list but we'll see.

Ballerina

I'm sort of cheating with this one since it did get a wide American release under the name Leap! but I still want to talk about it because of the fact that not that many people do talk about it. In fairness I can see why since it is a very forgettable film heck even right now i'm struggling to think of anything from this film but that doesn't mean that it shouldn't be forgotten since even the bad films should be talked about so we know what to look for when spotting a bad film.

Mary and the Witch's Flower

We're heading back to the land of the rising sun for this film because it seems that the only anime that people in the animation community will talk about are either really popular films like Your Name or anything by Studio Ghibli. Which to me isn't fair because not everyone can be Studio Ghibli and films from smaller and this case newer studios should be talked about as well infact alot of ex Ghibli employees worked on this film. From just this film alone I can say that Studio Ponoc have a bright future ahead of them.

Mary And Max

Now i've not seen this film myself yet I do have it downloaded tho and I hope to be watching it sometime within the next week. This was a film that someone on Cartoon Amino told me about and after seeing the trailer that they provided I went and downloaded the film because it looks freaking fantastic and for the life of me I have no idea why this film didn't get much attention when it came out in 2009.

The Breadwinner

It still shocks me to this very day that not alot of people know about this film and this is one of the few times were I agree with the OSCAR nomination. This film is everything you want from a great film it's funny , it's tragic and most importantly of all not only does it have great animation done by Cartoon Saloon but it comes from a place of pure passion. So I urge you guys to go and check this film out because you won't forget it one bit.

So there we go guys I want you guys to know that you shouldn't feel obligated to check these films out like I say a few times early on in the post i've not seen them yet but I plan of doing soon. All of these films should be seen for one reason or another and the reason why I chose to stick with small indie animated films is because whenever a big name animation studio announced a new film people start talking about it but no one bats an eye lid when one of these smaller studios do.

Ten Of What Are In My Opinion The Greatest Anime Of All Time

Hello there anime fans with alot of anime fans out there very fond of doing lists I thought i'd do something a tad bit different a list. Only this list will not be a best of kind of list because all of these anime have either stood the test of time or are going to stand the test of time. Please note that since i'm only one man i've not seen every single anime that's ever been made so there will be alot of possibly great anime missing so lets get it started.

10) Your Name

I'm getting this one out of the way right now because let's face it you all know that every top 10 best of list is going to include this film. So putting here just makes the whole thing a little bit more unpredictable and yes Your Name is a truly great film heck i'd even say it's one of the most stunning anime films in the past few years but my god was this film over hyped as hell and when I say over hyped i'm talking Frozen levels of over hyped. It's even getting to the point that if you make a top 10 best of list you feel obligated to include this film. 

9) A Silent Voice

This film is in my opinion much better then Your Name yes Your Name is alot more stunning of that i'm not denying. However in terms of how I personally felt towards the story having been a victim of bullying myself was quite different to how I felt towards the story in Your Name and allot of that is due to the fact that like I said I myself was bullied and I can there for connect with the main female character alot easier plus both the anime and the manga made me cry alot.

8) Hellsing Ultimate

You no the expression "you never forget your first time" well I would like to sort of echo that because while Hellsing Ultimate wasn't the first anime I watched (like most of you that honour goes to Pokemon) but it was the first anime I ever bought on either VHS / DVD /Blu-Ray so it does hold a special place in my heart. It also helps that this OVA series is really kicka*s for me it's a great horror anime but there's a few more that are better but for different reasons.

7) My Neighbor Totoro

I had the pleasure of seeing this film for the first time last year and while I don't think it's as good as people have made it out to be over the years. I can certainly see why people would like it perhaps I missed my chance to fully enjoy it or perhaps it's only good threw nostalgia glasses but tho I have ti admit it is one of the best anime films of all time but in my personal opinion there are a few films that are miles better.

6) Highschool of the Dead

I know that alot of people are going to kill me for putting this show above anything to do with Studio Ghibli but here me out. I put this here because this show knows that it's a dumb show and it just has fun with it it doesn't try and bog things down with complicated storylines it knows that your here to see girls with big boobs take on a hoard of Zombies and it has fun with it. This show to me says that you don't need a great plot line to be good all you need is to be fun a bunch of girls with Double D's.

5) In This Corner of the World

This is such an underrated masterpiece this film got overshadowed by A Silent Voice which in turn was overshadowed by Your Name. In all honesty none of those films should have been overshadowed because they are all great in there own way so you might be asking your self what puts this film above the other two then well it's simple not only i'm a history buff but i'm also a sucker for a really engaging story and this film does both.

4) Blood-C

Now I know your wondering why this show little show that hasn't made much of an impact on the medium is featured here well that's because this show is not only well acted but also well animated. It helps that there is a a really good mystery as well and that's something that I cannot say happens that often in either anime or in cartoons so when something comes along and the mystery is actually good you have to give it some credit.

 3) Dragon Ball Z

Now I know your wondering why isn't this show number one well when we get to number one you'll fully understand why. This was a show that many people myself included grew up with heck i've just seen the latest movie for crying out loud despite turning out one terrible god awful American movie and a terrible spin off everything that has come from this franchise has been solid gold and know where is that more apparent then in DBZ the show which i'm guessing turned alot of us onto anime in the first place.

2) Arrietty

What's this two Ghibli films on the same list and one of them isn't one of the more well known ones what kind of madness is this is what i'm assuming your saying right now. Well there's a simple answer for that and it's that i've not seen any more of the more well known Ghibli films and I can't remember When Marnie Was There and just to make things clear when I talk about this film i'm always going to talk about the UK dub because the American dub is terrible the UK version does the story alot of justice.

1) Ghost In The Shell

I don't think it needs saying but whenever I talk about Ghost In The Shell i'm referring to the original movie not any of the other animated movies , not the TV show and defiantly not THAT live action movie. Heck it's weird because whenever people do mention Ghost in The Shell it's always the TV series that comes to mind not the far better 1995 movie i'm not saying that the TV series isn't good far from it but when push comes to shove i'm always going to go with the movie over the series any day.

So there you have it anime fans ten anime that are in my opinion the greatest anime of all time now I know that alot of you are wondering where certain shows or movies are. Well like I said at the start of the post I havn't seen every single anime out there so chances are I havn't seen your favourite show or movie.

  

Tom And Jerry Shorts Review

Cartoon fans i've made it very freaking clear that I love Tom And Jerry and what's not to love these two are one of the best silent double acts ever and while i've reviewed plenty of the movies heck one might even say that there's another review coming but i've never reviewed the original. Well that's going to change as i've just downloaded twelve of the original shorts so here we go with the review of Tom And Jerry.

Like alot of theatrical cartoons from back in the day there's no real plot heck the plot of each cartoon changes from from to cartoon. So in one episode Tom could be someone's pet trying to keep Jerry out the house and in the next episode they both could be at the beach. Point is it doesn't matter what the set up of each cartoon is because the characters weren't known for there stories they were known for the violence and I think it's wise that the makers chose not to have a very detailed story since each short is around nine minuets long so they just give you the set up and nothing else.

Unlike alot of cartoon even of the time Tom And Jerry actually doesn't have a voice cast well at least for the main two characters. They do have voice actors for Mammy Two Shoes and Spike but Tom And Jerry are one hundred percent silent with only Tom's screams being provided by co-creator and animation legend William Hanna. Honestly in my opinion it was a rather bold move even back then to not have your main characters say a word they would say the odd word of dialog in the odd episode but for a lot of time they don't say a word.

It's at this point I have to mention THAT movie and no I don't mean the Willy Wonka one you all know the one I mean. It's the one where Tom And Jerry spoke all the time whoever thought that was a great idea has clearly never seen a Tom And Jerry cartoon. Since if they did they would no that Tom And Jerry never talk it's one of the unwritten laws of cartoons with i'm sure the the other one being if it's good turn it into a terrible live action movie.

In order to full prepare myself for this review i've watched alot of episodes from all three era's of the original shorts so that means i've watched cartoons from the William Hanna and Joseph Barbera as well as the infamously bad Gene Deitch and the Chuck Jones era. So I can say that in terms of animation quality I agree with alot of people when they say that the Hanna-Barbera era is perhaps the best era for the shorts and characters however I have a certain fondness for the Chuck Jones era since I grew up with alot of those shorts on VHS.

I think it's safe to say that alot of us cartoon fave have at some point grown up watching Tom and Jerry be it the original shorts or the various TV shows and movies. These are characters that we have all grown up watching since there's just something about them that makes them timeless and I think alot of that is due to the fact that they don't talk and I know I shouldn't keep going on about that but it's something that really sets them apart and because they don't talk that means there's not held back by what was ever popular back in those days.

If you guys want to watch all of the shorts in one sitting you actually might be able to since there's one hundred and sixty one shorts so you could watch all of the shorts in a good few hours very easily. However that is something that i;m not going to be doing anytime soon because I remember how it was watching just thirty Looney Tunes cartoons so there's no way in hell i'm subjecting myself to alot more episodes.

I would however be willing to watch alot of the movies provided I had a break inbetween each one tho. Since there are a lot of Tom And Jerry movies but what is odd is that last year was for a long time the only year that didn't have a new Tom And Jerry movie so I have to wonder did the people in charge realise that the Willy Wonka Tom and Jerry film was that bad that they just gave up on the franchise or are they planning something for this year that's more in line with these original shorts.

You guys just knew I had to include this short when I was picking the shorts to watch since it's perhaps one of the most famous Tom And Jerry shorts ever made. It's also the cartoon where Tom And Jerry straight up commit suicide so to say it's depressing as hell is an understatement. There was also a rumour that this was meant to be the series finale and it thus would have been a fitting end for the duo but as well know that turned out to be false since many more cartoons were made over the years.

 Something that I quickly realised was that in alot of the shorts Jerry just straight up picks on Tom for no reason. I'm not even kidding Tom would just be chilling out alot of the time and Jerry would walk on over there and cause all sorts of trouble and for no freaking reason I know that that's a small detail to mention but it's one that i thought was worth bringing up because alot of people say that it's Tom that starts alot of the violence when alot of the time that's anything but the truth.

There's no way I can do a review of the original Tom And Jerry and not mention a few things the first thing is the apparent racism in Tom And Jerry. Yeah I don't get this but apparently the character of Mammy Two Shoes is seen as raciest and to be honest she's not a racist character at all and so how did people in charge of making this show in 60's choose to handle this character why they chose to replace her with a thin white woman because apparently making a character white really fixes things.

The other thing that I have ti mention is the fact that Tom And Jerry all throughout these shorts are ever so rarely friends yes there is the odd cartoon where they do team up but it's mostly to take on Spike so it would make sense. However it doesn't make sense for them to not only become friends in that THAT movie but to then remain friends that is just out of character if that was say Tom and Spike you could buy it but it's not Spike in fact he's not even referenced once in the whole thing which considering he's quite a big characters is a huge flaw.

It wouldn't be a review of Tom And Jerry if I didn't talk about the slapstick and im going to try and not be that hard on them because what might have been funny back then might be now. I will say however that a vast majority of the humour in these shorts is still really funny yes you are going to get the odd unfunny joke but those are mostly in the Gene Deitch directed shorts and lets be honest those cartoons are pretty freaking bad anyway. 

What helped set Tom And Jerry apart from all the other shorts that were out at the time is that they used slapstick as there main source of humour. So like I said at the start of the review you got a minuet maybe a minuet and a half of just set up and then you got nothing but pure violence even in the very first cartoons where Tom looks more catlike and even has a cat yell (thank god they changed the designs) there's still plenty of slapstick heck even in the movies they know to have the humour from Tom And Jerry be them hitting each other because nobody does that better then those two.

Overall these characters are legendary for a reason so there's really no point in me even giving these shorts a rating because you all ready know if there good or not. So instead i'll end the review by saying that I hope these characters stay around for a long , long , long , long , long time.