We may well have just received the very first trailer for the upcoming film Pokémon The Movie: Mewtwo Strikes Back Evolution, but there's another 2019 Poké-movie also getting a little bit of love as we approach the new year.
Remember Detective Pikachu? Of course you do. The film is set to arrive in cinemas on 10th May 2019, bringing Pikachu and the gang to life in a way we've never seen before. Ryan Reynolds, who plays the comical and adorable Pikachu in the film, has shared this image of himself covered in little dots - the dots are used alongside motion capture technology to place any expressions and gestures he makes onto the animated Pikachu's face.
If you want to see how this turns out for the final product - and also because we can't help wanting to watch it all over again - we've included the official trailer for you below. If you're interested, you can also check out a collection of character models and props which were used in the film, spotted at Legendary Entertainment's headquarters.
Two very different Pokémon films arriving in the same year. 2019's going to be a good one, huh?
[source twitter.com]
Comments 27
Thought he was only doing the voice, fair play to him.
While im sure there are beautifully made artistic movies full of nuance and thoughtful writing coming out next year which everyone will say is a must see... i just want to watch a Pikachu in a funny hat crack one liners.
I figured they were doing something like this but it's awesome seeing it in action.
Admittedly, I'm not a Pokemon fan. But this actually looks pretty good and I'll see it when it comes out.
Warner Bros. used top-of-the-notch state-of-the-art motion capture technology to make Ryan Reynolds feel like Pikachu, while the Sonic Movie animators took notes from Donkey Kong's TV Show.
Notice how they haven't been hiding the characters behind silhouettes.
I'm slowly moving out of the "cautiously optimistic" zone into "pretty optimistic" zone for this one. This tech fan enjoys stuff like this!
Huh, I would not have expected them to do mocap for a mouse, but it works so I'm glad they thought of it.
Jigglypuff didn't have enough time to draw on Ryan Reynolds face, so she just drew dots and skadoodled.
Awww he is so cute! Love that close up on Pikachu. Just wanna give him a big ol huge! So adorable.
Better than the Sonic movie
Somewhere, somewhen, Andy Serkis is plotting to take Ryan Reynolds down, no one takes a mocap role from Serkis. Not his job.. his.. precious!
I still can't shake the idea that this is just Deadpool as a Pokémon...
@RyanSilberman Sonic's marketing team is just bad. With mascot based properties, fans can get pretty judgy with how a character has been adapted into a new form of media. With Detective Pikachu they smartly knew this and put it all on the table in the trailer. The results spoke for themselves. A lot of people have differing opinions on how the Pokemon look. Buttttt, many people will agree that, cute or creepy, the Pokemon seem to work in the context of the movie. More importantly, the trailer is well constructed and makes the movie seem like it will be at least be an entertaining ride. By presenting the Pokemon in the same context the movie will presumably be presenting them in, the seemingly quality movie was allowed to speak for itself and get past any criticism some fans may have with the Pokemon designs. Sonic hasn't done this. They have revealed only the character, not even in full, and have left only that out there for people to judge. The reactions have (predictably) not been positive and as of such the marketing team will be facing a now even more uphill battle from here on out (more uphill than most live action video game adaptations already face).
Fun fact, in addition to playing Deadpool, Ryan Reynolds was also the CGI body model for Juggernaut in Deadpool 2.
This is just a by-the-numbers lowest-common-denominator populist Hollywood popcorn flick, through and through, with its use of tired tropes and stunt-casting in order to sell tickets (there are countless out-of-work voiceover artists that would have done an infinitely better job) just like virtually every other game-to-film adaptation that preceded it (and will no doubt follow), hence why so many with little to no familiarity with the Pokémon franchise are so keen to see this. It never ceases to bewilder why the masses are so eager to see butchered Americanisations of long-running franchises in the form of Hollywood flicks rather than the source material.
Similarly, I love DOOM, but the casting of the grossly overrated and seemingly omnipresent "The Rock" cringe was an instant turn-off. Detective Pikachu, even without the phoned-in performance of Reynolds, looks bad either way with its hideous animation (typical of U.S. CGI movies) which would have looked more at home in a grotesque comic horror film such as Gremlins (which I quite enjoyed) or Critters. Even something as left field as a Pokémon horror film would have been preferable, but in Hollywood, marketability trumps all else, creativity be damned.
The Detective Pikachu movie seems like an easy way to make half a billion to a billion dollars and potentially lure a few non-Pokémon fans into the franchise in the process. It is not aimed at film lovers or Pokémon fans per se, but everyday moviegoers who may be inclined to sample a new franchise, albeit in a typical Hollywood fashion, with its clichéd "smartass" Amercianised butchering of a beloved overseas icon (Peter Rabbit is another recent example that springs to mind). I can't say that I liked the aggressive fan insistence on DeVito filling the role, but he would easily have been a far, far superior choice to Reynolds, or frankly anybody capable of executing a distinctive cartoonish voice.
There are still great films being produced by independents in the U.S., but the manatees at Hollywood haven't produced a decent film in years, and it will probably surprise my non-Pokémon fan friends that I do not wish to see this.
@Silly_G It's best to reserve judgement for the film until you see it. I agree that Hollywood just cares about profit, but that doesn't ALWAYS curb creativity (i.e. the new Spider-Man movie, the LEGO Movie, etc). I too have concerns about this movie, but I'm going to wait to see it before I brush it off as a bad popcorn-flick (which there are many these days).
If detective pikachu doesn't say his catchphrase "bizinga buzonga lasagna KACHOW!!" then I well be insanely displeased.
First of all, Ryan Reynolds is awesome.
Secondly, that movie looks WAY better than I was expecting.
@Kimyonaakuma "I still can't shake the idea that this is just Deadpool as a Pokémon..."
I kept expecting a 4th-wall break.
@N00BiSH It's not the CG we're angry about, It's Sonic's character design. Some people thought Pikachu looked initially creepy when the trailer came out, but adjusted to it because he still inherently looks like his game counterpart. Sonic just looks overly realistic for the sake of "fitting in" with the real world, and looks very off-putting as a result. I'm sure the mo-cap will be fine, but the design just looks unsettling
@Silly_G I feel like if they were going the cash cowl route, then the studio would've just settled on an action-oriented Pokemon movie with a Trainer protagonist battling various Gym Leaders and thwarting Team Rocket. The fact that they chose a world within the franchise that no average moviegoer will recognize, is frankly quite refreshing. Pretty much no one except my closest friends were even aware this was adapting the Detective Pikachu game. I'm excited at the prospect of this actually being good because it presents a unique vision of the Pokemon world beyond what casual Pokemon fans or average moviegoers will even remember.
@BlueBlur101 : That's because it's not necessarily aimed at longtime Pokémon fans, as I said earlier. It is, by design, aimed at attracting as many bums on seats as possible, hence the casting of a big name and the fact that no prior knowledge of the franchise is assumed (or needed) to follow the movie.
Those interested in a trainer protagonist would be watching the annual animated features, which have been ongoing since 1998.
@Silly_G Honestly If I were just a greedy Hollywood executive, the easiest way to attract people would just be to make a generic action movie with a cookie cutter protagonist played by a high profile celebrity, on the nose references to the anime, and Giovanni being played by someone who looks nothing like Giovanni
@BlueBlur101 Well, I mainly implying two things.
1. The Sonic movie design is as bad(worse even) the model in the DKC cartoon.
2. The DKC cartoon used motion capture. Not to it's benefit, though, and I can see the same thing happening with the Sonic movie.
i.e. realistic running animations.
@N00BiSH well you have to consider that the dkc show was madd around the time CG in general was in its infancy, having only released a few years after the likes of Toy Story and Reboot.
Not saying that gives Sonic a free pass, I just need to see the full design with the proper lighting, in order to judge whether this will be a bad film, or a hilarious trainwreck
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