So this isn’t exactly a new thing, an adult take on a world where humans and puppets coexist (Greg the Bunny comes to mind), but this movie’s trailer makes it look like the film is probably the most extreme hardcore project of its scope ever attempted.
Happy Time Murders
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I'm actually quite interest in this movie. Looks to be pretty funny in my opinion.
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Not really into the Puppet Semen joke.
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i heard the producers of Sesame Street is suing this movie for a tagline that they use.
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Definitely checking that out.
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They had me until the muppet ejaculation gag.
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Peter Jackson already did this, and the result is the cult classic Meet the Feebles.
HEROMAN… ATTACK!!
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I hadn't even heard about this until the articles, where the Henson company is really miffed that this could hurt the brand. Certainly is my "kind" of comedy, might see it. Although Melissa McCarthy is ehhhhh
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Also, remember Greg the Bunny?
…Yeah, me neither
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I remember Greg the Bunny, it's a really underrated show.
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Peter Jackson already did this, and the result is the cult classic Meet the Feebles.
That one is about puppets? Neat, I'll have to check that out. But yeah, I already pointed out HTM is nothing new, this one just seems to have a high enough budget to look professional.
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So it seems like they're not lifting the review embargo til the film actually comes out, which I'm not sure how to take. Usually if the filmmakers are confident in their work they'll lift the embargo early, like they do with Marvel movies, but since this is a somewhat controversial project I would hope they would release the embargo on reviews a few days early so we could have the same confidence in it, but if they don't…well, it just feels like they don't have that much faith in their finished product, so they may not be expecting the critics to be favorable to it. I'm probably still going to see it if it doesn't get below a 40% on Rottentomatoes, otherwise I'll wait for DVD. It just bothers me that I can't see any reviews the few days during the week before it's released.
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I'm interested in seeing it myself. Maybe next week, since I'm gonna see Crazy Rich Asians friday.
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Unless people are reviewing it favorably, I'll probably sit this out. Every trailer or TV spot I see for this just seems to put me off from it. From all i've seen, the bottom line of the humor seems to be the most juvenile takes of things like South Park, or Family Guy(which aren't at their best by being vulgar) and just using puppets. Again, I could be wrong. I didn't see "Ted" for years because from what it looked like it was just "family guy in live action". And…it was. But when I actually saw it it reminded me of FG at it's highest point, and I actually enjoyed it.
But everything I see from this film just rubs me the wrong way. Something seems weird about the fact that they keep calling them what they are, puppets. It feels like they really wanted to use the Muppets for something like this, but for very obvious reasons couldn't. There is no draw for me personally to these "characters". They all seem based on specific stereotypes to tell very specific jokes and...I don't know. It all just seems so formulaic based on the single joke of "haha see! Bet you'd never see the Sesame Street guys do THIS".
Hopefully I'm wrong and you all can tell me how great this is, but as of now I just get angry whenever I see a tv spot for this.
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I've got MoviePass for a little longer, so I'll check it out and give my take on it. As it is, I'm going for the performers themselves and not necessarily because I think it'll be a great film, though I'm hoping it'll at least be watchable..
Like the Avatar? / Like the Miis?Dragalia Lost ID: 97617932505
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Ign's review for the movie is out.
http://www.ign.com/articles/2018/08/22/the-happytime-murders-review
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The other reviews are also coming out, and it unfortunately doesn't look very good.
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_happytime_murders_2017I dunno, I still feel like I kinda have to go out of loyalty to Muppets and Jim Henson.
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23%?! You've got to be kidding me! Never in my wildest would I have imagined that bad…holy crap. Okay, I need to think about this, but apparently my hunch was correct if they waited til only 3 days before to let people review.
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Saw it tonight. The easy was to describe it is like Roger Rabbit by way of Fritz the Cat and with puppets. It's not particularly funny, clever, subtle, memorable or heartfelt, but the puppet characters are integrated quite naturally into the human's world, the puppeteers and a lot of the human supporting actors do an admirable job, and the story and action were pretty engaging most of the time, except the few times where both the crass and the repetitious jokes wore out their welcome.
Bill Barretta is an actor who can basically do no wrong, and he takes a role that could be kinda one-note and makes it pretty relatable and as entertaining as it can be. Phil Phillips as a character is pretty routine
Melissa McCarthy is an actress who's style is pretty obvious by now, and you're either gonna like her or not. I don't, personally, but she didn't ruin anything for me because I knew what to expect.
The mystery isn't that intricate, and actually kind of nonsensical at points. It's telegraphed pretty clearly whodunit well before the actual reveal, and it's hard to care about the deaths because those that should be emotionally connected to the characters never seem to hit them all that hard. And like I said, it's a raunchier and less subtle Roger Rabbit, where lots of people outright hate puppets for no discernable reason.
As an attempt at kickstarting the big screen older audience puppet film genre, I guess it couldn't afford to risk being too deep or subtle. The trailers make it pretty clear what kind of movie it is, so if you can stand those and like puppetry in general, I'd recommend checking it out if you can. In the future, though, I hope that if they get another shot, they'll aim for a PG or PG13 type story with actually relatable and memorable characters and stories, and maybe an original song or two?
P.S. The behinds the scenes in the credits are great, but you can leave once they're over, there's not post-credits scene.
Like the Avatar? / Like the Miis?Dragalia Lost ID: 97617932505
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They just need to do Avenue Q. Avenue Q already showed us how to do "adult" puppet shows.
Thanks for the review though.
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Like the Avatar? / Like the Miis?Dragalia Lost ID: 97617932505
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I saw AQ in 2010, and yeah, it deserves a film adaptation. And you're welcome!
But that production didn't involve Brian Henson. It's looking like the box office isn't meeting the budget and they won't even break even on this so I doubt it'll get another try. Too bad…an idea like that might have made a better 52-minute TV pilot than a feature film if they didn't manage to get it 'right' with such an endearing concept.
