Disney's Raya And The Last Dragon

[James]

Raya and the Last Dragon review up!

https://animatedviews.com/2021/raya-and ... agon-film/

Long story short: so much wasted potential.

[Daniel]

And I thought the dialogue couldn't get worse. Loved the Poochie comparison!

[Farerb]

I agree with what you wrote James. The movie turned out pretty much the way I expected from the trailers, but then for some reason it got glowing reviews, so it got my hopes up but no...
I thought the movie was fine, but not amazing.
As for the modern speech, I know that Disney did it in their previous films as well but they were much more light-hearted and had a much more comedic tone, but with Raya it was just jarring. If they decided to do this serious worldbuilding, then the speech needs to be treated more seriously.

[EricJ]

Raya and the Last Dragon review up!
https://animatedviews.com/2021/raya-and ... agon-film/
Long story short: so much wasted potential.

I can completely imagine higher-ups at Disney having a similar conversation as The Itchy & Scratchy producers! “Today’s girls want a princess with attitude. She’s hip, she’s in your face. We’re talking about a totally outrageous paradigm.” Perhaps some evidence of this idea can be seen after the film, where a possibly unprecedented four directors are credited, as well as eight writers! That’s literally the definition of film by committee.
...
Despite all those issues, this though was probably the worst. There was actually a really good story hidden underneath all this. The underlying mythology created for the film about dragons and the evil spirits and the magic orb and the five tribes could have been epic. Should have been epic! This was a story that could have supported being one Disney’s best animated films ever. But they took this phenomenal idea and put the worst characters and dialogue on top of it. Which is almost unforgivable based on what could have been. As if that weren’t bad enough, even the movie’s over-aching message was admirable, but was all but lost amongst the wisecracking until near the end.

So, what I'm hearing is:
1) Too much "Modern princess role-model with attitude!" at the expense of atmosphere or setting,
and
2) Too much "Modern princess role-model with attitude!" at the expense of a unique or complex story.

That does sound rather familiar to what some nut around here has been ranting lately about the Jennifer Lee era at the studio--Not that someone didn't warn you.
In the words of Maui, you're welcome.

[Ben]

Long story short: so much wasted potential.

Oh. Like many, my hopes weren’t high (it sounds like now you can see what I meant by the anachronistic dialogue), but when the reviews came in I must admit that my interest grew, again like many, even if I still couldn’t see the "amazing animation" that others were pointing to. Sounds like those "hopes" need to be put back in check.

[James]

...As for the modern speech, I know that Disney did it in their previous films as well but they were much more light-hearted and had a much more comedic tone, but with Raya it was just jarring. If they decided to do this serious worldbuilding, then the speech needs to be treated more seriously.

Jarring is the perfect word. Which I had used it!

[James]

...In the words of Maui, you're welcome.

[James]

Oh. Like many, my hopes weren’t high (it sounds like now you can see what I meant by the anachronistic dialogue), but when the reviews came in I must admit that my interest grew, again like many, even if I still couldn’t see the "amazing animation" that others were pointing to. Sounds like those "hopes" need to be put back in check.

A lot of my issues may have been tempered if I had watched the trailers for the film. (I didn’t even know the dragon talked until I watched the movie!) The rest of you may have a better experience due to lowered expectations.

[gaastra]

Went to see raya at our theatre. We had alot of fun watching it. The animation looked great on the big-screen and the bonus cartoon in front of it was fun! With that said there were more people at our tom and jerry showing last week but raya is the better movie to me.

Speaking of raya---

Girl scouts call out disney!

https://deadline.com/2021/03/raya-and-t ... 234710945/

Love how disney ceo follows it up with a disney plus plug only for the girl to turn it around and ask them why no soul theatre release!

Pretty funny.

[Ben]

Well good for her!

And least that article uses the right version of Premiere to describe Disney's OTT branded on demand films. Still can’t believe they used the wrong one for "premier access".

True, both mean "first", but premier is more associated with the name for political figures while premiere is the long-held description for a theatrical debut of a film (or show), and has that more magical showbizzy feel. Whenever I see that stupid Premier Access logo it just looks wrong.

[Daniel]

Home video release will be May 18th.

[Ben]

Ooh, May is starting to fill up quite nicely! Uh-oh!

[EricJ]

I'm still holding off on this movie, but ease my Lee-era fears:
Despite all the reviews of "She's a contemporary-slang heroine with attitude!", every clip and picture I see of Raya, she's got that "Determined" look that female filmmakers use, because they think "Empowered" > "Likable".

Please tell me they didn't decide to make her the Captain Marvel of the Disney Princesses, who goes around punching out Moana's grandmother...

[Bill1978]

Please tell me they didn't decide to make her the Captain Marvel of the Disney Princesses, who goes around punching out Moana's grandmother...

I don't believe they did. Raya is just your basic hero going on a hero's journey due to family trauma who makes a bunch of friends along the way. In fact, I would describe this movie as a reverse Saving Private Ryan

Instead of losing a member at every pitstop, she actually picks up a new person who in the end assists the world in destroying the evil

And Eric is should make you happy to know that Raya doesn't even work out how to save the world, no one does. It's just a fluke basically, technically

[gaastra]

I'm still holding off on this movie, but ease my Lee-era fears:
Despite all the reviews of "She's a contemporary-slang heroine with attitude!", every clip and picture I see of Raya, she's got that "Determined" look that female filmmakers use, because they think "Empowered" > "Likable".

Please tell me they didn't decide to make her the Captain Marvel of the Disney Princesses, who goes around punching out Moana's grandmother...

Raya is pretty determined but no mary sue. She almost gives up, she loses at least two fights and has to be saved thanking the ones who save her (but does win fights also) and at one point her temper makes her make a bad choice but she does see it later and tries to put it right.


"And Eric is should make you happy to know that Raya doesn't even work out how to save the world, no one does. It's just a fluke basically, technically"


She does guess what could be and takes a huge risk but is not sure. However if you think she saves the day on her own you are wrong!