Coop's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[CoolJaw: T.T. IIII-V]

Dark prequel

A very macabre piece, with some additional information on the background of the characters, which gives a very much more clear image of what's going on with the protagonists - this sort of traumatic instance has probably lead to him suffering from some form of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

I think that the drawing still requires refining, as the changes in the style are still too great over the panes. When you show the characters drawn almost perfectly on one shot, then the next it shows them as a mess of lines, there is something a little iffy with it all.

Still, it was nice to see a little more colour in there - perhaps it is time to make the piece full colour?

[Review Request Club]

Celx-Requin responds:

Hello,

I'm going to play with more color in one chapter of the last act.
Hopefully it won't turn out too bad!

Thanks for the review!
- Celx

[Sellout - LordOfTheRings]

Pretty Damned Funny

Wow, that was awesome - the writing, the animation and the way that this has been dwelt upon for some considerable time. You've clearly spent a lot of time studying the film and the idea about the fact of someone not having seen the film is absolutely brilliant. With a film of this magnitude, you wouldn't expect anyone not to know who Frodo Baggins is.

Then again, when you come up with alternative names from them, they start to seem like football hooligans or drunks... especially Gary. I like the way that everything is set up as a low key discussion pre-script and development, which almost seems like they need a beer or two, to stimulate the creative juices.

Perhaps this piece could have been a more topical piece, related to the fact that The Hobbit has gone into production. Granted, you've got a smaller market, because not many people know who the cast of that are. Bilbo and Gandalf are recognisable, but the rest are pretty vague.

And of course, you've got the gay sex love interest in there with Sam and Frodo, which is easy to focus upon, as is Frodo and Gandalf, but I think it would have been a lot more risqué if it were say, Legolas and Gimli getting busy.

[Review Request Club]

sirjeffofshort responds:

Wow, that's comprehensive haha. Thanks for the review. It's true we could have explored the territory a little more, but that's not to say we're done with Middle Earth entirely... we'll see what the future brings. I'm glad you enjoyed the short though, keep an eye out for more in the future.

[The Lord Of The Rings]

Could use better voices

It's certainly not a bad piece, but I think that you do need to give the piece a good proof read, before publishing the piece (Bilbo's ring, the apostrophe means a lot) and then perhaps getting all of the finer details sorted should be the best option.

From there, I'd say that you could do with getting the voice acting just a little louder and perhaps just a little more fluid, but it's a good effort.

When it comes to the delivery of the punchline, it could have been set up better, by having a longer build up and some sort of atmosphere before delivering Frodo's come on. I think that even though most people have seen those first scenes from Fellowship, it still needs a little more to make the picture fit the cause.

[Review Request Club]

[Keep the change]

Short and a little crude

I think that it's a decent practice piece, which shows that you're willing to learn the tools that go with this fine program. You could certainly use subtitles, as this piece doesn't have the loudest voice acting and as a result, I found myself turning up the volume to hear the voices, only to have my ears raped by the sound of the gunfire. Balance is the key.

With the animation and drawing, you could use a little more time there, meaning zooming in and possibly using a smaller tool, to give a greater degree of control over what you're drawing, so that when you zoom out, it looks more rounded and a better quality image.

The shop keeper standing behind the counter, was he a midget, or was there something else there that I missed? It didn't seem right. Also, you don't need to drop hints like "This flash deserves a 5", as it's not even a subliminal message. More work on the animation will bring its own reward for you :)

Finally, with the change that hits the counter, perhaps just make it a denomination that is recognisable, as opposed to writing "change" on it. Why not have the voice actor do an impression of Home Alone's archive footage film, with the line "You can keep the change, you filthy animal"?

I look forward to seeing what else you can produce.

[Review Request Club]

theo-the-slayo responds:

thanks for the great advice, but this was really somthing i did today to keep me busy and for a laugh, i do usally put more effort into my flash, cheers for the review

[We will rock you]

Better, but more work required

Okay, I can see that this piece has taken you to the next level. This is where you need to start learning some good stuff and taking steps forward:

1) Lip sync. The first big ask of anyone doing a music video (Unless you're LegendaryFrog, that is) is that you get your character's lips to move with the words when they are sung. The one really good drawing of the one blonde guy was a classic example, as there were lines to symbolise a mouth, but you need to make this more of an effort to move the chin. No-one's mouth changes shape without their chin moving up and down. This error occurred elsewhere in the piece, as well.

2) Stick figures / mannequins. Great for when you're sketching, but when you've done that and have the main drawing, take the sketch frame away, to see your work as if you've drawn it freestyle. This will make the long shots look much better. Using a smaller tool and zooming in while you are drawing will also help this, even if you still draw with a mouse. When you zoom back out, it will look so much better.

3) Continuity errors - as this piece looked decent, I was still horrified by the guitar hand positions - high notes like that should probably ignore the top 2 strings on a guitar, but should also be held near the body of the guitar, as opposed to well up the neck like that. A small ask to make this piece look a lot better.

[Review Request Club]

MonoFlauta responds:

Haha is an old one anyway :P thanks for reviewing!

[La Vie Boheme]

Too many slides

Okay, the best thing that I can think of for this piece, off the cuff is to make it less of a slideshow and have someone on a bike, or in a car driving down the street. As they progress, show the bits and pieces that make up the lyrics on either side of the street and give some subtitles to the piece.

It was a little on the loud side, but don't let that get you down - spending more time on improving the quality of the drawing is certain;y the best way to go. Zoom in and use a smaller pointer to make better quality drawings and from there, you can give us a much better looking piece that people will vote up very high into award winning status.7

[Review Request Club]

MonoFlauta responds:

I didnt wanted to make this song haha but yes, thanks for reviewing :p and its an old one

[Rama Lama]

Abstract

Well, it certainly gave me a an impression that you need better writers or writing skills to interpret pieces like this. Normally, throwing together random sorts of pictures and animating them in a round-about sort of way doesn't tend to get you anywhere (oh well, the practice is good, that's for sure), but there seems to be something in there that you've managed to get sorted.

With the way that this piece has been put together, I was not the most inspired by the imagery presented. However, some of the bits looked decent, so concentrate on those to develop them into better pieces.

I think that you've got a great sense of producing fine works, but not quite the ability to hold yourself to them, so the work doesn't get finished to the standards you set for yourself. Try using slightly fewer themes through the piece and work more on the better parts - lose the flashing backgrounds and focus on things like the couple of singing individuals. Make them more dynamic - more moving parts, get the lip sync right, that sort of thing and you'll be away.

[Review Request Club]

MonoFlauta responds:

haha tahsnk a lot for the review, anyway is a very old one flash, so i find usefull many of your tips but some of them i already have, thanks :D

[Madness Combat 6.5]

Very enjoyable

How do these guys keep taking a load of grievous wounds and not dying? Bullet wounds have now come along and inflicted some pretty nasty damage on them and still, they don't give up. I can understand with Hank, Jesus and the Clown, but these guys don't even have names, do they?!

Still, let's look at the story - yes, you've written a masterpiece, that ties up some loose ends from previous entries, especially with Jesus quitting the piece, for now ;) and some more questions being asked, prior to reality pressing the big reset button.

Will Madness Combat 10 answer some of these questions, or will it open new ones for us to try and work out. I swear that I'll never know how your mind works, so I'm inclined to think "both" :P

Are there many more guns that you've yet to try? Now we're seeing the 50. calibre get a debut as well as the grenade launcher. RPGs haven't been used yet, so I'll expect to see them at some point.

[Review Request Club]

[SWAP! ch.1]

Very interesting concept

I like the way that you've taken two different (but similar) games and have swapped the characters for comedic effect.

I think that there's a great degree of writing here, but it has been let down slightly by the animation style, I feel. With how it all looks, I'd say that you need to get the drawing just right - zooming in a little could help, as with when you take more time to get it all to look just right - I think that it would have been better with one animation style throughout, as opposed to the two for the different "episodes" that you've portrayed.

Certainly a very likeable flash, as exampled by the award that you won. I hope to see more of your work in the near future. Sonic / Mario?

[Review Request Club]

[Wrong Date]

Good joke, but needs work

I think that there's some potential there and you've got a great chance of taking this further with a few minor tweaks to get it working better. Firstly, I'd suggest that you start with the drawing - get the background right and the rest kind of falls into place. You've gone the wrong way with the detail lines - really thick on the moving parts and then really thin on the background parts like the computer.

Try zooming in and using a slightly smaller tool, as it will give you a much better looking work when you zoom back out - this is where cheats come in, especially with backgrounds, since you can reuse them for every frame if the camera angle is the same.

With the moving guy, you've got a few poses that you've sorted out, so more effort with them will make it better, as a better drawn piece looks smoother as they move, for some reason.

With the delivery of the punchline, have a really good looking girl and she offers to play strip poker, then loses horribly and reveals the punchline. With that, you need to stylise the mouth to fit the rest of the face, don't just have an expanding rectangle of pink - tonsils, teeth, tongue and some chin movement are all necessary to develop you as an animator, but you'll find what suits when you try.

[Review Request Club]