Scel's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[Antigravity Cat 3]

After having finished watching all the Antigravity Cat cartoons, I feel like this is the best one. It carries the joke to a new bizarre level without necessarily being inaccessible to new audiences. The premise of a cat opting to float on the ceiling is fantastically amusing- they'd be that snide. And the piss even works out funny enough. That said, I feel like either the "trilogy" should be complete, or future series installments will need to move on from the piss joke and start doing other things with the antigravity premise.

Finally, it moves very cleanly and sounds very good. The simple art style is likely to thank for that, but it's still made better for the nuanced animation.

Carbonwater responds:

Thanks man. :)

[Breaking Poke-bad]

Nicely animated, decently voiced, with an solid ending.

The problem is that it doesn't feel focused to me. It seems to know what it wants, but the actual product doesn't reflect such focus, instead stumbling from one joke to the next with a good sense of humor but seemingly no idea how to reach those jokes rationally.

Either way, it's certainly nothing to scoff at, and even if I felt like the writing was shaky, the production otherwise is not. Nicely done.

[The humans are dead. +]

Fully entertaining. Really fulfilled the song and its contents in a delightful way. In fact, before this, I had no interest in Flight Of The Conchords. So it's a success in multiple senses.

Steinberg responds:

Nice! I'm glad I was able to make people interested in them.

[Madness Combat 7.5]

Nope.

So the last time I reviewed one of these, we were following Hank and the damn clown was back or something- I forget because, as my review states, this series has really run itself straight into the ground with aplomb.

So I forget what happened in 7 or 8 and frankly I can't be bothered to go back and look. It's always going to be something equivalent to "Guns, Guns, Knives, Blood, and Guns". It repeats itself continuously, bringing little new to the table and rehashing ideas that either have already been present or should have been very fucking obvious a long time ago- case in point being the guys with yellow blood. No shit they're engineered.

I'm pretty much tired of seeing the phrase "Madness Combat", but I recognize they're popular and that they are your pride and joy. You've been doing these damn things for, what, the better part of a decade now? I was going to give a 6, but the disgust I feel in seeing this name as endlessly as I do is not the point. The point is that you continue to make these whether or not they're still fun and "mad". I suggest here (as I did on the last video) that you wrap up this storyline in the next few years. By the end of next year if you can achieve it. A nice round ten years, eh?

Go watch the first 5. See the energy, life, and manic glee you'd installed there. Particularly the first one, with its complete banishment of reasoning. That was TRUE madness.

7/10. Normally I vote equivalently to my rating- a 10 and 9 would be a 5, an 8 and 7 would be a 4.

Not this time.

You've already shown us how lovely a fight you can produce. You haven't given anything "new or interesting." 2/5.

[Babies]

Mixed Metaphor

Funny as is the norm for both of you, though I feel like the metaphor got a bit mixed here. It seems to be balanced somewhere between shitting out "babies" and actually having babies.
The art is solid, though, and the tune is fun and different from other Weebl hits. The pun's a bit odd, but it's fun.

9/10, 5/5.

[Jack's Halloween Treats]

Short, subtle, and quite elegant

Well-illustrated. Well-animated. Decently-voiced with charming sounds and nicely-timed musical backing. The attention to detail here is clearly an act of love from creator to creation, and the result is a fun and subtle Halloween treat suited for all ages. It's spooky and charming without being insulting to the adults or too violent for the kids.

All things considered, it's just a very sweet and interesting cartoon ripe for the holiday. 9/10, 5/5.

[Nyan Caxx]

Excess Nyan

When you intake too much nyan, you hallucinate and vomit rainbows.

On a serious note, this was hilarious, spooky, and genuinely fun. Well-drawn, well-voiced. Great audio to boot. I gladly give this a 10/10 and a 5/5.

[Animator vs Animation III]

Fantastic fun

I've had a soft spot in my heart for a long time when it comes to this series. I have no complaints either- it's just a lot of fun and energy.

10/10, 5/5.

[Madness Abrogation]

A certain Something...

The past few episodes of this series did not satisfy me quite like the earlier ones. Don't get me wrong, this is still a good little series, but it felt like the whole thing was getting stale. I feel as though the series is going to end in the next couple years- I know it takes a while to make them, and thus I suspect there might be one or two more left before at the very least a reboot, or perhaps the conclusion of the Madness series in general.

Getting to the point, the past few episodes didn't quite satisfy, and really this one felt like it was just going on and on. The last minute or so was actually intriguing, though. It feels like this rambling series is approaching a point and that the madness may have a greater purpose of some sort. The inclusion of the presumably quite dead Tricky seems to be a hint at that.

Whatever your plans are for finishing this series, I can honestly say it's run its course. No matter how complex and visually stimulating you make these animations, they're starting to blur together and feel trivial. The end has to be coming, otherwise all of the time invested in watching this series (and your making it) will have been essentially a waste. Thus, it gets a 9/10 for continuing to pump out solid action, though it loses that crucial final star because the series is burning itself out and I can only take so much more Madness Combat.

[Death & Taxes Ep. II(2/2)]

Not too shabby

So your efforts here are much more complex than the original (this review will refer to both parts of episode 2), and it certainly shows that you're trying new things. This is good.

There's 3 primary issues I have with these, though. The first is your pseudo yell. I know others have harped on it already, so in brief it's not convincing anyone that it's a yell. Problem #2 is that the sound was really rough here in part 2, and the difference in volume between the dark lord and other various characters resulted in my constantly adjusting my own volume. It was really not fun to keep changing the volume is characters alternatively screamed and whispered to each other. Last but not least, de-saturation can be good, but the saturation is half of what made the first episode and first half of episode 2 so much fun! The rich colors and vibrancy of it all- it was cartoony, but this gave life to an otherwise unbelievable and genuinely rotten character. It made the evil dark lord go from an a$$hole to a really fun fellow that just happens to want to kill everyone.

Take these as you will. I will probably watch more when and if they're made. The above are merely my thoughts on what worked and did not work.

All that said, you get an 8/10 and a 4/5.