Pokemon: Arceus and the Jewel of Life (2009)

Plot: Ash and his friends arrive at Michina Town where they witness the resolve of the feud between Giratina and Dialga with the help of a guardian named Sheena. Shortly afterwords, Sheena informs them that the legendary Pokemon named Arceus, who is said to have created the who universe, as arisen from its slumber and intends to destroy mankind for betraying it and keeping it from retrieving the Jewel of Life. Giratina, Dialga and Palkia fight to stop Arceus, but they are no match for it so Dialga sends Ash, Dawn, Brock and Sheena back in time as a hope to stop the catastrophe that has caused Arceus to attack the humans.  

So now we come to the last chapter of the supposed Diamond and Pearl trilogy. And as the final installment of this so-called trilogy, it had a story that was it more interesting than its predecessor, but still had a large amount of flaws.

I'll start with the good stuff. First off the general story is more intriguing then Giritina and the Sky Warrior. I liked how the backstory became less and less simple as the movie progressed. I also like how the characters are going back in time again except this time they're traveling to an age where Pokemon aren't even called Pokemon; they're called magical creatures. This like that add more of the mythos behind the franchise is starting to become one of the main reason why I'm glad that I'm going through these movies. The relationship between Sheena and Damos is in some respect well developed and leads to a fitting climax, and on top of that, the climax itself was exciting.

So how is the film heavily flawed? Well for one thing, it goes way too far with delivering exposition. There is at least three if not four different times where they say the exact same story of Damos and Arceus. The last time in particular only needed to show it some sections of the story instead of literally showing us the entire event. I get how there's more to the story the more times they tell it, but the way that they do that comes out pretty redundant. Also, this movie didn't have a good sense of knowing how time travel works. Now unfortunately, I can't go into a whole lot of detail into that because a lot of it is spoiler related. But if you're familiar with the concept of time travel from something like Doctor Who or Back to the Future, you're likely to watch this movie and find yourself saying "I don't think that's actually how that works." at least a couple of times.

I normally don't make a thing about the voice acting choices for movies or TV, but the voice for the voice of Arceus does not work. I'm sure the voice actor is doing his best, but his performance doesn't fit into the idea of being a being that is caring but vengeful, powerful being. Every time he's yelling sounds like a big whiny brute in a way that's similar to Zero in Giratina and the Sky Warrior. Also, we come across what is easily the worst villain in any Pokemon movie. I won't give it away because this is also in spoiler territory, but the character that plays the villain is so one noted that he makes the Iron Masked Marauder look interesting. The Marauder at least had a design that made him look a little cool and a device that made him dangerous. This character on the other hand is so bland that you can tell from his appearance that he's the villain and can figure out his gimmick super fast.

Also as much as I hate to agree with Il Neige, the concept of this movie being the third installment of a trilogy does not work. It did start off that way when all of the other legendary Pokemon are fighting Arceus, but kind of like with Giratina and the Sky Warrior, the connections to the previous films are almost non-existent. Maybe if you are a big fan of both the game and the anime of Diamond and Pearl, this would feel more like a big epic trilogy, but the only way that these films connect are the legendary Pokemon that appear, and even that doesn't count for much.

Finally, let's address the big elephant in a room; the concept that Arceus is basically a Pokemon version of God. Il Neige made a point that the film does get the sense that this movie should have taken a turn that represents the concept of how the relationship between God and man has fallen apart. I think that's kind of true for reasons that I can't explain because it's spoiler related, but I also think it would be a little much to dive into a concept of a god who created everything in this world. I know he supposedly created everything in this universe and that he can adapt to all the different types of Pokemon. But to me, the movie makes it clear that even though he's a Pokemon that created this entire world, he is still a Pokemon. He lives, he can run out of energy and die, and a Pokemon trainer can capture him just like any of these mythical creatures. So for my money, I think they were right to keep ideas of Arceus out of concepts like that and stick to the fact that's he's still just a legendary pocket monster.

And that's my review for Pokemon: Arceus and the Jewel of Life. I like the story better then the one from the previous film and both the climax and the relationship between Sheena and Damos was done fairly well. But the story is also very flawed just with the time travel aspect alone, the voice for Arceus does not fit, and the villain is by far the worst one in these Pokemon films. It's not as bad as Giratina and the Sky Warrior, but it's still bad.

Rating: 35%

Pokemon Giratina and the Sky Warrior (2008)

Plot: Shortly after the events of The Rise of Darkrai, the hedgehog-like legendary Pokémon, Shaymin is drawn into a battle between Dialga and Giratina, who drags both Shaymin and Dialga into the Reverse World. Shaymin uses her powers to escape through a portal back to the normal world giving Dialga the oppertunity to follow after he disables Giratina's ability to venture to Earth. Shaymin finds itself in a seaside town and comes across Ash and his friends and tells them that she needs to go to the Forest Garden so that it can migrate with the other Shaymin. But things get complicated when Giratina is trying to find a way to capture Shaymin so that it can enter Earth and a mad scientist named Zero appears to have other plans for the Reverse World.

So as I said in my review for Pokemon Ranger and the Temple of the Sea, I thought that movie was going to be the one that's going to be the first of big dull dud that I come across among the Pokemon films. But it turns out I had to wait two more films before actually found the first big dud. Not to say there aren't some kind of nice things about this movie, but when comparing to any of the other films - even Pokemon 4Ever, it didn't do a thing for me at all.

Let me start off with the minor good stuff about the movie. First off Shaymin was a slightly better character than I thought she would be. When it was getting stuck in the midst of a fight between Dialga and Giratina, I thought she was going to be another innocent cute sea Pokemon like with Celebi, Jirachi and Manaphy. But it turns out that Shaymin it's actually a bit of a pompous, self-centered jerk. When it started talking, it acted like it's the most important thing ever and is completely full of it itself whenever something good happens, claiming it's all her doing. However, it gets boring really fast. It doesn't have much of a relationship with the other characters apart from arguing with Ash but eventually time becoming friends, and sort of favoring Dawn because she's the loving female character, but without the emotional attachment that comes with it like with May and Manaphy.

The fact that this all ties into the last film is actually very interesting. According to Il Neige, this is technically the second part of the Diamond and Peal/Sinnoh trilogy, and the film after this, Arceus and the Jewel of Life, is basically part 3. So I hope they make good use of that when it comes to bringing up Giratina, Dialga and Palkia. That being said however, the events of The Rise of Darkrai are only briefly mentioned, making the movie feel insignificant as a part of a trilogy in the long run.

So how is this film worse than Pokemon 4Ever? Well I think Il Neige put it best that it feels like there's a bunch of random ideas that don't add up well together. For example, I would declare that the villain, Zero feels like he's even worse than the Iron Mask Marauder if he didn't have some interesting quirks. He isn't trying to take over the world so much as he has his crazy belief that he must destroy the world in order to save the Reverse World and it drives him mad. I'll even technically give him points for being the first Pokemon villain to have a passion for committing genocide. But aside from that, there was nothing really unique about him at all. Honestly he sounded more like a mixture of some of the past villains like having a big ship used for capturing Pokemon like Lawrence III or having an evil laugh the Iron Mask Marauder and so on and so forth. Besides, his symbol is literally a zero. I know this is meant for kids and everything, but that's just sounds silly even for Pokmeon. The idea of the reverse world is kind of a neat idea, but it feels like it was there just for the fun of watching characters like Dawn and Ash moon walk in certain areas where there is no gravity.

But the main reason why I like this movie less then Pokemon 4Ever is that I didn't care about what happening. Celebi may be nothing but cuteness, but at some point, even I cared about what was happening compared to Shaymin. Its personality was different like I said, but even with that, I did not care for whether or not it was going to reach its goal. There's also this professor guy who took Zero as his apprentice, and that sounds interesting on paper, but I didn't really care about him either. There's even a random cameo of the legendary Pokemon Regigigas, which... I guess is neat if you're a Diamond and Pearl fan, but even then it didn't really contribute much. Even Giratina who has a unique yet intimidating design, was not as interesting as he could have been. I think what I'm basically trying to say is that this movie does look like something that should spark my interest in the same way as any of the other films regardless of what I thought about them. But it all comes down to whether or not I was interesting in what was happening, and in the end I though it was dull.

And that's my review for Pokemon: Giratina and the Sky Warrior. It has some interesting ideas such as the villain's goal or having a cute Pokemon that's actually a jerk, but its execution is clunky to a point that I didn't care about what was happening in the film even though I had a feeling I should.

Rating: 25%

Independence Day: Resurgence (2016)

Plot: It's been exactly 20 years since the events of the first movie and humanity has used this time to prepare for the possibility of another alien attack. But during the celebration of defeating the aliens, the alien come back with an even bigger and more powerful army. I'd say more, but that's all there really is to know.

I went to see an early screening for this movie with my brother, Johnathan, and honestly we almost had fun. Not in the sense that it was good, but because of how remarkably, unforgivably bad it is. What I thought was going to be a bad yet slightly amusing rehash of the last movie turned out to be such a ginormous mess that it's basically director Roland Emmerich's own personal Transformers: Age of Extinction, but worse. This movie had one or two decent moments in the dialogue, but when you're looking at the movie as a whole, it's a bigger train wreck than what Bay tried to do.

For those of you who didn't read my review for Transformers: Age of Extinction or don't remember, here's my basic thoughts. It had way too many characters and had countless story lines that are good on paper but went nowhere, and as the movie progressed I had little to no idea whatsoever what was happening. Independence Day: Resurgence is basically the same thing but it goes farther. There's so many random stuff shoved into this movie that by the end, you realize that this movie went absolutely nowhere. There's more characters than I can keep track both old and new and all of them added nothing. Some of them may be fighting aliens or figuring out plans, but as Johnathan pointed out when we were walking home from the theater, there were absolutely no consequences. The stakes where high given that the aliens are back and with bigger and more advanced ships, but there is little reaction to the actions that any of the human characters make. One character sacrifices himself with a big bang and admittingly a kind of cool one-liner, and even that didn't really add anything. The funny thing is - again, like Age of Extinction, a lot of these situations that the characters are in are good ideas by themselves. You have pilots who get stuck inside the main alien ship, there's another alien species that wants to help, people are getting telepathic messages from the aliens, and many of these situations would have been interesting on their own had they took the majority of the story. But no, they have to add all of this other crap that's so pointless that I don't even remember what it was. It's really appalling yet funny how the first film had a straight forward story from beginning to end and a simple theme of celebrating the 4th of July, and then we get a sequel that's throwing anything on the wall and trying to make it stick and making no connection to the holiday apart from just one line of dialogue.

Honestly, I'm trying to figure out who among the characters were the most effective to the plot, but I just can't think of anything. Everyone is doing stuff in groups and none of them have anything special about them that's actually helpful for the fight against the aliens. Even Jeff Goldblum's character who in the last film at least had a talent that conveniently helped humanity get the upper hand had absolutely nothing going on for him. So many characters like Goldblum's dad are constantly appearing in this movie with no purpose whatsoever. Like they're only there just so that you have people from the last film or are grown up version of people from the last film. The idea of bringing us grown up versions of characters like Will Smith's stepson or the President's daughter is good, but I barely know a thing about them. The last movie may have had a lot of characters too, but that film knew to take enough time so that you'd remember them in some way. But the development for most of these characters seem to end almost as soon as it started. That's the one thing Age of Extinction did better then this movie; it rushed on so many of its characters, but even Bay had a small group of characters to focus primarily on - that being Cal, his daughter and her boyfriend. They were by no means the right characters to focus on, but it's more than Emmerich did here.

The action also goes completely nowhere. If all you want is random explosions with aliens and humans with sci-fi weapons, you'll get it, but you will have no idea what is happening. A lot of the action is a matter of convenience. Like the alien mother ship as a powerful shield and yet their smaller ships don't, and then the queen alien has her own shield but it's temporarily effective...and that's just the plot holes I remember. By the time we get tot he last 20 minutes of the movie, things were executed so lazily that it stopped being amusing. People are dying, explosions are everywhere, the fate of the world is at stake and in the end none of us cared what was happening.


And that's my review for Independence Day: Resurgence. Some of the plain ideas behind what it happening sounds good on paper if they took more time on them, but what we have instead is a remarkable mess with all concepts of focus and consistency thrown out of the window in terms of story, characters and even action. The last movie was no Die Hard either, but it knew to keep its story simple and to give its main characters an importance to the plot. This movie doesn't even try to make even the original characters stand out for squat. But that's okay, and do you know why? *Bill Putnam voice* Because we're going to move on. We're gonna survive. This year, you shall ignore this movie on your Independence Day! *audience cheers*

Rating: 10%

Independence Day (1996)

Well in a couple of hours from when I start writing this review, I'll be going to an early showing of Independence Day: Resurgence. So it only figure that I should make sure to re-watch and review the first film before that.

Plot: Set two days before the 4th of July, an army of aliens travel to Earth and begin destroying the human race. So it's up to a group of people including a F/A-18 pilot, a computer expert, and the President of the United States to figure out a way to fight back as save the world from annihilation.


As a kid I liked this movie. We never owned it, but it was a nice maybe-if-we-feel-like-it movie to watch on the 4th of July. But as I got older, I started to see how silly it is. There are some things that make it a little entertaining -heck, I'll admit that the idea of this taking place on Independence Day is kind of a charming idea....but in a very silly popcorn movie kind of way. In fact, I think I remember around high school there were people who thought this was a Michael Bay movie that he didn't direct but produced. Now none of that is true, but given the basic premise on top of all the special effects, character stereotypes and the fact that this is about invading aliens, it does kind of feel like Bay took a lot from this movie when he was making the first Transformers film.

Let's start off with the characters...mostly that the majority of them are pretty much stereotypes. Now to be fair, some characters have their own charm, but mostly because of the actors that are playing them; mainly Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman and of coarse Will Smith ...at least for me personally. Goldblum is doing his usual "um"s and "ah"s, but I think he's likable enough. I thought Pullman was entertaining as the president, and finally, I figure most people will like Will Smith the most just because he's Will Smith. Even when he's not fighting aliens, he still has a likable charm to him. But aside from that, the majority of the characters are stereotypes. The drunk redneck, the jewish guy, the geeky scientist and so on and so forth.

The most of the explosions look pretty cool even today, but there are a few shots where you can probably tell today that they're fake. Other visual effects like the CGI for the aliens and their ships don't look that great, but I guess you can just say that it's a product of its time. Plus to be fair, it was good enough back then that it did win an Oscar for best visual effects, so while the Oscars aren't always right, I guess that should count for something. The designs of the aliens and their ships do look like your stereotypical aliens with their UFOs, but I think they made them work well enough to still look a little cool.

The dialogue in this movie is cliched in the long run. A lot of it you more than likely have seen many times before. But with that said, some of the lines are portrayed so silly/corny that they are still memorable in their own way. I think none of us who have seen this movie will ever forget Randy Quaid as Russell Casse shouting out "Hello boys, I'm back!" And as silly as Pullman's big speech before the climax is, admit it it sounds kind of awesome. As far goes a big speeches in our B actions films, he says this speech in such a fun yet motivating way that I'd rather hear him inspire the troops then something like  Idris Elba's "cancelling the apocalypse speech in Pacific Rim with - as I said in my review for that film, made me and my brother snicker. 

And that's my review for Independence Day. If you just want to see a silly popcorn movie - particularly to celebrate Independence Day, you'll have fun here. But if you're looking for something more than just action, stereotypes and likable actors like Will Smith, you should give it a pass.

Rating: 50%

Pokemon: The Rise of Darkrai (2007)

Plot: Between the dimensions of time and space, the legendary Pokemon, Dialga and Palkia start fighting. Palkia is injured and so flees and secretly hides in the Sinnoh city, Alamos. Meanwhile, Ash, Brock and their Diamond and Peal companion, Dawn travel to Alamos where a mysterious Pokemon named Darkrai is lurking in the shadows and giving people and Pokemon nightmares. The Baron of the city is attempting to capture Darkrai, but with the help their new friends Alice and Tonio, Ash, Brock and Dawn may discover that there's more behind Darkrai then he appears.


So this is the first of the Diamond and Pearl movies and is said to be another one of those films that some people view to be their all time favorite Pokemon movie. So... is it really a crime that I don't share that view? *viewers booing* Yeah, that's what I thought. Honestly, I side with Il Neige that this movie has some really good ideas but they don't take full advantage of them.

Let's start off with Darkrai himself. On the one hand, he is a creepy Pokemon. His design is intimidating, the fact that he gives people nightmares is menacing, and he all around gives this movie a sense of a horror movie...at least as much as a Pokemon film can. But aside from that, it feels like there's more that they could have done with him. Without giving too much away, the film gives the idea that Darkrai isn't really a threat. Now how we discover that is interesting, but the same time I feel like we needed more of him having an intimidating presence. When we get the big reveal, it feels more like all the interesting and menacing aspects about him are thrown out the window just for the sake of the plot. On top of that, it feels like he didn't have much of a connection with the characters. It has that small connection with Alice because he knew her grandmother and that's about it.

The film also gives an implication early on that there's going to be a love triangle between Alice, Tonio and Baron Alberto. Not to say that this could have been the most complex or important thing in the movie per say, but I was kind of looking forward to it. I mean come on, we haven't had love triangle in any of these films since technically Pokemon 2000. But it's resolved in a matter of seconds as Alice declares her feelings for Tonio. The relationship between them is interesting enough that I still root for them as movie went on, but their relationship never grows. We find out why Alice has her feelings for him, which is further justified in the climax, and we get the feeling that maybe something happens between the end...but the key word there is maybe. Again I'm not saying that this has to be one of the most important aspect about the movie, but I still get the feeling that I wanted more out of them whether there is a love triangle or not.

Another missed opportunity was more time for Dawn in particular to shine. As I said before, I never watch the Diamond and Pearl series, but from what little I do know about Dawn as a character from seeing a couple of YouTube videos and some Pokemon:X and Y fanfiction, she sounds like she's a relatively cool character with a fun platonic relationship with Ash. Sadly however, there is little to no focus on her. We do get the sense of her having a platonic relationship with Ash during the climax as they are working together to try to save the day, but that's all we get. Here's to better luck hopefully in the other films.

The climax  was in some respects fairly intense. You have this city trapped in between dimensions, it's slowly being destroyed, and the legendary Pokemon are clashing against each other relentlessly. But after watching Il Neige's review and thinking more about it, the battle between Dialga and Palkia and Darkrai was very repetitive. They're just shooting lasers on each other and Darkrai is trying to interfere and then they do the same thing over and over again.

If there's anything that I sincerely enjoyed in his movie, the first thing that comes to mind is that the animation is gorgeous. Maybe this is the case with some other films and I'm only noticing because I saw this in HD, but some of the locations in the colors of the sky and/or the lighting stood out exceptionally well. Every now and then, there would be a shot that made me feel like I was watching a scene from When Marnie Was There. I also liked Alamos and the mythology behind it. The landscape was interesting and the Time and Space towers had a unique look.

And that's my review for Pokemon: The Rise of Darkrai. I enjoyed the animation and the design of Alamos, but the film is met with ideas like Darkrai and the romance that I felt they didn't take a whole lot of advantage from. It's another mixed bag to say the least.

Rating: 55%

Pokemon Ranger and the Temple of the Sea (2005)

Plot: Ash and his friends befriend a traveling family circus who kindly take them in after suffering from dehydration in the wasteland. While traveling with them, they find out that the family are in possession of a rare Pokemon egg and are helping a Pokemon ranger named Jack Walker who is trying to keep the egg from the hands of the evil pirate known as The Phantom. The egg eventually hatches to reveal the rare Pokemon, Manaphy who believes May to be its mother. So the race is on to take Manaphy to the temple of the sea before The Phantom does.

When I saw the cover for this movie, I thought I wasn't going to like it. Manaphy looked like it was going to be another Pokemon that was cutesy for the sake of being cutesy, leading for this movie to be the first dull dud that's worse than Pokemon 4ever. But surprisingly I rather enjoyed it. Not as much as I enjoyed Pokemon Heroes and there are some problems that I realized after watching the film. But for what it was as the last movie with the advanced generation characters I had a nice time.

The heart of what sold this movie for me surprisingly enough is the relationship between Manaphy and May. Like I said earlier, Manaphy easily could have been used to be cute for the sake of being cute just like with Celebi. But it works here because the cute, baby-like behavior makes sensebecause it actually is a baby. And the mother and child like relationship between Manaphy and May is touching at times. It was touching how they were developing this deep bond even though they would eventually have to be separated which leads to the best emotional moments of the film. The last scene with with them in particular I could help but actually say "Awww!"

The only complaints I could think of slightly comes from Il Neige's review for the movie. He basically thought that by focusing so much on her being the mother figure for Manaphy, the filmmakers kind of threw out her all-around personality from the show. Now as someone who never watched Advanced Generations I can't really confirm that. But thinking a little more about it, I did realize that she did become so devoted to the role that she doesn't really do anything else. In fact, apart from letting out her Squitle so that she could swim through a water tunnel, she never even called out her Pokemon to battle. So if you did watch Advanced Generations and think that this was out of character for May, I'm not going to say that I don't understand at least a tiny bit. But for me personally, I really enjoyed watching her bond with Manaphy.

The story in general is also stronger then in Lucario and the Mystery of Mew. It's basically a treasure hunt in a Indiana Jones sort of way. The climax was also pleasantly enjoyable. We even have a moment of Ash playing as the hero which you can say is a bit of a down given that it's also backs up to the fact that May doesn't do anything when she could have helped out Ash. But I guess the little kid me that still kind of roots for him likes the idea of only him doing this heroir deed. Similar to Latias and Latios is sharing ability I also enjoyed how there was a payoff to that defense power that Manaphy has...especially since it felt like a pointless gimmick early into the film.

If I had any major problems with the movie, they would be The Phantom and surprisingly Jack. The Phantom is another going it's all about greed and is slightly better than the Iron Mask Marauder because he has memorable personality and is sometimes used for laughs. But at the same time, the idea that one of the villains in his Pokemon movie is basically a pirate just sounds stupid to me. Jack in fairness was an interesting character when you put him on paper. It's his job to basically save the day and he doesn't even capture Pokemon so much as temporarily hypnotize them or something in order to travel or fight an enemy. In some respects his job sounds like a more fitting job for Ash because he probably will never become a Pokemon Master. But kind of like with Rayquaza -albeit at a much lesser extent, his purpose in the movie started to dwindle by the time we got to the climax. it feel like he was there just to be the Phantom's nemesis while it's still only May and Manaphy's story.

And that's my review for Pokemon Ranger and the Temple of the Sea. The villain was a little too silly for me and Jack's role as a title character was underwhelming, but the story and the relationship between May and Manaphy kept me invested to the point that this is probably my personal favorite of the Advanced Generations films. It's no Pokemon Heroes, but I'm still glad that I saw it for what it was.

Rating: 70%

Pokemon Lucario and the Mystery of Mew (2005)

Plot: Centuries ago, an aura-guiding Pokémon named Lucario sensed two armies about to clash at Cameron Palace. He tries to help his master Sir Aaron save the kingdom, but when Lucario finds him, Aaron sealed Lucario in his staff and flees. Sir Aaron's Pidgeot returns to the queen of Camron with the staff as the two armies mysteriously stop fighting and return to their homes. Cut to the present as Ash and his friends come to Cameron to celebrate the life of Sir Aaron who has been declared a hero. Ash wins the Pokemon competition and is rewarded with the privilege to hold Sir Aaron's staff. But because he's dressed like Sir Aaron, Lucario releases itself from the staff and informs the group that Sir Aaron might not be the hero that they think he is. But while that's going on, Pikachu and the other Pokemon encounter the rare Pokemon Mew and after a failed attempt of being captured, Mew teleports itself as well as Pikachu and Team Rocket's Meowth to the Tree of Beginning. So the group has to travel to the Tree of Beginning with the help of Lucario to retrieve Pikachu. 

So this is the one that a lot of people considered to be their favorite of the Pokemon films. And what do I think? It's...okay but nothing spectacular. *viewers booing * Alright alright, let me elaborate. When I say it's not that great, I'm not saying that I don't see why some people view this as their favorite of the Pokemon films. But some of the other elements hurt the film enough that I didn't enjoy it in the same extent that I enjoyed Pokemon 2000 or Pokemon Heroes.

I'll start by talking about what is by far the best part of the movie: Lucario. Lucario is the most awesome and interesting Pokemon in the Pokemon movies since Mewtwo. His design was cool, the fact that uses telepathy to communicate just like Mewtwo is great, he's brooding but still has a sense of honor and a good heart, and he has these cool aura powers. Plus the story about him and Sir Aaron is interesting. You care about  how much Sir Aaron meant to Lucario and how torn he is that Sir Aaron might have betrayed him. Sir Aaron is also an interesting person even though we see little of him. He's practically a Jedi given that he can use aura powers just like Lucario. Also his suit was really cool. I remember whenever I saw Ash wearing it early in the film, I could help but think "wow, I would like to wear that too." The first scene of the movie where we find out what happened between Sir Aaron and Lucario was also enjoyable...if not a shame that we didn't really see much of a the war. In fact Il Neige made a good point that arguably that whole thing with the war could've been its own movie.

So where does the movie fall flat for me? Well to be blunt, it's the plot. Not the parts that have to do with Lucario and finding out why Sir Aaron disappeared - I stand by saying that it's interesting. I'm specifically talking about the quest that Lucario and Ash and his friends are going on. When you really think about what they're doing, you realize that there isn't really anything at stake while they travel to the Tree of Beginning. Yeah, they're worried about Pikachu and Meowth, but you can figure out pretty quickly that they are in no danger whatsoever. The film keeps coming back to the two of them and Mew, and all they're really doing is playing. Granted, the group does come across dangerous obstacles such as the tree's white cells (which I thought it's kind of neat), and coming across Regice, Regirock and Registeel (the latter of the two I thought had pretty cool voices.) But ultimately, their mission is really just retrieving Pikachu who isn't even in any sort of danger. In fact, nothing really dramatic or terrible happens until the climax which unfortunately was just like Destiny Deoxys in that it was a forced raising of the stakes just so that we can have a conclusion of Lucario's story just like with Tori. Granted, this is done slightly better given that the stuff they do for Lucario leads to a well delivered, bittersweet ending. But it's still annoys me that the climax in general came completely out of nowhere with an incredibly forced explanation. On top of that, Mew is kind of a selfish twit. When you really get down to it, all of the danger that the characters go through and all the harm and so on it's completely his fault. People are risking their lives just because Mew brought Pikachu to his home just to have someone to play with. Honestly, I choose to believe that this is a different Mew from the one in Pokemon: The First Movie where I could admire that one for beingplayful but also having a sense of wisdom.

And that's my review for Pokemon: Lucario and the Mystery of Mew. The fact that Pikachu didn't really need saving and that all the bad stuff is out of Mew's selfishness really bothers me. But when you put that aside, it's still a decent film mostly because of Lucario and his mission to find out more about Sir Aaron if not anything else. It's just an okay film for me, but I can see why people consider it to be their favorite Pokemon film.

Rating: 65%