JackHammer Reviews: the Hotel Transylvania films

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Hello, JackHammer here, and after my review of The Emoji Movie, and especially since Halloween is around the corner, I decided to watch both Hotel Transylvania films again.


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I saw the first film in theaters back in 2012 with my girlfriend (whom I started dating at the time) and her friends (that I kinda had a strained relationship with) and I think that was the night we had our first kiss, and I thought the movie was fun, I definitely had a good time back then thanks to it's humor and concept, and what's funny was that I didn't even know that the characters were voiced by Adam Sandler and his friends until I started watching it, and I didn't even know till the credits that this was directed by the guy who made Dexter's Lab and Samurai Jack (Which I didn't see all the time but enjoyed them when I did).


And Ever since the first film came out 5 years ago, the general public seems to be split on whether these are good movies or bad movies. Audiences like it because of the comedic tone, while critics think they're a little too childish.


But 2 of the most different opinions I can think of come from Doug Walker (A.K.A. the Nostalgia Critic) and Mat Brunet (A.K.A. :iconanimat505:).


(Disclaimer: this review was made before my opinion on Doug Walker changed and I started to disassociate myself with him.)


Doug likes the films saying they have great humor, memorable characters and heart.


While AniMat criticized them (along with other Sony Pictures Animated films) saying they're an embarrassment to the animation industry by making it look bad and giving the general public the idea that all animated films are just dumb cartoons for kids.

   

Now to be honest, I think they both had valid points, but what do I think of these polarizing films? Let's find out!


One of the things AniMat always says about these films is that the stories feel like a 90 minute cartoon rather than a movie, and in some respects, he's kinda right.


The first film centers around Dracula trying to keep a human kid's identity a secret after the he enters his hotel filled with monsters who hate humans, because Dracula was being overprotective with his daughter.


While the second film focuses on Dracula trying to make his new grandson a vampire.


When you think about it, both these stories and the concept would be great for an animated TV series, but as movies, they feel rather weak. Mostly because they feature a ton of cliches.


But what I hate the most is whenever these films try to be cool and hip by playing songs like "Sexy and I know it" or mentioning stuff like social media and cell phones, another thing I like to add is that this is probably the stupidest way to promote a movie.........


They do make up for it a bit with the humor, although while I did laugh plenty of times in the first movie, I didn't really laugh as much when watching the second film and only chuckled at other parts, And even with good humor, It's kinda hard to enjoy both of them without turning off your brain.


Now the one thing that both Doug and AniMat like to talk about a lot is the animation. And on one hand, Doug says the fast animation matches the comedic delivery perfectly, while AniMat says it's way too cartoony and over the top and tries way too hard to make the audience laugh (Which is something he also said about Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs).


In some ways, the cartoony style here isn't that bad and is definately better than the Cloudy movies, and it does match the comedic tone. But there are also times where the animation is SO fast that I can't see what's going on! And while you could argue that the cartoony style doesn't look good in CG, I'd still have this cartoony style in CG rather than cloud with a chance of meatballs sam and Flint by JackHammer86.................this!


At least the style in Hotel Transylvania IS a style and not just a bunch of characters that look like cancer! XD

The characters are memorable and funny in a way, but how they're handled is pretty questionable.


For example, Dracula IS funny and Adam Sandler does give a great performance and shows that he can play a cartoon character (which is something he definitely failed to show in Eight Crazy Nights!) But he also reminds me a lot of Marlin from Finding Nemo both because of how he's an overprotective father and because of his backstory.


That part isn't bad, in fact I find it OK, it just feels like a copy and paste to me.


But I do kinda like this deleted scene


The other characters like Frankenstein, the Werewolf, the Mummy, etc are funny too, but they have little to no connection to the main stories.


Mavis is actually pretty bland by going from one generic character trait to another like the Disney Princess type character, or the love interest, or the overprotective mother, and while she does have 1 or 2 funny moments, that's not really enough to make a 3-dimensional character.


Tbh, the only thing I like about Mavis is her design...


Johnny is the one thing that both Doug (or at least his brother Rob) and AniMat seem to agree on by saying he's an annoying prick who tries to be hip for the young crowd before he was toned down a lot in the second film and... yeah he's pretty annoying when you first see him, but by the third act of the first film, he didn't really annoy me as much tbh.


As for the new characters in the second film, Dennis just feels like a novelty item rather than a character.


And with Mel Brooks' performance, Vlad can be funny once or twice but doesn't leave much of an impact since he only appears in the third act.


So yeah, most of the characters have their moments but the execution of them isn't really the best.


Overall, these films do have good ideas, good humor and memorable characters but they probably would've been much better in a TV series.


However, do you guys remember in AniMat's Cloudy 2 review, he talked about films where you have to turn off your brain in order to enjoy it?


To be honest it's those kind of movies for me.


Because it's a world that I want to be in, I just turn off my brain whenever I watch them and think of them as cartoons because that's what they feel like. Heck, I even pretend they didn't come out in theaters. Lol


That's also why I'm not gonna see Hotel Transylvania 3 when it comes out in theaters, I'm just gonna wait till it comes out on Netflix because from what I heard about it, It once again sounds like something out of a saturday morning cartoon, and that's not what I wanna see in the theater! I wanna see more than just a funny cartoon! That's why films like Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King and Inside Out are some of my favorite movies!


I guess these films are fun to watch around Halloween in a way, but I just wouldn't take them too seriously!


I'd probably give them a 7/10. See ya later guys!



UPDATE: For those who wanna hear my thoughts on Hotel Transylvania 3, here's what I have to say about it...


It's awful!... I hate it!... Seriously, I can't even turn off my brain anymore because it's not AT ALL funny like the previous two! All it is to me is a dumb and even boring cartoon with a super cringy ending!


That is all!

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Anjanimates-MMD's avatar
i love the characters, and also the plot. idc what people say about the story, i think it's cute