For our next segment, we welcome guest blogger Emily R. Aguilo-Perez from the University of Puerto Rico, who incidentally will be speaking at the LCSNA’s Fall 2011 meeting in New York City. She graciously volunteered her services to review That Guy with the Glasses’s review of The Care Bears Adventures in Wonderland (1987):
I wasn’t aware of the existence of the movie (if it can be called that) called The Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland, but the Nostalgia Critic, from the website That Guy with the Glasses has done a hilarious review of it in his newest episode, and I think you will enjoy it. When I was a little girl, I used to love the Care Bears, and I still find them cute. I also still love the Alice stories, so I was a little excited when learning there is a movie that combines the Care Bears and Alice. The excitement towards the movie quickly diminished. Here’s why. Although I haven’t watched the whole movie, the clips from the review were enough to help me form an opinion, one that isn’t too positive, but I will let you be the judges of that. I do want to point out some things about the movie before commenting on the Critic’s review.
- The stories have changed. What a surprise! Alice visits Wonderland but her adventures are completely different from the books. Are they better than the book, you ask? I think we all know the answer to that.
- There is one thing I like about this movie (“like” might be too much of a compliment). I should say, there is something I don’t dislike so much about the movie: the Queen is not evil, so it moves away from the usual “evil witch, evil women” most children’s stories present. The Queen might be, as one of the commenters observes, a version of one of the Queens from Looking-Glass but which uses the idea of the Queen of Hearts because she is more recognizable.
- This is the most important point. WARNING: After watching the movie clips some of you might feel the sudden urge to poke your eyes out or chop your ears off because, get this… THERE IS A RAPPING PSYCHEDELIC CHESHIRE CAT!
What was up with the ‘80s and ‘90s and the constant need to rap? Ironically this is the character in this movie the Nostalgia Critic “kinda likes,” acknowledging that the bar has been set phenomenally low, so a rapping cat sadly counts as an “up.” Not to give too much away, but if there is one reason to watch this review, it is actually to listen to all the rapping nonsense taking place, and the wonderful remix the Critic produces using other rapping animated artists from other not-so-wonderful movies. This is something the Critic does wonderfully: his references to pop culture, which include the Mario Bros. game and movie, Disney movies, other songs, and even Double Mint gum add to the hilarity of his review. In addition, when the fall into Wonderland occurs, the Critic makes reference to the Disney movie, not Tim Burton’s, but the animated feature from 1951. He refers to it as the “much better Disney movie.” This of course is a point of debate for many of us Lewis Carroll fans because there are very differing opinions about it. I do believe the Critic is referring to the animation in that movie, which was excellently executed and really brought Wonderland to life in a way that not a lot of movies have been able to.
At one point the Critic also comments on the names in the movies, indicating that the Princess’ name is Princess, the Queen’s name is Queen, and the Wizard’s name is… you guessed it, Wizard. This is not only funny but it also makes one think about the absurdity of the movie and makes one wonder how much thought the writers actually put into it. There is one character, however, which is given a name, but I will let you find out for yourselves and laugh at the absurdity, and of course laugh along with the Critic’s comments.
Amid the jokes and screams of frustration, the Critic demonstrates his knowledge of the original books and the period in which they were created. For instance, there is a robot (yes, you read correctly) in Wonderland that needs to be destroyed for some reason. The Critic comments that this is “clearly fitting the Victorian-based novel that this hacked film was loosely based on, but hey, if Tim Burton can throw in breakdancing I guess Care Bears can throw in giant robots.” Robots in Wonderland? This movie seems to be a mixture of Wonderland, Looking-Glass, Care Bears, Transformers, and pure nonsense (and not the good nonsense only Lewis Carroll could so perfectly create). But I don’t want to spoil all the fun of watching the review, which is actually truly funny, and the “fun” of watching clips from the movie. So I will leave you with these wise words about the movie from the Nostalgia Critic himself: “Not only do they insult the intelligence of the younger audience watching this, but now they insult the intelligence of the timeless Lewis Carroll books…” Enjoy!
Warning: This contains some spicy language!
Furthermore, our blog posted That Guy with the Glasses’ review of Alice in Wonderland a few years ago here. Additionally, someone has put the original on YouTube:
