| ______________________________________________________ Wing Commander Starring: Freddie Prinze Jr., Matthew
Lillard _____I watched this tasteless movie for one thing: Star War's second trailer. For those that saw it, is the light-staff kickass or what?! Hotdawg, I love that weapon! Where was I? Oh, yeah, the Wing Commander review. I guess I've already shed my little insight on it. If it wasn't for the trailer, my four dollar matinee money would've went out the window. _____Based on the popular series that spanned from Wing Commander I to IV plus the Privateer series, Wing Commander the movie is sure to bring fans of the game to the theatre. I played the first two wing commanders, and then I lost interest in space dogfights. I've seen the full motion video produced in the later Wing Commanders, played by Mark Hamil himself. The character that Hamil portrayed is none other than the main character of the movie himself, Christopher Blaire (Freddie Prinze Jr. from She's All That). _____The story is set in the future, where space travel and pulsar jumps are possible in the year 2654. For those that have kept in touch with the Wing Commander games, this movie depicts Blaire and his maniac companion played by Matthew Lillard heading for the great expanse of space, right after they graduated from the Academy. The plot is horribly simple... the Kilrathi, invading, cat-like aliens that wish to destroy all human beings, has stolen the Navigational Communication device known as Pegasus, and are about to take over Earth. It drags on with little love affairs sprinkled in the story line, and some racial prejudice mumbo jumbo. It was completely predictable, and without suspense throughout the entire movie. _____There isn't much else to say about Wing Commander. Envision Starship Troopers meets Top Gun mixed in with some common cliche's and mediocre acting. The special effects such as seeing the ships being blown up were pretty good. By now everybody has gotten used to seeing Hollywood produce crazy special effects, and so it no longer is much of a doubt that special effects will be good in a movie. I particularly liked the pilot's helmets, where they had neat infra-red lenses and all that high-tech shmuck. _____Inside the large carriers, such as the Tiger Shark, is exactly the same as those in Starship Troopers, and every other space movie that have space carriers. You can tell the producers made an honest attempt at making things look futuristic, with 3D maps that highlight an area, and computers that talk with a sexy woman's voice. The dorm rooms are all identical, with automatic sliding doors that appear to have no locks. What I think is an oversight in part of the director is the missle rooms and hallways... they look exactly like submarines! You have a hoard of people working down in the engine room, and the missles are still loaded manually through firing tubes. This is the 27th century, for light's sake! Not very futuristic, is it? You would think high-tech guided missles would be computer automated, and able to do crazy stuff like branched guiding system or something. Instead you get plain ol' vanilla submarine missles. _____Obviously I'm not downgrading much of the movie due to little inconsistencies. Overall it was a very imaginationless linear plot line that offers little to no sub-plots. The special effects were cool, but it's nothing that you haven't seen before. The aliens are like typical aliens, having dark green skins with slimy ships and dark portals. Nothing much to stir action and excitement in the movie at all. Prinze Jr. isn't much of a hero / protagonistic guy, and he plays Blaire poorly in the movie. Lillard (the bad dude in Scream) was funny, but still completely prototype. There was this one line that struck me kind of funny: Since Blaire was supposed to be gifted in the arts of plotting coordinates and stuff because he's half Pilgrim (the movie explains the Pilgrim concept), he was chosen to be the one to deliver the crucial message to another Admiral where they can intercept the Kilrathi. Blaire expressed concern in that he has no faith, but was bluntly replied with, "It's not faith! It's genetics!!" _____Otherwise it was ho hum... I found my mind drifting towards thinkin' about the new Star Wars movie and how cool it was going to be when it is released. Younger fans such as those in the range of 4th through 7th grade will find it cool and awesome. Older adults accompanying them to watch the movie will most likely snore away for 2 hours. Young adults such as myself see it as a bland, and un-innovative movie showing off nothing of interest. Hard-core fans of Wing Commander games may enjoy the movie, but even they may see it as a sub-quality movie. Overall Rating: D |