Finally saw the last two Vanguard Animation movies in their catalogue: Trouble and Fearless.
“Trouble” was just downright awful; It was a miserable experience. The plot about a rich pampered dog getting misplaced and trying to survive in the big city sounds too much like Bolt but could’ve been alright if it wasn’t for the unnecessary torture of its protagonist. The pampered dog Trouble (voiced by rapper Big Sean for some reason) gets beaten up, scolded at, made fun of, arrested, threatened and even shunned so much throughout the movie and for what? Sure he’s pampered and spoiled and doesn’t know how to behave like an actual feral dog but doesn’t justify all the shit that he went through. It wasn’t cathartic or funny, it was depressing and way too bleak that I ended up sympathizing with him. The rest isn’t better where the conflict is cliche, the supporting characters are annoying and there are squirrels who act like greasers while Backstreet Boys music plays behind them for no reason. That and it wastes the talents of Big Sean, Pamela Adlon, Lucy Hale, Marissa Winokur, Joel McHale, Wilmer Valderrama, Damon Wayans Jr., Olivia Holt, Snoop Dogg and Betty White (not so fun fact, this was her last ever movie before her death). To make it even harsher in hindsight, Betty White’s character literally says in a happy tone that she’s dead… Yeah, not so funny now…
Anyways, fuck this movie, I’m never watching this again.
“Fearless” was also bad, but I was mostly bored with it. The plot about two teenagers trying to return a couple of magical babies back into their videogame before the villain gets them is dumb and doesn’t make sense. If the babies, the hero and the villain all come from a videogame, and the protagonist gets the babies from a wormhole through time and space that enters their dimension, doesn’t that mean that the video game is actually some simulation for another dimension that we didn’t know about? Did the developers even know about it? What happened if the protagonist kept on playing the game and controlled the characters, would it be controlling his dimension? It just leaves so many questions. The main characters are dull and bland, the villain is laughably awful, the hero from the game is really annoying with his one-liners and the voice acting is horrendous. Yara Shahidi, Miles Robbins, Miguel, Jadakiss, Angie Martinez, Harland Williams, Gabrielle Union and Fat Joe all don’t do good jobs. It’s either phoned in (the protagonist played by Miles), trying way too hard (the general played by Gabrielle) or completely unfitting towards the character (the villain played by Miguel. No seriously, his voice DOES NOT fit the character at all). Overall, it was another movie that was kinda boring and kinda stupid at the same time.
That ends my Vanguard movie marathon. I can see why this studio crashed and burned, they weren’t that good with their best movie only being decent at best.
