Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Good morning and welcome back to another episode of movie Deputy Reviews, where we are concluding our kung fu Panda series with Kung fu Panda Four. Now, you have gotten a glimpse for the last couple days of what the original reviews sounded like that were on the website. And if you are at all familiar with my programs, you can probably hear a difference between the way I wrote the reviews and just the way that I just kind of talked to you about the reviews. Because when you're writing them down so that you can go back and you can make edits, you can make changes with the podcasts, I don't, like pre record anything. I don't script it. I don't do any of that. So I just, I have the notes that I took during the movie and then I just sit here and talk to you about the movie. So it's a little bit different in that retrospect, but it's still all the same old fun. I still look deep into the interrogation of the movies and I really look at like, what the audience is and what the, the whole meaning of the story is supposed to be. And though with this one, we kind of see a little bit of a disconnect away from the original trilogy. At the same time, it's almost a stronger movie because of some of the things that it does. And don't worry, I won't spoil any of that for you. But it is important to kind of address all of that and everything before you watch this, or if you've watched it already, I hope that you enjoyed this review. If you have any feedback, of course I welcome it. You can either hashtag moviedeputy on social media or you can message me directly at my email, which is moviedeputymail.com, or on the contact me page on moviedepity.com. Now, if that was almost like word vomit, because that's all, folks, I apologize. I know it can be a little bit overwhelming sometimes, but I absolutely love what I do and I hope that you are enjoying it as well. It is truly an adventure and I just kind of see the progress of everything and I just still can't believe we've done over 2000 movies. So, yeah, I've got a lot to get switched over to this podcast format, and I'm going to go ahead and jump right in with kind of the review of kung Fu Panda four. Again, I did give this an innocent rating, but this one just kind of goes in a little bit of a different direction than what we're used to seeing with these movies.
[00:02:27] So I hope that you enjoy. But in this one, like I said, I don't ever script anything. But in this one, Poe, of course we know he's the dragon Warrior, but what he is with this one, we see him not only being the dragon Warrior, but we see him progressing to being the spiritual leader of the Valley of peace. Basically he is becoming like Master Oogway was. And so in order to do that, he must find a new dragon warrior. Now it's like, wait, he is the dragon Warrior? And was Master Oogway ever the Dragon Warrior? That's kind of a little bit of a plot hole that we see in this one. Just, just a little bit.
[00:03:07] But we really get to see, it's like how the process goes. It was like we know how he was chosen. It was just very kind of off the wall. I mean, completely unexpected, almost by accident how he was chosen. But so now how will he choose a successor? How will he choose the person to be the next dragon warrior? That is going to be a lot more complicated than it seems because he's gotten used to this position. He likes the power of this position and he doesn't really want to give it up. And I mean, honestly, can you blame him? I wouldn't blame him. It's like he's happy doing what he's doing. He loves protecting the people and now he knows who he is. He has his family.
[00:03:44] And it, it almost seems like it goes down a little bit of a different direction in the beginning of the movie, which thankfully it didn't follow that if you sit down and watch, you'll understand the reference I'm making. But trust me, it is still safe for all ages and very much innocent on that, which I'm so thankful that they did that. But this one really does something that the rest of the movies lack. And because of that I'm actually going to let you know the score now before I get into too much more of the story. The first, the original kung fu panda, I gave a 6.25. Kung fu panda two, I gave a six out of ten.
[00:04:18] The third one I gave a 6.25. And this one, and I'll explain this here in a minute, but I'm actually giving kung fu panda four a 6.5 out of ten. And like I said, even though the story is maybe missing a little bit of something, we've seen how he uses the special finger hold and I'm not going to go into any like, graphic details on that. It's not that. It's not that it's graphic or anything, but I don't want to spoil it if you haven't seen these movies yet, so. But there's a special finger hold that he does. And then he also does this, the whole skidoosh, and he does all these other things, and it's really specific to him as a character. So it's like, how is he gonna pass all of this on? But the thing is, we see him defeating these quote unquote bad guys in these other movies, but we don't ever see any resolution to that. And in this, he ends up needing all of their help, and so he's able to bring them back and make peace with them.
[00:05:16] And it's like it almost rides that fine line of maybe being too much, but it does. But it brings. It concludes a lot of the other pieces of the story that we've seen up till now. And it's not just him making peace with them. It's understanding why they made some of the decisions that they made and why he's made some of the decisions that he's made. So it's really a much more in depth story than what we have seen from the other three movies. And because of that, like I said, even though it's a little bit disconnect from the trilogy, it really does something special. And so I. I really have to look at that. I had to separate. It's like, okay, a seven is very good. Memorable. A six is a very good story. Memorable. Some flaws. And, okay, all these movies have some flaws, but some of them are just a little bit better than others. And this one is just.
[00:06:12] It just kind of takes just a notch. It's like, I almost wish I had a partial point between, like, a 6.25 and a 6.5. But I don't want to complicate my rating system that much further.
[00:06:26] There's already enough. It's like, between one and ten, which you'll never find the zero on movie deputy, because no movie is that bad. There's a lot that are really bad, but there's none that deserve a full zero.
[00:06:36] But you'll also never find a ten on movie deputy for that same reason. Cause there's no such thing as a perfect movie. And then everywhere in between there, I have quarter. A quarter point rating system. So everything from, like, 0.25, though, I've never given below a one all the way up to, like, a 9.75. Again, the highest score I've ever given is a 9.25. Hashtag sound of freedom.
[00:06:59] But like I said, this one is just. There is something special about this one. And I really hope that if you are at all familiar with the other kung fu Panda movies that you give this one a chance. It's not gonna be what you expect, but in this type of a situation, that's actually going to be a good thing. So be sure to come back tomorrow for the new releases that are coming out this weekend. And as always, you know which buttons push so you never miss the latest and greatest of a movie deputy episode. And of course, I will be back soon. Bye.
