Not All Fairytales Go by the Book

I've never been so anxious to see a movie before. Ever.

Sure, I was really excited for Tangled, but I kind of knew what to expect from it. I knew that she was going to go outside her tower to go to the kingdom with a thief named Flynn Rider. While that wasn't the entire plotline, I had a bit of an idea of where the movie was going. With Hoodwinked 2, I didn't.

In some ways, I was pleasantly surprised. And in others, a little let down. But I'll get to that later.

Hoodwinked 2 (or Too, as the posters say) takes place sometime after the Red and the gang join the HEA in the original Hoodwinked. Red has gone away for some "secret training" at an undisclosed location, leaving the team in a bit of disaray. Meanwhile, Wolf and Granny have been called out on a mission to help save two kidnapped children, Hansel and Gretel. Seeing that "Red Riding Rogue" didn't show up again, Wolf takes matters into his own hands... er, paws. And everything goes horribly wrong.

Cut to Red, who is far far far far far far far away out in the mountains, finishing her training with a covert group called The Sisters of the Hood. But it's interrupted when she gets an urgent call from Nicky Flippers, the head of the HEA. Her granny has been kidnapped, and he teams up Red and Wolf together for the rescue mission. But more is on the line than it seems.

The story was well done, although some things were kinda a stretch for me, and I was engaged almost the whole time. It was especially cool to see how all the characters worked together. When Red and Wolf are partnered up, they both have their own way of doing things. They really rub up against each other before the conflict is resolved, and some interesting character development is introduced. There are some pretty nice plot twists as well, and most of the jokes were hilarious.

Now to the downside of the story. While the majority of it is good, some parts of it seem to have little or no meaning. While this may have been done on purpose (to direct the main characters about where to go next), I found it a little disappointing. Especially when Boingo shows up, a la Cats and Dogs 2.

One thing that gets me is that this movie was originally delayed because of "glitches in the animation" or something like that. And it seems that even with a year of extra time to fix it, it survived. Although how obvious it is probably depends on the person, there are some problems lip-syncing the animation to the voice acting. I think it's mostly just at the beginning, though.

When the credits began to roll, I began to wonder if the filmmakers were trying to send the audience a message with the song they played at the end. "You got Hoodwinked Too, but you got hoodwinked, too. We got you good. Yeah, you know it!"

I don't know, maybe I'm being too nitpicky. Maybe I'm such a fangirl of the original that the flaws of the sequel stand out more. Or perhaps my expectations were higher than they should've been. It just feels that this movie has the potential to be more than what showed up on the big screen. :/

So I'll end by saying that it wasn't the best sequel I've ever seen, but it has its good moments and is worth a watch. If you want to introduce someone to the Hoodwinked franchise, though, show them the original.

The OTHER Soundtrack

So it turns out that the Murray Gold score wasn't the only thing that came out yesterday. An album of eleven songs with lyrics was also released on iTunes. If you have iTunes on your computer, you can preview the songs here. It's nothing special, really. It's worth a listen to, but it's not as good as the score. There are a few songs that I like a lot, and one in particular that I find very interesting, but I'll talk about that some other time.

In other news, another clip has been released on MovieTickets. I'd put a link up, but I decided last night that I wouldn't look up anything more about Hoodwinked 2 until after I saw the movie, so I haven't even clicked the link. So visit the Hoodwinked 2 page on MovieTickets or click the link on their Twitter to watch it. Just don't tell me what it's about. The reason I'm not watching it is because I've already spoiled too much for myself.

Music Video

EDIT: Here's the Youtube video:

Yep, I got more Hoodwinked news. Earlier today I found a music video on the movie's IMDb page. The song is catchy, but the choreography was terrible and it also contains a few interesting clips. And by "a few" I mean "a LOT". There are extended versions of clips we've already seen, as well as glimpses at new places and characters. Most of these clips have been sped up to some degree, though, so they go by in a flash.

Fun fact: Chief Grizzly, P-Biggie, and the Lizard Director can be seen in some of the clips if you pause at the right moment.

 

Three days left! I'm looking forward to it! :D

HW2 Soundtrack

Well, I just started searching around for more news on the Hoodwinked 2 soundtrack and here it is: it turns out that the digital soundtrack is coming out April 26th, and it will be released on CD format May 17th. To add to that, Amazon now has all the names of the songs up, as well as thirty second or so previews of them. The names are as follows:

1. Happily Ever Before
2. Operation Free The Children
3. Out Of Reach
4. Red
5. Sister Hoods
6. HEA
7. Hoodwinked Hop
8. A Hasty Exit
9. A Long Standing Feud
10. The Amazing Granny Puckett
11. How It All Started
12. On The Trail Of Evil
13. An Unwelcome Disturbance
14. Three Pigs
15. A Pitiful Fight
16. The Song Of Kirk
17. The Unstoppable Hoods
18. A Dastardly Growth Spurt
19. Red Down
20. Legs
21. Go Red!
22. A Gigantic Problem
23. In Training
24. All In The Balance
25. Swaggering Through The City
26. Fight The Fight, Fighters
27. Until Next Time
28. Hoodwinked Logo

I'm fairly relieved that the song names don't really spoil anything (I spoiled part of Tangled by looking at the soundtrack names once). They tell you just a little bit, but are vague enough to keep you guessing. The weirdest one, though, is "Legs". While I have a slight idea of what it means, I don't get why they called it that. :/

The previews are pretty interesting as well. The whole soundtrack seems to have a bit of a jazzy feel to it. I'm partially glad that they only give you part of the songs, because I caught what I think is the cue for something happening in the movie and it cuts off almost right after that. You can find the previews here.

Ugh, it's SO close! Less then four days! I think I'm gonna go insane from waiting! x_x

New Countdown Timer

Just stopping in to say that I finally found a countdown generator. This is great because even if I don't post, the countdown is here and it's more accurate. So... yeah. I don't have much time to type, so I'll put another post up later sometime. :)

A Few Corrections

Countdown to Hoodwinked Too: 1 week, 2 days.

Okay, I meant to say this earlier, but I never got the chance to. First of all, I'd like to make some corrections about what I updated about in the webcast. The "two or three new trailers" are actually commercials. Looks like I was too excited (and exasperated, at seeing a spoiler) to see new footage that I forgot to check how long they were. Oops.

Second of all, if you missed the webcast, it's been recorded on the player on the post below. Just wait for the trailer to end, and it'll show up. Just be aware that at the end, the host gives away the same spoiler that was in the commercial I saw, so if you don't want to know it, turn the video off when she starts reading the cast list.

And, yes, that is a countdown at the top of the post. I might make a graphic for it, but I seriously doubt I have time to, so I'll just keep it like I have here for now. :/

HW2 Red Carpet Premiere LIVE Broadcast

Today is a big day. The Hoodwinked 2 premiere is just about to start! For those of you who don't live in California, which includes me, you can watch the LIVE broadcast below.

Live Streaming by Ustream.TV

The channel is switching between the trailer and some short footage of what's going on at the theater right now. It said at 9:35 PST that the broadcast would start in 25 minutes, so it'll probably keep the loop going until 10:00 PST. I can't wait! :D :D :D

Stay tuned for further updates.

UPDATE: Two or three new trailers commercials have just been shown. One, unfortunately, contained a spoiler. Sigh. -_-
UPDATE 2: The broadcast has officially started! :D :D :D

Don't Go Too Far or You'll Miss It

Hey howdy ho! I meant to put up a post a few days earlier than this, but oh well. There are just a few HW2 updates today.

-The soundtrack comes out April 26th, according to Amazon.
-Commercials are now on the air. Not sure how many, but the one I saw looked like a shorted version of the trailer (audio sounds that aren't in the movie and all). :/
-A new movie still has been released!



Granny's head looks a bit too big, but that's just me.

This picture is especially interesting, because it's the first to show all the main characters together in the actual movie. 

And the biggest news so far, (that I actually found out while writing this post) THERE'S A CLIP! It shows the first part of the fight between Red and the Bridge Troll. When's April 29th gonna get here?! I want more!

And for those of you who have not seen the Cars 2 promo Pixar put up April 1st, I'd suggest that you do. It's HILARIOUS. Plus, there's something... interesting at the end of the video.