Initial reaction to WC movie in '99

[Chevieblazer]

you might have a point there. if those are films that ran in theatres, they are apparently SO bad they never made it to europe.
alone in the dark was on screen for an entire week, after all...

 

[Sigmar Maximus]

I was just wondering since I wasn't here in '99, what were your initial reactions to the Wing Commander movie? Did you feel the same about it as you did now, or were you like "Holy crap that was great!" and then a few months later "Eh...there were a bunch of problems."?

Just rather curious about the whole thing.

I was happy with it. I wish they had not shown the Kilrathi at all, as I thought it took away from the myster of which they were.

While I knew they were cats', I did not once see them in WING COMMANDER 1, and they were always a 'distant enemy', one that I took on in missions and that was it.

When I got to the end of SECRET MISSIONS 1, I nearly froze in both terror and wonder when they show the part where the former Admiral of the Kilrathi being vaporized by the Emperor for losing the SHIVAR weapon....for the first time I got a real good look at the enemy and was like "wow"

They should have done that with the movie as well.

 

[lxi]

you kinda seem them in the vid screen in WC1 but really not much at all...

 

[Sigmar Maximus]

you kinda seem them in the vid screen in WC1 but really not much at all...

Yeha, and that is what made them a more detached enemy. It is like seeing the enemy thru a gun sight and firing and then actually seeing what you are up against up close, that is how I felt when I saw that part at the end of Secret Missions 1, i was like "WOOOH!!!"

 

[ChrisReid]

While I knew they were cats', I did not once see them in WING COMMANDER 1, and they were always a 'distant enemy', one that I took on in missions and that was it.

When I got to the end of SECRET MISSIONS 1, I nearly froze in both terror and wonder when they show the part where the former Admiral of the Kilrathi being vaporized by the Emperor for losing the SHIVAR weapon....for the first time I got a real good look at the enemy and was like "wow"

They should have done that with the movie as well.

That's odd, because they didn't do that with the game. In addition to the comm vdu scenes and the detailed Kilrathi photos in the Claw Marks manual, the Kilrathi show up in a variety of cutscenes throughout WC1. Did you miss them getting poked at by the Mopoks or held captive by the scientists at Port Hedland?

 

[Wulf]

He probably played it on the Super NES like I did initially, where the cutscenes just had a planet zooming in with subtitles being flashed. I got to tell you, seeing the Kilrathi in SM1, also on the SNES, gave me that "Whoa!" feeling as well! When I got Kilrathi Saga for PC about 4 years ago, I couldn't believe how much was cut out when the game was ported to Nintendo!!

 

[ChrisReid]

Well, new stuff also got added too. The SM1 intro on the SNES has some invaluable information on the origins and testing of the Sivar's weapon.

 

[Wulf]

Now that you mention it, I don't recall an intro like that for the PC SM1. I guess there's some good with the bad

 

[Sigmar Maximus]

Thanks guys.

ONce I saw that scene at the end of SM1, it really more defined the entire saga for me. I know realized I was up against an entire race and culture and stuff like that, and that I was not up against some cat's in Dralthi's, for example.

 

[DyNaMiX]

Personally I loved it.
I was excited from the moment i heard about it. IT was one of my top games (if not THE top) and to finally see it all in 2 hours of action was quite exciting.
I looked past all the inconsistencies and saw it was one big "everything Wing Commander" in 2 hours.
We had the rapiers/hornets from the first game. The pilots from the first game (hunter was the first one that shocked me, you can pick a fellow aussie over anyone else). The Tiger('s) Claw was the only thing I noticed straight off. The rest was fine. We had skipper missiles from the third game, Tolwyn and the Concordia (which we weren't really formally introduced until the second game) and there was the romance between Maverick and Angel (2nd game). It was great.

How I reacted to it after I saw it? I consider it a peice of it's own. I don't wanna try fitting it into the universe of hte games because there is too much that bugs me. I see them as two seperate media much like a lot of PC games have a console variant. If you play PC games you've got the Wing Commander with Mark Hamil and the first carrier we served on was the Tiger's Claw. If you jump into the world of movies, you've got Wing Commander which takes all the magic of the games. But as far as I'm concerned, Maverick first went to the Tiger's Claw when we see him in the cartoons, and he first started his tour of duty when I went up to Shotglass and introduced myself.

 

[Sigmar Maximus]

As far the movie went, I would have been hapier if they had dropped the whole 'pilgrim' thing and instead concentrated on what made WC 1 so great.

 

[Bandit LOAF]

Unprecedentedly interactive gameplay?

 

[Sigmar Maximus]

Unprecedentedly interactive gameplay?

Well, that too, but it was getting to know the characters you were flying with and getting to take on the Kilrathi the way it was done in WC1. I was happy with the movie, would have been more happy if it was more a direct port (ie, Paladin had been already on Tigers Claw; more of the 'classic characters' ie Spirit, Hunter, IceMan, BossMan, Halcyon, etc)

 

[LeHah]

Not only would that be somewhat boring since we all know what happens already, but also runs a greater risk of continuity problems. I very much doubt that they could cram the entirety of WC1 into a 100 minute or even two hour movie.

 

[Dyret]

I just saw the movie again today. I have only seen it once before, and i didnt remember much... Here's my opinion: The movie is great!

 

[Wulf]

Yeah, I thought it was fun to watch. I just don't think the movies did the games enough justice, imho. The depth wasn't there, and the movie's Kilrathi were not the Kilrathi I admired and respected. Plus, Paladin being French was...weird.

 

[ChrisReid]

Yeah, I thought it was fun to watch. I just don't think the movies did the games enough justice, imho. The depth wasn't there, and the movie's Kilrathi were not the Kilrathi I admired and respected.

Plus, Paladin being French was...weird.

Paladin is Paladin. The actor who played him in the movie was Turkish.

 

[Wulf]

I forgot about that! Hehehe...poor Melek. He looks more like an ape in that style; should've stuck with WC3 costumes! Were you able to take that screen directly from WC4, or did you have to go somewhere else?

 

[scheherazade]

For me the movie was a victim of the typical game-based-movie.


Thoughts of those involved in architecting the movie :

"Hey, this game is AWESOME."
"Ya, I know, It's so cool. I love everything about it. There should really be a movie about this."
...
"Let's make a movie!"
"Ya!"
...
"Now that we know we like everything about the game, LETS CHANGE IT ALL FOR THE MOVIE!!!"
"YA!!!"
...
<months pass>
<movie comes out that generally skims the look and feel of the game, is a partner in spirit, but in execution is largely just totally different and pretty much unrelated.>
<people's reaction : "wtf" or "...">

-scheherazade

 

[Maj.Striker]

Look, one thing that doesn't get talked about a whole lot in the overall presentation and design of the Wing Commander movie is this:

Wing Commander 1 came out a good 7 or 8 years earlier. Since that time the games had evolved a great deal into the giants that were Wing Commander 3 and Wing Commander 4. Look at Wing Commander 4's ships and look at WC 1's ships. Quite a bit different in color schemes and appearances. Look at Blair in Wing Commander 4 and look at Blair in WC1. Quite a different appearance. Look at the uniforms, technologies etc. I wonder if these were some of the things going through the minds of the producers/creative content designers. "Sure, Wing Commander was a great hit...but have we changed the look and feel of the package over the past few games so much that going back o the Green and white color schemes, tan and blue uniforms and etc that it would turn off our audience?" I'm not saying that's what they thought that but I wonder if it crossed their minds and inspired some of the creative changes (i.e. the bengal and rapier models etc.)