Review: 'Alpha and Omega'
The documentation of Alpha and Omega (trailer) is as much a cliché as the content. Its closing disclaimer assures us that the story is completely fictitious; all well and good, yet it continues with: "No identification with actual .... products is intended or should be inferred."
This could only have been added out of tradition, as this is little more than a rip-off of prior animated films, Disney's in particular. The only difference is that the originals did a good job.
This isn't a well-known studio's production (indeed the credits say that it's split between the US and India) and unfortunately that is very clear. While the scenery looks rather good, the wolves – intended to be the focus of your attention – needed a lot more detail in their models. This is particularly noticeable in the tails, which often seem to have been tacked on at the end; and worse, in an incredibly poor design choice, their hair. Wolves don't have human head hair, and its inclusion does not do the characters any favours.
Most characters don't stand out on their own in any way; the exceptions are sometimes for the wrong reasons. Eve (Kate's mother), for example, stands out for having a nose at least twice the size of anyone else in the film. Despite her lack of aesthetic appeal, she makes up for it with one or two good lines:
If any of you wolves have hurt my daughter, I will personally rip out your eyes and shove them down your throat so you can see my claws tear your carcass open!
Character-wise, nearly everyone is unbelievably shallow. You don't need to spend more than a few seconds listening to their lines to learn everything there is to know about them. The one exception is Lilly, who we see keep her feelings a secret. Humphrey, who as a main character ought to be one of the more complicated ones, is a joker; apart from that, there's really nothing more to him. He has feelings for Kate, but there is no subtlety, and never any real 'feel' to them.
The story is decent, but it's been seen a thousand times before. Aside from being derivative, the biggest disappointment is how the quadrupedal characters occasionally feel the need to stand on two legs and dance. They look even worse in that pose and The Lion King showed it was entirely possible to have an excellent quadrupedal dance sequence.
Following on that thought: Disney made a point to include songs, often excellent ones, into their films. Alpha and Omega didn't copy that though, which worked against them. In a train scene, which reminded me of Spirit's train scene in Spirit: Stallion Of The Cimarron, we get a strange choral howling and symphonic music. This is a really beautiful scene; you can feel a climax building, a climax that could be reached with a powerful song. Instead we scrabble on the lower slopes of the peak, failing to climax and abruptly changing tone, as well as seeing the animators stretching events (again) to conveniently suit the plot.
If I had to find a single unique feature in the story, it would have to be the lack of an evil character. There is a conflict between two wolf packs, but neither comes off as bad; one of them is just a bit mental. Strangely, there is no second-in-command to balance the leadership and the packs blindly do what they are told, which makes the ending a laughable, bipolar, roller-coaster of battles and peace over the smallest issues. It isn't even slightly satisfying, as no one seems to have much reaction to near-death of one of the pack members and the viewer is left with a bunch of questions about issues that the film appears to have just forgotten.
In the end, Alpha and Omega seems less like a proper film and more like a film student spent his time cutting together his favourite scenes from old Disney films and, when told that wasn't allowed, changed it enough to look slightly different. If it were a parody, it would have succeeded. As it's own film, it is a failure. It can still be enjoyed, perhaps especially in a group where you play 'spot the inspiration.'
About the author
Rakuen Growlithe — read stories — contact (login required)a scientist and Growlithe from South Africa, interested in science, writing, pokemon and gaming
I'm a South African fur, originally from Cape Town. I'm interested in science, writing, gaming, all sorts of furry stuff, Pokemon and some naughtier things too! I've dabbled in art before but prefer writing. You can find my fiction on SoFurry and non-fiction on Flayrah.
Comments
Yes, this film was hilariously bad.
I'd have to agree.
It's not the kind of movie you'd honestly enjoy in a vacuum, but rather one that's good to get together with friends and riff on.
Uncanny valley.
That is all.
Wikipedia's article on "Alpha and Omega" says, "Produced on a $20 million budget, the film has been declared a financial success, and is Lionsgate's highest-grossing animated feature to date." Can we expect a sequel, then?
D:)
Yup. If you go onto Crest Animation Production's Wikipedia page it says Alpha and Omega 2 will be coming in 2012-2013.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
D:
THAT IS NOT THE THE UNCANNY VALLEY.
THE UNCANNY VALLEY IS NOT THE END-ALL, BE-ALL OF CREEPINESS.
IN FACT, THE UNCANNY VALLEY IS, BY DEFINITION, A VERY SMALL, VERY SPECIFIC PART OF THE "CREEPY" TERRAIN.
The "Uncanny Valley" effect occurs when something approaches near human, but is a little off. The vast majority of characters in Alpha and Omega are nowhere near human, so do not fall into the terrain of the Uncanny Valley.
I don't know why Uncanny Valley is always capitalized, either. It's not a real valley. But, anyway.
You are probably experiencing a reaction to what has best been described by Noel Carroll (he's got an umlaut in his first name, but whatever) in A Philosophy of Horror, or Paradoxes of the Heart, which he uses the word "liminal" or "interstitial" to describe the appeal of certain types of monsters. Basically, monsters are often created (by the author, not mad scientist) using two anti-thetical states, such as living/dead (anything "undead," natch), animal/human (anything furry, natch) and even solid/liquid (think The Blob).
Anyway, Carroll explains that these kinds of paradoxical monsters often create a paradoxical reaction in the viewer; one of horror (defined by Carroll as a mixture of both fear and disgust) and, at the same time, fascination. He uses this to explain the "paradox of horror," i.e. how people can enjoy fear and disgust. Basically, he says, they don't; they enjoy the "fascination" of monsters. It's a bit weak, in my opinion, as a answer to the paradox of horror, but the theory of "liminality" as a source of both negative and positive reactions works well enough on its own.
Furries are obviously fascinated by a certain type of "liminal monster" (using the definition of monster as "unnatural" rather than "evil"); certain people also have an almost virulent reaction to furry art. Given Carroll's theory, it can be seen that both reactions are entirely natural and even complementary.
The characters in Alpha and Omega exhibit a high level of liminality, but in a way you are unused to (human traits overlaying an animal template, opposite of the usual furry method of animal overlaying a human template); this is why you find them creepy.
SO STOP SAYING UNCANNY VALLEY LIKE YOU KNOW WHAT IT MEANS, 'CAUSE YOU DON'T.
Unless you were creeped out by the few human characters. That was probably the Uncanny Valley, then.
Creepy designs are creepy.
Why argue?
Because I am a died in the wool horror fan, almost as much as I am a furry fan. There is creepy, and then there is creepy.
To quote Stephen King (from memory):
"On one level, David Cronenberg's Shivers asks how we feel about newfound levels of sexual promiscuity and their consequences in modern society. On another level, it asks how we feel about a leech jumping out of a mailslot and attaching to our face. These are not the same areas of unease at all."
To some extent I think you're splitting hairs. When you're talking about empathy with anthropomorphic characters, the issue is how closely they fit our image of "human".
On the other hand, the Uncanny Valley* is specific about relation to *realistic* depictions, so you're right in that sense.
On the other other hand, language changes! :)
By the way, I wrote an article on this subject for the Association for Computing Machinery -- see http://www.computer.org/portal/web/csdl/doi/10.1109/MCG.2008.79 . I can send it to you privately: Contact me at howling -at- tgeller dot etcetera.
* Capitalized by tradition, really. It's actually a translation of a Japanese phrase used by Masahiro Mori in his seminal 1970 paper on the subject. It should properly be in quotes, but that's unwieldy. Eh, you're probably right... it could be lower-cased at this point.
Perhaps it is capitalized because it has become a real place over time. ;-)
Located near Eerie Indiana ;)
I don't think it is specific to humans, as many animals, especially the Canidae family are familiar enough to humans to be able to identify with on some level and to have traits distinguishable between some kinds of healthy vs. abnormal. The uncanny valley can just be when increased realism in general triggers various negative reactions to subtle issues. Although abstraction and stylisation can subdue or defuse those triggers, and the use of animals would probably act like some amount of additional abstraction compared to similarly styled humans.
It is kind of hard to be so definite about the uncanny valley thing though, since the vast majority of all the stuff written on it is really just conjecture and speculation to explain some people's personal experience. Up until recently, there was little to no actual attempts to research and test some of the ideas related to it. If I remember correctly, recently there was something that suggested the motion and animation was one of the cues people could be quite sensitive to, and it would seem quite possible that even a stylised animated wolf could trigger that for some people if the motions were exaggerated and cartoonish. I haven't seen the film myself to directly comment on that.
Basically, you start with an animal, and slowly star adding human features to it.
You do NOT do it the opposite way. The wolves in this here movie had faces too human and thus a bit creepy.
Dude. Chill out. That huge comment was not needed.
Wow such opinions, such need for expression, wow...
"The characters in Alpha and Omega exhibit a high level of liminality, but in a way you are unused to (human traits overlaying an animal template, opposite of the usual furry method of animal overlaying a human template); this is why you find them creepy."
I my self don't find their designs creepy at all. I think it's that what so many (Or some that is) are currently used to. Some people who are used to the usual Furry art (That has often shared the same "human" range) may find this one "creepy" because it's a little far on the edge of that usual range that so many Furry art has had. So for a guy who expands on accepting even more designs (Even closer to Human as some Furry art has), this is probably why I like this one..
If the "usual" Furry art was new in the now, (Pretending we never had all the Anthropomorphic stuff for the past centuries), I'm pretty sure some people will find those kinds of designs creepy as well, because they are not used to it, yet. I think it's the theory of seeing something so unknown, then accepting it as a Culture or something sometime later if people just got used to it, know what I mean? "Lot's often fear the unknown"
I also disagree that it's the "Human than adding non-human animal" way since clearly they still look like they started out as "normal" looking wolves, then they added human "parts", but for the faces, they just added much human rather than little. To me, it still fits how "Anthropomorphic" creatures are normally made, just an even more different art style of them and that they are a bit closer to the, HuMaNz, haha. Anyway, I think "Furry" has it's length, they could go so far that even a cat with a 100 % human face could still count. Have you seen those types of walking dogs with Abs before? O-o
Sorry for the old reply, you don't have to reply this, though your comment was still for some reason interesting.. I think.
-Note: If this comments brings too much attention on the website, maybe even unusual arguments, then can I ask for this comment to be deleted? I don't want to cause a huge drama or something, also if it's not OK to comment on old areas, then I don't mind for it to get deleted either.-
I like how you left out the often mentioned critic for those who actually know about dog breeding.
Around the section where they're first going to go "howl at the moon" a couple of female pack members are talking and you can hear one say, "It totally relaxes the knot." Then there's the whole concept of, "howling at the moon."
When I first seen the previews, I thought the movie to be of a children's movie, I was mistaken.
Your comment made my day.
I didn't remember that line. Even if I did though I wasn't going to go after factual inaccuracies. It was a movie, a fantasy. If you want it to be accurate then you'll have to watch a documentary.
It still seems like a children's movie to me...
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I'm not saying every furry who defends the right of a children's movie to include lines like "It totally relaxes the knot" is an actual zoophile.
But I'd be surprised if there wasn't a strong correlation.
Seriously, people. I suppose you were OK with Mike Myers making erection jokes in The Cat in the Hat as well!
It's actually perfectly logical that "Alpha and Omega" should look like a Disney rip off. It was produced by Richard Rich, who directed "The Fox and the Hound" and "The Black Cauldron" for Disney in the 1980s (classics only if you believe Disney's publicity that every Disney animated feature is a classic), and directed "The Swan Princess", the most obvious Disney imitation of all, for his own Rich Animation Studios in the 1990s.
Why did he do this...
I mean,... you can this concept and make a decent movie out of it.
But he didn't.
As far as I remember The Swan Princess was good. Of course it then had a whole trail of sequels which is never good for something. Unless a sequel is planned from the start it's unlikely to be any good.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I think about halfway through I realized, much to my chagrin, I was liking it.
It was about the part when emo-doo wolf volunteered to give rejected suitor a tour. I knew exactly where that subplot was going, but that probably explains why I liked it. It's sappy Disney crap, but it works. Doesn't make it good; in fact, makes it worse.
Bra scene also tickled me, though this time it was the only Dreamworks "edgy with a capital E for Everyone rating" joke that worked, rather than "overused Disney magic moment" that worked.
Those cliches work on me, man.
Probably top ten favorite bad movies.
The movie was okay, I guess. I wasent particularily moved by the storyline but a friend of mine who is all mister tough guy, always serious never cries, actualy cried during the final scenes. did anybody else find the end emothional?
Personal I prefer Balto to Alpha and omega.
"The story is decent, but it's been seen a thousand times before."
While I do disagree with this review, and since the designs are there main purpose as "furry designs", I would ask, are you saying that it would of been "better" if the main idea was changed to something it's not?
Or are you suggesting that they could of added more to it (Being fine that way), like more surprising moments without changing the idea done on purpose?
I think it's very flawed to bring out a "general idea" as a flaw, just because it's been done before. It's like saying that we should avoid the idea that the "good guys" will win at the end of every movie we mostly see. Better example: We should avoid making a "love story" now..
The strange thing about the story idea being brought out is "Why this movie" all of a sudden? Why are you fine with other movies being similar, but not Alpha and Omega? What if there was a group that always wanted to see two wolves fall in love? I've never seen that entire idea before, and I might like it. Even if I seen the general idea being used already. I've also seen a lot of fans loving this movie for what it is, and that does count as feedback, which shows that this movie does actually work for groups.
This isn't meant to be a mean comment or anything, but I believe it's interesting to talk about.
I also know this is just an opinion of you but it's in a review, which may often be used to tell Furries to avoid or not avoid (Correct me if wrong).. However, it seems very bias about half of it, which serves no feedback value much to the makers; because some things you didn't like has been done on purpose for certain audiences..
Then again, you probably are suggesting "more" to it rather than "attacking the whole thing". Which is more understandable kind of if so.
Didn't see the whole movie but I did look around it. Seems fine for what they tried aiming for generally. Especially for a small money making business.
Here's a review that I posted ages ago on a non-furry website. One of the admins had snarkily requested a furry's take on it, so I responded:
Arright, you want a furry's opinion on it... well you DID ask. First thing to understand is that when furries go out to see movies like this, objectivity takes a major hit. There's not a tremoundous amount of anthropomorphic stuff to be found in mainstream culture, so it's often a case of grasping at whatever straws can be found, quality be damned. That's why it's a heavily art-based subculture: generating its own content is the only way to get the furry fix until the next sporadic movie or cartoon comes out. A lot of furries won't watch the film for the plot, they're looking for cute scenes, poses, clever species-related humor, symbolic aspects - if enough little fleeting sparks happen of whatever appeals to the viewer, entertainment has been achieved.
Initially I had no intention of watching this film. Actually I learned of it here on Cartoon Brew and agreed with the general consensus. I deliberately avoided telling my local furry community about it, because I didn't want to give it any additional publicity. As it turned out, someone else clued in and went all (and I quote) "OMG WOLVES!" This is the grasping-at-straws thing I'm talking about. What's sad is this person is over age 30, like me.
What's also sad is that I still haven't thrown off similar attitudes. I must admit to being partially interested in going to see Voyage of the Dawn Treader to see the CGI critters. But with age comes maturity. I didn't watch The Secret of Kells for the critters; I sat awash in the beautiful designs. Curious to see The Illusionist. I love animation, furry or not. If it happens to be anthropomorphic, great, icing on the cake, unless it's a complete piece of shit like Roadside Romeo. I need good writing, anthropomorphism be damned.
Anyway the reason I ended up going was that there was a get-together happening afterwards that I wanted to attend and I needed a ride, so it was part and parcel. First bad sign, in a city of over 600,000 people it was only showing on two screens, 3D only. Opening weekend Saturday matinee... 30-ish people in the audience, a very bad turn-out. Most of them were a large group of 5-to-8 year-olds. Of the local furries, besides me and the OMG guy, only two others showed up. So the trailer had not made much of an impression on our group either. Another over-30 furry friend of mine, living in a different city with 4 times the population, had only 12 people in the theater when he went. He too questioned why he was there to begin with, and described his experience using the words "pain", "make it stop", and the characters as "boring" and the design "gross".
Still, let's start at the beginning: Trailers. Yogi, most of which I missed (uuugh, thank god) because I was out getting a drink. The only thing I saw was BooBoo hanging onto the side of a vehicle while his butt was pummeled by the tops of passing fenceposts. As if the Cartoon Brew posts about it haven't been nightmarish enough. Second trailer, Tangled. Enh. (Personal bias.) And that was it - only two trailers. I was surprised.
Film plot: "alpha" and "omega" are class differences within the wolfpack. There are multiple alphas (trained hunters, duty, responsibility, seriousness) and omegas (lower class, who are supposed to ease tensions, by telling jokes, etc., their duty is to encourage fun in the pack; surprisingly didn't often use the clumsy-goof trope). Custom has it that alphas and omegas don't form relationships together. Main protagonists, Kate and Humphrey. What the trailer didn't show is that the two of them are long-time childhood friends to begin with, they're not especially adverse to each other's company; but now that Kate is becoming a trained alpha, she must move on. There is also a neighboring wolf pack, the "Eastern wolves". They have no more caribou on their territory, are beginning to starve, and are crossing territorial lines. An agreement is made that the two packs will unite to ensure survival and avoid war, to be sealed by an arranged marriage between Kate and the son of the Eastern pack's leader, Garth.
Kate is initially impressed by Garth's many skills until she finds out that his howling is epically terrible. In fact his howling is so bad, it stuns birds right out of the sky. (This is one of the few better jokes in the film.) Before she can reconcile what she wants to do, and before Humphrey gets a chance to express his feelings for her, they're tranquilizer-darted and carted off to a park in Idaho as part of a park repopulation program. Immediately they start heading back north, because without Kate, the two wolf packs will go to war. To appease tensions until the full moon deadline, Kate's sister Lilly (an omega) hangs out with Garth.
At this point we get the road/buddy film thing happening. Humphrey gets Kate to be a little less serious, and earns her respect by saving her life at one point. They travel with the occasional help of a French-Canadian goose golfer and his bird sidekick caddy. Meanwhile, Garth encourages Lilly's self-confidence, and she teaches him how to howl. In fact his howling gets so good that now he attracts birds to him instead.
Anyway, war is about to break out and Kate arrives in the nick of time. She appears to be sacrificing her own interests for the good of the packs, but at the last moment can't go through with it. Fighting starts to break out, interrupted by a caribou stampede that almost kills the two pack leaders, who are saved by Kate and Humphrey. Their deep friendship and Humphrey's mourning over Kate's near-death impresses them that maybe custom should be broken and alpha-omega relationships be given a try, so Kate hooks up with Humphrey, and Garth with Lilly. The end.
Sex jokes: surprisingly few, though a good bit of leering-at-potential-girlfriends. The word 'mate' (noun, not verb) is barely used, thank god. Toilet humor: a lot. I counted at least 14 instances, not including many butt shots. The toilet humor stops abruptly after the road-trip part of the movie ends; this was refreshing. The end portion gets a good deal more serious and dramatic.
I have to tangent here momentarily to talk about 3D. Personally I'm not a fan of the trend. I don't like how it causes directors to frame shots, it makes my eyes water, and the glasses make the lighting less vibrant. 3D animation falls into three categories for me:
(1) Innocuous 3D - this is the most common, and is the general state of affairs in Alpha and Omega. You forget the film is in 3D, can suspend your disbelief, and although nothing special is happening, it's quite passable as is. This was, in my opinion, the only thing that made Avatar in any way notable; the successful creation of a full CGI/live-action 3D world you could suspend disbelief in. Pity the rest of it was such a piece of crap. Unfortunately this effect is immediately ruined when...
(2) A film sets up a shot specifically for 3D purposes which will look all too obvious in 2D, making one's brain leave the film. Things flying out of the screen, "Oooh, look at THIS in your FACE!"-style, or over-dramatic shots to show depth and layers. I absolutely HATE all of it. There's a good deal of this in Alpha and Omega, espcially right at the beginning of the film. Frankly Coraline did this too, as did the run-from-the-dogs-over-cliffs chase scene in Up. (Which also felt like a videogame tie-in.)
Films that do it right? Yes, you can set up shots that work in 2D and 3D, that don't make you feel like you're missing out while watching the 2D version. Films that successfully did this: Toy Story 3 and How to Train Your Dragon. Excellent work, people!
(3) Full immersion. Very, very fleeting. Very rare, and hard to pull off. Something about the 3D atmosphere of the scene just clicks. You get goose pimples... and then it's gone. If 3D is going to continue, this is what I want. I've only experienced it twice. One of the forest scenes in Avatar, and a single point in Bolt. What did it? Blades of grass waving in a light breeze in the foreground.
Okay, back to the film. Alpha and Omega goes between (1) and (2) a lot. (3) is never achieved. Animation quality, enh. Could be a lot better, could be worse. I didn't personally like the character designs - but they're good enough to achieve their purpose. Only had two "WTF?" animation moments: when some of the wolves are doing a weird curvy dance early in the film; and a section near the end when the packs had been united, and all the background characters start doing a weird hopping-skip thing. I mean seriously, wha? Fur textures, passable, works better on some characters than others. Body language, passable. Two major fails: the CGI motion of saliva and mud. Seriously, get help.
Here's something that I liked: No one breaks out into song. THANK YOU. Bonding and cameraderie between wolves is done by howling, and it's not "Awoooo!", it's basically musical singing without words. Whoever's responsible for that decision in the film - you deserve recognition. It was an excellent choice. Sadly, because of songs in previous films, it felt like the characters were about to break into song. Such relief when they didn't!
Script dialogue: nothing special. Voice acting: good work. Also nice touches: Garth isn't a jerk. He's a nice guy as it turn out, no idiotic male rivalry. Closing credits: Looked more 3D than the rest of the film! Lots of the animators' sketches, 3D models, reference sheets - really nice to see the work behind the film shown during the credits like that.
Canadian goose and sidekick: boring. Their wacky dialogue wasn't; it lacked snapiness and pacing. As characters they were ok, but... yawn. This film takes no risks. All very formula, doesn't stretch boundaries or even experiment with them. The only thing in the film that surprised me was just how... vicious Kate's mother is. She was a bit scary, to be honest. The effect was enhanced by her facial design being worse than everyone else's. And given that "alphas-and-omagas-shouldn't mix" was the whole defining pivot of plot conflict, an attitude so well-entrenched in wolf society, it felt really weird for it to be dropped so readily to achieve the happy ending.
Worth watching? If you're an animation fan, no. Animation student? Maybe, to analyse and critique. A parent with 5-to-8-year-old children? Actually yes, if you need to fill some time. This is what I'd describe as a "babysitting movie". There's very little in it to appeal to adults except for the odd throwaway line here and there. None of the writing-on-two-levels that Pixar does so well.
But it's not a movie that'll have you writhing in pain for an hour and a half. Certainly a lot of eye-rolling, at worst an eyes-glazing-over moment or two. It's animated fluff that doesn't stand out, and would make a decent rental for young kids.
Sure, you could do better. But contrary to expectations, it could have been a LOT worse. It's cohesive despite the toilet humor. The kids in the theater laughed, they had fun. And for some it was their first 3D experience. Heck, all it took was a non-descript cloudscape at the start and a whole bunch of them went "Whoooooaaaaa!..."
For me, it passed the time I guess; no desire to watch it a second time, and I don't think the recent rise in 3D ticket prices was worth the experience. It's a run-of-the-mill, dumb "let's see if we can make some money from kids" formula movie. I don't think it's worth praising or demonifying; it will not stand out in the annals of animation history.
Post new comment