MovieChat Forums > Pokémon: Detective Pikachu (2019) Discussion > Dilbert, Garfield, Optimus Prime, Pikach...

Dilbert, Garfield, Optimus Prime, Pikachu.. what do they have in common?

posted 8 months ago by avortac4 (3743)
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Let's look at FIVE examples that have to do with talking, mouths, etc., that some weirdo in Hollyweird somewhere has an OBSESSION about changing. NOTHING like that can EVER remain faithful to the source material, can it?

01) Dilbert has no visible mouth in the original comic. You can read years and years worth of material and never see a mouth, except a couple of very rare, much later points, where he gets absolutely enraged or something.

Yet, in the cartoon, he had a mouth from the beginning. That is NOT my Dilbert, that does not look or feel like Dilbert, I don't see why that was necessary. People can't tell who's talking just because there is no visible mouth or lips forming words? You can even take this insanity to the Planet of the Apes movies, where a mere injury to the throat prevents ALL non-verbal communication somehow. It's so very very stupid.

02) Garfield doesn't talk, as in he does NOT form words with his mouth and lips. He is a gosh-darned housecat, HE CAN NOT TALK! He 'thinks' with thinking bubbles, they are NOT speech bubbles! How did this new version learn to suddenly talk? Cats do NOT talk, but hey, we have a movie, so we have to make everyone form words with their mouth and lips, or audience won't know who is talking! Durrr...

03) Optimus Prime talks, yes, but he DOES NOT HAVE VISIBLE LIPS in the source material. Watch all the cartoon seasons, read all the comics from the eighties - NO VISIBLE MOUTH WHATSOEVER.

Yet, in the stupid movies, he suddenly has the ugliest lips I have ever seen - if that's not off-putting, I don't know what is. WHY would there ever be a need to add such monstrosity over something that used to be, and is supposed to be 'cool'? It looks HIDEOUS and unnatural, that is NOT MY Optimus Prime! What's wrong with these people?

Oh, is it because audiences are considered SO STUPID, they can never tell who's talking, UNLESS THEY VISIBLY SEE A MOUTH AND LIPS FORMING WORDS?!

04) Mafalda.

What? I just added this as a bonus in the middle, because it's SO curious, how Mafalda in the comics DOES have lips and mouth, DOES talk a heckuva HECKUVA lot, about very deep topics in a very eloquent way, so what do they do when they make her into a cartoon?

THEY REMOVE ALL TALKING COMPLETELY!

WHAT?! It's not even the reason that audiences need blahblah from previous points, it seems to be that whatever the source material is, hollyweird and whatever studios are involved, have to REVERSE or INVERT it!

So if a character doesn't talk or have lips, make them talk and/or have lips form words.

If a character does talk and has lips, make them completely silent for 100% of the time.

What kind of sense does this make? Seriously!

05) Do I even have to talk about Pikachu at this point, when so many people have already been shocked that not only does Pikachu speak, but he/she/it/they/whatever speaks ENGLISH instead of Japanese! (I am not going to go so far as to research whether a japanese version has Pikachu speaking japanese outside some dub stuff)

This character is originally Japanese, can say only one word in the source material, and when they make a big movie about the character, whops, suddenly they have to be able to speak perfect english. WHY?

[–] avortac4 (3743) 8 months ago

As a sidenote, I ABSOLUTELY hate and abhor this ridiculous hollyweird-mentality that if they make a BIG MOVIE about some character, let's say Garfield or Pikachu, they have to put them in some 'storyline' instead of being faithful to the source material.

I don't think there IS enough material to make a good Garfield movie regardless, but putting him into some kind of 'adventure' or 'he has to find the precious gem from the jungle'-type ridiculous storyline, defeats the purpose of even using the character. They could put just ANYONE in there, and it would be the same gosh-darned movie, same story, etc.

Garfield is a lazy housecat that tortures Nermal and Odie (of course Davis had to tone this down with the success, so investors and such would be appeased appropriately and properly), despises Jon, the hand that feeds him, destroys the furniture, curtains, etc. and eats everything in the house as much as animalistically possible.

There's no real story there, and if you remove him from this environment and this house-laziness, where 'nothing happens', and then put him to star in some adventure story and make him save an Amazonian village or stop some sudden supervillain from taking over the world, you remove what makes him Garfield, and reduce him to 'a lackluster hero of a generic story' that just happens to look like Garfield.

The only true and proper Garfield movie would be a cat being lazy and having no rules, which leads him to be a psychotic, sociopathic, abusive, toxic torturer and to abuse Jon, Lyman, Odie and Nermal to his heart's content. Any 'adventure' happening would be within that framework, as in him trying to not chase mice even though Jon wants him to, and all those spider-related incidences.

A special DID do a 'good job' with the Halloween stuff and so on, but it wasn't a 'true Garfield' scenario, because the essence of Garfield needs the inside of the house and lazy shenanigans on a daily basis, not a generic adventure outside.

[–] avortac4 (3743) 8 months ago

So this movie is a similar thing happening.

Pikachu can't be just the Pikachu we know from the TV show, doing the TV show things, but it/he/whatever has to be a SPECIAL, completely re-engineered version that can talk, goes on an adventure, becomes a detective (of all things - why is this so common? Didn't they do this to the 'Friday' girl from some comedy horror franchise as well?), and so on..

It's like things are NOT allowed to be faithful to the source material, no matter what the source material is like. He talks, make him silent. She doesn't talk, make her talk. He doesn't have a mouth, well, by golly, now he does! He doesn't have lips, well, now he HAS to (even though he is a ROBOT, for crying out loud!)..

The insanity of this 'we have to CRAM and FORCIBLY CONFORM AND FIT this character into our pre-existing, idiot-pleasing formula for maximum profit'-crap never ceases to surprise and anger me, but at least I have this place to vent.