Kung-Fu Panda

[Avaitor]

Discuss the franchise here. The movies, the show or whatever.

The third film is scheduled to come out in 2016 which... is way too late for me. Since I preferred the sequel, I hae relatively high hopes for this one, but wow is that a ridiculous wait.

[Dr. Insomniac]

I was originally turned off since, well, Jack Black as a panda. But, turns out I quite liked it. Haven't watched the sequel or much of the show though.

[Spark Of Spirit]

I also haven't gotten around to the sequel, though I probably should since I liked the first.

[Avaitor]

If you liked the first, you should totally see the sequel! Didn't my review sway you to go see it?

And c'mon, it has Po as a baby panda. Doesn't that interest you?

[Dr. Insomniac]

Jack Black's Jack Blackness forces me to wait until it's on FX or something.

[Spark Of Spirit]

I sort of forgot.  I do that a lot.

But it's on Netflix here, so I could easily get around to seeing it and probably will soon enough.

[Avaitor]

People who got to review KFP 2 got this party set for free.

And I did not.

This is why we need to become a big name site already.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

That reminds me that I still need to see KFP2, and as someone who really enjoyed the first movie I have to wonder why that hasn't happened yet....

Also, as far as Dreamworks' animated features go, I also still need to get around to watching How to Train Your Dragon eventually.

[Micki!]

Hi old thread, let me resusticate you..!

So I watched the sequel very recently, and I wasn't such a huge fan of the first movie I have to say, it just felt forgetable and i cared very little about the main villain, who in the end was just a play-thing once Po discovered how to fight him...

However, friends recommended to me to watch the sequel,  and i honestly liked it infinitey more... the 2D animated flashbacks in particular really felt great, and the villain felt way more menacing, and also worked much better with the background he had and all that, plus all the other fighters finally got way more screentime and all felt way more part of the movie..! I honestly (and i bet most did) guessed the ending from the very beginning of the movie, which is usually a big turn-off to me, but it somehow worked here, i'm thinking the great way characters were finally portrayed kind of just overshadowed the easy-to-guess plot in a way...

I also think, despite not nearly liking the first as much, that it was necessary in order to establish the characters and such, so i guess i don't really mind the first movie for what it made room for in the sequel..! Here's hoping it wasn't just a lucky shot, so it'll spawn a third movie with the same quality, and hopefully it doesn't end up trying too hard being whacky or epic in order to be "better" than the second movie...

It'd nice to see dreamworks has some honestly good spark in them still

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, I finally got around to watching the sequel!....3 years late....

Anyways, I really enjoyed it. I don't agree with Micki! about the first movie, especially since the sequel was basically the same brand of humor, but for what it is I liked it as much as the first movie. The story itself wasn't quite as tight as the first movie, but the humor was actually a little but more spot on than the original, so I consider it to be an even trade-off.

I still have no interest in the TV show, but I'm certainly glad that we got 2 great movies out of the franchise.

[Avaitor]

I think after the HTTYD movies, KFP 2 is my favorite CG Dreamworks movie.

Besides those and the first one, the pickings aren't all that strong, though.

[Spark Of Spirit]

HTTYD never really clicked with me, but I do like KFP and PIB. Dreamworks is much better at the adventure comedy than their usual comedies.

[Inkwolf]

I recently rewatched both movies.

The first time I saw them, I thought KFP was meh, but liked the sequel very much.

On re-watching, I found a lot to like about the first movie, too. It works better as a part of a bigger picture than as a stand-alone watch. Or maybe it's just that, once you already know the main plot is pathetic-loser-turns-hero-clich?, you can stop waiting for awesome stuff to happen to the plotline and just enjoy all the small touches more.

KFP 3 is scheduled for 2015. I am looking forward to it!

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

The plot formula for both is predictable and cliche, but I always felt that was done intentionally, like it was parodying the archetypes and formulas for those plots as much as it was celebrating them. But yeah, both movies work better when you view them for their humor and multitude of clever references and in-jokes rather than their actual stories.

[Avaitor]

Info on #3 is revealed.

I'm really digging the voice cast additions, give or take Rebel Wilson. And the story sounds pretty good. I hope that Dreamworks will still have it together come next March.