New Ultramarines Movie Trailer is out... and looks awful

[IvanTih]

Some members of other forums attended a sneak peak of the film today. Here are their reviews:

Bell of Lost Souls

Warseer

So far the reviews are pretty positive.

There is also a review on DakkaDakka and it's similiar to one from WarSeer,at least in my opinion.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

There's also this bad boy. It's a very long video, but you can skip the first 16 minutes with no problem.

The Highlights:

-The animation still kind of sucks, but for different reasons.

-The plot and characters are typical 40k in a good way.

-The voice acting is mostly good.

-The Landspeeder roxxed many soxx off.

-The sound and music are excellent for dancing.

-There are some funny moments.

-Generally, people found the movie to be "good but not great". Most agreed that they enjoyed it enough to say that they plan to buy it immediately (probably).

[Stravo]

There is news that the movie may be delayed. It was supposed to start shipping out today but customers who preordered have been receiving emails about a delay caused by unforeseen circumstances and they are working to fix it. My 40k fix may be denied, cruelly denied.

I have yet to receive this email but folks on Dakka have begun receiving them.

Text of the email is:

Dear xxxxxxxx

RE: Order 500000029

Unfortunately, due to a production issue outside of our control, we are not able to start shipping your order for the ULTRAMARINES DVD Collector's Set today, November 29th as planned. We are working around the clock with our third party suppliers to resolve the issue as soon as possible and hope to be able to give you details of a new ship date tomorrow.

We at Codex Pictures know you will be very disappointed not to receive your DVD as soon as anticipated and are equally distressed ourselves that this has happened.

Please accept our sincere apologies and rest assured we are doing everything we can to resolve the issue and get your order to you quickly.


Codex Pictures

[Bob the Gunslinger]

I got that email.

It looks like some unhappy people are visiting the Ultramarines' Facebook page.

[Srelex]

Sooo...has it got through to anyone at all?

[Bob the Gunslinger]

Codex sent an email saying that they'll ...hopefully... ship the DVDs out next week.

[Rogue 9]

Well, I'm now even more happy with my decision not to preorder.

[Stravo]

I just received this email from Codex Pictures. Looks like the issue is one of the components of the collector's edition is not ready or has issues. Great.



Dear Frank

RE Order 100000442

We regret to tell you that we are not yet in a position to confirm a dispatch date for Ultramarines, although we still anticipate shipping to commence next week. Both the Codex team and our suppliers are continuing to work flat out to make this happen.

Some of you waiting for your order have asked us what the problem is. We would like to reassure you the issue is not with the movie itself, but with one of the other components of the collector’s set.

Once more, please accept our sincere apologies for the delay. We will posting further updates on www.ultramarinesthemovie.com and emailing all existing customers as soon as we have more news.

Codex Pictures

[Bob the Gunslinger]

Update:

Dear Keyser Rahim Badongadong

RE Order 100006969

We can now confirm that shipping of the Ultramarines DVD Collector’s Set will start next week. Orders will be prioritised according to the date that they were received. All orders placed should be shipped by the end of that week.

You will receive a confirmation email once your order has been dispatched and you can expect delivery within 2 – 4 days of that ship date.

Once again, please accept our sincere apologies for this delay. We do hope that you will soon be able to enjoy your Ultramarines movie.

Codex Pictures

[Bob the Gunslinger]

Hi Abdul Darmok Tanzanian III,

This email is to confirm that your order has been shipped.

Your order has been despatched via Priority Mail.

If you have any questions about your order please contact us at support@createdistribution.com

Thank you again for your business.

[Name changed to protect the innocent until proven guilty.]

US order 100004199, if it makes a difference.

[Darmalus]

My copy just arrived, smaller than I expected. Neat little prequel booklet, nicely sets up a reason for any bonehead moves and exposition made by the space marines. I'll probably watch it tomorrow when my friends come over after work.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

I liked it a lot. The special effects definitely had a Red Dwarfish low-budget feel, but the movie was still pretty awesome. It makes me want to put together some models .

I want to rewatch a lot of the action scenes tomorrow because they were very entertaining, even if I feel that the bolter and the crozius arcanum of the movie aren't exactly what they should be.

It felt like a typical Space Marines short story, which I found to be a good thing. I really can't say more without spoilers, so I'll just leave it at that.

[Norade]

I just finished watching it and while the facial modeling left a lot to be desired it was a pretty good movie in all. It definitely had the short story vibe going but they really played up the tension well.

[Gurachn]

I watched it and enjoyed it.
I think a major factor in how much you will appreciate it comes from your attitude going in.
I think if you expect it to be a big budget motion picture (which it clearly is not) then it will suffer by comparision to the current crop of Hollywood CG extravaganzas.
If you imagine it as a particularly well funded fan movie (much closer to the case), then you are very likely to be pleased and surprised.

Actually, my impression was that it would make an extraordinary animated series.

[Feil]

I've seen it now, and I enjoyed it. The movie is much better than the trailers suggest, nothing amazing but solid and enjoyable all the way through.

Seems kind of backwards. Usually trailers present the movie much better than it actually is. I'm happy to have been wrong.

[Steel]

I saw it recently. I wouldn't say it was great, but it wasn't terrible either. If they go ahead with some more projects hopefully they'll get everything a bit more polished and more efficient so they can cram in more cool bits for less effort.

They spent quite a bit of time walking slowly, I did always imagine the SMs to be a bit more dynamic...

On the hilarious side, I was watching it with a few other non fan people, and while they weren't too impressed one of the girls reactions to "take their gene seed" was "Oh I'm going to use that one some time!"

[PainRack]

Im wondering whether the movie I saw is remotely similar to that Feil or others saw.

How was it... good? The plot was routine, nothing psectular, but the execution of the plotline was long and meandering.

It tried to show us some action clips, but it couldn't decide on how to use special animation like slowtime bolter shots or drawn out chainsword chewing, which ultimately screwed it up. For tips on how to use special animation shots, Sucker Punch shows the way, indeed, its the only thing that movie was good for, using camera tricks to give us a sense of action.
As such, the execution of said tricks was neither spectular and subtracted from any excitement of the action scenes, which was humdrum. Maybe its ok when compared to stuff like Exo Squad and the like, but any contemporary viewing of Japanese anime would had put shame to Ultramarines depiction of action.

Voice acting was good. But the script didn't give it any things to shine about and it was like watching a video game clip at times.

In terms of WH40k, it did give us some good peeks at wh40k lore but others was.... meh. Right. First time combat as Ultramarines... whatever happened to scouts? The idea that an entire squad is full of green space marines is laughable. Although the bits about "there wasn't a scrap of glory" does suggest that they had fought before... just that they were so green that they're honour seeking glory hounds.
I'm not sure how to like the depiction of veteran Space Marines though. The canon fluff is that Space Marines are scarred veterans due to countless battles but god.... it makes them look like old men.

We have some very good shots of bolter targeting imagery.

[Cykeisme]

Considering it's pure CGI, I really expected the movie to highlight the superhuman nature of the Astartes, and have at least one throwaway scene showing their sheer size compared to a human chapter serf or somesuch. Then again,I can forgive the stiff action and lack of superhuman action sequences due to budgetary constraints on the animation, though.

However, I have to completely agree with Painrack here. I was surprised at the number of inaccuracies to the background, considering Dan Abnett was directly involved, and GW was supposed to have very close oversight of the creative process.

The points that were most glaring are those already mentioned; it ignored the background that by the time a Space Marine first dons power armor, he should already be what would be considered a battle hardened veteran by mortal human standards. The "rookie" attitudes and speech of the Battle Brothers was very jarring, and does not gel at all with everything we know. Long years and dozens of high-risk operations in the Tenth Company should have shaken it out of them, and being taken into an Astartes chapter at a young age means they would likely never have displayed silly juvenile tendencies at any point in their lives.
Considering they're Ultramarines, the epitome of Codex adherence, this is completely inexcusable. They could have gone with a squad of Blood Claws from the Space Wolves, and it could have made sense. However, it looks as though the people who wrote the movie know so little about 40k, that they wouldn't even know why I suggest this, or what I'm talking about.

Also, every Space Marine we've seen in other depictions (even those over three or four centuries in age) don't look old, which implies they don't "go geriatric".. ever. Even if they did in extreme old age, the Brother-Captain didn't even have that many service studs.


Edit: To be fair, there were many aspects of it that I did enjoy, though it may have seemed otherwise since I only expounded at length on my grouses. It's the first 40k movie to be made, and there were plenty of good things about it.

[Srelex]

Isn't there a mini-comic with the DVD that explains the whole rookie thing?

[Elessar]

Dan Abnett was probably not the right author to do the Ultramarines. There's a lot of fluff to the Ultramarines and Abnett's claim to fame has been the Imperial Guard, not the Space Marines. He's written what, four Marine novels that I can recall off-hand (Horus Rising, Legion, Prospero Burns and Brothers of the Snake) and he had a lot of leeway with each. That is to say, he doesn't have to 'fit' into the huge amount of existing background that the Ultramarines have in the 40th millennium.

I mean, I had trouble following Chapter's Due because of the sheer number of characters. There's just a lot of exposition out there on the Ultramarines.

They really should have stuck it out with a random chapter. Or tapped Graham McNeill for research (but not angst. Apparently Abnett's got plenty of that)

[NecronLord]

For what it's worth, the actors for the old looking characters were briefed on their characters' extreme age by the crew so it's not that they forgot. . They were deliberately meant to be centuries old.

And yeah, the comic does have them as scouts. It's still not really good enough though - they could have put a mention in the film about accellerated training after the battle of Macragge, and hung a lantern on it all so it didn't seem so jarring.

[PainRack]

Also, every Space Marine we've seen in other depictions (even those over three or four centuries in age) don't look old, which implies they don't "go geriatric".. ever. Even if they did in extreme old age, the Brother-Captain didn't even have that many service studs.

Pictures or text?
Pictures yes, text no. The myriad layer of scars, their hardened skin and etc has been described that way, The problem was the art made them look geriatric, you know, old men as opposed to hardened toughs who had been around the block a while.

[NecronLord]

Unless anyone has any objections, I'll be unpinning this thread this weekend.

[NecronLord]

As there's no objections...