Quick Review of 'Warcraft'

Could this be the first "good" live-action video game movie adaptation? For people who are fans of World of Warcraft, hm maybe. Me? Meh. I probably wouldn't say so. Because of the supposedly good word of mouth (critics on Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 28%) despite not doing so great at the domestic box office (obviously) while actually a much bigger hit in China like Transformers: Age of Extinction and Terminator Genisys were, I now wanted to see the Warcraft movie for myself after skipping it in theaters. Given that it's made by Legendary, the studio that brought us the monster-sized blockbuster hits Pacific Rim and Godzilla. Mostly because of one character that I deeply care about more than the Alliance humans: Durotan, chieftain of the Frostwolf Clan. Why does it feel like I'm better off rooting "for the Horde" than the humans even if the Orcs are vicious and merciless like the other Orcs in The Lord of the Rings? Why? Because of a bunch of nobodies like Travis Fimmel (Anduin Lothar), Ben Schnetzer (Khadgar), Ben Foster (Medivh), and of course whoever the hell that poorly-developed young man is as Lothar's (SPOILER: deceased) son Callan. Do they expect me to cheer for the humans who unfortunately don't seem to be interesting enough for us to even care? No wonder this movie failed on the opening weekend 3 months ago. At least Game of Thrones have much better acting from stars that are already famous as of now! I do think Paula Patton is kind of hot, though. And seriously? No Director's Cut? Maybe Warcraft would have been better if the pacing is less abrupt and actually had MORE SCENES to properly develop the characters! Where's the part with the Orcs rushing through the snow? What's with the studios cutting out very important scenes nowadays since Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad? The best thing about Warcraft for me, are the motion-capture CGI Orcs. Especially Durotan! His interaction with Orgrim and his wife Draka have proven how much of a good actor Toby Kebbell was than his disgustingly awful Dr. Doom role since Koba in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. That's why I consider Warcraft as one of the great examples of how to really make CGI characters like the expensively-animated Autobots more than just visual props, which Michael Bay and Paramount should definitely learn from when building their own cinematic universe! And man, what an awesome fight between Durotan and Gul'Dan! Overall, Warcraft is visually enjoyable since Transformers, but the way it ended just made me despise Gul'Dan and Lothar (because he thinks Garona murdered King Llane in cold blood when the king forced her to in order to "bring peace between humans and Orcs") so much deep down once my favorite character Durotan is dead (and maybe along with his entire Frostwolf Clan minus Orgrim). Don't know why they're saying that they loved it. I doubt that it was worth watching again and again like the 1st Transformers movie and Pacific Rim. The ending shot of that cute now-orphan Orc baby Go'el definitely screams "sequel!" despite unsurprisingly flopping hard big time! And even if with over $433 million thanks to China, shame the studio still treated it as a box office disappointment. That's what I hate most about failed movie franchise starters (ex., The Golden Compass, John Carter, The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones). Thanks to this movie, now I really wanted explore more of the Warcraft video game concept even if we don't get sequels to the film that had such potential! For the Horde (that's right, people)!