PAC-MAN: Circle

Hmm, I'm all for an interpretation of a concept as much as the next guy. But this was a swing and a miss. It felt like it's own thing that they just added on references to Pac-Man seemingly after they'd already come up with something. It all just feels a bit too tacked on.

A better idea would have been to actually have the ghosts be chasing him through the "maze" But these things are t even ghosts. They are monsters with glowing things in their heads and they only show at the "end of the maze" It would have made more sense to have him run around the maze trying to collect something only to find that the maze is never ending and it just resets after he's gotten it all... Or hell if you must have the eat or be eaten thing.. make him a zombie whose skin has gone jaundice and his mouth is always opening and shutting.. (just like pacmans yellow pukka pukka look but grosser) So many good ideas can come from the abstractness of the game ... and still actually be closer to the concept than what this was.

A real shame.

The reason why I think this episode kind of works, is mainly because of the fact that it fits with vibe with the rest of the episodes, we've had games like sifu, dungeon and dragons, etc. So this episode I was wondering how it's gonna work. Cause it felt out of place. Now while this didn't entirely feel like pac man, i didn't care. Mainly because i thought it was a pretty creative idea, and i still can't get the ending out of my head, and the quote, eat or be eaten out of my head. Overall though i thought the episode was alright, it wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either. Not everything is gonna be what we want.

Stuck in an "endless labyrinth, haunted by hungry ghosts", the chosen must "eat or be eaten" and escape the maze.

Using the premise of PAC-MAN, the studio delivers an inventive and quite creative perspective on what has become quite a colorful franchise (can't get his most recent appearance in Smash Brothers out of my head). I applaud them for the effort, but I imagined this might be the one that would not fit the mold of what they expected to deliver.

Whether you think the taken liberties align to your preferences or not, this 10-ish minute episode provides little in the way of satisfactory narrative or take-aways.

All previous episodes of Secret Level varied from just tepid and uninspired to actually bad and confusing. Videogame aesthetics seemed poor for animated short films, and the script was always too shallow. I suspected that perhaps they worked a little better for game addicts, as I had no involvement with any of those five games (I have been playing D&D for decades, but on table with friends, not in videogame, and it is completely different). Then, Pac-Man episode came up, and off course I love that game - just like possibly the whole humankind! I am not happy to say: that was a great disappointment. A revisionist approach is probably not the best one for a beloved classic game, but it could still work. However, it is very hard to identify the game in this short film, despite the very end. Animation is also unpleasant and has a generic style with no connection to the game. Indeed, this episode reminded me more the dire horror unofficial Z-feature movies that are being released with characters now in public domain, such as Mickey Mouse and Pooh. That is not a compliment, to be clear.

I have reviewed each episode of "Love, Death + Robots" and am a big video games guy, so thought I'd do the same process for Amazon's "Secret Level".

I mean, I have, of course, played Pac-Man in various forms for years. I haven't though played "Shadow Labyrinth" that this particular episode is more closely based around and for a good reason, that it's not been released as of time of writing. There are recognisable "Pac-Man" elements though that I'd assume the game is going to play with.

A humanoid creature falls out of a survival tube and is met by Puck (Emily Swallow) a yellow ball who explains that the creature is the "Chosen" one and its destiny is to help them escape from the maze they are both trapped in. Puck presents the Chosen one with a sword and facilitates the killing and eating of various dangerous creatures to survive. The ultimate aim is to the defeat the ghosts, that haunt the maze and escape.

A bit more stylised than the previous editions of the show and less concerned with photo realism than producing a scary and at time ethereal world. There are moments of real horror in this one too, as the true nature of the puck is revealed and amongst the most gory elements of the whole series so far.

I don't really know what to think of this one, I mentally dubbed it "Zack Snyder's Pac-man" as soon as it finished, as it was such a dark version of what has traditionally been a colourful and family friendly sort of game. If you're looking for something akin to "Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures" this is certainly not that. It was inventive though; I'll have to give it that.