Kickassia

This film was the first of the anniversary films that Channel Awesome created. Unfortunately, you can tell it is a first effort. The story is very, very simple in its ideas and execution. It definitely drags in parts, showing that there wasn't that much of a plan for the story.

However, for all of that, there is a charm to it, especially if you know the personalities of the internet critics involved. It is definitely low-budget and amateur, so keep your expectations at that level. I do enjoy it, because the comedy is fun, the music and camera work is decent, and I enjoy watching the internet personalities. Of the three Channel Awesome films, this one is definitely the worst, though it's still a decent first outing.

It's easy to look at this and say it's a run-of-the-mill passion project on par with the average student film, it pays tribute to fans with a series of cleverly written and executed set pieces with comedy classic to the source material that lands more often than fails. What lets it down however, is a failure to utilise the vast spectrum of personality featured in the Channel Awesome line-up, relegating a large chunk of the cast to fleeting and unremarkable background roles in a scenario which could have explored their different personas with more depth and intricacy.

Words can't correctly explain how bad this movie is. Reading the snippets of quotes from the movie on IMDb, I thought it might be a worthwhile film to see. The dialog seemed quirky and looked to have a fair bit of humor behind it. Plus I'm easily a sucker for checking out films made by the average Joe with a camera, some friends, and too much time on their hands. The Gamers, Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising, and more popular films like Clerks are classic examples of when this concept works. Unfortunately for me and the hour and a half of my life that I will never get back, "Kickassia" is a true example of what happens when the concept fails miserably.

Though there are elements of humor to some of the dialog, the delivery quickly shows that none of the "actors" (and I use the term rather loosely) really have any business getting in front of a camera again. Writing...maybe, acting...never. I've seen better performances (and more believable sfx) by kids on YouTube with a camcorder and After Effects. If given to individuals that could actually act their way into the paper bag to begin with, there's enough humorous bits to make a rather amusing 15-20 minute short film.

To make matters worse, I did some checking and it turns out that most of the people attached to this film critique movies for a living (under the forum style names that their characters are named after). It boggles the mind that a group that analyzes movies and points out the idiosyncrasies and errors in them, could watch this waste of celluloid upon completion and think that it's good enough to unleash on the general public.

The only reason I give this two stars instead of one is due to the brief glimpses of humor within this mind-numbingly bad film and the fact that Lindsay Ellis (Nostalia Chick) is kind of cute.

In summary, if your thinking of watching this, pouring bleach in your eyes, watching linoleum peel, or banging your head into a wall repetitively would all be better uses of your time.

It seems the last two reviewers weren't fans of the Nostalgia Critic to begin with. Kickassia is the second-anniversary collaboration of all the members of ThatGuyWithTheGlasses.com. A site which has its own sense of humour, its own community. And if you're not part of that community, this movie may seem unfunny, out-of-place and bad. But really, to fans of TGWTG.com, it's incredible! It's the perfect collaboration! Everyone keep there inside jokes, most of the jokes are very funny and the acting is good for the most part. Of course, it's not going to be that Oscar-worthy nominee or the so-bad-it's-good kind of movie either, it's just people having fun filming a long funny video for their fans and nobody else. Reviewing this as a movie would be like reviewing each of Shane Dawson's videos like they were shorts! The Internet as whole other kind of humour that people should get use to. It's not immature or stupid, it's just different. And a lot of people seem to have a problem with difference these days.

Remember when Spoony and the Nostalgia Critic used to be funny? When they seemed like regular, down-to-earth guys? After witnessing 'Kickassia', that seems like something that happened in another lifetime.

There were warning signs before, of course. Their previous one year anniversary special didn't bode well, but this film takes the raging Internet egotism and desperately unfunny in-jokes to hitherto unprecedented levels. Not just a failure as a film, this is a misstep of 'Love Guru' proportions, the kind of ego-stroking embarrassment that makes you reassess their previous work and wonder if they were ever actually that funny to begin with.

Yeah, so they're just online critics making something "for the fans", but most of these people critique films for a living and really should know better. It's low budget, but many films have been made for less and managed to throw decent acting, direction and lighting into the bargain, when Kickassia fails to get even the latter right. What jokes there are come off as forced and poorly delivered, when they're not being outright lifted from other sources.

Once a keen fan, I've been losing faith in TGWTG's material for a while now, and this really seals the deal for me. A sprawling epic of compressed awfulness that only the most die-hard of fans could ever enjoy. Avoid.