Looking back at the Warcraft Movie...

[Heavy Gains]

The only major problem for the Warcraft movie was the US audience. Apparently they'd rather be deceived by shady movie 'critics' than to simply have an open mind and enjoy something. The movie did great outside the US, and I suspect for this exact reason.

Watched it twice. Wanted to like it. Concluded, both times, that it sucked. Sorry bro.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

Problem with the movie is it had 2 roads to take.

One, take the road that people know enough about the back ground already or know someone that can explain the base lore to them and then just get to a good story.

Two, explain and set up everything for 45 minutes before getting to the 3rd act and actually having some story play out.

They choose road 2. Now if this was a trilogy or something planned to be released it would make sense. But instead you got a movie that more or less just explained the players to you for a really long time as they talked about what they were going to do for a while and then they finally did it. I personally feel they should have just gone on a full out action flick approach and just have a lot of moving pieces and just one or two characters to flush out. That way if the movie didn't pan out at least you had a movie that can be rerun on TBS or something every 5 weekends and it be a good hack and slash watch. If it caught on then you can take those characters you flushed out and in the next movie move into development of a more story focused narrative. A lot like the original Star Wars movie did. Just went for run and gun action movie stuff. It made enough money to squeal up a bit so they move into more story telling in the next movies.

Also would have helped if the expansion they released more or less along side it didn't turn out to be the biggest pile of shit ever. You would have had a much bigger cross audience of current players, the masses of old players that returned for that short minute at the start, and then you wouldn't have had to depend as much on a big unknown element going to see the movie. But one domino feel like poo so the next kinda went along side it.

[Calfredd]

Biggest cockslap was Stormwind not being burned to the ground at the end. Lol how the fuck they ever gonna make a sequel? The second war happened because the Stormwind refugees had to flee north. Here the Alliance wins at the end.

Fucking Duncan Jones. Fuck that guy for calling himself a Warcraft fan. Yeah no guys don't worry, I'm a huge fan of the game I'll stay true to the story. My ass.

Oh JustRob, never change.

[bloodmoth13]

Warcraft doesnt need a cinematic universe, it needs an animated television series. Film series requires too many recurring characters and for the plot to be formulaic, tv series would allow it to be much more experimental.

I dont think a warcraft 3 story would have done much better, nobody would be happy with arthas's casting, any lore mistake would be hounded 1000 times harder than war1 lore mistakes, separate campaigns (kalimdor campaign vs lordaeron/scourge) would have felt pointless and even more disjointed and splitting them into separate movies would have also felt bad.

Having a tv series where a single episode could follow a single character instead of needing to include the whole cast would do great things for build up

[Volardelis]

I would've liked it if any film based on Warcraft would be focusing on 1 or 2 characters and events that are critical for them. Such as Thrall freeing the orcs, Arthas becoming the Lich King etc.

[Zafire]

I thought it was really good, but it could have used a narrator to explain the lore as the movie was progressing. An extra 10 or 15 minutes would've made it sooo much better. Foreshadowing Thrall being an important figure would have been a great ending to those that aren't familiar with the WC universe as well, since it's a spoiler most people who have played the game know about.

[Planetdune]

No. In fact, Viggo Mortensen was the only cast member who used an actual weapon in stunt scenes, because he wanted things to look at authentic as possible. The rest were using "stunt swords".

Well the armor and weapons used in LOTR did look a lot better either way.

[JustRob]

I thought it was really good, but it could have used a narrator to explain the lore as the movie was progressing. An extra 10 or 15 minutes would've made it sooo much better. Foreshadowing Thrall being an important figure would have been a great ending to those that aren't familiar with the WC universe as well, since it's a spoiler most people who have played the game know about.

They did foreshadow Thrall's future as Green Jesus when they sent him up the river in a basket.

- - - Updated - - -

Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad if Legendary hadn't gone through complete restructure in the middle of the production and changed most of the crew while shooting. Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad if Blizzard hadn't been constantly breathing at his back about this stuff.
From what he's said in interviews, he basically didn't get to do the movie he wanted.

But then again, the Warcraft story is kinda one dimensional and cartoonish, so I think it would have made a better animated film, instead of real Hollywood production. The moment they decided to go for the big screen was the moment they started to compromise.

There was really no other outcome.
And there will never be another one, so you don't have to get your knickers in a twist about it.

Well, Duncan Jones said he wanted to do a sequel, but let's just hope to Christ that's wishful thinking on his part. I cannot bear any more atrocities in the Warcraft franchise directed by this man.

[Strakha]

the movie was awful in almost all aspects. probably one of the worst things blizzard has done outside of warlords of draenor, warcraft adventures and starcraft ghost.

[SirCowdog]

They did foreshadow Thrall's future as Green Jesus when they sent him up the river in a basket.

You're thinking of Moses. He was the guy found in a river and later lead his people out of slavery.

Jesus was born in a stable and went on to die for his people. Slightly different story.

Well, Duncan Jones said he wanted to do a sequel, but let's just hope to Christ that's wishful thinking on his part. I cannot bear any more atrocities in the Warcraft franchise directed by this man.

If they're going to do another Warcraft movie, it should be the story of Arthas and the Lich King.

[Soon-TM]

I found the movie bad. Very bad. Like really really bad. I remember going to the cinema with a bunch of friends, all of them Warcraft fans like me, and when the film ended we were just staring at each other... like WTF Blizz

The most ironic thing about the film is that D. Jones butchered the lore (following Blizz's directives, I'm sure) in order to appeal to newbies and WC fans alike... and he ended pleasing no one, like it often happens in these cases.

[frogger237]

That as well, although the orcs weren't too bad. I definitely think they should have been toned done a little, a lot of the orcs were just massive to the point that when I first saw the opening of the movie I was excited because I thought that Blizzard hadn't neglected the ogres in the First War

Yeah they made the male orcs waaay too big I mean like one finger of Durotan was like the size of baby Thrall.

[ChampionChains]

The movie would have been terrible regardless of which era in the story they started with.

Everything about the movie was bad. The mixing of cgi and live actors was bad. While the cgi looked great, it will never hold up when placed in frame with live action actors. The lighting was terrible, there was no natural lighting whatsoever and it made the entire film feel like it was shot on a small theater stage. Garona was terrible, both visually and her acting. I don't think many of the other actors (while usually good actors) weren't much better. The story pacing was far too forced due to them trying to cover a lot more than can usually be covered in a single film, especially while trying to develop so many characters and fill the audience in on back story and everything else. The script was bad, everything was bad.

I'd seen Duncan Jones try to deflect much of the blame onto the production company, film companies changing hands, Blizzard's involvement, etc. and gave him the benefit of the doubt. Someone had mentioned to check his other films and said they were great films. I'd seen MOON and it was a good film in my opinion. But I checked out his most recent movie on Netflix (MUTE) and it was TERRIBLE. I felt like I was watching a very low budget student film. The story was shit. The dialogue was shit. The acting was shit (even from the actors who are usually good). I totally got the vibe they were going for with the setting and world building, but it all fell very flat. There were parts of the plot and characters that seemed like they were important, but whatever importance they were supposed to have must've been left on the editing floor. nothing really meshed at all, the entire film felt like one cheap, convoluted disaster. I have a very hard time believing that the writers, director, producers, editors and actors were on the same page regarding the plot of the film.

After watching MUTE, it felt like every single mistake and poor choice that was made in the WARCRAFT movie was 100% echoed in MUTE. So I have a hard time believing Duncan Jones when he tries to deflect all the blame onto everyone but himself. Which is crazy considering how much I genuinely like MOON. It's almost like Jones gets overwhelmed and lost when he's dealing with more than one actor and a set that's more than 1-2 rooms. I feel like he filmed a shit ton of scenes and plot points then got to the editing process and had no idea how to fit it all into a cohesive film.

They should let this franchise die as far as films go. Or Blizzard should produce it themselves in their own in-house CGI. 100% CGI, no live action actors and let Blizzard make the film they want to see with no input from outside film houses.

[chrisnumbers]

People don't know how to enjoy things lol

[Kul Tiras]

Bad casting, poor dialogue, real actors for humans make combat not believable at all (like watching an army of Hulks fight medieval knights), armor on humans looked like plastic, weak music compared to all the amazing arsenal of songs Warcraft has, a fucking murloc had to be there, gay love story allusions between Garona and Lothar, shit director for this type of movie, no memorable battles, dwarven weaponry which was not at all present in the first war, arcane magic whereas the first war only had conjurors, etc.

[Daffan]

Script not bad, who cares for average Joe viewer.

Bad humans
Bad cosplay
awkward dialogue
Force humor but not funny

teehee

[OreoLover]

Shoulda stuck with a couple heroes and (over)simplify things, IMO.

Pretty sure that's where you can engage the "average Joe viewer."

[JustRob]

If they had focused only on the human characters, it might have been more succesful. They so badly wanted to have some good guy orcs to show that "hey not all orcs are bad". But the truth is during the first war the orcs were bloodthirsty monsters. Durotan wasn't part of it, but he wasn't part of anything, he was immediately exiled. And there's no reason to develop Durotan and Draka, they're just extensions of Thrall.

But that's movie these days. We can't simply have good vs evil anymore. The bad guys always need some good guy bad guys to nuance things. That wasn't necessary here, because the orcs are nuanced later on in the Warcraft story. And if the movie had been succesful, they could have shown that in the sequels.

But who am I kidding, that's just one of the many problems with this movie. Wrong casting, wrong storylines, unnecessary plot points...

By the way, did they ever explain why Khadgar deserted the Kirin Tor? I always forget. For some reason they make a plot point out of the fact that apparently, Khadgar is to succeed Medivh (I have no idea why, but Medivh himself acknowledges this), and apparently he thinks it makes it better because he renounced his vows or whatever. Did they ever explain that?

[Vaelorian]

For me the movie sucked and was amazing at the same time.

Amazing:
Actually this will be a short list as to why it is amazing....
Elwynn Forest!! Stormwind!!! Armor!! Nostalgia things littered all over the place. Sheep!!

That was basically it.

The things that annoyed me:
1. THE FELL!!!! OMG THE FELL!!! Suddenly it wasn't fell magic anylonger. THE FELL!!!! fuck that...
2. Orcs were good ánd bad at the same time!! This was confusing for the people watching. The reason as to why the orcs really went for Azeroth was unclear.
3. The demonic influence was vague
4. Several Classes not seen in the movie. Priests? Shamans?
5. Several Races not seen in the movie. Gnomes? Elves? I mean I get that there was no Alliance yet. But if you show us Draenei at the beginning of the movie without any explanation about them whatsoever... perhaps show us races that we atleast knew were there on Azeroth.
6. Anduin Lothar was just Ragnar Lothbrok really... And it saddens me to say that.
7. Mages from Darnassus were dumb and stubborn as fuck. But oh well... it serves the plot....
8. No one expects Mediv to not be "Mediv" until it is really late in the movie.
9. Anduin Lothar in love with Halforcen? Really? Why?

And many more... cba anymore to write.

[Felixon]

Eh,considering the fact,that most of the movie contradicted the established lore. For me it was like WoD 2.0 with alternate Stormwind and alternate Horde.