YMMV / Kickassia

• Aluminum Christmas Trees: Yes, Molossia is a real micronation, and that is really its president As Himself. The "underling who's blatantly just him in a different outfit" bit is actually toned down for the series; he really has several such characters.
• Awesome Music:
  • The opening anthem. Kickassiaaaaaa!!
  • The timing on the music in Part 4 when Ma-Ti yells at The Nostalgia Critic as he exits is perfect!
  • In Part 5, the Boss Theme from the SNES Batman Returns game becomes Funny Music.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Film Brain. He's either hilarious and adorable or just annoying. There don't seem to be any middling opinions.
  • Santa Christ. He's either way cool and a fitting part of the special or a God-Mode Sue who should never have even existed. Whatever you thought of him before, Kickassia won't change your mind.
• Better on DVD: The whole thing is meant to be watched all in one go as a 90-minute film. The original idea was to release it in three parts, but it was later changed to six (see Trilogy Creep). That said, Doug himself has advised that it's best to either watch the whole thing from start to finish or, failing that, watch parts one and two together, parts three and four together and parts five and six together.
• Catharsis Factor: Given that Critic was raped by Spoony and his trauma over it was confirmed to be a Thing, Critic knowing Spoony is inside Insano and wanting to kill him anyway is pretty satisfying.
• Continuity Lockout: The movie is almost completely unwatchable unless you already have a decent grounding in the memes and recurring jokes and characters on the site. Even fans of the site found the ratio of "callback jokes" to "actual jokes" a bit off. Doug learned his lesson from this, and the next year's special Suburban Knights is far less dependent on knowing everyone's schtick.
• Crosses the Line Twice: Santa Christ's cameo. They manage to get out two words of his theme song, before it's interrupted by N. Bison shooting him dead.
  Insano: ...Well gee, that's sad.
• Fan Nickname: Nostalgia/Lindsay Palin for the Nostalgia Chick in her VP costume.
• Fanfic Fuel: This movie was the birth of so many Critic punishment fics that even Brad teased during a livestream that the character had been a “a very bad boy” in the S&M context.
• Fight Scene Failure: Lampshaded when the Critic begins to "levitate" using electricity.
  Dr. Insano: You do realize you're just standing on your tippy-toes, don't you?
• First Installment Wins: While not considered "good" by the standards of film, some have made the argument that this film manages to have a level of thoughtfulness and creativity that the other subsequent films lacked, mainly due to the film being made more for the sake of having a fun film together, even with its myriad of flaws that would later become worse with each later installment. Kickassia could be seen as being more openly satirical of how nonsensical their concept actually is, and much of a mess a group of internet critics would be if they actually tried to run a nation despite each of them being egotistical dickwads with no common sense. Whereas by contrast, each of the later films would become increasingly bloated with an ever enlarging cast, production troubles due to incompetence, and a perceived egotism and lack of self-awareness of how flawed the characters (especially the Nostalgia Critic) were.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The Critic being happy not to do any reviews ever again becomes slightly less funny later on when he has a Heroic BSoD about how pathetic reviewing makes him.
  • Critic telling the Chick it'll fall on her to keep the nostalgia name alive becomes the opposite of funny after To Boldly Flee. Noted by the two themselves in her review of Cutthroat Island, as he passes the torch onto her, saying “it's like Kickassia, just with emotional depth and actual sincerity!”
    • It becomes even more harsh years later when Lindsey would go on to both retire and disown the Nostalgia Chick persona due to her dislike of the role while Doug would end up continuing as the Critic despite his desire to retire the character.
  • Doug's commentary beating himself up for the other producers getting sunburned (despite he and Rob telling them to wear sunscreen) is cute, but after nearly stopping Suburban Knights because he was so scared that everyone hated him, and refusing to eat/sleep in To Boldly Flee so he wouldn't snap at anyone, it really should have sent off warning bells.
  • “The Kickassian War” was hilarious originally, but with everything that came out about the site's Troubled Production, it can get uncomfortable. There's also Rob's Played for Laughs blaming of Doug for everything, which is also awkward considering how much the latter gets Mis-blamed for the site's problems.
  • From bloopers/commentary, Doug being afraid that Phelan would kill him after what happened to make Phelan leave the site (Michaud firing Allison after 15 minutes away and Doug fleeing when she called them out on it).
  • The Phelan/Brad/Benzaie commentary, in which Phelan talks casually about the fun he had on set and his satisfaction with the film (even including some praise of Doug Walker) can sting pretty harder knowing how sharply his relationship with the site and the Walker brothers would fall over the years. Indeed, his commentaries on the three anniversary films illustrate this progression rather well^note though Phelan did not actually leave the site until January 2015, with his Suburban Knights commentary being cooler on the film and expressing more frustrations with Doug and Rob's conduct, while the To Boldly Flee commentary has him outright mocking the film and lambasting a lot of the creative choices made, along with comments that foreshadow his eventual reasons for departing.
    • From the same commentary, Brad and Phelan reference the fun Lindsay Ellis had on set. By her own testimony, she has NO fond memories of the anniversary films, only frustration.
  • One of the Hilarious Outtakes has Rob trying to get Benzaie not to say "and" in the line "How about I launch Beary over like a kamikaze bear?" by saying, "One means rape". The fact that Justin was present and laughing with everyone else makes this less funny in hindsight.
  • The “sometimes we all need to give into the madness” scene. Everyone knows about Noah's eventual meltdown, but Doug can and has turned into quite the hot mess himself.
  • Little Miss Gamer's cameo being stuck in a video game is awkward as she'd actually left the site by the time the film came out, and this was the last time she appeared on anything.
  • This subreddit points out that Kickassia, in a way, inadvertently predicted the eventual fate of Channel Awesome. The movie revolved around the Critic's ego and lust for power and how everyone eventually revolts against him because of it. And now, Michaud and his massive ego, with Doug allegedly being too spineless to act out, has caused nearly everyone to revolt against Channel Awesome, with almost everyone having left at this point. But in an ironic twist of fate, the Cinema Snob was the first to act out against the Nostalgia Critic, but Brad Jones is currently one of the very last people left on Channel Awesome (only Guru Larry is also still there, and he only stayed this long out of spite over being forgotten for the last decade).
    • Film Brain's storyline is also similar to Some Jerk with a Camera's time at Channel Awesome. Both started out as ardent defenders of the Critic/Channel Awesome, even when others started revolting. Ultimately, an event caused them to be disillusioned ^note For Film Brain, it was the Critic killing Santa Christ. For Tony, it was Doug continuing to be Michaud's doormat. and turn on them as well.
    • Critic's mournful line "a president has no friends". Doug has lost quite a few friends and professional connections thanks to his blind spot regarding Michaud.
  • Phelous's resentment towards the Critic becomes this after their real life falling out.
  • “Do I have to start paying you so I can cut your wages?”, given the former contributors’ complaints about continually being mistreated and under-appreciated by the higher ups.
• Ho Yay: 8-Bit Mickey riding Handsome Tom while shirtless.
  • Also, this bit:
    Film Brain: I would never leave you, Critic!
    NC: ...I know that, Film Brain.
  • The Critic's and Spoony's ham-tastic conversation about giving into Insano.
  • Lee's interview with Chris Larios: "You feel beautiful." Well, he is 3-D now.
  • In one of the bloopers, Benzaie kisses Spoony on the cheek when trying to get him to turn into Dr. Insano.
  • Also in the bloopers, when Phelous slams Critic against the fridge, either Phelan pushes Doug down to make him kneel or Doug slides down on his own.
• Moe: Film Brain, to some.
• Nightmare Fuel: Spoony transforming into Doctor Insano. This picture from the credits illustrating the scene helps add to the creepiness factor.
  • The Critic revealing what he needed that dynamite for along with his use of the term "Nasty-wasties."
  • The Critic not being quite dead and rising up behind an unsuspecting Insano.
  • Phelous' face after shoving the Critic against a fridge. In his commentary, Doug says he was genuinely afraid for his life. Lampshaded in the bloopers, too:
    Doug: You're really going to kill me, aren't you?
• One-Scene Wonder: Ma-Ti.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Both Film Brain and Phelous were immensely hated at early points of their review careers. In Kickassia, they are given plenty of screen time and funny moments to encourage people to give them a second chance. Both succeeded.
• Spiritual Adaptation: As admitted by the cast and crew, Kickassia is a fully live-action Looney Tunes skit. The initial encounter between Nostalgia Critic and Baugh are even a direct remake of Wile E. Coyote's introduction in Operation: Rabbit.
• Suspiciously Similar Song: The opening theme and episode title cards are obviously influenced by HBO's John Adams.
• Unintentional Period Piece: The Sarah Palin parody played by Nostalgia Chick was dated even at the time (in 2010, two years after Palin's Vice Presidential run) and now that Palin has become a historical footnote, with the only significant thing she did in the following years being a failed run for congress in 2022, the parody is easily one of the most dated aspects of the movie looking back.

---