Kung Fu Panda franchise

~applause~

Most unhelpful pagetopper EVER.

edited 18th Apr '16 7:46:21 AM by PushoverMediaCritic

Lmao you weren't kidding when you said how much you love this franchise. That is awesome though!

Haha, thanks guys, I didn't think it was that special. I kind of wish I kept that paper now.

The only film I recall writing a paper on was Kill Bill 1 & 2, though the subject was any random book or film you wanted to analyse. I think I got a decent grade too. xD

Anyways, here's news of the DVD/Blue ray release!

Apparently, this is what we'll get of special features:

"Everybody Loves a Panda Party - Join Po and the entire cast of lovable pandas to sing-along and learn why everybody loves a panda party in this all-new presentation. Po's Posters of Awesomeness - Po leads a deeper exploration of the awesome art in Mr. Ping's hut as the posters come to life and illustrate his hilarious stories. Panda Paws - Watch the enormously talented panda ribbon dancer Mei Mei starring with Bao in an exclusive animated tale. Make a Panda Party Paper Pal - Learn the mystic art of paper folding and create a village of panda pals as Po hosts this fun and entertaining tutorial. Play Like a Panda - Adorable overload! Learn all about real baby pandas, their amazing lives, and their remarkable playful ways. The Origin of "Skadoosh" - For the first time ever, Po reveals the extra-super-secret origin of his world-famous catchphrase. Faux Paws Deleted Scenes - Discover fascinating story insights with this revealing collection of deleted footage you couldn't see in theaters!"

Soo we're gonna have Jack Black explain how he came up with "Skadoosh"? As I seem to recall it was something he add-libbed in the first film. XD Either way I can't wait for the deleted scenes and the thing about baby pandas (I assume it's videos they made?)

But is it just me or does Po look weird in that DVD cover? Wouldn't be the first time covers does that to characters though.

edited 20th Apr '16 3:34:53 AM by Lancelot07

He looks pretty cool to me, especially with that faux-kamekameha pose he's got going on, Yeah, I'm way more interested than I should be in how 'Skadoosh' became a thing.

I just thought something about his face looks odd. Guess it's just me.

Btw, I'm tempted to add to your alternative character interpretation about Kai. Is it actually stated somewhere that he always was a villain? I'd get the impression he could easily be seen as someone who was once noble but then had a Face–Heel Turn.

My interpretation is that he was always evil, or was at least evil long before the panda incident. The earliest we hear of him is a guy who was once referred to as the "maker of widows", so not exactly a moral fellow by any stretch. Kai's story isn't so much "good guy turns bad" as "bad guy refuses to turn good", and I love that about him because it makes him unique from the previous villains. (Not that a blade-swinging, chi-sucking, hammy goofball voiced by JK Simmons isn't unique enough already.)

You're right, the "maker of widows" line in particular would generally indicate someone not very nice, unless he was fighting other villains but took a tad too much pride in killing them than he should, and the discovery of chi was simply the tipping point, from where he realized "Why am I pretending to be good? I'm not!"

It's an interesting discussion either way.

Btw, I'm guessing the "visit to Mr. Ping's hut" might be from where those stills we saw that weren't in the movie is from i.e. the ones with Mr. Ping hugging Po and tucking him into bed etc. Unless it's simply a deleted scene.

edited 21st Apr '16 5:02:12 AM by Lancelot07

I think Kai was a sort of Token Evil Teammate to Oogway back in ye olde days. I have the headcanon Oogway's days as a warlord were basically him touring China and defending the oppressed with his roaming army (so, in effect, a more martial Robin Hood), and Kai accompanied him under the pretense of defending the oppressed but really just wanted to bash some skulls. The moment Oogway realized the way to harmony required not just war, but also peace (as seen by the pandas), was the moment Kai, natural Blood Knight as he was, realized he and Oogway were incompatible, and thus their rivalry began.

Mine is that Oogway was kind of a bad guy, but more of a Noble Demon who would rather conquer through negotiation and cunning than brute force. with Kai being a sort of counter-balance that provides the muscle when violence becomes necessary. It's that combination that makes them such a formidable team. I also have a thing where Past!Oogway constantly quotes The Art Of War.

It's interesting how many different ways you could take this. Almost makes me glad they didn't go too in-depth with it because it's always more fun to come up with your own explanations.

edited 21st Apr '16 8:17:55 AM by Berserker88

My headcanon is similar to Berserker's, except I think that Kai and Oogway were equally evil until Oogway had his Heel–Face Turn.

I figured that Oogway and Kai were more "soldiers of fortune" who would lend out their services to whoever rewarded them most, and weren't evil so much as self-serving and uncaring as long as they got reward and renown out of it. An famed unstoppable army of mercenaries, essentially.

My take on their dynamic was that Kai was obsessed with making their army stronger, more powerful and more famous than any other in history, while Oogway didn't really care about anything until meeting the pandas.

Would anyone mind if they re-released the Holiday Special, except replacing the generic Masters with the ones introduced after it came out? It bugs me that there are like four ducks, three sheep, two pigs, and two antelope and that Master Thundering Rhino is completely different.

Completely different? He looks exactly the same aside from his outfit.

That's a very good guess too. All this should be added to the page somehow, hah

I noticed a difference too in that his hide is much darker in the special than in the film.

edited 24th Apr '16 3:52:11 AM by Lancelot07

Oh. I guess he learned to lighten up sometime between then.

I finally got to see the movie. I think I liked it a little bit more than the second one, and about the same as the first one. The first one always had a bit of an advantage though, I think, in that it was a movie that I did not expect to be good, whereas I went in expecting great things from the sequels (and got them).

I liked Kai more than I expected from the trailers. From seeing him in the trailers he looked really goofy and didn't have an especially great character design, but in the actual movie he's animated and acted so well that the design really works, and he actually ends up striking a pretty good balance between being humorous and threatening — just like how these movies strike such a masterful balance between comedy and drama. It's impressive how all three movies manage to have antagonists that are so completely different, yet all three of them work well in their own right. A good sign of how these people approach making sequels with just the right attitude.

I guess my one gripe is that it could have been a bit longer. I mean, everything in the movie is good, but I get the feeling that some of it would be better if given a bit more room to breathe. Like others have pointed out, though, saying you'd have liked something to go on longer is a pretty faint criticism.

It's not so much that he looks completely different. More that the Master Rhino attending the feast was implied to be an old man given the wrinkles comment and his voice while the Master Thundering Rhino introduced later is not an old man.

Didn't Po just call him "Master Rhino"? That may have been Flying Rhino, Thundering Rhino's father.

I considered that, but isn't Master Flying Rhino long dead?

So apparently the film just passed the 500 million mark worldwide!

And Dr Doughs, long time no see!

I dunno, do they ever say? I just checked the wiki, and they don't mention anything about him being dead. He could just be retired, and donated his stuff to the palace for exhibition.

If he's alive, it's even sadder to think about his son's death.

So just after pondering how cool such a thing would be, I found out there's a fighting game based on the Kung Fu Panda movies. Looks like it has a pretty complete selection of characters, too (other than not being able to play as Mantis). Has anyone played it? Is it any good?

edited 26th Apr '16 1:56:38 PM by DrDougsh

Judging from youtube clips, it looks like a pretty terrible Smash ripoff.