Reviews WesternAnimation / Wreck It Ralph

All the rules you mentioned had a reason for existing in the movie. The rule about dying in other games was to establish that the characters could die, keeping the suspense. Glitches aren't bad "for some reason". They're bad because glitches can't visit other games and could result in the game being unplugged. The missing memories were required for the villain's plans to work. The bugs aren't characters because the AI for them wasn't finished (this was explained in the movie).

I'm saying this because it seemed like you didn't pay much attention.

You're using the in-story justifications for why they are there, rather than the actual reasons for why a writer should put them in a story in the first place. A better writer would provide more elegant obstacles, instead of the unwieldy contrivances.

I think I explained the rules about death and missing memory. I think the rule about glitches was so Ralph would have second thoughts about helping her race. The bugs provided a huge climax to the story, which I liked.

I do have to wonder why having these rules is bad. You said they weren't hard for the viewer to keep track of. I also don't understand the phrase "complicated, yet less complex".

As I said, they feel contrived and unwieldy, which in turn makes it harder for me to engage with the story. Wreck-It Ralph requires there to be an arbitrary rule about glitches to keep the girl in her own game, because the writers couldn't think of a more elegant way to keep her there. In other movies, the obstacles are fairly self-explanatory: In Toy Story, the obstacle is that Woody and Buzz are lost just before moving house, which makes life hard for something as small and fragile as a toy. Another obstacle is a mean kid who has fun busting apart toys, a natural, plausible enemy of a toy.

I simply adore Toy Story, but "Toy Story" and "Wreck-It Ralph" are two very different films besides the borrowed "alive when no one is looking". Ralph hits on the ideas of roles, how they come to be, how they're assigned, and whether you can move pass the roles you've been given. Personally, I think that's a pretty good message for kids, you could do far worse when it comes to animated films.

Glitches are bad for some reason.

That's a fundamental law of video games, with a few exceptions. Saying "glitches are bad for some reason" is like saying "bleeding is bad for some reason". Glitches corrupt your game. That's what a glitch is, corruption.

Also, Toy Story didn't explain its rules either. No justification is ever given for why toys must stay still when their owners are nearby, or they wanted to be played with, or let themselves be owned. They just do.

I'd agree with Raconteur that the similarities between Wreck-it Ralph and Toy Story are superficial at best. When you really look at the underlying themes, Toy Story is about learning to deal with change and accepting new things (and people) into your life, while Wreck-it Ralph goes for more of an "Accept yourself and who you are/don't drive yourself crazy trying to be something you're not" angle.

@Tuckerscreator: the Toy Story rule is explained by the fact that toys aren't seen moving in real life (which every kid knows), so if they were to move in real life, they must be doing it surreptitiously. Kids went away from that movie, wondering whether or not their toys actually do move around in secret (if this wasn't something they always suspected). Wreck It Ralph goes by that same logic.

But especially Toy Story was VERY hazy about the "don't move" rule...for one, it didn't explain why it was there in the first place and two, they suddenly all start moving in front of Sid to terrify him. Never mind that Toy Story is by far not the first movie which used the concept...I remember seeing one in my childhood in which the Toys lost their ability to move forever if they are caught doing it. Plus, if Wreck-it-Ralph is like another movie, than it is like Tron, which plays with exactly the same concept that there is life in computers. It is nevertheless a totally different movie. And I honestly have no problem to understand why any of the rules were there. The "you can die in another game" rule is there because there wouldn't be any suspense otherwise. The "glitches are bad" rule is there because it is logical, glitches are bad, and if there hadn't been something which forced Vanellope to stay in the game, the climax would have been much less satisfying. And the bugs are dangerous because again, they needed a real danger for the story to work. And I actually think that it was a good decision to tone the cameos down...they are fun, but it should be about the story, first and foremost.

I am saying the rules are unsatisfying because whilst watching it, they feel like they are only there for the story to function; a contrivance, rather than an elegant natural element which happens to sere the story. I say that knowing full well that all stories are ultimately contrived and that all obstacles are put in there by the author to make an exciting story, but there is a knack to making the obstacles feel like they should exist within the created world. That is to say, it should feel like something that would naturally crop up.

For instance, there is the whole thing about the bugs being not characters, but viruses, so as to make them a looming threat...but this is a movie specifically about showing how game villains aren't all bad. To get around the story's central premise, they had to throw in an explanation that makes the bugs into non-sympathetic, outright bad characters. "Gliches" are loveable, misunderstood social outcasts, but viruses should be hated and despised. It is a very transparent plot device.

On the other hand you have Turbo, a villain who is clearly a bad person because of his insatiable obsession with winning/being the celeb - that makes sense, seeing as how he is the lead character from a racing game that got decommissioned - of course he wants to get back to winning trophies. It's intuitive. You don't need to make something up about programming to justify his actions.

I'm failing to understand how the writers trying to flesh out their world of video game characters is a bad thing? Yeah, they put in many rules, but that just shows the love they put into making it in the first place. They further fleshed out their world. Why do they need a specific reason to do that again?

Plus, having video game characters, with all the nuances of modern technology, already calls for a more complex world than Toy Story, which was just...well, the normal world. Would the film just be better if they had characters just walk from one game to another inexplicably, always respawn and basically have no dramatic tension at all? Where would the movie go from there?

I'm not going to assume, but your review makes it sound like you sat there, grumbling about absolutely everything. "Why do glitches HAVE to be bad?" "Why does Ralph HAVE to be a bad guy?" The simple answer is that they don't. The movie just is that way. Why do the toys HAVE to be alive in Toy Story? Why can't the film be about a boy losing his toys the story of what these toys mean to him as he grows up without them coming to life? Why is Woody's name Woody? Why does Buzz Lightyear HAVE to have a separate TV show? Bo Peep serves no purpose so WHY is she here? The answer to all these questions is "Because they are" and it's the same way in Wreck-It Ralph.

I would suggest giving the film a rematch and judging it on its own merits rather than comparing to Toy Story (Why do that? They're barely even similar.) or complaining about the world they set up. Stop overanalyzing and just enjoy the film.

Nicksmi the topic creator doesn't appear to be that much of a deep thinker. By its own name and terminology a glitch is bad. I mean come on.

The die in another game rule makes sense. When a characther dies in thier game the game simply reloads their data, and things go on, but if they die in another game their is nothing to load and they are simply deleted

What both the reviews and the comments below lack is the author's explanation on what, in his understanding, would work better as the movie's rules. You say "these rules are bad because they're convoluted". To that I say: what would be better, then? Give us some examples. Don't just compare it to Toy Story, come up with your own take on the plot and its rules. Even a rough outline, just so we can see where you're coming from.

I actually posted a review of this movie, saying that I feel the movie is very flawed but had the potential to be awesome. Sadly, my opinion has changed. After a couple of re-watchings, I feel the movie is even more flawed than before. For example, I can no longer stand Vanellope. She just isn't funny to me.

@Zu The Skunk: Challenge accepted. There is a movie called Inside Out That I quite liked. That's way more abstract than Ralph but it doesn't feel half as contrived.

Pardon me, sent that prematurely. The point is, Inside Out works because it isn't constantly having to explain away plot contradictions. For Wreck-It-Ralph to work, it just needed to stay consistent with what it establishes. Don't make a point of showing how characters can come and go from one game to another, if it is only going to make it awkward later when you have to explain why some characters can't come and go from games. Same again with establishing how the bad guys in games aren't bad, only to then have to find a way around the fact that you want some of the bad guys in games to be genuinely bad.

There are plenty of stories to tell with Wreck-It-Ralph's set up, many of which serve as back ground details in the movie we already have. Maybe you could make a movie about a group of arcade game characters becoming refugees, having to hide within into other arcade game units, because their busted old machine gets put in the trash. Perhaps you can tell a story about the friction between new arcade game characters introduced to an arcade, versus the old ones. Ralph's desire to not be a bad guy for once can easily be worked into any story.

^ This doesn't really answer the question. The only thing you do here is say "this movie works and this one doesn't". In order for me to truly understand your point, you'd have to provide examples of what would work better in terms of storybuilding within the context of the Wreck-It Ralph movie. I need to be able to compare your suggested vision with how the movie actually turned out. Only then I could understand where you're coming from.

You can't see where I am coming from unless I rewrite the story for you in the way that I would like, so that you can compare the two?

I've already explained one key principle of story building, which is to stay consistent with what you establish. Another is obstacles. A story needs obstacles for Ralph to face to be entertaining, however in Wreck-it-Ralph, the obstacles tend to stem from arbitrary rules (the viruses, the thing about glitches not being able to game hop, the dangers of dying outside your own game, characters have had their memories wiped; basically any obstacle that makes you wonder "Wait, why is it that way?" and can only be answered with "it just is, okay!"). We do have obstacles that make sense within the story, such as the way in which everyone is antagonistic towards Ralph because he's a designated "bad guy". A better movie would have more obstacles like those - power outages or breaking machines in an arcade? That sounds like a real threat to a game character. A game character who is a designated hero who hates and hunts the designated bad guys? That would make a plausible obstacle too. Populate the movie with that kind of things that actually have some kind of real world reference point, or plausible sounding basis - even in a fantastical movie about talking video-game characters.

To be honest, with John Lasseter as an executive producer, I don't doubt Disney was counting on that comparison. It might have actually worked for the better, at least as far as sales go. There were even critics making that comparison in a positive light.