It was enjoyable enough. Gotta say I've only played 3 and seen a few videos of WoW but it was still really damn cool to see the Alliance armor and hear stuff like "For the Horde/Alliance" in a movie. And even I noticed that subtle nod with the orange level up effect they threw onto Khadgar near the end when he defeated Medivh.
Enjoyed it more than the hobbit sequels tbh. It's not something I'd go shouting at the heavens about. But it's an alright romp in theaters. You can tell it suffers from editing issues with a lot of these abrupt scene transitions. Needed more connective tissue, BUT it's the first film I've seen in theaters this year since Everybody Wants Some that didn't have such long pacing issues and plod along at times (and I'm including ones I enjoyed more than this too such as Nice Guys and Civil War). So it's kind of a positive and a negative that they cut so much away from it.
anyways a few more thoughts
- I love the hell out of Ragnar from Vikings, so I was pretty entertained by his Lothar tbh. I can see why his performance would irk some people but I love how Fimmel always looks like he's amused.
- Durotan was of course the other standout from the movie, Kebell did great. And because it was a mo-cap performance I really think they should bring him back to play another major character (Orc or Human) in a sequel if it happens. This man is underappreciated. Guldan, Medivh and Garona weren't bad either.
- King looked like shit lmao. Cooper is a bad person to get for somebody to look regal, and that wig too haha, looked like those old-timey children with the curls and giant lollipops.
- Orc mo-cap was incredible. I dismissed this shit in the trailers but these Orcs are so good in close-ups. It belongs in the conversation alongside LoTR, Avatar and Apes tbh.
- The mage action was really cool, that and seeing these beastly Orcs (particularly in the intro and the forest) fight humans was very cool. The large final battle was not nearly as satisfying as the smaller ones, they should take a cue from the big epics like Braveheart and LoTR for the next one
- Ramin Djawadi is a pretty bland composer. Dude has been phoning in his Game of Thrones work for a while now and he didn't do much good here, this series would really benefit from bringing in Howard Shore. Even when he had a lesser output with the hobbit trilogy it eclipses this by a landslide.
All in all I give it a 6/10. I don't regret watching it, and I'll even rewatch it again if there's an extended cut or if a sequel pops up. You can tell Duncan Jones went in earnestly as a big Warcraft fan wanting to make the film. In many ways it definitely reminds me of John Carter in that regard. I'm pretty sure if there's a sequel he can improve on it. And how amused I was by seeing this game world brought to life bodes so well for me enjoying Assassins Creed since I already love that cast AND the trailer. I wasn't expecting myself to be suckered in by seeing this videogame stuff brought to screen but it's pulling me in tbh.
edit: actually reading about stuff that was cut....eh I'll check it out but I dunno if it will be an improvement. It was odd hearing stuff like Fel without context but it can be figured out well enough anyways, and things are explained later.
It does go all in at the beginning and it can lose you if you're not with it, but sometimes i don't think that's a bad thing. I rather liked the pacing of this movie despite the questionable sacrifices because of it.
