RageLite review - Hotel Transylvania 2 (A Strange Halloween 2)

A Hotel for monsters, cliché, what a bore

But something about it left folks wanting more

Was it the crisp animation, fluid and quick

Or was it the story, that thought makes me sick

The child of Dracula meets the guy of her dreams

But true love is not always as it seems

Will the sequel zing, a love that is true?

A Strange Halloween: Hotel Transylvania 2

Hotel Transylvania 2 came out in 2015, with much of the same cast and crew as the first one, the only difference I can see is in the writers. Before, Robert Smigel and Peter Baynham wrote the screenplay, based on a story by Todd Durham, and Dan and Kevin Hageman, this time Adam Sandler and Robert Smigel wrote the story themselves.

The movie was successful, making $473m on a $80m budget but that doesn’t mean it faired any better critically, it didn’t.

RageLite review - Hotel Transylvania (A Strange Halloween 2)

A Hotel for monsters, a novel idea

Told again and again, for all to hear

Comedians notorious brought into the fray

For a comedy, light-hearted, make of that what you may

3 films have been made, all profitable too

But those that rated it highly were few

So how do they rank among the films I have seen?

Find out as we resume A Strange Halloween

Hotel Transylvania was an idea created by Todd Durham, a comedy writer mostly known for skits and sketches. He created a bible with various idea for characters, plots, theme park rides and such, and sold it to Sony, who saw $$$ in this project and green-lit it. And despite the films themselves getting mixed reception and making but not Disney levels of money at the box office, the franchise, as a whole, has been massively successful, making billions of dollars for Sony.

So, for the first 3 weeks of A Strange Halloween 2 (I’m gonna keep my Luke Cage reviews going for now) we’ll be looking at what goes on in this hotel of Horror. Let’s start with the first film.

#67 - The Emoji Movie

This little black mark in the history of pop culture was a long time coming. I promised myself I’d never pay money for this movie, so I’m going to be streaming it on Sky Cinema instead. That’s why this review has taken so long.

But here we are, here we are. The Emoji Movie was released in 2017, and still haunts the nightmares of everyone who watched it, earning an 8% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which puts it at Fant4stic levels… yeah, this is gonna be a tough one.

It did make money, $250m on a $50m budget but when you find out that Incredibles 2 broke $1bn worldwide this summer, this is relatively pathetic by comparison. Still, it’s sad this movie made money, we’re to blame people. But let’s just dive in and see how bad this is…

Why I love Arthur Christmas

Christmas is almost upon us and it’s time to finally look at a Christmas special, as we do every year, but because I’m busy around the holidays, I’m only doing a short piece on this one. This may essentially end up being a repeat of the Nostalgia Critic Editorial on it, but I want to say I love this movie so much… Arthur Christmas

A team-up between Sony Animation: the studio that brought you The Emoji Movie and you know, this abomination

And Aardman most known for stop-motion stuff like Wallace and Gromit and Chicken Run, this movie came out in 2012 to a positive critical reception but rather low box office figures, only $142m on a $100m budget, it’s quite possible this movie lost money at the box office.

But I think it really is good enough to be considered a classic, here’s why