Wreck-It Ralph Directed by: Rich Moore Starring: (voices of) John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jack McBrayer Rating: Not Yet Rated Release Date: November 2, 2012
TRAILER SCORE: 7/10
Thoughts by TSR: I have never been a huge video game guy – though I used to play Mario Kart with a friend for hours – but I still got a kick out of this first trailer for Wreck-It Ralph. Despite my lack of interest in video games, I can still appreciate the amusing appearances by several known characters, especially Bowser from Mario and Zangief from Street Fighter. My one concern with this is that they’ll lean too heavily on people’s nostalgia for all of these characters – and the world of arcades in general – which could leave viewers like me cold and diminish the overall product.
I’m not in love with the entire voice cast – I don’t have much affection for Sarah Silverman, Jack McBrayer, or Jane Lynch – but John C. Reilly seems perfect as the title character. I laughed every time he said “I’m gonna wreck it!” in the opening 8-bit moments. The high point of the trailer is definitely the very fun Bad-Anon scene. After that it loses a little something, mostly because the story looks fairly standard.
Wreck-It Ralph does sort of seem like Toy Story with video game characters, though I don’t expect it to reach the highs of Pixar’s film. And that’s just fine. Disney is more than capable of making fun animated films on their own. All minor quibbles aside, this is another promising animated feature set for release in 2012.