Review of Wreck-It Ralph (2012) by Bryan S — 16 Jul 2014

As someone who loves video games and the culture that surrounds them, it's great to see so many movies nowadays that deliberately tribute and pay homage to them in various ways. Even if it comes in absolute contrast to the frustrating lack of well-made video game-film adaptations that our media culture still seems to be running it's course through...

But "Wreck-It Ralph" isn't based on any real video game out there, instead it creates it's own world where original and popular game characters alike all live in and coexist. It's sort of like the video game version of "Toy Story" in a way.

In the film, our protagonist is a "bad guy": the one and only, Wreck-It Ralph -- main villain of the game, "Fix-It Felix Jr.". Ralph is a tormented character when we're introduced to him; he no longer enjoys his job, he feels a serious lack of consideration and/or respect from his fellow game characters, he feels jealousy towards Felix (the main playable character of the game), and even does the unthinkable: he 'jumps' from his game to join another one and eventually gets dropped unexpectedly into a racing game entitled "Sugar Rush", where meets Venellope, a racer who's on the run from the citizens and hierarchy of the dystopian candy kingdom she calls home.

Venellope, you see, has a "glitch" or a "bug" that makes her coding bounce around and break the physics boundaries of the game, and it is because of this flaw that the other inhabitants of "Sugar Rush" are not only afraid of her, but are quite clearly biased against her, believing that Venellope (as a character or even a person at all) should not have ever existed. Through the course of the story Ralph learns not to resent his role as a villain and comes to terms with the fact that there are somethings you just can't change, while Venellope in parallel learns to believe in herself even when others won't dare to do so.

"Wreck-It Ralph" has a very deep and positive message about self-acceptance and peer-acceptance that transcends the boundaries of what we commonly call 'kids movies' or 'family films' and speaks to a broad spectrum of people from just about every walk of life there is (including adulthood).

It crams so many inside-jokes, easter eggs, and references to multiple video game media into the tiniest and most compact of scenes; and the visual styles of each different game world are so uniquely characterized that it becomes instantaneously believable in their reality.

This film has everything from music by Skrillex, appearances by Sonic, the hedgehog and others, and a cast of voice actors so talented and ingenious in their portrayals that you almost wish the film was live action. If you like video games, you'll probably love "Wreck-It Ralph". If you like animated films, you've probably already seen "Wreck-It Ralph" a thousand times over. If you like Disney movies, then you either recognize or will come to recognize "Wreck-It Ralph" as something far, far more uniquely imaginative (not to mention progressive) than anything else Disney has ever done before, and would be hard put to imitate in the future.