In this twelfth non-canon review, Ruby does one movie review on her own when Yang, Blake and Weiss went out to go shopping. This one, however, is very much different from the others, this time being a so-so musical adaptation of one of the most famous Broadway productions ever made, Mamma Mia.
BEACON
Ruby starts off as she sat on her commentary chair, "Hello, I'm Ruby from team RWBY. I remember it so-", before she saw Pyrrha, Nora and Penny knocking and opening the dorm room door to see their friend, "Hey, guys. What's up?"
"Oh, just wondering if you're going to review Mamma Mia.", Penny said to Ruby.
The short-black-red-haired girl asked, "Yeah? What about it?"
"That's amazing! We heard Mamma Mia is one of the most famous Broadway musicals ever made, and they made a 2008 movie out of it!", aspected Nora.
Pyrrha agrees, "Yeah, this review is just gonna be as good as the ones including superheroes, fart jokes, or Nicolas Cage."
"It isn't just reviewing Mamma Mia. I'm tackling a subject matter that a lot of people don't usually address.", experimented Ruby.
Penny curiously smiled, "And what's that?"
"I'm talking about the art of the chick flick-", Ruby explains before hearing Penny, Pyrrha and Nora's interested noises.
Pyrrha and Nora embraced, "Ooh, that does sound like a good one..."
"Hey! Get back here! Get back here!", frantically said Ruby, watching the three about to leave to go back to the JNPR dorm room.
Penny waved, "Have fun!", greeting her friend goodbye as she follows Pyrrha and Nora back to their room and closing the door.
"It has ABBA's dignity put into it!", called out Ruby, before she sighs and commences, "The truth of the matter is there is kind of an art to the chick flick. Now I'm not talking about the ones that are on the spectrum like 'Is The Hunger Games a chick flick?' 'Is Bridesmaids a chick flick?' I'm talking about the ones that are ovaries to the wall, estrogen inducing, couldn't be mistaken for anything else chick flick. The same way an action film like Harry Potter is gender neutral, but Pacific Rim is obviously a dick flick, which is like a chick flick, only the exact opposite. And that's also not to say men can't like chick flicks or women can't like dick flicks. But let's not kid ourselves, it's not boys who made the Twilight films a hit and it's not girls who made the Transformers films a hit. Hollywood is always going to market to repetitive demographics. When they find a pattern that keeps repeating, they're going to exploit the fuck out of it. But here's the thing: there's actually a lot of chick flicks out there that are really good. I don't care if it mostly stars women, A League of Their Own is fucking hilarious. I don't care if there's a lot of romance and kissing, The Princess Bride still kicks fucking ass. As the years go on, we see more and more effort being put into what was originally thought to only be a niche , one of the highest-grossing films of all time was a chick flick. And you could argue one of the highest-grossing animated movies, Frozen, as well as its sequel are chick flicks. It's clear a lot more effort is being put into them and more and more audiences are opening up. But here's what really pisses me off, when people try to use it as an excuse; when they watch something that they know is terrible for them and is absolute shit, but they just shrug off, 'It's okay, it's a chick flick.' What the fuck does that matter?! Calling a film a gross-out movie doesn't make Rob Schneider's work any better. Calling a film a video game movie doesn't make Super Mario Bros. any better. So why does laziness and insulting writing get a pass here? Well, I don't think it should. Case in point: Mamma Mia!"
Ruby's Commentary of Mamma Mia! (Part 1)
The leader of team RWBY synopsized, "This is one of those chick flicks that not only loves to use that excuse, but likes to fuck things up for other chick flicks that are actually trying to be smart and intelligent. Based on the Broadway show every married man over 40 years old was dragged to, Mamma Mia is a jukebox musical that, rather than have a variety of artists, giving the off-chance you might actually like one of them, instead chooses the one your mother listens to when she's drunk at her book club. And don't get me wrong, if you like ABBA, no problem. They've had a lot of big hits and they're very talented, but this is not the movie to showcase any of their abilities. This is an example of trying to take a sub-genre, in this case, the chick flick, and try to resort it down to a mathematical formula. Like, if you use this combination of elements, you'll end up with a demographic who'll fall for it every time. The Bruckheimer films use it, the Happy Madison films use it, and you can bet your ass this fucking film uses it. I know this because I've literally found the checklist. The Lazy Chick Flick Check List to guarantee profitable box office. How many of them do they check off? Well, let's demean women everywhere under the guise of empowering them. This is Mamma Mia!"
Mamma Mia!
"We start off by visually ripping off another chick flick...can you guess which one? ...As we see a girl sending off three letters.", referenced Ruby for the movie Titanic as the movie shows Sophie (the main character) putting three letters in her mailbox sent to three certain special people, "She'd be like, 'I just made the assumption this movie's audience can't read, so I thought I'd clarify that.' The men get the letters and start making their way towards Greece as we have Lazy Chick Flick Check #1: A Glittery Title. Oh, good, this is the cinematic version of those ten-year-old stickers you get at grocery stores."
The film cuts after the Mamma Mia title to Sophie meeting her friends Ali and Lisa, squeeing in excitement and greeting themselves in hugs.
The leader of team RWBY felt startled, "Ah, yes. And this brings us to Lazy Chick Flick Check #2: Squeeing. Actually, I shouldn't say squeeing as much as psychotically howling like sloppily castrated hyenas. I swear, you could play these sounds at the end of a horror trailer for a 80's horror movie called The Squeeing Idiot Massacre!", continuing; "So our main character is Sophie, played by Amanda Seyfried, who's about to get married, but also found her mother's diary which gave not one, not two, but three possibilities to who her mystery father may be.", as the next part shows Sophie reading her diary and her friends correcting the punctuation, "Punctuation is so wild!", before telling the next scene, "And here's her mother, played by Meryl Streep, trying once in her life not to get an Oscar as her acting clearly shows always vocally imitating a drunk Wicked Witch of the West, going like, 'Come on, I never drink and broom at the same time!'", before she said, "We discover that Sophie has invited all three of her possible dads to the wedding, which is indicated in Lazy Chick Flick Check #3: Comic Relief Speaking In Unison.", as the friends in the movie told Sophie happily for punctuation again, "Oh, you forgot...dot, dot, dot!", the last part with Ruby saying this in unison with Ali and Lisa in the movie, as the former laughed.
The next scene in Mamma Mia showed Ali asking Sophie if they know about the letters, with the latter replying in a question of what would they write to a total stranger.
"Sophie could also say, 'Jeez, that's almost as crazy as having a musical set in Greece and yet having no Greek star in it.'", Ruby said before adding as she goes on to the next Mamma Mia scene, "Oh, we gotta make way for Streep's sisters to come in as they partake in Lazy Chick Flick Check #4: Ear Bleedingly Loud Secret Handshakes.", as she sees Donna reunite with her friends Rosie and Tanya (played by Julie Walters and Christine Baranski, respectively), doing the same thing as Sophie and her friends from earlier, "Jesus, you could just call this Girl Huddle: The Movie.", summarizing after, "Streep owns a hotel where Sophie's fiance has a brilliant idea to attract more people. Yeah, you're not gonna believe this. It's really quite inspired. Put it online! Yeah, I can easily see how any business owner would overlook that tiny step. I bet Donna in this scene would say, 'Oh! Next you'll be telling me we have the right to vote!', when Sophie tells her about going online!", as they showed a scene with Dominic Cooper's character Sky (Sophie's fiance) and Sophie, "Yeah, that makes sense, as apart from all the tons of people we see all the time during the musical numbers, nobody would ever know where this place is. And why would they? It's obviously such a low-key, visually uninteresting paradise that I'm sure word would never spread by mouth. I mean, let's face it. Nobody ever wants to come across a fucking shithole like this one. Hell, I bet the rent here is so cheap. Cheap enough to support a gigantic hotel that apparently nobody comes to. I'm sorry, what fucking planet are these people on again?"
The movie then shows a brief scene sample of Pierre Brosnan's character Sam in a following scene.
The black-red-haired huntress analyzed, "Of course, seeing how nobody comes to this little shack, Streep has trouble keeping up with repairs and has to do a lot of it herself.", notifying about Streep's singing in the Money, Money, Money scene, "Yeah...just keep in mind, people, Streep is still nine voice lessons away from her Into the Woodsquality voice, so...just try to enjoy her awkward transition period.", before seeing Rosie and Tanya joining in with Donna and imagining themselves in a rich boat, "Look, lowly middle-aged housewives! They have the same fantasies of being rich and full of themselves that you do! I always said Tevye's If I Were a Rich Man song would be made so much more powerful if they showed him getting a massage, drinking champagne and having hot women fan all over him. It just...make me feel for him more."
Next, the movie cuts to the three fathers of Sophie arriving at the island and meeting their daughter.
"So Sophie's dads arrive, played by Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth and Stellan SkarsgÄrd...Am I saying that right? Do I pronounce the other little 'o'? And is ecstatic to find that she has been thrown into an adventure of Choose Your Own DILF. They, of course, have no idea that she's one of theirs, and Sophie, being a cute, charming dunderhead as opposed to an emotionally unethical fuck-face, has no idea what the hell to do with them.", Ruby recommenced as she watched a scene between Sophie and Colin Firth's character Harry (one of her three fathers), "He can also quote, 'But I'm not done being Colin Firth.', when he leaves the scene."
The next scene showed Donna hearing something above the ceiling in the next scene as she goes to investigate what it was.
The leader of team RWBY demonstrates, "Now, this could be a potentially funny scene. Streep is about to see not one, not two, but three of her ex-boyfriends in front of her without any warning whatsoever. This could be something like that 3rd Rock From the Sun episode when Don is suddenly confronted by all of his past girlfriends. The reaction could be really funny. Hell, it could be downright hilarious. So, let's see what funny stuff they have up their sleeve.", as when Donna comes up and saw the three fathers, she imagines them wearing rockstar and Hawaiian suits before she starts singing Mamma Mia, "Wow. Fucking amazing! That was practically gift-wrapped for you, just about any reaction there would've gotten a huge laugh, and instead, what do you go for? A song that intentionally has nothing funny in it whatsoever! Even the song doesn't really sum up how a person would react after seeing that. It's way too cheerful and upbeat. Which falls into the most tragic and worst of Bad Chick Flick Writing: Be Funny...But Not Really!", noticing and ranting, "Anyone that knows anything about comedy knows that it's all based on misery. There's always an element of something negative in it if you're going to get a laugh. But for whatever reason, really bad chick flicks think that women can't handle actual misery, so they always follow it up with a lot of giggling. For example, after her "upbeat" song, she falls right into the middle of all of them. This could be a really funny setup if she freaks out or tries to come up with a clever excuse. There's a lot of various options you could do to make this very humorous. But what does she do? She's like, 'Oh, it's cute! It's adorable! We don't really wanna get upset here, we're just having fun! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!' How is that funny? You have all these humorous setups here, and yet, you do absolutely nothing with them. Another bad chick flick that did something similar is the Sex in the City movie! They're all checking out this guy, he's really handsome, they think he's hot, but then he goes and kisses another guy. Now, that'd be funny if they looked disappointed or were bummed out, but what do they do? 'Oh, that's silly! That's fun! We're strong women, so nothing upsets us! Therefore, absolutely nothing funny can happen to us either! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!' We don't want to offend you, ladies, because we assume that you kind of have the mindset of toddlers. Like, if anything remotely threatening happened to you, 'you'd get sad and cry and, oh, no-no-no-no!' So, don't worry. No comedy here! Nothing funny whatsoever!"
Ruby watches another snippet of the movie where a bunch of the characters were laughing.
"We replaced all that really upsetting funny stuff with a whole bunch of giggling, because again, we kind of see you like babies. If you see a lot of women laughing even though you don't know shit about them, maybe you'll start laughing, too. They'd go, 'Oh, look! They're laughing, they're laughing! Don't you also want to laugh? Ha-ha-ha-ha! Oh, everything's so positive and upbeat here! Ha-ha-ha! Nothing bad, no reality, nothing mean at all! Ooh, it's okay! We're just gonna laugh here! It's gonna be so cute! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!', because they respect us. They respect us as smart, intelligent adults. Because...in a way...did you do something different to your hair? It looks nice...because they respect us. They're the Good Chick Flick.", speaked Ruby, as she said, "We'll be right back. Gotta go grab something quick.", as she left the room.
To be continued...
