Wednesday 3 April 2024

Kung Fu Panda 3 and Testament: The Story of Moses

Learning to be teachers.

Kung Fu Panda 3

Having saved the village numerous times now, the "dragon warrior" Po (a talking panda voiced by Jack Black) is tasked with stepping up to be the new teacher as his own one is retiring while also reconnecting with his biological dad which puts his adoptive father on edge. Naturally things go terribly at first but urged on by an impending doom track yak, a mighty undead warrior from the ghost realm, Po has to get everything lined up perfectly just in time to save the day... by simply being himself! It's a good message for the younger audience wrapped up in a fun animated adventure, but plot wise there's no real threat to Po or his friends here which is a shame as I do enjoy protagonists learning through consequences. Still a decent watch.

Testament: The Story of Moses

As you might expect, this three episode mini-documentary-series focuses on the life of Moses from escaping death as an infant to bringing lots of death to the Egyptians while saving the slaves. Alas Moses himself is mostly a grumpy, non-interesting character (which is ironic as this is his story) but maybe that's what they were going for? In contrast Pharaoh exudes in screen charisma and is great. While the dramatization certainly has some budget behind it, I'm not sure how much value is added by the "expert" segments of actual theologians talking about him seeded at various points in the plot which couldn't have been better done with just some book-end like text. As such the episodes are quite lengthy and if you should attempt watching it I'd advise at least bumping it up to 1.25x speed.

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