Hi everyone! Welcome to another session here on my blog! Today, we are going to be getting our big game faces on, as we get into some samurai fighting. Oh, but it’s not with humans. This time, we have anthropomorphic animals that pick up swords that will be involved in some samurai training, and fighting. That being said, let’s discuss Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank.
Plot: In a Japanese like land that is famous for samurai fighting, a dog named Hank (Michael Cera) is sent to the fictional city of Kakamucho, a city that’s populated by cats. Though not well received by the cats at first, due to him being a dog, the cats eventually learn to warm up to him. But when Hank discovers that a coup that could threaten Kakamucho forever, it is up Hank to learn the ways of samurai from a reluctant, but humble cat named Jimbo (Samuel L. Jackson), and hopefully save Kakamucho from certain doom once, and for all.
Well, this film, which was made by Paramount Pictures, and Nickelodeon Movies, isn’t exactly one of the worst films out there. However, Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank isn’t one of the best out there either. First of all, there’s the animation. Alright, the animation was okay. However, when compared to animation of other animated films that was made by this company (i.e. 2011’s Rango), the animation isn’t exactly the best in this film. Putting that aside, the storyline wasn’t the best either. I mean the film probably might have been a little too short. The film might have needed a longer running time than 85 minutes, maybe more like 110-120 minutes, if not more. But hey, at least there was a short film attached to Paws Of Fury by the name of Big Nate. There’s also the characters. Alright, alright, the major standouts as far as characters go we’re probably Hank the dog, Jimbo the samurai training cat, and the villain car Ika Chu. The rest of the characters were just decent. They’re not bad, but they could have maybe been given their due more. Additionally, there were some elements that didn’t seem to mesh well in this film, such as ancient practices, and modern times being out together. Yeah, there were points where this film seemed to imply that the movie was set in modern times. However, more often than not, the film seems to act as if it’s set in more ancient Japan, you know? Also, there were quite a few cliches that didn’t seem to be well executed, especially when it came to certain moments that occurred near the end of the movie.
But was this film completely horrible? Absolutely not. There are still some good things that would make Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank worth watching at least once, if not more. To begin, like I said, Hank, Jimbo, and Ika Chu were the major highlights of this film. Ika Chu especially was a great villain in this film. Not to mention that it was nice to finally have a villain in an animated film period that wasn’t even a twist villain like Disney has at least had in the more recent animated films. If companies like Paramount Pictures/Nickelodeon Movies, Universal/Illumination, and even DreamWorks continue to take the more traditional route when it comes to creating villains, hopefully Disney will follow suit. Anyway, some of the action was really good too. I mean even if the climax felt a little short-lived, at least the samurai fighting at that moment was still well choreographed, along with all the other action scenes, namely the ones that involved samurai fighting. Oh, and did I forget o mention that Samuel L. Jackson does the voice of the samurai cat trainer Jimbo? Let me tell you, he is hilarious even in that role. Samuel L. Jackson is always great in any role that he does, be it Nick Fury in The Avengers, the cop dude in Pulp Fiction, Jedi Mace Windu in the Star Wars prequel trilogy, and films like those. Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank is surprisingly no exception. Finally, it was great to have some surprisingly clever jokes over the course of this film.
And that’s my review for Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank. Although not quite one of the best works of animation, the movie is a decent T watch with fun jokes, a somewhat mature story at times, and some good action. Still, I because this film was just okay, I can see why the film hasn’t performed all that well in theaters. If you want to see it, I would say wait until the movie comes to Paramount+, or On Demand, or somewhere like that. That, or if you have a deal at either Regal, or AMC theaters, where you can see a certain amount of movies a week for free, then see Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank in theaters for free without having to pay money. And hey, at least there have been worse films out there in comparison to this one.
Final Grade: C
Matthew’s Animated & Live-Action Movie Reviews 