Made the decision, despite not caring much at all for the first 'Alpha and Omega', to see its follow-ups (yes there is a franchise) out of curiosity and as an enormous fan of animation, would see anything regardless of critical reception.
'Alpha and Omega's' first sequel 'A Howl-iday Adventure' was dreadful, repeating all the mistakes/flaws from the original, amplifying those flaws, and making more along the way. Proof that 'Alpha and Omega' didn't need a sequel, let alone a franchise. The second sequel 'The Great Wolf Games' is every bit as bad, if this review is like a reiteration of my review for 'A Howl-iday Adventure' it is because the flaws here are exactly the same as previously, and the whole thing said about that film's flaws in the previous sentence applies here too, it's every bit as pointless too. The only thing that's different is that it's not based around winter/Christmas.
Let's start with the animation. The animation wasn't the best in the first film but it had its decent moments. It however is 'Toy Story' compared to the animation quality here, which is not quite Video Brinquedo, Spark Plug Entertainment or 'Foodfight' bad but almost and on the same level as 'The Swan Princess' CGI films. Blocky character designs, almost creepy expressions, very flat colours, a complete lack of fluidity in movement, endless goofs as long as your arm and less than meticulously detailed backgrounds are reminiscent of computer animation and video games in their infancy, something that one does not expect at all for 2014 even for low budget when technology has advanced as much as it has.
Can say no better for the music either. None of it fits with what's going on, stylistically it feels out of place and out of kilter, it's obtrusive and it's not even good music on its own. The writing is even worse, summing up in one word it's abominable. half-baked ideas and any parts that strive to be funny or poignant instead come across as eye-rollingly cheesy or cloying.
Worse are the "funny" jokes and dialogue, which are not funny at all, one groans at some of the wordplay/puns and older audiences who are children at heart whenever seeing animation (like me, one is never too old to appreciate animation and it is not strictly oriented towards kids only) will question the appropriateness of some of it.
Story-wise, there is not much of one at all. Like 'A Howl-iday Adventure', it is short but feels longer thanks to plodding pacing and thin plotting. The games themselves are far from great, they're poorly animated, tedious, repetitive and have no suspense or anybody worth caring about to take any sides.
The characters are never engaging, they are either bland or irritating and some of them are completely pointless.
Voice acting is weak all round, the first 'Alpha and Omega' at least had Hayden Panettiere giving a pretty good account of herself and Dennis Hopper. There is nobody of that calibre here, some overdo it and some act as if they weren't even trying.
Overall, as far from great as one can possibly get. This franchise has serious potential of being one of the most over-milked in existence if the rest of the films continue to be this bad. 1/10, very rarely give out this rating but 'The Great Wolf Games' and its predecessor deserves it. Bethany Cox
