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The Lego Movie is the fir... The secon.. Thir...Four... Fif... ka-billionth film based on the ultra-popular
line of toys and it's definitely not bad but it bears a huge resemblance to the first movie
based on Lego, the Adventures of Clutch Powers, released by Universal in 2010 on DVD. While
While I enjoyed The Lego Movie a thousand times more than Clutch Powers, I couldn't sit through
it without thinking about Clutch. They aren't identical but they still are so similar to
the point where I can still compare them as I am going to now.
Before I start I should mention that while The Lego Movie definitely is not the first
First of all we have the artwork on the DVD boxes. On The Clutch Powers box we see our
hero and the supporting characters behind him with the antagonists and their buildings
to the left. On the Lego Movie we see our hero and the supporting characters behind
him with the antagonists and their buildings to the left. Have I missed the memo on children's
movie poster design or is this a coincidence? It looks like the people who designed the
Clutch Powers DVD cover didn't make any renders of the supporting character so they took screenshots
from the film and photoshopped it onto the cover.
The Lego Movie uses the lego bricks in a much better way than Clutch. In The Lego Movie everything
is lego but for some reason in Clutch most of the scenery is just average 3D photorealistic
renderings. It's like the *** Lego ads you see on Saturday morning TV.
New from Lego Pirates
The pirates are looking for the treasure
The fight for the treasure has begun!
A new collection from Lego Pirates!
In Clutch, Lego is used so minimally that it's almost like they could replace the minifigures with
anything else and the story would make equally as much sense. Sometimes they just throw building
into the movie just so they can say "hey look kids, LEGO!" and the kids will buy it whereas
The Lego Movie uses bricks everywhere as if it is an enhanced stop motion. You wouldn't
be stupid for thinking that it looked like a stop motion animation from ForrestFire or
Keshen with some enhancements such as better texturing in minifigure hair and somewhat-accurate
physics.
The Lego Movie has much more detail on the minifigures bodies. If you look close up on
renders of Emmet it looks like they scanned in an actual minifigure.
In Clutch Powers it looks like they made the textures in Photoshop, they're too clean and don't have enough blemishes
to be convincing. It appears as if they used the reference images for the painting of the
real life minifigures.
Minifigures in the Lego Movie, for the most part, move like an actual minifigure would
with limbs that can only move forwards and back and mostly rigid torsos. In Clutch they
move as they please, mostly they move normally but sometimes the characters do things that
no minifigure could. Again, they could replace minifigures with actual people and there would
be little difference.
The Lego Movie starts with about 5 minutes of logos and prelude and then an upbeat song
with cinematic shots of the protagonist and the large metropolis that he lives in.
♫ Everything is Awesome!
♫ [Music]
Everything is cool when you're part of a team! ♫
Showing him doing everyday tasks around the city and driving to where he works.
In Clutch Powers it starts with 6 min of logos and the prelude and the protagonist driving to his workplace,
the only difference here is that he isn't dropping off his dry cleaning or buying a
coffee.
♫ Everybody wants to be like me!
You can't wait then!
I, I, I, I work alone! ♫
Is it just coincidence? I mean Clutch drives through a construction
site while Emmet drives to a construction site. You'd think that The Lego Group would
mention that to Warner. Maybe it's a homage or I'm looking too deep into it. It's not
like the Lego Group didn't know about it, the movie only released about 3 years earlier.
The Master Builders of the Lego Movie have a similar ability to Clutch who can see pieces
in a way that allows them to think of something to build with speed and ease. The Master Builders
see the actual pieces with actual identification numbers whereas Clutch sees the pieces around
him and quickly visualizes what he wants to build. I think both conveyed the idea of structure
recycling pretty well but in Clutch it was done so rarely that it's not worth mentioning.
A cool thing with the Lego Movie is that you can buy every single set seen in the movie
essentially working as an advertisement. With Clutch Powers you can't build everything!
You can't build Mallock the Malign, Omega, Clutch, Peg or any other main character. Why
didn't they make actual minifigs for them? "Maybe because this a Direct-to-DVD". Clutch
serves not only as a LEGO Power Miners ad with the prelude but also as ad space for
actual pre-roll ads. The DVD *** has Lego ads that play before the movie.
Why would you bother putting ads for Legoland and various related Lego sets on the DVD when the movie
is supposed to serve that purpose? It's pointless.
As you saw The Lego Movie is quite similar to Clutch Powers. If you haven't seen either
yet I suggest you look at Clutch Powers first as it will make you see how much Lego movies
have improved in 4 years. When you do watch Clutch Powers though, reduce any urge you
have to think that it is a prototype of The Lego Movie.
I hope you enjoyed this video, expect reviews of both movies soon.