A BETTER SCRIPT FOR THE MOVIE JUMANJI

First, I must commend Jake Kasdan for this wonderful movie, the twist and fun was top notch. Ninety percent of the scenes were funny, It’s been long I laughed out really loud when watching a movie. Dwayne Johnson hadn’t acted a funnier character before, bringing him to Jumanji was a good step and other artists made it excellent.

OVERVIEW OF THE MOVIE

Four kids were placed in detention, the punishment they got was to clean and arrange a deserted room. They found a video game there and proceeded to playing it. The game Jumanji was a war game, the characters they picked were meant to save the city. All they had to do is overcome all obstacles and place a stone they were given in a dragon statue’s eye. The kids never got to play the game with the game pads, instead they were drawn into the game and acted as the characters. They either save the city or get stuck in the game forever.

Interesting, isn’t it? Beautifully composed fiction but I still feel they should have done much better or do it my way. Winks.

THINGS THAT DOESN’T ADD UP

Coming across the Video game.

In 1996, Alex’s Dad found the Jumanji game, it was a board game at first and he took it home to his game-addicted son. Alex later found a game cartridge in it and advanced to play it. Then, he got stuck into the game. Twenty years later, the four kids found a video game with four pads and they got stuck too. What are they trying to tell us here?


_{Fridge with the game.}

The game can be found anywhere, yes! That’s what it is. And it can be in form of anything, it’s possible someone else downloads a strange app on his phone and gets Jumanji installed, then he gets stuck too.

Opinion

Introducing a different game was uncalled for, there should have been just one. The four kids should have come across the game Alex played before he disappeared. Alex's Dad knew his son was addicted to video games, he should have been the one that found the video game the four kids saw. A real video game not the board game his son wasn’t into. The son would have tried playing the game immediately he saw it hence the disappearance.

Terrified of what happened, Alex's Dad should have vacated the house. Imagine living in a place where your son had disappeared from. New people should have bought it, there was no need making the house look old and deserted after Alex disappearance.

My script

Alex's Dad sells the house to Bethany’s parents, Bethany never played the game when she saw it because she wasn’t into video games. After the detention they got, the kids became friends and decided to relax in Bethany’s home. Spenser saw the game and suggested they all play it, after arguing on what they should have done instead, they all held each pads. And they were drawn into the game afterwards.

And that’s it! Jumanji should be one video game, not something that can be found anywhere or everywhere. If at all it should be more than one, then Alex and the four kids’ mission shouldn’t have been intertwined.

The game

What you needed to do to play the Jumanji game is choose a character and voila you get drawn into it without knowing anything about what you chose or having an idea of what game you are about to play.

Opinion

Every one familiar with adventurous games, especially the one like Jumaji gets to know their characters’ strength before getting into the game, if not all, they should have gotten an idea. Mortal Kombat gives you characters to choose before starting the game, you get to know who you chose, the strength and ability of your character. Jumaji didn’t hint them, they only saw the names and the characters’ professions. They found a way to introduce the characters’ strength later but I felt it should have come in earlier, since they acted a game scene. You don’t know your characters during a video game, you can only understand and practice their skills during the session. But you actually chose them because of the skills they have not the sweet names you saw.


_{When Moose saw his capabilities.}

My Script

Fridge checked the strengths and skills of Moose Finbar, he decided that’s what he wants. Since he wasn’t too brilliant and Zoology is a course of study he wants to be good at, Moose would be a perfect option for him. He didn’t know what “weapon backpack” actually means but he concluded he will have lots of weapons with him. Since they will be playing in a jungle with weird animals and dangerous guys, the Zoologist would make him a winner. The character being black made him choose it too.

Spenser was glad to choose Dr. Smolder, the fact that he has no weakness amazed him. His strengths is enough to triumph in the game he thought, Spenser plays video games all his life and he knows what to do with the strengths he saw before picking the doctor.

Martha chose the only lady in the game, she hates video games anyway and the last thing she would want to fight with is a man running around. She wants to get off the game quickly that’s why she chose the female. She cared less about her strengths and weaknesses, she just felt a lady wouldn’t last long in the jungle.

Bethany had no choice than to pick the last character, Professor Shelly.

This way, the four kids already knows the character they chose. That’s how a video game works! When they finally landed in the jungle, Spenser would be surprised to see Moose Finbar, the character Fridge chose. The realization of what happened would set in there. Since it’s a video game, they should have made it look like it 100%.

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Every other scene were superb. The way all the levels were accomplished was good, I mightn’t have written a better script to describe how they passed each levels, so I give them a thumbs up here.

_Jumanji!

Let me drop my pen here, there’s another movie I’m about to watch. Want to find out? Keep checking my blog.

So, what do you think? My script or theirs?

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All images are screenshots from the movie.