Street Fighter Movie Review — Absolute Cheeks, But You'll Love It Anyways

If you are a fellow millennial like me, then I am sure you have played and grown up with at least one iteration of Street Fighter. Like come onnnnnn, they’ve rereleased some version of each entry about three damn times.

So, when the first Street Fighter movie trailer dropped, I was SUPER hyped for it! Having even played Street Fighter competitively, I was well aware of just how deep the cast of characters in this franchise goes. I even thoroughly enjoyed the casting, as I personally thought a lot of them were great picks. I know, I know, the majority of you hated the cast, but they truly did a great job with their respective characters.

Now, let me tell you, I am having a super hard time deciding if I even liked this movie…

It is definitely a hot mess, and there are so many reasons as to why it is so. It’s even difficult to know where to begin just because of how much is wrong with this movie. Yet, I thoroughly enjoyed the damn thing despite all my gripes.

But again, this is the Grumpy Suite, and we have grumpy thoughts.

Let’s begin digging into this dog water of a movie.

Gonna start with the bad, but end with the good. To begin, the humour was so utterly cringe at times. Forced jokes, juvenile jokes, and misplaced jokes. With so many funny guys in this movie, you would think the humour would be excellent, but so many times it just misses the damn mark.

My absolute biggest gripe is that they do such an excellent job building up tension and awesome action sequences, and then dump some fart joke right in the middle of it to ruin everything they just set up. Remember when we’re about to meet Blanka? How hype that was? With the dudes pulling on chains? Then he makes this awesome entrance……into a smelly armpit joke?!

WHAT?

I just could not believe how cheeks that was.

There are many moments like this, and it completely ruins the tone of the film. And that leads directly into the next biggest issue with this movie. They literally cannot figure out if they want to be taken seriously, be an action film, be a comedy, be an animated film, or be live action.

So what did they decide to do?

They dropped it all into one bowl like they’re making the Powerpuff Girls, but this time it did not come out so magically.

I hate that there were moments where I sat there frustrated because I was thoroughly enjoying the movie, and then they would just poop all over the moment with some completely out-of-touch joke.

I honestly think they are onto something with making it an action comedy. It completely makes sense for an IP like Street Fighter. It was never, ever meant to be serious. But they really could have executed it much better by at least keeping the comedic moments in between the more serious sequences instead of constantly interrupting them.

The final quarter of the film truly nails this when we see Ryu and Ken taking on Bison’s henchmen and we are treated to some sexy fights! It was adrenaline-pumping for sure, and many of the fights are easily some of the highlights of the film.

I mean, as they should be, right? This IS Street Fighter!

Buuuuttttt, this does lead to another problem.

Yes, I did say butt. Yes, this is a butt joke. It’s fitting with the IQ brain rot of this film. That is how bad the humour can be in this movie.

Back to the problem I am referring to: There are just waaaaayyyyyy too many characters, so we really don’t get much of a fleshed-out story for many of them. We know Bison wants a tournament so he can lure Ryu out of hiding and steal his aura. But Akuma is somehow supposed to be part of the main plot, yet, just like Roman Reigns in WWE, we get more of a cameo appearance instead.

Ryu and Ken also have some familial issues to deal with. Which, btw, was actually pretty cool because we got to see that Ken was once the better of the two.

I’m telling you, despite the thrashing I’m giving this movie here, there is also A LOT of good in this film! I promise you.

Let’s start with the casting. I know many of you are gonna cry here, but hear me out. They really did such an excellent job with it.

Chun-Li is gorgeous, and Callina actually shows some acting chops. Many people, for some odd reason, have been heavily hating on Noah as Ken, but I feel he did an excellent job playing the handsome playboy who also happens to have actual fighting skills. Also, unlike his Ryu counterpart, Noah actually has the muscle mass that feels appropriate for his character.

Fiddy Cent as Balrog made all the sense in the world to me when it was announced, and I loved it.

Andrew Schulz made everyone wince when he was announced as Dan, yet he was awesome! He was one of the very, very few characters who consistently had the right timing for his jokes. And Dan is supposed to be goofy, guys. Come onnnnn. Why would you want some super-serious actor playing Dan? Schulz was a great choice.

Mr. American Nightmare Cody Rhodes, who already plays a Captain America-esque role in WWE, was perfect for Guile! Too bad we didn’t get some better fight scenes with him, though.

Honestly, everyone looked the part. I loved it.

There is so much they can do with this franchise, and I do think they could make an even better second film. This first entry into the movie series has already shown that they can pull off an incredible action movie if they really want to.

They just need to do a much better job with the humour, because if they can nail that balance, I think they’ll finally nail the tone too.

I still recommend checking it out with your friends. The movie is still a lot of fun!

ESPECIALLY if you are an SF fan like me.

I’ll give the movie an absolute cheeks outta ten.

But in my heart?

I’ll give it a 7.

Mr. Grumpy