Random Worst Live-Action Movies Based on Cartoons (22 items)

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  (#6) The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas

  • Kristen Stewart, Rosie O'Donnell, Joan Collins, Alan Cumming, Jane Krakowski, Stephen Baldwin, Harvey Korman, Alex Meneses, Thomas Gibson, Kristen Johnston, John Cho, Nigel John Taylor, Mark Addy, Taylor Negron, Danny Woodburn, Jack McGee, Tony Longo, David Jean Thomas

  The first live-action Flintstones movie, starring John Goodman and Rick Moranis, is at least an entertaining restaging of Hanna-Barbera's classic Honeymooners riff. Replacing them with Mark Addy and Stephen Baldwin for a prequel is just blatant downsizing that disappointed most fans, though Alan Cumming's Great Gazoo is a minor highlight in an otherwise dull and cost-cutting follow-up.
  
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  (#1) Dragonball Evolution

  • Emmy Rossum, Jamie Chung, James Marsters, Chow Yun-Fat, Ernie Hudson, Justin Chatwin, Joon Park, Texas Battle, Randall Duk Kim, Julian Sedgwick, Eriko Tamura, Shavon Kirksey, Jon Valera, Megumi Seki, Mike Wilson, Luis Arrieta, Freddy Bouciegues, Rafael Valdez, Richard Blake

  Dragonball is a cartoon so stylized that making it in live-action is a fool's errand to begin with, and the moment anybody even attempted to style Justin Chatwin's hair into a Goku 'do, it should have been a red flag.

  By the time he turns into a giant were-ape at the movie's climax (yes, seriously), the accumulated red flags ought to have summoned a herd of angry bulls. The video above sums it up best.
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  (#15) G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

  • Sienna Miller, Channing Tatum, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Brendan Fraser, Rachel Nichols, Dennis Quaid, Christopher Eccleston, Karolína Kurková, Marlon Wayans, Jonathan Pryce, Ray Park, Arnold Vosloo, Lee Byung-hun, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Gerald Okamura, Kevin J. O'Connor, Saïd Taghmaoui, Leo Howard, Grégory Fitoussi, Jerald Garner, Michael Benyaer, David Jean Thomas, Americus Abesamis, David Murray, Larry Hama, Tom Ohmer, Charles Howerton, Fahim Fazli, Gunner Wright, Jacques Frantz, Brandon Soo Hoo, Westley Nguyen, Jason Castle, Kaleti Williams, Lock Lee, James Howarth, Bob Rumnock, Robert Russell, Liana Mendoza, David Michael Fordham, Peter Breitmayer, Michael Broderick, Burton Perez, Michael Bretten, Joseph Stephens Jr., Jessica Lynn Sadowski, Melissa S. Markess, Damien Moreno, Jabbaar George, Ken Thomas, Duncan Bravo, Ashley Sommers, Markell Andrew, Caleb Campbell, Wayne Lopez, Kellie Matteson, Jacare Calhoun, Greg James, Michael Foster, Frederic Doss, Elena Evangelo, Martin Dew, Tj Austin, Robert Almodovar, Cristofer Sanders, Zaayan Lala, Mary Scanlon, Chris Akers, Buzz Covington, Mark Hames, Allison Moore, Fabrice Baral, Daniel Josev, Michael Sommers, Sean Velie, Ron Thompson

  G.I. Joe! A real American hero! "It's G.I. Joe, against Cobra the enemy, fighting to save the daaaay..."

  Except in the movie, G.I. Joe is an international task force, and Cobra doesn't exist yet. Maybe next there can be a Thundercats movie without thunder, or cats.
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  (#8) Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties

  • Jennifer Love Hewitt, Bill Murray, Tim Curry, Sharon Osbourne, Bob Hoskins, Billy Connolly, Vinnie Jones, Rhys Ifans, Jane Leeves, Richard E. Grant, Breckin Meyer, Lucy Davis, Roger Rees, Roscoe Lee Browne, Joe Pasquale, Ian Abercrombie, Jane Horrocks, Robin Atkin Downes, Judi Shekoni, Jim Piddock, Greg Ellis, Veronica Alicino, Jane Carr, Martin Tyler, J. B. Blanc, Justin Shenkarow, Vernee Watson-Johnson, Oliver Muirhead, Hope Levy, Ben Falcone, Lena Cardwell, Susan Leslie, Jean Gilpin, Neil Dickson, Kenneth Danziger, Bryce Lenon, Andy Kreiss, David Kallaway, Russell Milton, Johnny Gidcomb, Mark Sussman, Joe Towne, Paula J. Newman, Marie Del Marco, Ed Pearce, Diz White, Melanie Tolbert, Brian Manis, Peter Lavin, Larissa Anes, Tricia Rockman

  Bill Murray narrowly saves the first Garfield by making the lasagna-loving fat cat into a version of the actor's Saturday Night Live lounge singer persona. The sequel rips off The Prince and the Pauper, and pettily names its villain after a film critic who was mean to the first movie (Billy Connolly's Lord Dargis is named for New York Times writer Manohla Dargis).

  Sadly, that's the funniest joke in the movie.
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  (#17) Æon Flux

  • Charlize Theron, Frances McDormand, Jonny Lee Miller, Pete Postlethwaite, Sophie Okonedo, Stuart Townsend, Marton Csokas, Amelia Warner, Yangzom Brauen, Anatole Taubman, Caroline Chikezie, Paterson Joseph, Billy Morts, Milton Welsh, Wolfgang Stegemann, Betty Okino, Lavinia Wilson, Mickey Nedimovic, Timmi Trinks, Peggy Flood, Narges Rashidi, Wil Röttgen, Nikolai Kinski, Bruno Bruni Jr., Joost Siedhoff, Megan Gay, Terry Bartlett, Thomas Huber, Ralph Herforth, Jannik Büddig, Shaun Lawton, Axel Schreiber, Mehmet Yilmaz, Maverick Quek, Claudine Biswas, Claas Würfel, Weijian Liu, Karolin Peiter, Lilja Löffler, Michael Pink, Joachim Schoenfeld, Mirko Lang, Alexander Flache, Natacza Boon, Marianne Sonneck, Martha Fessehatzion, Bojan Heyn, Rainer Will, Charlie Beall, Robin Gooch, Phil Hay, Ronald Marx, Anna De Carlo, Nils Dommning, Aoibheann O'Hara, Kim Pfeiffer, Tamara Röhl, Justin Schierlo, Clio Burggraeve, Khira Lilli Pobanz, Alex Benjamin, Katie Mullins

  Aeon Flux probably could never have worked. The show is just too avant-garde, too cavalier about disregarding continuity and the whole good vs. evil paradigm. And it's all set in a future world that would require a massive budget to recreate onscreen.

  Director Karyn Kusama tried, and caught between studio regimes, wound up making a film even more compromised than she imagined, one that tied Aeon's world to our modern world in an awkward and obnoxious way that felt like a betrayal of the source material. Also, they couldn't get the basics right - Aeon's costume was all wrong, and love-hate interest Trevor Goodchild didn't even have his signature blond hair.

  Still, a cartoon-accurate Aeon Flux would allow for any number of reboots, so maybe someone will try again someday. Maybe.
  
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  (#21) Casper

  • Christina Ricci, Dan Aykroyd, Rodney Dangerfield, Amy Brenneman, Ben Stein, Eric Idle, Brad Garrett, Bill Pullman, Devon Sawa, Cathy Moriarty, Fred Rogers, John Kassir, Joe Alaskey, Terry Murphy, Joe Nipote, Malachi Pearson

  It used to be a playground joke among kids who had grown old enough to be cynical: Casper was obviously a dead kid. Nobody ever thought, however, that a major motion picture would emphasize that fact.

  Yet when director Brad Silberling came aboard the movie version, it was probably inevitable. Following the 1989 murder of his girlfriend Rebecca Schaeffer at the hands of a deranged fan, many of his films fixated on the possibility of an afterlife for the virtuous. For the Wings of Desire remake City of Angels, that's appropriate. For Casper, not so much.

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