This certainly cranks up the nostalgia. If you grew up playing the Tony Hawk games, or skateboarding, then you will probably enjoy this.
As great as the subject matter is, it's a rather bland documentary. Just a lot of talking heads, a lot of patting eachother on the back, and a quick overview of the series itself.
The documentary is best when talking about the first two iconic games; in particular their development. The impact the games had on not just the skating world, but the bands who featured on the soundtracks was interesting too.
This makes me want to listen to the music featured on the Tony Hawk games even more than it does play the games themselves. You're probably not going to learn anything new here. The sheer volume of quick interviews is enough to make you more dizzy than the gameplay angles.
But for all its documentary shortfalls, it's still a nice enough trip down memory lane.
Pretending I'm a Superman: The Tony Hawk Video Game Story
2020
Action / Documentary
Pretending I'm a Superman: The Tony Hawk Video Game Story
2020
Action / Documentary
Keywords: video gameskateboarding
Plot summary
The story of how skateboarding became a part of the mainstream by focusing on the success of the "Tony Hawk's Pro Skater" video game franchise.
Uploaded by: FREEMAN
Director
Top cast
Tech specs
720p.BLU 1080p.BLU 720p.WEB 1080p.WEBMovie Reviews
Fun trip down memory lane
Deck The Halls
This documentary, seemingly released to coincide with the release of the remastered versions of "Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 & 2", was advertised on Sky Documentaries last week - and being a fan of the game series, I downloaded it. Whilst it has some interesting moments, ultimately the story wasn't quite interesting enough to be worthy of the documentary.
Combining archive footage with recent interviews with various personalities, the documentary tracks the rise of Skateboarding from child's activity, to a rebellious outsider movement, to X-Games popularity. It's most high profile name, Tony Hawk, a lifelong gamer begins to discuss a video game with various parties, before settling in partnership with Neversoft/Activision and producing a series of hit games that both reflect and then influence the skating scene.
The skating side of the documentary is perhaps a bit more interesting than the gaming side. Plenty of interviews with a number of skating figures that take you though that history. There is some needle in there, towards Tony I felt - with him being a big shot and taking their world mainstream with the X-Games and the game itself. It's then really interesting out the other side, when you have skaters that were totally inspired by "Pro Skater" and even learning that some tricks that began in the game and were thought impossible, have become utilised in real life.
The actual game development though unfortunately isn't really that interesting. They had a game they thought was OK, but might not sell. It did catch on though, and sold more than they could have hoped, so they drove the franchise into the ground by releasing too many games too quickly and diluting the formula. There was a little talk about the much derided skateboard peripheral, that didn't really work, but that could have been delved into further. There was no talk about the "Jackass-ification" of the series towards the end there though. There was some discussion about the soundtrack, however, which was a key aspect for some bands to get their music heard by wider audiences.
I enjoyed the huge nostalgia buzz, don't get me wrong - but perhaps a wider target, such as action sports games in general or a wider look at the history of Neversoft, would have been more interesting.
Not Bad
A nice little documentary about the franchise. I would have loved it to be a little bit longer with some more footage. Seems like some things were slightly glossed over. That being said, I'm not being a hater. It's worth a watch and will definitely make you want to run out and buy the new remastered games for nostalgia!