Marco 5: Epilogue (2022)

## Change can get scary... well, at least for Marco himself.

***Marco 5: Epilogue*** (most commonly known as ***Marco 5*** and originally titled *Marco 5: Family Staycation*) is an 2022 Marcanese American computer-animated dystopian comedy film produced by Anaya Animation for Columbia Pictures and Paramount Pictures. The film was directed by Kevin Armand in his feature directorial debut and produced by Joe Murray & Cody Cameron from a screenplay by Mike Rianda & Gennedy Tartakovsky (who previously directed the 2021 Marco Toon *Family Staycation* and the first two *Hotel Cloudylandia* films for Anaya Animation). Featuring the voices of Hugh Jackman, Joseph Gonzales Jr. Tina Fey, Pierre Coffin, Anna Faris, Mel Gibson, Renee Zellweger, Jason Sudekis, Danny DeVito, Andy Samberg, Kristen Bell, and Ed Helms; the returning cast is joined by newcomers Jake T. Austin, Ben Mendelsohn, Jamie Demetriou, Chloe Garcia-Moretz, Abbi Jacobson, Johnny Depp, Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham, Emily Blunt, Clint Eastwood, David Cross, Kathryn Hahn, Kristen Wilg, Rianda (as the voice of Richard), Tommy Lee Jones, Selena Gomez (who replaced Julia Sawalha as the voice of Melissa), among others. The seventh and final installment of the *Marco* franchise, the film has Marco & his friends enjoying retired lives from espionage until Marco's menacing AI algorithm clone decides to take over the world with a tech uprising.

## Plot

After the events of *Marco 4,* Marco & his friends fully dedicate themselves to almost perfect lives of well-deserved retirement from too much espionage: they attend an Astros game that's kinda worth the watch, hop on a train ride through Hermann Park, ride on the waves at Schiltterbahn New Braunfels, attend Bom Bin's prestigious grand circus festival, among other fun things. Everything goes well and Marco creates his most recent high-tech creation: Marco's highly kind and intelligent AI algorithm clone. Impressed by Marco's newest creation, his friends take him back to his birthplace Galveston for a nice spring break vacation, until suddenly... Marco's AI clone becomes self-aware that he's meant to be Marco's most threatening arch-nemesis to date and abducts all of humanity, even Marco's family and friends, except for Marco & his siblings along with Joaquin & Emiliano and his new friends. Marco's world comes crashing down as he and his remaining friends must return their dystopian world back to normal, stop AI and some tech uprising while also destroying his semi-utopian planet, and most of all returning their missing friends back to Earth safely. And as Marco soon realizes that he's getting all lame... he's got plenty of cool superpowers too. However, he also encounters someone else who he could start a relationship with...

## Good Qualities

1. The animation is very vivid and expressive with even more flashy colors as always despite the film's animation style *completely* being copied straight out of *Hotel Cloudylandia*; however, this *Marco* film arguably has the best if not the most impressive photorealistic visuals and animation. The animators also take full advantage of Marco's superpowers and limb movements in such a fun way.
2. Very cool soundtrack once again from Mark Mothersbaugh and Mark Ronson, with songs such as "Ain't We Going To Walk The Moon?" by DJ Rapper and "Something's Crazy Here" by Jake; as well as excellent choice songs like "24K Magic" & "Wake Up In The Sky" by Bruno Mars, "I Hate Everything About You" by Three Days Grace, "Comfortably Numb" by Pink Floyd, and "New Day" by Danny Gokey.
3. The idea of Marco & his friends saving the world from a tech uprising while also returning the world back to normal, although the execution being similar to that of *Hotel Cloudylandia 3: Traversmania,* is very cool yet interesting at the same time. Also, the concepts of two alternate universes (one being completely dystopian, the other being a semi-utopian planet driven by artificial intelligence) and that of Marco gaining his own superpowers are very fantastic.
4. The film's new characters are really amazing additions to the franchise, much in part thanks to the Silver Springs residents and Talia:
	* The residents of Silver Springs are very kindhearted and overly sympathetic church members whom already knew Marco & his friends and still treat them well regardless of their differences; essentially, they are good-natured optimistic Christians whom have lots of enthusiasm, care much about the people around them, and have strong faith in God while not being the stereotypical "highly religious" people: which include the Zbylots, the Zimmermans, and the Crowells.
	* Marco's new friends are also great characters for this film: Justin & Socky make great comic reliefs, Richard and Peter make a great dynamic thanks to their clever tactics of helping Marco's team and Peter's several quotes, Emily makes for an overly kind and sympathetic character, and Juan Angel serves as a decent comic relief although not as good as Justin or Socky in terms of character development.
	* Despite her somehow being an obvious copy of Mikayla, Talia makes a strong and beautiful love interest for Marco and the perfect replacement for Aileene, as the latter pushed Marco aside in favor of her new boyfriend. She also plays a huge role into Marco's character development as she was the one who gave Marco her signature frappe (hence why Marco turned himself in the form of Marcoman) and whom saved him from his possible demise after being thrown back to Earth.
5. Awesome voice acting from the returning cast as well as newcomers Ben Mendelsohn, Jamie Demetriou, Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham, Emily Blunt, Abbi Jacobson, Kristen Wilg, Kathryn Hahn, Selena Gomez (who does a better job voicing Melissa than Julia Sawalha), screenwriter Mike Rianda, and especially Tommy Lee Jones & David Cross as Agent Clark and Peter respectively.
6. Some funny if hilarious moments in this film; such as the scenes with Justin, the dinner scene in which Marco & his new friends attempt to eat crawfish with chili, whenever Madcap interrupts AI's evil plans or tries to correct AI's errors (a really good example of this would be when AI orders Madcap his crown despite the fact that they are both holograms), the scene where Marco plays with himself after being lame (also worth mentioning the Columbia Pictures opening scene), and this gem whenever Talia requests Marco to have her "frequent espionage victim" card stamped.
7. Marco & Talia's chemistry is done pretty well here, to the point that it's arguably better than Marco & Aileene's relationship. After his former girlfriend Aileene rejected him, Marco begins to lose his faith in true love despite having God by his side as well as his family. But when he encounters Talia having fallen down to Earth, she welcomes him but Marco still feels immense guilt about Aileene's betrayal towards him and the fact that he provoked AI's tech uprising on humanity, the latter which he thinks would make Talia angry despite his great amount of love towards her. Talia, on the other side of the coin, wanted to become Marco's new girlfriend despite the fact that she loves Cole more than Marco, and Cole's romantic affections towards her. When these two ends meet, Marco stays in love with Talia after realizing that Aileene has moved away from AI-5000 and Cole being injected by AI's microchip. And although Marco does tell her the truth behind AI's problem, Talia accepts Marco for who he is despite his failures and both start their own love relationship together.
8. The Astros opening scene, the Hermann Park scene, Bom Bin's grand circus festival scene, the Schiltterbahn scene, the Kemah Boardwalk scene, and the Galveston scene are very memorable, with the latter scene having us wonder what would've happened if Marco visited his birthplace for the first time.
9. AI is a very threatening and kinda funny villain who comes off as a major threat for Marco & his friends like or even more so than Edgar; his motives for destroying Earth are somewhat justified since he only wanted to transport humanity to a much better planet despite his sole purpose of eradicating them for his desired revenge on Marco, who miscoded him although his primary intention was to make AI kind and smart like him. He is the prime example of how artificial intelligence could affect people's lives in negative ways, and also someone whom people try to make him good but later becomes evil due to his self-awareness. Even better than AI would be Madcap, since he is technically the "kinder" version of AI despite him being inept if maniacal and provides the best jokes in this film concerning AI and his planet; he also has very cool features such as his verbal mouth expressions and fireball weapon like that of Sir Clay Moriarty from *Animated.*
10. Several emotional moments throughout the film that either come off as heartwarming, impactful, or just downright sad and tearjerking; like the film's opening scene in which Marco says goodbye to Aileene after she decides to leave him alone in favor of her new boyfriend, the coffee shop scene when Talia welcomes Marco with her signature frappe drink, the dungeon scene, the Thanksgiving scene, the scene when Marco falls down to some landfill, and the film's ending scene. Perhaps the most emotional scene in this film (aside from the film's opening scene) would be when Marco & Talia tour Silver Springs for their first date together.
11. It's very nice to see all of the other *Marco* characters from the previous films making cameo appearances here in this film, and also some fan favorites such as Edgar, Ian, Bradley, and Marlene.
12. Very nice and different if unexpected twist on the Columbia Pictures, Paramount Pictures, and Anaya Animation logos referencing *The Matrix*: the Sony logo gets pale and the "O" transfers to the Columbia Pictures logo (now black and white) in which the Torch Lady, after getting herself reflected by the sun, gets blue glitches only for Marco to show up as the Torch Lady; the Paramount Pictures logo seems normal but seconds later turns pale with the stars and mountain disappearing; and the Anaya Animation logo is shown with white font over a black background in which some (and then all) of the letters disappear by the blue glitch.
13. These quotes became instant memes even before this film got released to theaters:
	* **"Gee, it's like Resurrection Sunday, but only on a Friday..."**
	* ***"JUST GIVE ME MY CUP OF COFFEE!!!"***
	* **"Whoa... that was just a tiny *explosion!*"**
	* **"Why... why am I so *BLEH?!"***