Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Green Snake’ on Netflix, the Far-Too-Action-Packed Second Part of a Chinese Animated Fantasy Saga

Now on Netflix, Green Snake — a.k.a. White Snake 2: The Tribulation of the Green Snake — is a sequel to 2019’s Chinese box office hit White Snake. The films take a page or three from Disney formula, adapting a popular story from folklore into action-packed animated cinema product complete with princesses, monsters and the like. The films tell the stories of two demon-snake sisters who can take human form; the sequel focuses on the Green Snake’s solo adventure, separate from the White Snake, which tempts one to say, here she goes again on her own, going down the only road she’s ever known. But I’ve made up my mind — I ain’t wasting no more time, so let’s just get to the review (with many apologies).

GREEN SNAKE: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: In ancient China Blanca the White Snake (voice of Zhang Zhe) and her sister Verta the Green Snake (Tang Xiaoxi) attempt to flatten an island temple by controlling massive ocean waves. But their nemesis Fahai (Song Xuchen), a gold monk, summons a gold dome to protect it, then manifests a gold dragon made of light I think, and the ensuing rigamarole renders the sisters asunder, and I don’t mean they’re just, like, living in different suburbs now. There’s entire realms between them now. Verta tumbles into a strange land that looks a lot like a post-apocalyptic movie set, complete with rows of burned-up cars and abandoned skyscrapers, but instead of zombies milling about, there are demons and monsters, and yes, there’s a difference between the two, but for the life of me, I can’t explain it to you without sounding like an idiot, so please accept another apology.

This effing hellhole place is called Asuraville, and Verta gets the guided tour thanks to a woman named Sister Sun (Qiu Qiu) as they tear ass through the city, avoiding antagonists known as Ox-heads and Horse-faces, which I wish I was making up, but I’m not. The Ox-heads and Horse-faces ride studly motorcycles and dress like they’re in heavy metal videos from 1983, and they’re the rival gang to Sun’s pals, led by Sima (Wei Chao), who are all quite sexy and athletic, and look like refugees from Tank Girl, except for the giant octopus, who just looks like a giant octopus, and who I’m sure looks sexy and athletic to other octopuses. Sun gets Verta some pants and gives her rifle and motorcycle lessons so they can survive in this setting, which I interpreted to be a confluence of multiversal realms, although I could be way off, not that it remotely matters. Point being, it’s a dangerous place, especially when the hero characters are all nearly obliterated by a tornado full of deer ghosts, another thing I promise I’m not making up.

A number of comrades and villains cycle through Verta’s adventure, some of whom don’t last very long, so don’t get attached: a masked man (Wai Wai), some frog people, some alligator people, some wolf-bat creatures that look like ghosts but aren’t ghosts, and Precious Jade Workshop Foxy Boss (Zheng Xiaopu), an agent of chaos who’s literally two-faced, human on one side and fox on the back, and who’s familiar to those who survived a sit through White Snake. All Verta wants to do is reunite with her sister, but she has to make her way through hordes of rejected TMNT bad guys, a flashback scene that looks ripped off from Frozen, several dozen apocalypses and many tornadoes, whirlpools, portals and other miscellaneous vortices. Times are tough.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: I’m pretty sure the mega-overstuffed Green Snake was inspired by every movie that ever existed, but more specifically, I saw stuff from I Am Legend, Raya and the Last Dragon, Paul Bettany Movie That Time Forgot Legion, Mulan, Minions, Dawn of the Dead (the 2004 remake), hyperactive Chinese blockbuster The Wandering Earth and Every Which Way But Loose. Can’t get an eyeful of a nutty biker gang without being reminded of Every Which Way But Loose.

Performance Worth Watching: I guess Zheng Xiaopu’s vocal characterization of Precious Jade Workshop Foxy Boss almost penetrates the movie’s overwhelming melange of near-non-stop action and too much plot.

Memorable Dialogue: A scintillating line via Precious Jade Workshop Foxy Boss illustrates how the movie could stand to edit out some unnecessary detail: “Asuraville was created by the potent resentment brimming from all of humanity’s unmet luck.”

Sex and Skin: None. TBHPRBFAOHULTBSP: Too Busy Harboring Potent Resentment Brimming From All Of Humanity’s Unmet Luck To Be Sexually Potent.

Our Take: Green Snake looks great: crazy character designs, gorgeous detailed settings, inventive action choreography, etc. But it can’t tell a coherent story, and is so hectically paced, if you fall behind for even a brief moment, you’ll never catch up. It has too many characters, subplots upon subplots and hyperactive action sequences that are so frequent, they cease to have much dramatic impact. It’s full of things like karma-testing wind tunnels that lead to Wish Bridges or a giant beanstalk reaching up toward a nebular wad of sky-gas lightning, one cockamamie fantasy scenario after another, and it’s enough stuff for 20 movies.

One tends to get irked when everything is staged like a climactic battle, with the intense clashing sound effects, the score reaching mighty crescendoes — but it ends up not being climactic at all, and one realizes there’s 80, 40, 25 minutes still left in this movie, which clocks in at an are-we-there-yet 131-minute length. Somewhere in all this is a story about sibling affection, which eventually reaches an emotional capstone. Not that we care at all by then, considering how we’ve been bowled over, electrocuted and mentally and physically flummoxed by this movie and its quest for ceaseless forward motion.

Our Call: SKIP IT. Green Snake is simply too much. I wanted to tap out after only a half-hour.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com.

Stream Green Snake on Netflix