Expiration Date (I) (2014) User Reviews

Great!

[youmas-17455 · 8/10 · 20 April 2022]

Expiration Date is a great short. It's beautifully animated, and I personally think it truly captures the personalities of most of the mercs (I wouldn't say that for Sniper and Pyro because they don't really do much). While Scout and Soldier get most of the focus, you can still see snippets of personality from other characters, like Medic's enthusiastic tone when he says "Tumors!", and the part with Demoman right before the title card.

However, a great film is not without its fair share of problems. One first issue I have with this short is that Soldier's stupidity is especially exaggerated. In the early TF2 shorts and comics, Soldier is definitely misguided in some of his actions, but he's not a madman. However, Soldier's lines and actions in Expiration Date are a bit too wacky. They're quite humorous and do manage to get a chuckle out of me, but they're a bit out of character.

Also, the ending is kind of cheesy and contains cliches of the romance genre. It's ambiguous whether or not Miss Pauling likes Scout, which I guess is OK. However, if they do start dating, it would be Überlame because it is implied beforehand on several occasions that Miss Pauling merely tolerates him and doesn't like him back. He did save her life, but if she fell in love with him just for that, that would be kind of generic. All I'm saying is that it would kind of ruin the character development and humorous moments between the two characters that already existed.

Rants about romance aside, Expiration Date is great and I recommend watching it even if you don't play Team Fortress 2.

Beautifully animated and surprisingly funny.

[tritexzisnotjeff · 10/10 · 24 June 2014]

I've been a long time fan of Team Fortress 2. From its surface, the game might seem like nothing more than a few guys shooting at each other in a desert, but it's more than that. TF2's world has huge potential for storytelling, and Valve is definitely aware of that. This short tells a story that's not too realistic, but also not too unrealistic. The plot was perfectly fit for the world of TF2. The characters were great. Each one acts just like they do in other shorts and in game. The short was also pretty funny, way funnier than I thought it would be. Moments like Spy saying "Seduce me" or Soldier saying "I have done nothing but teleport bread for three days." had me gasping for air laughing.

The story perfectly fits the world that it's in, the characters are phenomenal, the animation is smooth, and it's hilarious.

10/10

Teleporting can be hazardous to your health

[Horst_In_Translation · 6/10 · 8 March 2017]

"Expiration Date" is a 15-minute animated short film from 2014 and this one was made mostly with the intention of getting more people curious about the video game "Team Fortress 2" as this quarter of animation was also made by the people who made the video game. And for that, it is a pretty respectable feat. The early love story was pretty entertaining, even if it may have been overdone a bit when he asked his superior for help and in the end the action sequences were too much as well and they sacrificed a bit of a better story or more really funny scenes for that. But thanks to the animation and also some of the jokes, it was a decent watch. Visually, this film was top-notch, no doubt about it and with this style it would also have worked as a full feature film. Maybe they will make one in the future too. I would watch it I guess and I think it can be a success. Until then, check out this goofy little film about what kind of chaos ensues when you try to teleport bread.