If the above rant felt either petty or random, I have a good reason for it: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem looks great! While at first glance the animation might seem overly similar to the Spider-Verse flicks, Ninja Turtles is far less polished and more rough around the edges, making it appear hand-crafted. In fact, the Turtles themselves feel like they were made out of clay. Fire seems like it was drawn onto the screen using crayons, explosions look like pencil scribbles, and New York City is large, enticing, and messy. Seriously, you could take stills from this and easily mistake them for concept art. It’s good stuff.

And the stylization doesn’t end there, as Mutant Mayhem fully embraces its sketchbook design to the point where nothing looks “realistic” for want of a better term. If someone gets an electric shock, their bones will appear as they get zapped like they’re a Looney Tunes character. If there’s an extended gag involving vomit, it’s handled in such a cartoony manner that it will make you howl with laughter instead of wanting to throw up yourself. This is a movie that skillfully manages to be gritty without ever coming across as edgy just for the sake of being so, embracing the gross-out nature of the franchise while not being off-putting about it.

But enough about the animation. I suppose there is also a story, although it’s basic enough that I didn’t even feel I needed to open this review with a plot summary. If you’re familiar with the Turtles, you’ll have a good idea of what you’re getting here, and despite the “Mayhem” of the title, everything is fairly straight-forward, with villain Superfly’s “destroy all humans” scheme being almost identical to those of Magneto in multiple X-Men outings. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, of course, but it does keep things from getting quite as bonkers as you might expect from a Ninja Turtles movie (at least until the climatic battle, when the film throws everything at the screen at once and sees what sticks).

Speaking of Superfly, however, Ice Cube is absolutely the MVP of a stacked voice cast. He’s clearly having a blast, making the bad guy (bad fly?) hilarious, charismatic, and dangerous (he even gets to swear a little, which might make a few parents in the audience flinch). Superfly doesn’t actually appear until around the mid-way point, but when he does, he gives everything a jolt of energy, initially viewing the Turtles as allies and claiming he wants exactly what they want: acceptance from society. I suppose there’s some form of social commentary to be found in how the human characters are designed–they look more “mutated” than the actual mutants–but rest assured, Ninja Turtles doesn’t come anywhere close to being heavy-handed, and while there are gentle themes of prejudice here, they never in any way feel like a lecture.

Contrasting the borderline grotesque appearance of most of the humans is April, the only “regular” person to be found who is, it must be said, more grounded that previous incarnations of the heroine. Fortunately, she is also very appealing and likable, working as a good companion for the Turtles and balancing their genuine goofiness with a more rational look at the world. Even better, the film allows her to be funny (she’s responsible for the aforementioned vomit gag, so take that however you will), making her feel right at home in this universe.

Which brings us to the title characters. As much press surrounding this has noted, the Turtles are all voiced by actual teenagers this time around, resulting in performances that feel remarkably organic and spontaneous. The only “downside” to this–if we can even call it that–is that this makes their personalities sort of meld into each other sometimes. The distinctive characteristics are there for those familiar with the bunch, but newcomers may have a hard time telling their Raph from their Mikey.

That said, it seems really unfair that the teenage stars don’t have their names included in the main end credits, with the more famous cast members getting billing before them (even if this does lead to a funny reference to Halloween 6 of all things). Mutant Mayhem has a lot of talent behind the microphone, and they do a good job with what they’re given, but many audience members are going to miss what are essentially glorified cameos from John Cena, Rose Byrne, and several others. Apart from Ice Cube, only Jackie Chan really has a major role as Splinter, providing the beloved martial arts master with more social awkwardness and anxiety than we are used to seeing from him. Chan is terrific, his voice warm and world weary, even if the casting may feel slightly too on the rat nose.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem is a fun-filled if not familiar ride, with inventive action, good humor, an awesome soundtrack, and endearing characters. In other words, all of the ingredients of a typical successful animated movie. What sets it apart is its bold animation, which is brilliant, and makes this a bodacious trip worth seeking out on the big screen…especially if it’s one that doesn’t make the film look too dark!

Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken is a beautiful looking film, featuring a predictable plot, some irritating characters, and a too-easily-wrapped-up ending… that your kids will probably really enjoy.

As much as I usually harp on story being the most important aspect of a film, I can forgive the formulaic narrative here because, despite there being no surprises, it is fairly well told. But some of these characters are so tedious and annoying and drag the whole thing down! Ruby’s classmates sound nothing like kids. And I mean that in both ways it can be taken. The voice actors playing them sound much much older than the age they’re supposed to be portraying. And the kids seem to be speaking the way clueless adults think nauseatingly hip high schoolers talk these days. (Example: within the first five minutes of the film two different scenes have characters discussing a “post-colonial patriarchal construct”. Ugh!)

If you can get past that, and thankfully the worst of these characters don’t figure as heavily in the latter half of the film, there’s a decent enough movie here for kids. While adults will see every story beat coming a nautical mile away, there is a somewhat surprising message about kids not always knowing best. And a fun secondary plot line involving a fisherman provides some nice comic relief.

The animation is lively, colorful, and engaging, and there is a lot to look at. The cityscapes are full of easter eggs that are fun to spot. The under the sea world is a bit bland, until we get to where the krakens live, where things are much more appealing. The character designs are a bit hit or miss. The humans and most of the sea creatures are interesting, though some seem like they were thrown together near the end of production.

While I can’t hum a single measure of Stephanie Economou’s score from memory now, while watching I really enjoyed it. Two songs released with the movie, This Moment and Rise, fit the tone and message of the story well but are otherwise your average by-the-numbers movie pop songs.

While several of the voice actors in the film were irritating enough to deserve mention near the top of my review, I should point out there were several nice performances. Lana Condor as the title character was outstanding and really anchored the entire movie. Toni Collette and Colman Domingo paired well as the controlled and steady parents of the their sometimes manic daughter. And Jane Fonda was kind of fun as Grandmamah.

There are a lot of movies out there that should be much better than they are. And I’m the first to get upset when I feel a film isn’t reaching its potential. Other films are just animated money grabs, trying to make a quick buck without expending much effort, barely worth the time to write about. This isn’t either of those. It’s just a movie that sets out to be entertaining without trying to be too ambitious. And it basically meets its goals. Feel free to release Ruby Gillman the next time you’re looking for something diverting for your little ones.

Ember is a fire element with a temper whose parents immigrated to Element City from the old country. They run a shop that Ember will one day inherit. Wade is a water element from a well to do family who kind of just flows through life aimlessly. When he puts her family’s business in danger, the star crossed acquaintances must fight both the might of governmental bureaucracy and the fact that they could literally kill each other to put things right.

I’m saying this way too often about Pixar, but once again their latest is a fine little film, but that’s it. It’s not really bad. It gets the job done. But I don’t have much desire to go see it again. Four times in a row now — with Luca, Turning Red, Lightyear, and now Elemental — I feel like I got a movie that could have been so much more but settled for less.

I have issues with both the plot and the plotting, but let’s discuss the story issues first. Elemental is a very basic “boy meets girl, they fall in love, but they’re from two different worlds so complications ensue” story. Now I know historically love stories in animated films have not been that deep. But in recent decades studios have at least tried to make these relationships a little more interesting: Belle imprisoned by the Beast but eventually there’s something there; Shrek and Fiona despising each other during their journey until they realize they’re accidentally in love; Branch finally putting aside his fears and revealing his true colors to Poppy. In Elemental, my synopsis would be “Wade and Ember are in a lot of scenes together so now they’re in love apparently”. Not a lot of effort went into letting the audience see what they saw in each other. Their love was more a plot contrivance that the plot objective.

The other main story in the film is between Ember and her father. This works much better. The filmmakers make us care about this relationship by showing us how it developed and how it continues to the present.

There were some weird issues with the way they told some of the story. As usual, I don’t want to spoil things. So let’s just say, occasionally it seemed like the writers thought of a new idea for the end of the film late in the game and chose to set it up by having a character say “by the way” and drop some random exposition or just flashback to something. Instead of weaving this new idea into the film artfully, they just found a good spot and spliced it in as an afterthought. It was jarring the couple of times it happened and felt forced when they tried to pay it off later.

One minor story problem I had has to do with the world itself. The movie has obvious analogies about immigration. The writers are not too heavy handed about it, but the comparisons themselves aren’t exactly apt. When homes for rent in the 1800s put up signs saying “Irish need not apply”, it was unfounded fear that caused their bigotry. In Elemental, when fire elements are unwelcome it’s because it’s been shown that they can be an actual danger to the unprepared other elements and their property. The fear has a foundation. Having a character basically saying “they just hate us because of who we are” is a cop out when you just burned up half their body as you were squeezing past them on the train! Like the love story, the immigration allegory feels superficial and more like an attempt to make the story deeper than it actually is.

Let’s move on to the best thing about the film: the animation. Elemental is absolutely gorgeous. When I said earlier that I didn’t have much desire to go see it again? Maybe I might just to focus more on the art! Element City is amazing and so much fun to explore. There are clever designs everywhere that reveal how each element goes about their lives. The characters are pretty great… at first. As the film goes on it does become a little obvious that maybe there’s not a lot of variety when it comes to making anthropomorphic wind, for example.

Thomas Newman’s score for the film is very nice. It’s not overwhelming, but doesn’t just provide atmosphere either. One interesting thing he did of note was give the fire element immigrants themes that sounds like they could have been influenced by their (fictional) cultural heritage. An original pop song by Lauv, Steel the Show, features but is entirely forgettable.

Oddly for a Pixar film, I wasn’t too impressed by the voice cast. Most characters were either unmemorable or mildly annoying. The two that did stand out were Leah Lewis as Ember and Ronnie del Carmen as her father. Their performances help sell the most interesting relationship in the film.

Before I wrap this up, I want to say that as a reviewer I get no joy out of criticizing the hard work of others. My favorite thing is to tell you why I love a movie! But Pixar is a great company and I really want to see them get back to their glory days. Unfortunately, I think they have a leadership problem. Remember the special features on old school Pixar DVDs that took you behind the scenes of their “brain trust”? This was a group that would help filmmakers hone their stories to their absolute best, feelings be damned! That mindset is gone, I believe. These days plots are more often than not based on the personal stories of filmmakers. And since the stories are personal, maybe there’s a fear of being offensive when trying to critique. So when real depth is replaced with superficiality, or when genuine emotion is replaced with shortcuts, there’s no one to say, “wait, we can do better” or even “I’m sorry but this isn’t working”. Until story is king again in Emeryville, good enough may be good enough for Pixar.

I want to stress that this is not a bad film. It’s just… fine. It’s filler for their theatrical release calendar, not a cinematic event. And Pixar is better than that. It’s especially frustrating because, like the three films before it, there’s the framework of a really great film here. It’s just missing a few important elements to take it to that next level.

In 2018, Sony took us Into the Spider-Verse, with a film Animated Views called a “game-changer”*. It won the Best Animated Feature Oscar, was the first non-Disney movie selected by our readers as the best of the year, and made a ton of money. So a sequel was a no brainer. But Sony has never been one to shy away from exploiting their Spidey film rights as far as possible, so it wasn’t too much of a surprise when they announced two sequels.

The first, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, picks up about a year and a half after the first film. Miles has grown into the suit, both physically and talent-wise. But being Spider-man takes a toll and he misses the friends he made who went back to their own universes. On her version of Earth, Gwen is struggling alone with her responsibilities and has issues with her father. When they discover a secret society that moves across dimensions to keep things in balance, they both want to join for their own reasons. What happens next? Ummmmm…**

Let’s discuss the first of two elephants in this multiverse. When the film title was originally announced, it was called Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, Part One. A few months later, the “Part One” was removed and “Part Two” was officially retitled Beyond the Spider-Verse, with both halves being made simultaneously. So going in, savvy viewers knew we weren’t going to get the complete story this year.

Other made-as-two-part films have threaded this needle in different ways. Back to the Future II and III took two mostly separate stories and weaved them together with a cliffhanger ending sandwiched between. Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame (originally titled Infinity War Parts One and Two) took one epic story, and strategically divided its story elements over two films. These two series of movies worked well because the first part did the job of being both a satisfying and freestanding film that was also able to setup a followup.

Across the Spider-Verse chose a different path. The filmmakers took one long story and just arbitrarily cut it down the middle. Despite its massive runtime, the entire movie is just a big setup for part two. There is almost no plot point resolved in this first half.

That’s not to say the setup isn’t interesting or entertaining. The half of the plot we do get is leading to something good. I was definitely left wanting to know what happens next. But I also felt somewhat cheated due to getting only half of a film. If the credits started rolling on The Little Mermaid right after Ariel makes her deal with Ursula and you were told to come back next year for the rest, you’d wonder why you even bothered to watch this half now rather than wait for the whole thing.

The second issue that can’t be ignored is the length of the film. At two hours and twenty minutes, Across the Spider-Verse is the longest animated film in Hollywood history. Arguably, only two other major studio animated films have ever crossed the two hour threshold***, so not a common event. Even with the amount of animation released seemingly increasing exponentially over the past 30 years, runtime is not something studios have been willing to experiment with. The fact that Sony allowed its filmmakers to not only split this movie into two pieces but also make the first half so long, would hopefully imply they had confidence that the most would be made of all the extra time.

Unfortunately, that faith may have been misplaced. As I’ve already stated, the plot is not uninteresting or unentertaining. Not by a long shot. There is, however, too much filler. It’s like once the animators got the permission to not worry about runtime, they used that leeway to stop editing the story they had, rather than to fill the extended time with more story. Over and over, scenes drag on well past what is needed. The opening scene runs so long that when the title card finally shows up it’s almost a surprise that we’re still so early in. A later scene features a needlessly slow moving device that we watch way too long before a character notes the ridiculous speed in a throwaway joke. An excessively long chase scene seems to be the main plot of a third of the film. There was so much room to tighten up this story, that the runtime feels more like an ostentatious luxury than a necessary requirement.

Looking past all that, most of the other aspects of the film are pretty great.

The brilliant and unique animation style of the first movie is continued here, with mostly similar results. With each different dimension of the Spider-verse getting its own distinctive look, there are plenty of beautiful visuals. But occasionally the effect felt forced or not up to par with the original. The music of the Spider-Verse is fresh and fun. But the audio mix of some of the dialogue really could have been a lot better.

The voice actors were the best parts of the film. The returners (Shameik Moore as Miles Morales, Hailee Steinfeld as Gwen Stacy, Brian Tyree Henry as Jefferson Morales, Luna Lauren Vélez as Rio Morales, and Jake Johnson as Peter B. Parker) step back into their roles without missing a beat from their great performances in the original. And the newcomers (Oscar Isaac as Miguel O’Hara, Jason Schwartzman as The Spot, Issa Rae as Jessica Drew, Karan Soni as Pavitr Prabhakar, and Daniel Kaluuya as Hobie) easily rise to meet their level.

I need to reiterate that the half of this movie we do get is not bad! My complaints are more with the length and pacing, and the choice to not give the audience more of a standalone film. I’m sure when these two parts are watched back to back, the experience will be amazing… and I’ll be the first in line for tickets! But I’m only able to review the half that we were given and not what might be Beyond.

After being betrayed by rogue con artist Forge Fitzwilliam, widowed bard Edgin Darvis and his barbarian companion Holga Kilgore plan to get back at their former associate and reclaim Darvis’ daughter Kira. Fitzwilliam has become Lord of Neverwinter and he’s bringing back a popular, yet controversial event with high-stakes betting that will fill his vaults with riches beyond imagination. The ideal target for a heist. Darvis and Kilgore enlist the aid of half-elven sorcerer Simon Aumar and tiefling druid Doric. But in the background is Sofina, a red wizard setting a nefarious plot into motion that leaves the group having to deal with more than just breaking into a heavily guarded vault.

One of the biggest hurdles in adapting Dungeons & Dragons into a film is that there is no one plot to be based off of. It’s generally up to the players to create their stories and how they would play out. Supplemental material have been released over the years offering pre-made content, from world settings to adventure ideas, for players to use. As such, there’s numerous options to choose in developing a film. For Honor Among Thieves, Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley went with telling an original story and based it within a popular setting called The Forgotten Realms. This has helped settle on a nice mixture of options for the presentation.

Most stories within the fantasy genre tend toward an eventual “saving the world” plot. To have Honor Among Thieves be more unique, the filmmakers instead are telling a heist that happens to be set within a fantasy world. This allows for emphasis to be on developing the characters and less on spending time having to flesh out the world when it is unnecessary to do so. If there’s any lore to be told, it’s because it’s something that will benefit the characters. Thus there is a purpose to the group spending time learning about and trying to locate a magical item called the Helmet of Disjunction as it will help Aumar break the powerful enchantments placed upon the vaults.

Another big hurdle has been how to portray the game’s mechanics and spirit. The mechanics is perhaps the hardest at bringing to life as much of how things work are not visual. This led the previous feature film to make spell casting inaccurate to how they’re done in the game so that it could be apparent on screen that such is happening. Honor Among Thieves is interested in the mechanics and figures ways to showcase them with delightful results. Aumar possess a token that brings a dead creature back to life. It is alive only long enough to answer five questions, then it is dead for good. What can be a conundrum is that it answers any five questions spoken aloud.

Honor Among Thieves captures the spirit of the game in realizing its key component: fun. More often than not, films in the fantasy genre tend to play with such seriousness that they run the risk of being droll and stiff. The other direction is to spoof the genre, lampooning the troupes to a corny degree. Goldstein and Daley instead looked to find a middle ground in which things are not taken with great seriousness, but it’s not a mockery. This is exemplified with Xenk Yendar, a human paladin the group seek the aid of to find the Helmet of Disjunction. But though they are in awe of his stoic prowess as a true heroic figure, his mannerisms get on their nerves very quickly.

Adding to the fun factor is the wonderful performances by the ensemble cast. Chris Pine captures the charm and occasional vulnerability of Darvis. Michelle Rodriguez hits the right beats playing the tough and warm Kilgore. Hugh Grant perfectly personifies the deliciously despicable Fitzwilliam. Justice Smith works quite well as the neurotic Aumar. Sophia Lillis is lovely as the unpredictably endearing Doric. Regé-Jean Page seems to be made to portray the righteous Yendar. And Daisy Head stands out superbly as the devious Sofina. Often in these films an actor’s presence can overtake the character. Here the whole cast embody their characters very nicely.

What’s also fun are the Easter Eggs fans of the game can discover. They’re utilized in such a way that audiences unfamiliar with Dungeons & Dragons don’t need to feel like it’s something very important, which happens to hilariously be spoofed in the film when Sofina explains in few words how it is the vaults are enchanted to a pair of delegates who just take her for her word. There’s quite an Easter Egg late in the film that’s sure to bring a smile to fans, which I won’t reveal even though clips of it have been shown already. And I was howling over a credited cameo appearance and how it’s done both visually and its part in fleshing out the backstory of one of the characters.

It’s almost a given that Honor Among Thieves would be special effects heavy like the first Dungeons & Dragons film. Whereas the previous film relied on the effects to carry the film, this film uses just enough that they do not hinder the storytelling. A lot of the visual effects animation is done for Doric whenever she uses her wild shape ability to transform into a creature. There’s a fantastic escape sequence that evokes being a single take shot in which she’s changing between herself and into various animals while trying to avoid getting captured. It’s impressive by itself, but made more so because it serves the plot in showing how dangerous the heist is going to be.

The visual effects are used quite well in bringing to life the many races and creatures that previous adaptations hardly touched upon. While they don’t play major roles, their presence lends itself to showing that there’s more than just humans, elves, and dwarves. There’s the eagle-like aarakocra and the aptly named dragonborn conversing with the characters. One of the most recognizable creatures within Dungeons & Dragons is the owlbear, brought to life is Doric’s preferred wild shape transformation whenever in combat. There’s even a unique use of a red dragon that’s wonderfully done with great animation making it all the more fresh and fun.

Honor Among Thieves is so much fun that it’s few flaws can be overlooked very easily. It tries not to be a spectacular epic like The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It flirts with going for the scope one would expected from the fantasy genre, but doesn’t quite go all the way. This can be either a good thing or bad depending on one’s interests. Same can be said with keeping the world-building at a minimum. While it would detract the story, digging deep into the history and lore of The Forgotten Realms would be enchanting to those interested. I may have to listen to it a few more times, but I found the score by Lorne Balfe to be merely pleasant and I’m not entirely sure how memorable they are. Again, these are minor criticisms that are forgivable for a film that’s difficult to dislike.

I’m hopeful that Goldstein and Daley have developed a blueprint on how to adapt Dungeons & Dragons into a feature film and make it work. Honor Among Thieves doesn’t take itself too seriously, yet it also avoids being a parody of the genre. The narrative benefits character development over unnecessary world-building, allowing for audiences to enjoy things happening and their servicing the storytelling. The animation is very nice and the overall visual effects do a wonderful job of bringing to life creatures and races from the game that had yet to be showcased on screen before. It is just a fun movie to watch from start to finish, having managed to roll a critical success.

The Beginnings of Animation (1900s to 1930s)

While experiments with creating moving images date back centuries, most film historians point to the early 1900s as the true beginnings of animated cartoons. During these pioneering years, animators painstakingly hand-drew each frame on paper, using techniques like stop-motion and zoetropes to achieve the illusion of motion when the frames were played in sequence.

Some of the earliest cartoon stars emerged in this era, like Gertie the Dinosaur (1914), Felix the Cat (1919), and the iconic duo of Mickey and Minnie Mouse (1928). While primitive by today’s standards, these shorts represent monumental achievements in crafting believable animated movements and personalities. They laid the foundations for the cartoon boom that followed in the 1930s.

The Golden Age of American Animation (1930s to 1960s)

With synchronized sound reaching cartoons by 1928, the stage was set for animation’s golden age beginning in the 1930s. Walt Disney Productions led the way with classics like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Pinocchio (1940), and Bambi (1942). These were the first animated features ever made, using groundbreaking animation techniques and unprecedented budgets for stunning visuals.

Beyond Disney, the Warner Bros. animation studio churned out wildly popular Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts starring Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and other iconic characters. Studios competed to create treasured cartoon stars like Popeye, Woody Woodpecker, Betty Boop, and Casper the Friendly Ghost. Even TV got animated with shows like The Flintstones.

By the 1960s, limited animation became more common to meet TV demand. While less detailed, this allowed a freer comedic style perfected in shows like The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show. The golden age defined animation as a storytelling art form in the public consciousness.

New Stylistic Directions (1970s to 1990s)

While Disney films continued to push technical boundaries, the 1970s and 1980s saw animation diversify stylistically. Anime gained popularity worldwide. Ralph Bakshi experimented with edgier content in films like Fritz the Cat (1972). Don Bluth brought lush visuals in The Secret of NIMH (1982) and An American Tail (1986).

On TV, The Simpsons (1989) ignited a craze for primetime adult animation sitcoms with its satire and surprising emotional depth. Steven Spielberg collaborated with Warner Bros. on the strikingly cinematic Batman: The Animated Series (1992), setting a new bar for TV animation quality. Experimental animation found an outlet on MTV’s Liquid Television.

The Computer Animation Revolution (1990s to Present)

The 1990s ushered in seismic shifts through the use of computer animation. Pixar’s first feature Toy Story (1995) stunned audiences with its computer-animated visuals indistinguishable from reality. The industry rushed to transition to digital workflows and 3D CGI animation.

Pixar went on to pioneer new storytelling techniques in emotional blockbusters like Finding Nemo (2003). DreamWorks Animation developed smash franchises like Shrek (2001) around celebrity voice casts. Disney eventually rebounded, revitalizing traditional animation with films like The Princess and the Frog (2009) while also producing CG megahits like Frozen (2013).

Today, computer animation dominates family features and box office charts. Yet traditional hand-drawn styles are kept alive through indie films and TV revivals like Castlevania on Netflix. Animation continues to blend artistry and technology in exciting new directions.

Classic Hand-Drawn Animation’s Enduring Legacy

Though computer animation rules today’s industry, the early pioneering work of hand-drawn animators laid the artistic foundations for the entire medium. Painstakingly crafting fluid motion and believable characters through thousands of drawings gave rise to iconic stars like Mickey Mouse.

The rubber hose art style of the 1920s and 1930s allowed wildly imaginative visuals. Disney’s 12 principles of animation established guidelines for achieving realism and appeal through techniques like squash and stretch. Generations of animators have built upon these hand-drawn innovations.

Many studios still maintain their hand-drawn legacy. Disney occasionally produces new traditionally animated films like Winnie the Pooh (2011). Cartoon Network relies on Flash and Toon Boom animation programs to maintain a 2D workflow. Concept artists still begin projects sketching ideas on paper first.

Perhaps most importantly, classic hand-drawn styles continue inspiring nostalgic revivals. Mickey Mouse shorts airing 2013-2019 on Disney Channel blended retro personality with modern humor. Netflix’s adaptations of Dr. Seuss stories use updated hand-drawn animation. The legacy of original cartoon icons endures through the ages.

Animation’s Bright Future

Over a century of advancement has made animation one of the most limitless filmmaking mediums. CGI continues evolving photorealistic digital worlds, with games and VR experiences expanding possibilities. Yet animation is no longer defined solely by family films.

Creators like Genndy Tartakovsky (Dexter’s Laboratory, Samurai Jack) and Jorge Gutierrez (The Book of Life) infuse personal visions into mainstream franchises. Anime exports like Studio Ghibli’s inspire devotion worldwide. Netflix investing in hand-drawn and stop-motion projects expands experimentation. The indie scene thrives with unique emerging voices.

With endless potential for mastering tech while honoring handmade craft, animation’s future looks brighter than ever. The artists carrying on traditions into new generations will surely dream up wondrous new characters, worlds, and ways of storytelling to continue bringing cartoon magic to the masses.

I usually synopsize a movie in the second paragraph of my reviews. But for this movie there has been a question lingering that probably should be answered up front: how does this film connect to the Toy Story canon? That’s answered right at the beginning with text explaining that in 1995, Andy saw a movie featuring the fictional character Buzz Lightyear. He loved it so much he got the action figure for his birthday that year. We’re then told, “This is that movie”.

The story follows Buzz Lightyear and his fellow space rangers as they divert from a mission to explore an uncharted planet. They end up stranded after an attack from the local flora and fauna destroys their hyperdrive. Buzz makes it his single-minded mission to fix what he sees as his mistake. The rest of the crew decides on a different course. So Buzz is forced to rely on a small group of ragtag rookies to try to get everyone home.

The plot is a fairly by-the-numbers and straightforward story. There are no big surprises and the tension is never dialed up very high. Unlike many other Pixar features, there is really no strong emotional through-line driving viewers to feel the highs and lows along with the characters. That means no tears this time out! But it also means we don’t care as much about what our protagonist is going through. On top of all that, it’s also not an extremely funny film. Sure, there are laughs throughout. But it’s more action-adventure oriented than comedy-based, which might be surprising to some fans.

Now you’re probably reading that and thinking, “Predictable, lacks heart, and not funny? So it’s pretty bad, huh?” Well, not really! It’s actually a solid little film. Plotwise, the writers have given the characters realistic motivations and interesting conflicts. So rest assured that this is not a boring story. Emotionally, the characters are moved to make the choices they make for personally important reasons. And those are explored. And we can understand their differing points of view. True, it never rises to the point of making you feel personally invested, but that doesn’t mean the characters themselves aren’t. And a lack of non-stop laugh-out-loud humor doesn’t mean something isn’t fun. The filmmakers have crafted a film that is very different than what you might expect from Pixar. That alone doesn’t make it bad, but adjusting expectations might be a good idea.

Another story-point I want to mention are the references to Buzz Lightyear from the previous films. The writers have done their homework! Catching all the little things that explain or at least call-back to what toy Buzz did or said was a lot of fun. As a bonus, (and without giving much away) after the film be sure to consider the journey Buzz went through in this film; recap it in your mind… (I’ll expand on that in the comments if anyone would like me too!)

I am not saying the animation in Lightyear was bad, because it absolutely was not! But looking back I can’t really recall anything blowing me away or even standing out much. We may just be at a point where their quality is so good so often that we’re used to it, maybe even spoiled.

Michael Giacchino, who is no stranger to animation, sci-fi, or action adventure films, gets to put his considerable talents on display here, and it works well. Themes stand out, but occasionally things do get lost in the background.

One of the biggest fan reactions at the announcement of this film was the replacement of Tim Allen with Chris Evans as the voice of Buzz Lightyear. I thought this was an understandable decision since technically these are two different characters, and was willing to give Pixar the benefit of the doubt. That was the right call. Chris Evans wonderfully channels some of Allen’s vocal mannerisms and inflections while lending the character a lot more gravitas. James Brolin is a nice choice for Zurg. Keke Palmer and Dale Soules are solid sidekicks. Pixar director Peter Sohn is a lot of fun as a robotic cat named Sox. I’m a big fan of Taika Waititi. In movies like Jojo Rabbit, Thor, and Free Guy his eccentricities melded into his character. Here, though, I felt like Buzz Lightyear just had Taika Waititi hanging around with him. Fun maybe, but a bit distracting.

Overall, this was an enjoyable movie. Did it really need to be made? Perhaps not, but it’s here and it’s easily better than some of the other things we’ve had to sit through in recent years. Does it measure up to the rest of the Toy Story legacy films? No, but to be fair, that’s a high bar that hardly any follow-up from any studio for any franchise has ever been able to do. Should you see it? Yes, it’s definitely worth the time. Sure, it’s not the most buzz-worthy film in the Pixar vault. So maybe go in with your expectations lowered to just infinity.

The Bad Guys are one of the most feared and successful criminal enterprises in town. But when a moment of doubt by their leader gets them nabbed, the quick-thinking Mr. Wolf gets them a chance at redemption — if they can pretend to be good while supposedly being reformed.

The story centers around a heist, and the filmmakers have gone out of their way to get the various tropes of the genre right. Adult fans of films like The Usual Suspects or Reservoir Dogs will be smiling at all the nods while they watch with their children. And while the tone is definitely kid-friendly, the plot itself has not been dumbed down for their sakes. Not being able to see where things are going too easily is vital for a film with so many twists and turns, allowing both grown-ups and kids alike to get caught up trying to figure it out before the end.

For an animated film about bad guys becoming good guys, it would’ve been easy to lay on the moral message too thick. Thankfully, the writers don’t fall into the trap. The Bad Guys aren’t that bad when they’re being bad, but they’re also not that good when they’re being good. Their personalities aren’t defined solely by which side they’re on — they’re the same people they always were, just with some different motivations at different times. In other words, (mild spoilers ahead:) they’re still fun and interesting characters by the time we get to the inevitable happy ending.

While a compelling story and interesting characters are vital to good movies, it’s the addition of humor that helps really set apart the most enjoyable animated films. Here, The Bad Guys delivers the goods. A lot of the heavy lifting comes from the way they play with the conventions of the genre. For example, the cliched “hacker” character who is always seen typing away furiously is a tarantula — so when typing away furiously isn’t cutting it, her laptop ridiculously sprouts more keyboards allowing her to use more hands. The stereotypical “master of disguise” character is a giant shark — who no matter the disguise always looks like a giant shark… but still always fools everyone.

The animation is a departure from the DreamWorks norm. Rather than perfect CG models and effects, the film has a more hand drawn feel, like a mix of their usual style with Into the Spider-Verse and Looney Tunes added in. The overall effect is charmingly beautiful, but also gives the entire production a lot of energy and fun it wouldn’t have had with just out-of-the-box, plodding CG. Character animation is stellar across the line-up, with each extremely varied role (wolf, shark, tarantula, shark, piranha, fox, guinea pig and more) all getting distinctive touches that make their persona feel unique and fresh compared to all the others.

The voice crew assembled for this team is what really elevates things past “just a kids movie” into a really good heist film. Sam Rockwell as Mr. Wolf, Marc Maron as Mr. Snake, Anthony Ramos as Mr. Piranha, Craig Robinson as Mr. Shark, Awkwafina as Ms. Tarantula, and Zazie Beetz as Diane Foxington voiced characters that could have fit in with the cast of Ocean’s Eleven without missing a step. As good as all the other components of the movie were, like a good heist, I’m not sure the filmmakers could have pulled it off without this crew.

It’s been a long time since I’ve enjoyed an animated film this much in theaters… and much, much longer still since that film was from DreamWorks! Like their title characters, it’s great to see them leaving their bad days behind and moving on to do good.

Unfortunately for me that meant taking a bit of a break from reviewing movies here at AV. I still watched them though. So instead of leaving 2021 as a big black hole in our review coverage, we thought why not just end the year off right with a quick review recap of some of the big studio releases!

Since it’s been a while (and for any newcomers) here’s how I rate movies. I give films two scores: an Overall score based on artistic merit like you’d see at any other review site. And a Fun Factor score, rating the movie purely on how entertaining it was. The scores are on a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being the worst of the worst, and 10 the best of the best. Those scores are saved for the very rare movie that really deserves them. I think I’ve only awarded those scores twice in 15 years. From there I determine if the movie was poor (1 to 3), average (4 to 6), or good (7 to 9).

The first two films listed I did a full review of earlier this year. The next seven are new reviews.

I know your scores will probably be different than mine. So feel free to tell us what you thought of the films of 2021 in the Animated Views Forum!

March 4th / FORUM DISCUSSION

I reviewed this movie back in March. Read the full review here.

BOTTOM LINE: With a mess of a story, a spinoff angle that felt forced in, and an over-the-top and embarrassing attempt to canonize the main character, there’s no denying fans of the show deserved better. Feel free to run from this sponge.

March 5th / FORUM DISCUSSION

I reviewed this movie back in March. Read the full review here.

BOTTOM LINE: So much potential. An unplumbed setting for an animated film, a deep and interesting foundational legend to build off of, a good message, amazing animation, a great cast of actors, and all the resources Disney can provide. All of it squandered because somewhere along the way, someone suggested they give audiences a pop princess rather than a hero on the regular.

April 23rd / FORUM DISCUSSION

HEADLINE: A surprisingly touching film about the straining bonds between a father and daughter… set during a techno-pocolypse!

STORY: The Mitchells vs. the Machines is a very funny movie, but right from the start shows its heart. The story centers around a father and daughter who just can’t understand why the other doesn’t understand them — even though they are both more alike than they seem to think. The tension between them is exacerbated as the daughter is about to leave home for college, and both want to leave on good terms. When that doesn’t seem likely, dad suggests a cross country family road trip to her school. While that alone is an idea ripe for drama and comedy, the end of the world gets thrown in as well. And it mostly works! The ending gets rushed and a bit too “deus ex machina-y” for my taste, but fits well enough with the manic energy of the rest of the film. What really gives the movie it’s emotional heft is something that a lot of animated stories (which are usually aimed at kids) ignore: parents. Parents get short shrift in a lot of animated films. But here, not only does the father learn to see and appreciate things from his daughter’s point of view, she is encouraged to take a step back from the hustle and bustle and other distractions of a teenagers life to really see and comprehend what he has sacrificed for her.

ANIMATION: The visual style was interesting. While obviously computer generated, the animation for humans and backgrounds incorporated hand-drawn elements that gave them an even softer look when compared to the sleek robots. Think Into the Spider-Verse (also from Sony) but instead of a comic book overlay, more of a pencil sketched look. Additionally, the entire film is punctuated with animated extras throughout, as if the main character, an amateur filmmaker, was putting in special effects for a YouTube video. For small example, when characters hug, a hand-drawn heart might appear between them. Or for a bigger scene, the film may go into a freeze frame while the entire screen is covered with meme-ish GIFs and captions. These were sometimes cute, occasionally cringy, but mostly ignorable.

MUSIC: The movie was so fast paced and frenetic that I didn’t really notice the score. Obligatory pop songs are scattered throughout, usually as stingers to a joke or big moment.

ACTING: The casting for the film is solid across the board. The father/daughter dynamic is captured perfectly by Danny McBride and Abbi Jacobson, with Maya Rudolph and Mike Rianda bringing in support as the rest of the family. Olivia Colman, Fred Armisen, and Beck Bennett are great as several of the title Machines.

BOTTOM LINE: A lot of fun, but with some real emotional depth.

June 18th / FORUM DISCUSSION

HEADLINE: The Little Mermaid meets Cars meets Ratatouille? OK, not exactly, but weirdly close!

STORY: The plot is fairly simple, but crafted extremely well. Luca is a sea creature who wants to explore that shore up above but who’s parents forbid it. Alberto is a sea creature who lives on land with a collection of human gadgets and gizmos aplenty. (When out of the water they appear human.) Luca runs away, befriends Alberto, meets a human girl named Giulia, and the three team up to enter a local race that will allow the two secret merman to buy a Vespa and explore the rest of the above-water world. The story is sweet and fun, and the conflicts are not too heavy or emotional. One of my favorite sources of friction in the film is the triangle between the three young leads. The story takes place in that innocent time of childhood before kids are aware of romantic entanglements. So having a girl come between the two boys, but in a strictly platonic sense, made for a unique plot line. The climax of the story came a little too fast and the resolution didn’t feel completely earned. I really think extending the fairly short 95 minute running time was needed to give the audience a proper ending.

ANIMATION: The animation in Luca is very different from the Pixar norm: almost cartoony, with wide open mouths that move to the sides when characters are in profile, and arms and legs that sometimes look like they’re being controlled by puppeteers. That’s not a knock. It works well with the film, given it’s lighter tone… and the fact that their mouths kind of look like fish!

MUSIC: The score helps underscore the setting, which is important when the setting is so important to the story. But it doesn’t do much more than that.

ACTING: I enjoyed the main characters’ performances all around. Jacob Tremblay nails Luca’s naiveté and curiosity, Jack Dylan Grazer gets Alberto’s misplaced confidence and secret loneliness, and Emma Berman portrays Giulia’s excitement and indignation just right.

BOTTOM LINE: A lovingly well made piece of light entertainment.

August 6th

HEADLINE: Musical monkey on a mission with Lin-Manuel Miranda.

STORY: Vivo is one of those types of films from studios not named Disney, Pixar, or DreamWorks that always worry me, especially when they feature singing/rapping animals! But, like a lot of recent Sony animated films, this one was a pleasant surprise. The plot has the too often used cartoon road trip as its foundation, but doesn’t fall into the episodic trap. The journey is interesting enough, has some fun characters along the way, and isn’t too predictable. The film has a fairly solid emotional core that by the end will have you actually caring about what happens to the characters.

ANIMATION: Sony Animation is not slacking in the animation department vs their competition. The overall art style here is fun and colorful and character designs are varied and interesting. We even get some wonderful hand-drawn styled animation throughout where the original CG-renderings get a 2D-makeover that doesn’t feel like it was done in a slapdash manner, but with care for the format.

MUSIC: Lin-Manuel Miranda writes some great music, but he is a very infuriating lyricist! Whenever I listen to one of his song scores, they always feel… unpolished. There’s always a song or two that are good to great, then too many that seem like he didn’t finish them in time so rushed out the last few verses. Also he has a few stylistic choices that grate, like just narrating action rather than being lyrical, repeating words and phrases too much, structuring the song with too many different sections, using filler words to get the lyrics match the melody, and thinking that having an up-tempo song that is so dense with words that it’s incomprehensible is clever. All that is true here. But thankfully the ratio of “works” to “doesn’t work” is more on the plus side than usual.

ACTING: While I originally didn’t think Miranda’s voicing of the title kinkajou was a good fit with the character, it did grow on me as the film went on and by the end I enjoyed his performance. Ynairaly Simo was sweetly annoying as the hyper Gabi, which is not a dig but a complement! And Juan de Marcos González and Gloria Estefan bring some gravitas to the roles of old musical partners who try to reconnect after years of denying their feelings for each other.

BOTTOM LINE: Vivo may not be an Oscar contender, but it is entertaining and made with care — far beyond the assembly line animated fare studios sometimes churn out without regards to quality knowing they’ll still make money.

October 22nd

HEADLINE: Another surprisingly touching dystoian-esque take on the role social media play in our lives.

STORY: Barney and his friends have grown apart over the years since elementary school, with their online lives seemingly subsuming their real lives in a race to create content and generate clicks to show how popular they are. Without a device of his own, Barney is a digital and IRL outcast. When personal social media robots become the next craze, his family finally gets him one, whom he names Ron. But it’s defective and doesn’t have the proper algorithm for friendship. So Barney has to teach him how to be his friend. The writers do such a wonderful job of almost surreptitiously demonstrating to Barney and the audience that friendship is not a one way street. Social media, which only shows part of our lives and doesn’t involve any real interactions with those commenting and liking, is literally that one-way street — which makes building a true friendship difficult. Kids experiencing relationships through their phones isn’t necessarily a bad thing. During the pandemic and lockdowns it was a life line. But Ron’s Gone Wrong reminds us that may have forgotten (or maybe teaches those too young to have realized) that it’s the people on the other ends of these devices that we should be forming bonds with, not the devices themselves. Even better, it does it without getting preachy. And to top it all off, it’s a very funny movie!

ANIMATION: While the animation in Ron’s Gone Wrong is great, it’s not distinctive or different than what any other good studio is putting out. However, Ron’s animation is noteworthy. The animators and writers did a wonderful job with the somewhat limited ways in which the he can show emotion and interact with others. This, along with the vocal performance, are the reasons why Ron is such an endearing character.

MUSIC: Another film where the music was perfectly serviceable but not particularly memorable or even important to the plot.

ACTING: I’m always surprised when I enjoy a Zach Galifianakis movie performance so much because I usually just think of him as a big goofball. But he is a very good actor in just about everything, and his role here as Ron is no exception. And Jack Dylan Grazer plays well against him as Ron’s owner Barney. These two center the action and heart of the film and are an important part of why the story works so well.

BOTTOM LINE: A movie with a message that doesn’t make the message the movie. All while being a lot of fun.

November 24th / FORUM DISCUSSION

HEADLINE: A magical mess of a movie.

STORY: The Madrigal family lives in a magical house, and each one of the family members is gifted a magical power when they reach a certain age. Everyone but Mirabel. She does however start to notice that the magic seems to be fading in the house and among her family — a fact everyone else want to ignore. And that’s basically the plot. There is no antagonist. Why the house is magic is never explained. Why Mirabel has no power is never explained. Why the magic is disappearing is poorly explained. One major plot point that is finally revealed is later ignored. In the end everything that went wrong is magically fixed with no explanation as to how or why. This is such a mess of a movie that I’m having trouble trying to even explain what’s wrong with it since there is not much plot to talk about.

ANIMATION: Despite the story issues, Disney can almost do no wrong when it comes to animation these days. Stunning scenery, amazing effects, compelling character designs. They got it all right. Especially praiseworthy was the Casita. A house that was both magically alive and rooted in realism as a building (for example, not just going all out by adding hands, feet, and eyes) was a fine line that they tight-walked beautifully.

MUSIC: Lin-Manuel Miranda writes some great music, but he is a very infuriating lyricist… Everything I said above for Vivo applies to Encanto’s songs as well. But the ratio of “works” to “doesn’t work” isn’t as high. Germaine Franco’s score, however, is nice: fitting to the setting, functional to the story, and just fun.

ACTING: One big problem in Encanto is a glut of characters, so many that they all get very little meaningful screen time. All were fine in their roles, but again, due to sheer numbers and the running time, they don’t get a lot to do. The one character who gets the most time, Stephanie Beatriz as Mirabel held the movie together almost single-handedly with an enthusiastic performance.

BOTTOM LINE: What in the world was that? “Let’s make a movie about family love. That’s a plot, right?”

December 15th

HEADLINE: Monsters fighting monsters. What else do you want?

STORY: Monsters fighting monsters. What else do you want? Seriously, this is a basic, by-the-numbers story about a sports league where monsters representing different cities fight other monsters representing other cities. The townsfolk get behind their monsters and root for them fanatically. The monsters have a coach who works to train them. That’s basically the story… and it’s not that bad! The plot is your cookie cutter sports cliche movie: a washed up player tries to live up to the legacy of dad with a unexperienced trainer on a team far removed from its glory years to attempt to win a championship from an unbeatable opponent who has disrespected them all. It’s every sports movie you’ve ever seen with absolutely no surprises. But again, if you accept that, it’s not that bad. Not great, but entertaining enough for something most of us weren’t expecting much from.

ANIMATION: Like the story the animation is not bad, but nothing will wow you. While the monster designs are fun, the human characters look too stiff.

MUSIC: Some stock pop songs (including the obligatory Eye of the Tiger and Tubthumping) and not much else.

ACTING: I love Will Arnett. He’s one of the funniest guys in show business. But his voice is so distinctive that it sometimes takes me out of the film for a moment. Changing it up just a little bit like his roles in Horton Hears a Who and The Lego Batman Movie would go a long way. Geraldine Viswanathan brought some much needed emotionality to the film without going too far with it or losing the character’s gruffness. And Terry Crews was a lot of fun and the egotistical champion Tentacular.

BOTTOM LINE: Monsters fighting monsters. What else do you want? A good choice for a rainy day when you want to relax and enjoy a movie but not think too hard or feel too much!

December 22nd / FORUM DISCUSSION

HEADLINE: Another one!?

STORY: You know how almost every animated movie ends with the characters all singing a pop song and dancing as the film goes to the end credits? What if the entire movie was the characters all singing a pop song and dancing as the film goes to the end credits? And then what if they made a sequel to that film? Sing 2!

ANIMATION: Illumination does have some great artists. Colors pop, movement is fluid and natural, sets are fantastical, and the art is top notch. Please give these wonderful artists something better to do with their talent.

MUSIC: Pop song after pop song after pop song.

ACTING: Matthew McConaughey is a good actor. I have no idea why he agreed to be part of this! But I will admit his performance is better than this film deserves. Like Will Arnett, he has a distinctive voice, but does an incredible job of hiding it with a voice that doesn’t feel fake at all, but is almost unrecognizable.

BOTTOM LINE: Ugh.

In 2017, Zack Snyder abruptly left the director’s chair on Justice League following the unspeakable tragedy of his daughter’s suicide. Too heartbroken to find the fight in him to deal with studio executives who were increasingly putting pressure on him to change his intentions for the project, the reins were handed over to Joss Whedon. The result was Whedon more or less taking over the film, doing a number of reshoots to add more humor (some might say “to make it more like Marvel”), but with Snyder still receiving top billing (Whedon would be given a screenwriting credit).

Which is to say that the theatrical version was a different beast entirely from what Snyder was aiming for, with Whedon’s edition serving as a breezy, fun extravaganza which intentionally or not played like a nostalgia-fueled tribute to superhero movies of the 90s. “One misses the days of wind-up exploding penguins,” Alfred lamented in a moment exclusive to Whedon’s film, as though longing for the more simplistic days of Batman Returns and Superman: The Movie where good and evil were clearly defined and moral grayness was almost nonexistent (this was further exemplified by Danny Elfman’s score). And, in many ways, that’s what it gave us–rather successfully, I would argue.

Yet even as someone who has been quite vocal in defending–and even loving–what we got (I’ve also been a champion for Solo: A Star Wars Story, so maybe I have a soft spot for patchwork productions), I’d still say there was something missing from it, something hard to define. For one thing, as much as I enjoyed it, the tonal shift between it and the much-darker Batman v Superman was more than a bit jarring, as it functioned less like a continuation of what Snyder was doing and more like the Diet Coke equivalent of Whedon’s own Avengers–which, in fairness to him, was probably exactly what he was brought aboard to do. While I think it’s hogwash to claim the now-popular narrative that Justice League was “universally hated” upon its release is an accurate one (I watched it in theaters twice with audiences who laughed and cheered at the right places), it didn’t feel quite epic enough, and didn’t land as the “big event” that it ultimately should have.

A couple of years and several fan petitions and hashtags later, and we finally have Zack Snyder’s Justice League–or The Snyder Cut as fans will almost certainly refer to it as–a bigger, badder, better vision of what came before. Amazingly, in spite or perhaps because it has pretty much the same plot (and most of the footage) of what we got in theaters, it’s like experiencing a film you haven’t watched. It’s longer than The Irishman,  but it feels at least an hour shorter, and many might be surprised by what an easy sit it actually is (for those with sore bottoms, there are convenient Quentin Tarantino-style “chapters” for easy breaks). It never allows for things to go too long without an action scene of some sort, but gives its characters some breathing room between each titanic battle, making the excitement even more effective than it was in the so-called “Whedon Cut.”

So if you liked the original film, you’re probably going to like this even more. If you didn’t like it, you still might enjoy this cut, which provides more of, well, everything. The drama has more weight, the punches have more impact, and perhaps most importanly, the stakes are much higher. There’s simply more “gravity” to the storytelling here, whether it’s Wonder Woman taking down British terrorists with more intensity and force, or Batman choosing to have Superman brought back from the dead, which here is highlighted as a risky and even borderline terrifying action which could have grave consequences for everyone in the future (something which no doubt would’ve been elaborated on if the intended sequels had been made).

What you’re essentially getting is Justice League, but with far more explanation points(!!!), yet at the same time Snyder’s film has plenty of quieter moments which almost resemble the delicate intimacy of arthouse cinema. It’s like Avengers: Endgame if it hadn’t waited two hours to get to the fireworks.

And while many of the goofier jokes Whedon added are not to be found here (and aren’t terribly missed, even if some of them were pretty funny), this is at the end of the day a more lighthearted outing than Batman v Superman (not to mention more accessible), feeling appropriately comfortable with itself while not abandoning entirely what that movie had already established. As a director, Snyder displays full confidence, delivering interpretations of these classic characters that feel more traditional than what he’s done before, while managing to maintain what made his takes on them feel unique to his universe.

In other words, Snyder gets to have his cake and eat it too, with the extended running time allowing him to balance the childlike enthusiasm he brings to his fisticuffs (of which there are plenty) with the more mature filmmaking he demonstrated in Watchmen. For instance, Lois Lane’s grief over Clark’s passing gets to be explored much further here, as she takes the same walk to Superman’s memorial repeatedly, unable to motivate herself to go back to work, but giving her life some level of a foundation by buying a police officer a cup of coffee every day. It’s discreetly poignant, a deceivingly simple gesture of kindness on her part which she’s most likely not giving herself enough credit for. It’s little touches like this that make this Justice League feel fully fleshed out, and all the more emotionally rewarding for it.

Speaking of fleshing things out, Steppenwolf gets a full special effects makeover, and a lot more to do. Emphasized as a servant to Darkseid with slavish devolution to him, Steppenwolf becomes a character plagued by pain, his eyes constantly haunted even as he’s carrying out his overlord’s attacks. He’s also a lot more violent this time, with the R rating providing permission for him to kill a lot more people than he could with a PG-13 in theaters (although even with a fair amount of blood splattering, this is a pretty tame R). Darkseid, of course, was only name-dropped in the theatrical version, but does get to make a few notable appearances here, looking towering, menacing, and cool.

Much of the new content focuses on The Flash and especially Cyborg, whose backstory–similar in execution to Dr. Manhattan’s in Watchmen–takes up a good amount of the film’s focus. A welcome addition in an extended edition, it’s easy to justify why this was removed from the theatrical version simply for the sake of time and pacing (of course, that’s not taking into account the much publicized alleged feud that took place between Whedon and Fisher during production). Other removals are more confusing, such as a cameo by Willem Dafoe which serves as a teaser to 2018’s Aquaman and would’ve worked as a nice set up to that in the original cut.

If there’s anything about Zack Snyder’s Justice League that might disappoint some fans, it’s that most of the film’s action beats were already in Whedon’s version, with a breathtaking sequence involving Flash rescuing a young girl from being run over by a truck being the only one that’s completely new. That being said, all of the fights have been amplified and expanded upon, with horses being thrown further, bodies falling down harder, and every kick and gunshot feeling fiercer. This is all greatly enhanced by a brand new musical score from Tom Holkenborg, which increases the adrenaline factor where it really counts.

It’s also a wonder how much the muted color palate helps this feel different from the original movie, with Snyder thankfully removing the bizarre glaring red sky that Whedon added to the climatic conflict. It also works remarkably well in 4:3 framing, giving everything a subtly retro feel which–intentionally or not–makes it resemble a film viewed on VHS presented in the pan and scan format.

It’s fitting, in a way, that Snyder chooses to end his opus on a cliffhanger, teasing the creation of what might’ve been while still managing to find contentment in doing so. Zack Snyder’s Justice League has the shadow what came before looming over it, the existence of Whedon’s meddling with it both inviting comparison  to it and almost taunting it like a cartoon shoulder devil.

But it overcomes all of this and triumphs as an individual creative vindication, albeit on a bittersweet level, with the spirit of Snyder’s daughter floating over it like a halo, her presence being felt frequently throughout the film as it’s probably no coincidence that grief, fatherly love and affection are among its most consistent themes. Given its rousing nature, I was initially wanting to clap once the movie’s end titles started rolling (to clarify, I was alone and in front of my laptop and it was past 3:00 AM), but instead my silence was demanded as Snyder dedicates them to his loss, with Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah being played quietly on a piano as it was his daughter’s favorite song.

Whether you love Zack Snyder’s Justice League or hate it, you have to respect its existence.