The Lego Ninjago Movie
/"I mean, my mom is weird, and collects seashells. Your dad levels cities and attacks innocent people. So, they've all got their quirks, ya know."
Filmology Rating: 2 out of 4
The Lego Movie ushered in a new creative brand of entertainment, one that appealed to pop culture junkies, children, and adults. What Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the directors of the film, did was basically make a movie that appealed to everyone; even if you never have never touched a Lego, the story of the film was strong enough that you could still feel connected to it. Then The Lego Batman Movie came out earlier this year and once again captured that same audience of pop culture junkies, children, and adults. All signs pointed to Warner Brothers Animation producing yet another hit after the two previous films in the Lego franchise, yet something felt completely different with The Lego Ninjago Movie.
The city of Ninjago is constantly under attack from Lord Garmadon, voiced by Justin Theroux, who wants nothing more than to rule over the city. Luckily for the citizens of Ninjago they have the secret ninja task force, consisting of Green Ninja, voiced by Dave Franco, Red Ninja, voiced by Michael Peña, Blue Ninja, voiced by Kumail Nanjiani, Silver Ninja, voiced by Abbi Jacobson, White Ninja, voiced by Zach Woods, and Black Ninja, voiced by Fred Armisen, to protect them from the evil overlord. Things for the team however take a sudden turn when they realize that the Green Ninja is the son of Lord Garmadon.
The Lego Ninjago Movie is what I was afraid Power Rangers was going to be earlier this year, a jumbled nearly incoherent mess that is only aimed at children. Perhaps all of my issues lie with the fact that I’ve never seen any of the direct to DVD movies in this series earlier or played with any of the sets in the toyline. But I would like to think that I don’t need to do those things to understand how the they functions. The film is trying to juggle two storylines which both could have easily been their own separate films. The first of the storylines outline how the team comes together despite the differences they all have and the second storyline establishes how our hero learns to accept that his villain father has helped turn him into the hero that his city needs. While the second storyline is clearly the more interesting of the two it feels half-baked in the movie, which leads to an overall bland experience.
Most of the time when a film has such inconsistent story problems you need to look at how many writers were involved with the film to see if scripts could have possibly just been taped together without much forethought. With a project that has six people credited with screenplay you cannot help but feel that was a problem. The team given credit for writing this project is incredibly interesting and rather diverse with some of the things that they have written; Paul Fisher and Bob Logan earned their first screenplay credit with the film, William Wheeler wrote Queen of Katwe but he was also one of the writers for the lackluster Ghost in the Shell, Tom Wheeler was the creator and one of the of the writers for the infamous television show The Cape, Jared Stern was one of the co-writers of The Internship, and the only other project that John Whittington has worked on was The Lego Batman Movie. The team feels like it was more jumbled up than the team in the actual film and they function even more poorly than the team they created did. The other films in the Lego franchise have had a clear thesis about family and creativity, but with The Lego Ninjago Movie I struggle to come up with an actual theme for the movie. It throws everything at the wall hoping for something to stick and that you will remember only the good things, instead you will just feel assaulted by colorful images with little meaning.
Another aspect that was inconsistent was the voice acting from the cast. Dave Franco is the perfect example of an actor who continues to be miscast. While Franco is good in the frat boy comedies like 21 Jump Street and Neighbors, he continues to trip over himself in every other movie like Nerve and Now You See Me 2. When it comes to voice acting it would seem that Franco doesn’t have the range needed to make you feel connected to Lloyd. Even with an uneven script a good thespian could make a character seem realistic and relatable. I would argue that the reason Franco is good in the frat boy comedies is because he doesn’t have to act, he is basically playing himself.
The one voice actor who I thought stole the show was Justin Theroux as Garmadon. I’m usually drawn to the villains more in films anyway so being drawn to the villain wasn’t that surprising but to have a villain who is the definition of over the top without seeming out of place. Sometimes you just love the villain for how evil they are and even when you know that you should never want them to succeed, you cannot help but admire how driven they are to succeed. While I have seen Theroux in many films like The Girl on the Train and Wanderlust, I haven’t enjoyed his performances in any of the movies I have seen him in and with The Lego Ninjago Movie he brings a sense of self- importance and comedic timing that make Garmadon the most interesting character in the film..
As a critic you should always try to feel a sense of apathy when giving a final verdict on a film. You shouldn’t let your personal thoughts and feelings on the previous films cloud your judgment for the piece of art at hand; for those who have been following my reviews for the past five years know that I’m terrible at this. I can’t help but have a hole in my stomach saying that The Lego Ninjago Movie is not a good movie. The film is definitely the weakest of the three Lego branded films so far, and sadly it is just a dull forgettable film that will quickly be tossed aside and rebuilt with another movie in the Lego franchise.
Rating: Skip It
-Jonny G