The Lego Batman Movie is a perplexing experience; it recycles the same artifice of the original Lego Movie while reiterating the same dull Batman origin story, though to this film's credit, it is at least the funniest of the franchise (sorry Adam West, I meant "intentionally" funny).
The plot is an excuse for madcap moments where Batman baddies from the relic of time zip into view, say one or two things by a celebrity-supplied voice, and are never in the foreground again. It is a 104 minute dash from one plastic set piece to the next, where things explode into smaller pieces of plastic and jokes fly at the screen Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker style. But the humor here evokes more smiling grins than laughs.
I am sorry- the actual plot involves The Joker feeling sad because the titular hero does not recognize him as his "arch-rival." He turns himself in, along with all of his bad-guy buddies, plotting to be sent to "The Phantom Zone," where the worst of the worst villains spent eternity locked up in the sky. And by villains, I mean other Lego themed sets, like Jurassic Park dinos, the Wicked Witch of the West, and that noseless Harry Potter dude, as well as the likes of King Kong and Dracula. The Joker, through a series of convenient plot points that happen purely to set up the plot, gets sent there and breaks out with the aforesaid evil-doers.
There are subplots, including Batman unknowingly adopting an orphan son, a love-interest that only goes as far as the two becoming "work" partners, among others. (There could have been something about lobsters, because that is all Batman apparently eats, but that could also have been just a joke that I did not catch the punchline to.)
Look, the movie is exactly what your kids want it to be, funny, and fortunately parents should get a kick or two. But that is not the point; the movie desperately wants to be a satire, a kid's movie, an action flick, and a superhero movie. But do we really need scenes of Batman contemplating the death of his parents? He does that in, like, every movie he is in, and if it is a parody, then why not have the photographs of his parents picking their noses or something? That is because it also wants to be a superhero movie, which is why it needs to add depth to its hero. But can't make the hero too complex, I mean, this is also an action movie; it needs scenes of explosion and chase sequences and gunfire. But not too much violence- can't show his parents being murdered or things like that, remember, this also wants to be a kiddie's movie. You see the problem here?
I am sorry- the actual plot involves The Joker feeling sad because the titular hero does not recognize him as his "arch-rival." He turns himself in, along with all of his bad-guy buddies, plotting to be sent to "The Phantom Zone," where the worst of the worst villains spent eternity locked up in the sky. And by villains, I mean other Lego themed sets, like Jurassic Park dinos, the Wicked Witch of the West, and that noseless Harry Potter dude, as well as the likes of King Kong and Dracula. The Joker, through a series of convenient plot points that happen purely to set up the plot, gets sent there and breaks out with the aforesaid evil-doers.
There are subplots, including Batman unknowingly adopting an orphan son, a love-interest that only goes as far as the two becoming "work" partners, among others. (There could have been something about lobsters, because that is all Batman apparently eats, but that could also have been just a joke that I did not catch the punchline to.)
Look, the movie is exactly what your kids want it to be, funny, and fortunately parents should get a kick or two. But that is not the point; the movie desperately wants to be a satire, a kid's movie, an action flick, and a superhero movie. But do we really need scenes of Batman contemplating the death of his parents? He does that in, like, every movie he is in, and if it is a parody, then why not have the photographs of his parents picking their noses or something? That is because it also wants to be a superhero movie, which is why it needs to add depth to its hero. But can't make the hero too complex, I mean, this is also an action movie; it needs scenes of explosion and chase sequences and gunfire. But not too much violence- can't show his parents being murdered or things like that, remember, this also wants to be a kiddie's movie. You see the problem here?
