WesternAnimation It's a LEGO Movie. Of course it's fantastic.
Man, I love these films, and even without much love for the original series or the premise of the film, I eagerly snatched it up once I found the DVD. I was not disappointed.
The cast is great. There's an admirable effort to have a more diverse cast with some having Asian backgrounds, which helps to alleviate the potentially awkward faux-Asia-by-America vibe, and all of them perform well. Dave Franco is shockingly good as Lloyd, and Jackie Chan could not be more adorable and charming.
The animation once more moves away from the all-LEGO look of the original, but there's some justification because this film is framed from the beginning as a reenactment performed by LEGO and some scenery in a shop. There's still some fantastic physical comedy and the LEGO solutions to a lot of effects are still brilliant. This film is particularly impressive in the sheer expressiveness of the minifigure "actors", as the LEGO face is really manipulated to emote, and it's really effective.
The story is really nice. Refreshingly avoiding an origin story, we instead see this version of Ninjago: The ninja are high-schoolers on standby for any of many frequent attacks by Lord Garmadon, Lloyd's father. Lloyd is of course tormented in his everyday life, but seen as a hero as the Green Ninja, enemy of Garmadon. What follows is half action movie, half family drama (these films all have themes of fatherhood, interestingly), and it's great. The typical LEGO silliness and meta-humor is rampant, but as usual, there's room for heavy emotion and subtlety. The framing device of the film is probably its weakest link due to the lack of reasoning for it, but Chan is so charming that it's hard to fault. I really enjoyed the maturity of the film, and its refusal to be too crass in its comedy.
Misako/Koko, Lloyd's mother, is also great, but feels underused for her supposed importance.
These are films where you are excited for the credits, because there's an awesome, joyous song to be had. Oh, Hush! and Jeff Lewis knock it out of the park again and it adds to the high of happiness this film delivers.
Overall, though, this film is really enjoyable and sweet, and deserves a better reputation. Go see it. You don't need to be a fan of either of its sources to have a great time watching it.
WesternAnimation A Fun, But Not Really Solid Movie.
Hmmm... Looks like the reviewer before me already made much of the job I was going to do right now... But I'll do it anyway.
Last year, I saw it. And while it's not as good as its predecessors nor the television series, it is still fun in its own right.
The film's plot is: a kid goes to a shop, and its owner tells the story of Ninjago. Which said story is about six ninjas (Lloyd, Kai, Jay, Zane, Cole and Nya) and their master, Wu, and the main bad guy, Garmadon, is Lloyd's dad, which makes Lloyd hated by everyone (except the ninjas, Wu and his mom). Oh, and he also lives with his mom (who brole up with Garmadon shortly after Lloyd was born), and has a hard time as a teen. Lloyd (I mean, Luh-loyd), in the course of the story, unleashes the Ultimate Weapon to drive Garmadon away from Ninjago once and for all. To his horror, he unleashed Meowthra, a cat that threatens to destroy Ninjago. The ninjas and Garmadon go to find the Ultimate Ultimate Weapon, the ninjas are betrayed by Garmadon, they find the power that was inside them all along, return home, Garmadon gets eaten by the cat, Lloyd apologizes to the cat and his dad and well, happy ending.
As usual, the cast (Dave Franco, Justin Theroux and Jackie Chan along the rest manage to do a great job), the visuals and music are great. Also, am I the only one who thought the ninjas' costumes looked great here?
I feel sorry for this movie being a Box Office Bomb. And this can be clearly attributed to the marketing, writing, directing and heavy competition this movie had. I hope it will manage to have a sequel, since, in my opinion, the show had an artistic overhaul to be closer in look to this film to bring the fans that were made by the film, and also it would be worthless - again, my opinion - if a sequel isn't greenlit. Man, Warner Bros. really foreshadowed the fate of this movie back in the 2014 short Enter the Ninjago.
Also, I can understand too why so many were upset with the changes. And I have watched the show since 2015 (most of its episodes, as of this writing), but I am not too angry to the changes.
As a result, a fun, but not a great movie.
P.S.: If I did something wrong in this review, please tell me.