LogFAQs > #975286495

Karo: A kindhearted youngster seeks to end centuries of bloodshed between humans and monsters by befriending a creature and showing all the adults how wrong they are. Whoa whoa, wait, doesn't this all sound awful familiar to you? Yup, I just described to you the literal plot of How to Train Your Dragon. This movie doesn't even try to hide the shame of plagiarism, I mean, even the design of the main sea monster is highly reminiscent of Toothless the dragon.
It was very hard to get emotionally invested in the story when it is just exactly the same thing I've seen already only inferior, and the only question remaining in my mind is who the hell did Chris Williams have to suck off to get this nominated for best animated feature.
They may be nothing really wrong with this film from a technical standpoint, and indeed, it checks every box and crosses every t in regards to animated movie production. But it ultimately ends up forgettable and soulless and devoid of any reason to ever watch it for the first time, let alone again.

Inviso: First off, this movie had such a weird animation style for me. I know its hard to explain, but it just felt like 3D animation from like a decade ago. It wasnt outright TERRIBLE, but like, it just didnt feel like it was up to par with other major studios. Disney and Pixar and Dreamworks have kinda reached this point where they can at least design human characters that look crisp and clean, and look polished in their animation stylewhile this animation gave me vibes of an early effort by a bigger and better studio.
With that out of the way, this movie just didnt do a whole lot for me. Its way too long for an animated filmor at least, its way too long for an animated film with as straight-forward and bare bones of a plot as this movie has. Its basically Moby Dick, except its a kids movie, so the monster is actually quite pleasant if you give her the chance, and the plot revolves around showing the world that the monsters are good. Thats fine, and it CAN work, except that was just so little in terms of comedy aside from like, a few pithy scenes. Instead, the lightheartedness of the film was largely contained to cute child/monster interactions between not just the titular Sea Beast, but also this weird and honestly unnecessary blue mini-monster that was JUST in the movie to be a cute animal sidekick.
But the BIGGEST flaw, like I said, is that the movie is too damn long. And I think you can attribute like half an hour of the runtime to a completely hamfisted political statement from the writers. The movie spends a ton of time world-building how theres a war going on between humans and sea beasts and there are whole crews of hunters that are essentially mercenaries who go out and wage war for the king and queen. And then a subplot comes up where the royalty decides they dont think the hunters are getting the job done, so theyre instead going to bring in this MASSIVE warship to handle things moving forward. This leads to a competition between Captain Crow (essentially Ahab) and the soldiers.
This subplotgoes nowhere. The warship shows up again VERY briefly and is utterly destroyed by Red (the main sea beast), and its only purpose seems to be that it exists to needlessly cause harm to Maisie? Now, I might be overanalyzing this kids movie, but that whole subplot feels like it exists ENTIRELY to critique likethe military industrial complex. Its this big, flashy ship that harms innocents and is ultimately useless. It serves no other purpose in the plot of the film.
But thats not all. Youd think that the big climax of the film would be Red versus the hunters or versus the soldiers or SOMETHING. And while thats a part of itduring the final sequence, Maisie has this moment where shes been reading tales of hunter heroism all movie long, and after interacting with Red, she kinda realizes the tales are exaggerated. But then she sees the royal quest and notices that the crest is printed on every one of the history books that paint the sea beasts as irredeemable monsters. So, the true climax of the film is Maisie calling out the king and queen for lying and forcing anti-sea beast propaganda on the peoplefor reasons? Its not well-explainedits just that the king and queen were lying to manipulate the population? Again, it just feels like a hamfisted political statement that doesnt contribute anything to the plot. Its SO bizarre the more I think about it.
This should have been the easiest possible story to tell. You have two options, really. First, Maisie and Jacob learn that Red isnt the monster they believe, and then they need to face Captain Crow and defeat him in his single-minded obsession with revenge. They KINDA did this, but its such a brief moment that it doesnt feel like a fully realized conclusion. OR, the hunter crew goes after Red, and as a collective they realize Red isnt so bad, so they need to team up with her against the soldiers and their warship. But instead, the conflict just feels so surface-level, and it all wraps up far too easily or quickly.
Ultimately though, I will give one bit of praise, in that I was never outright BORED watching this film. I may have started flagging in my attention towards the end, but for a two-hour movie, the fact that managed to maintain a JUST steady enough pulse to keep me engaged is something worth praising.