Review: Onward

Pixar's 22nd feature film, and I wasn't sure what to expect. The trailers looked liked something middle-of-the-road by their standard and there was very little that was hooking me in.

But as it's Pixar, I could not ignore a chance of their newest release.

It certainly ended up being a wise choice.
The story opens up well. You are presented to the world our characters live in as well as its history. That certainly helped me get invested and see where Pixar wanted to go with this. The rest of the story moves along pretty conventionally where enough laughs and creativity in there to keep it entertaining. A climatic ending that included a vintage Pixar tear-jerker moment gave the film a memorable pay-off that reminds us what this studio can do with our emotions.

It's got a world that is similar to Shrek that mixes in magic/fairytale history and real world lifestyle, which we know is something that can work. Up to a point, it does give us a world that is interesting and they play around with it with positive results.

The voice acting works rather well. Tom Holland and Chris Pratt give us characters that bounce off each other well, Octavia Spencer makes good use of her character and of course it was nice to hear John Ratzenberger makes his regular appearance.

So while it's enjoyable, it is certainly quite a way off Pixar's best. What makes this studio great is their simplicity in their story-telling and concepts. It therefore gives the writers time to give you an effective story that pushes your emotions to the limit.
This one comes across as if its trying to hard. It explains so much, in order to get something out of you and feel somewhat entertained.

You can feel their effort in explaining to the audience why all of this is happening. It therefore doesn't have enough time to give us strong characters and give us moments that will last a lifetime, like a lot of its predecessors.

Is it entertaining, yes. Did it make me laugh, yes. Would I watch it again, yes. But I know they can do better and have done better.
Basically all I'm saying is, don't expect an instant classic. I would say, expect a solidly entertaining fantasy adventure with some cool fun set-pieces and a good pay-off that sparks some magic that reminds you that you're watching a Pixar film.
If I was being harsh, I would call this 'filler' before their next project which is getting a lot of hype.

It's definitely bottom half in my ranking of the studios film. But it remains a good piece of work to be proud of, as I can see many people enjoying this.

I must mention, there is a Simpson short before it. Usually Pixar have put out their own latest short before a feature of theirs. But I guess to coincide with Disney's recent acquisition of Fox, they decided on this instead. It's a very funny and charming short with all the magic you expect from The Simpsons that will please people of all ages.

Rating: 7/10