The Lego Batman Movie 2017

C+

Like a lot of people, I was really surprised with The Lego Movie and I was hoping this spinoff featuring a lego Batman could find that same mix of originality, humor, and story. I was able to get a digital copy of this movie on sale at Amazon after getting a copy of the earlier movie for free. So I watched the first one again and the next day watched this one, which one friend of mine said was probably a mistake. Too much Lego? Too many direct comparisons? Too much Batman? I’m not sure which, but I think he was right.

In the first movie Batman was a breakout side character, comically dark and arrogant, who writes heavy metal songs in his spare time. In this movie he is the central character, back home in Gotham, fighting his regular band of villains and entirely too comfortable in his solitude. Unfortunately, this isn’t that original a story, and we already know a lot of this through many, many Batman movies and other superhero movies like The Incredibles where the superhero does some soul searching. I liked some of the humor as lego Batman looks back on 60’s TV Batman, and the Batman movies, all a part of this character. Plus we see lots of other villains and superheroes (though the chief villain is The Joker), not just from Batman or DC, but from all over, including Voldemort, King Kong, and the Jurassic Park velociraptors. It is fun, if a little too much, and you kind of know how the story will go from early on. So I was disappointed. I’m tempted to give the movie a C, but maybe that’s too harsh, so I will give it a C+. It’s probably still better than Cars 3 which for some reason I originally gave a B- (corrected to a C after further thought).

Written: 16 Oct 2017

Owned on: Digital