'The LEGO Ninjago Movie' REVIEW: A middling animated film that's a 100 minute commercial

'The LEGO Ninjago Movie' is the third and latest film in the LEGO film franchise with the previous LEGO films being The LEGO Movie (2014) and The LEGO Batman Movie (2017). This is an animated film which I did not see coming. With 'The Lego Batman Movie' it made sense because Batman was a prominent supporting role in the first LEGO film, plus Batman was already a marketable and established name, so it made sense to make a movie based on his character from the first film. My thoughts on both those previous film were surprising to me. My initial thoughts before they were released was that they were just films specially designed to be overlong advertisements for toys, but for both of them I was wrong. They were both overall enjoyable, heartfelt and funny family films, but I do prefer the first LEGO Movie to the LEGO Batman Movie for the funny factor. With this film however, this most certainly what looks like a commercial to me. The trailers weren't all that amusing to me and I just didn't see any other reason for this film to exist other than it's an adaptation of the cartoon series for kids. For this review I'm most definitely not going to talk about how this film is in comparison to the television show because 1. I haven't watched a single episode of said show and 2. I believe that a film should stand on its own as a single film, but does this film stand on its own? It doesn't, but it's not a total disaster either.

The film is about a little LEGO named Llyod (voiced by Dave Franco) also known as the green ninja who is shunned by everyone in the city of Ninjago for being the son of an evil warlord, Garmadon (voiced by Justin Theorox). The film also stars Fred Armisen, Kumail Nanjiani, Michael Pena, Zach Woods and Abbi Jacobson as the rest of the ninjas and finally Jackie Chan as Master Wu.

What's consistently great about all these LEGO movies is most certainly the animation. I always love how all the LEGO films are animated as if they are in stop-motion, it makes them feel real to me even though it is 100% done in computers. The film also did make me consistently chuckle throughout and kept me engaged for most of the film's running time, mostly due to the spot on voice acting from especially Jackie Chan. Jackie Chan is the reason why I don't think this movie's total trash. He does appear as himself in the beginning of the film which still shows me why Jackie Chan is still a superstar today. He's funny, charismatic and charming as ever. When you do see his character in animation form he still manages to be the Jackie Chan we know and love from his previous films by using everything that's around him in an action sequence. Good Job, Jackie Chan.

However, I do think this is the weakest film in comparison to the other LEGO films so far. This film didn't make me laugh as hard and made me feel any emotional connection to these characters at all. In fact, the green ninja is only character that's the most fleshed out. The other ninjas don't even seen like supporting characters. At least those Ninja Turtles movies produced by Michael Bay can make all four turtles seem important. In the end, the other ninjas are just ways to make the script longer. Speaking of longer, this film feels longer than it actually is. I kept dosing on and off all throughout the middle portion of the film were there's the least compelling action and where the jokes do fall flat. The reason why I do feel like this is the film that's designed to be a commercial is because it kinda is. The first 15 minutes which was introducing the characters and the first action sequence did have the pacing and energy of a commercial for toys. The previous films didn't even have that.

Overall, while it does upset me that this has the least effort put in terms of the script and pacing. It did make me laugh a couple of times and has a few neat ideas. This is the least entertaining LEGO movie for me, but I think it's fine for kids that want to see cool action sequences and a film I see would make kids want to ask their parents to buy them LEGO Ninjago sets for Christmas.

'The LEGO Ninjago Movie' gets a C+