Mr. Peabody & Sherman
Directed by: Rob Minkoff
Written by: Craig Wright, based on the series produced by Jay Ward
Voices by: Ty Burrell, Max Charles, Ariel Winter, Allison Janney, Leslie Mann, Stephen Colbert, Zach Callison, Patrick Warburton, Stanley Tucci, Lake Bell, Tom McGrath, Mel Brooks, Lauri Fraser, Guillaume Aretos, Stephen Tobolowsky, Dennis Haysbert
Animation/Adventure/Comedy/Family/Sci-Fi - 92 min
Written by: Craig Wright, based on the series produced by Jay Ward
Voices by: Ty Burrell, Max Charles, Ariel Winter, Allison Janney, Leslie Mann, Stephen Colbert, Zach Callison, Patrick Warburton, Stanley Tucci, Lake Bell, Tom McGrath, Mel Brooks, Lauri Fraser, Guillaume Aretos, Stephen Tobolowsky, Dennis Haysbert
Animation/Adventure/Comedy/Family/Sci-Fi - 92 min
Mr. Peabody & Sherman expose generation gaps. I am too young for the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show and its spin-off Peabody’s Impeccable History of the 1960s. Coming into Mr. Peabody & Sherman fresh, there will be no comparisons to the original source material. Baby boomer parents and grandparents will have to explain their origins and how faithfully the movie sticks with them. The time travel sequences remind me more of the phone booth from Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989); a reference most of the kids today will have no idea about either.
The bespectacled and bow-tied Mr. Peabody (Ty Burrell from Modern Family), the world’s smartest dog, discovers parenting really should come with a manual. Kids do the darndest things, even when their adoptive fathers have a Nobel Prize, advise heads of state, speak multiple languages, and play every instrument known to man.
Sherman (Max Charles) starts school and draws the ire of a particularly nasty classmate, Penny (Ariel Winter, also from Modern Family). While trying to impress the obnoxious young lady, Sherman takes the time-travelling WABAC machine throughout history causing a ruckus amongst history’s most famous people that only Mr. Peabody can unravel. We run into an extremely cake-hungry Marie Antoinette, a smitten King Tut, a tinkering Leonardo da Vinci who has trouble getting Mona Lisa to smile, and even some dunderheaded Greeks about to sneak into Troy inside a large horse.
Since children are the focus demographic, prepare yourself for the eye-rolling fart and scatological jokes. Our heroes eject out the butt of the Sphinx, fall out of the Trojan horse’s rear end, and find it funny that King Tut’s name rhymes with butt. Moving past that nonsense I doubt even five years olds will find amusing, Mr. Peabody & Sherman provides a healthy amount of side gags the adults will chuckle at and the inevitable head-scratching monologues about the space-time continuum that no time travel movie will ever convincingly explain.
Director Rob Minkoff (The Lion King) thankfully keeps the pace accelerated throughout most of the escapades except when the father-son relationship hits a rough patch. Parents and kids will take different lessons away from the movie at this point. The kids will like Sherman’s transformation from a meek little boy to a sort of can do young man. Us parents will get annoyed at Sherman’s recklessness and vote for grounding.
Some of the historical figures work better than others including Robespierre from revolutionary France and Agamemnon (Patrick Warburton) who is hysterical when he mentions how awkward it is at Oedipus’s house during the holidays. Realizing it is a comedy, the skewering of Marie Antoinette with cake jokes and a completely stupid joke that King Tut wears a skirt and make-up are a few of the asides a supposedly clever cartoon such as this should have known better to avoid.
Mr. Peabody makes for a relatively good guy for the kids to root for. His intellect is lauded, not mocked. He bests larger foes with his brains, not brawn. Throw in a dash of historical adventure and silly puns and Mr. Peabody & Sherman is not that bad, but it is not that effective either. Here’s to an average, middle-of-the-road, animated throwback.
The bespectacled and bow-tied Mr. Peabody (Ty Burrell from Modern Family), the world’s smartest dog, discovers parenting really should come with a manual. Kids do the darndest things, even when their adoptive fathers have a Nobel Prize, advise heads of state, speak multiple languages, and play every instrument known to man.
Sherman (Max Charles) starts school and draws the ire of a particularly nasty classmate, Penny (Ariel Winter, also from Modern Family). While trying to impress the obnoxious young lady, Sherman takes the time-travelling WABAC machine throughout history causing a ruckus amongst history’s most famous people that only Mr. Peabody can unravel. We run into an extremely cake-hungry Marie Antoinette, a smitten King Tut, a tinkering Leonardo da Vinci who has trouble getting Mona Lisa to smile, and even some dunderheaded Greeks about to sneak into Troy inside a large horse.
Since children are the focus demographic, prepare yourself for the eye-rolling fart and scatological jokes. Our heroes eject out the butt of the Sphinx, fall out of the Trojan horse’s rear end, and find it funny that King Tut’s name rhymes with butt. Moving past that nonsense I doubt even five years olds will find amusing, Mr. Peabody & Sherman provides a healthy amount of side gags the adults will chuckle at and the inevitable head-scratching monologues about the space-time continuum that no time travel movie will ever convincingly explain.
Director Rob Minkoff (The Lion King) thankfully keeps the pace accelerated throughout most of the escapades except when the father-son relationship hits a rough patch. Parents and kids will take different lessons away from the movie at this point. The kids will like Sherman’s transformation from a meek little boy to a sort of can do young man. Us parents will get annoyed at Sherman’s recklessness and vote for grounding.
Some of the historical figures work better than others including Robespierre from revolutionary France and Agamemnon (Patrick Warburton) who is hysterical when he mentions how awkward it is at Oedipus’s house during the holidays. Realizing it is a comedy, the skewering of Marie Antoinette with cake jokes and a completely stupid joke that King Tut wears a skirt and make-up are a few of the asides a supposedly clever cartoon such as this should have known better to avoid.
Mr. Peabody makes for a relatively good guy for the kids to root for. His intellect is lauded, not mocked. He bests larger foes with his brains, not brawn. Throw in a dash of historical adventure and silly puns and Mr. Peabody & Sherman is not that bad, but it is not that effective either. Here’s to an average, middle-of-the-road, animated throwback.
Comment Box is loading comments...
