Natalie Richer

Watched it with my mom, we found there was a lot of filler and the characters were kind of hollow. The girl scout dynamic didn't add to the story at all and kind of watered-down the real plot. The mother in the story was not strict, I didn't feel any sense of fear or anger from her when the situations called for it. No complaints about the voice actors just the writing was really weird. I find it strange that they decided to make the child rough and mean to animals... like they have an entire bit where vivo finds the grave stones of other animals. She hit him with a hockey stick, throws him countless times and generally doesn't make much effort to keep him safe. (Reminds me of the human girl from Nemo ) The other girl scouts literally make an entire point of telling her he'll die in this environment but she's not concerned, it then gets pushed under the rug cuz "he's brave" so he proves them wrong 🤦 I felt like they missed the mark when It came to the girl, they had an opportunity to really go independent on why she was struggling to socialize or why she hated the girl scouts. Instead it was just "girl scouts are boring and I'm not like other girls/ my dad died" The songs were off with the kid and felt more like yelling which I get cuz they used a real child actor but it still didn't hit home in anyway, I feel like they should have really worked with the child to find her range and find a song that suited her voice. She's not a bad singer the song was just not the right choice. I liked the character designs for the most part, it was definitely a fun style with lots of colours. The visuals were fun and vivo was super cute. I definitely liked the 2d animation bits the most, I felt that's where the real style popped and was the most enjoyable. The 2d bits were really fluid in motion and felt more natural. Whoever did the movement for vivo was excellent 👏 he definitely moved like a really monkey and I appreciated the micro movements when he was scampering around. Overall the movie is okay but I dont know that I'd suggest it, I feel like even kids would lose focus/ interest at parts. I love animated movies but sometimes I feel like people don't assume children care about plot? Children are a lot smarter than people think so I dont get why companies water down plots for weird random jokes that don't matter. All my favorite movies as a child and to this day where emotional and hit home, Nemo,Dumbo,monsters ink,Cinderella,beauty and the beast,thumbelina,shrek, cars,bionicles, iron giant, fivo, atla. They all had emotional plots with good character development, the villans/adversaries had solid points that were explained and made sense in comparison to the heroes/main character. Vivo is consistent and plot wise pretty solid, I understand his dynamic with the child, but her story is vague and doesn't add the value it should have.