Film Review: The Lego Ninjago Movie

Back in 2014, it would be fair to say that there was a fair bit of trepidation ahead of the release of The Lego Movie. Considering the mind-numbing stupidity of Battleship and the Transformers franchise, expectations were low for another marketing exercise masquerading as a big studio movie.

How wrong we were. The Lego Movie was all the things that a family movie should be – funny, visually impressive, engaging, charming and thrilling – and it quickly won over sceptics and set a new benchmark for what animation could do. It’s not a stretch to say that The Lego Movie is as good as anything that Pixar have produced, and it’s certainly one of the best family films of the 21^st century so far.

Earlier this year, the Warner Animation Group decided to follow up The Lego Movie by taking one of the film’s most interesting characters, Will Arnett’s narcissistic Batman – and making a superhero spin-off.

The result was another rousing success. Director Chris McKay managed to create a film that entirely skewered the Batman myth – and superhero movies as a whole – in a stroke rendering the ongoing DC cinematic universe essentially redundant. Who wants to see Ben Affleck in the suit after the fun we had with the Lego version?

Now, just eight months after The Lego Batman Movie comes the next instalment in the series. The Lego Ninjago Movie is based on the Danish brand’s ninja-inspired toy range and features the voice of Dave Franco as Lloyd, a teenager facing bullying at school on account of the fact that his father is Garmadon (Justin Theroux), an evil villain intent on destroying Ninjago.

As with the previous Lego films, the animation is an absolute joy. The worlds rendered in plastic bricks are sumptuous to look at, and gags about the limited range of movement of characters may not be new, but still hit the mark. For anyone with pets, there’s also a certain pleasure in watching a cat – monster Meowthra – knock over a load of brick-built constructions.

It’s a shame, therefore, that The Lego Ninjago Movie never hits the heights of its predecessors. The main problem is that despite the look of the film the Lego element here is largely irrelevant, and it’s a story that could have been told in countless other ‘universes’. The Lego appears a secondary means to an end, rather than an integral part of the story.

While there’s an impressive voice cast – Olivia Munn, Michael Peña and Jackie Chan all star – character development is largely non-existent, to the point where I actually struggled to remember any of the secondary characters’ names on the bus ride home. I’m not sure that the ‘real world’ wrapping that bookends the film entirely works either.

The Lego Ninjago Movie is also guilty of lifting many of its ideas from other pop culture sources. Main character Lloyd is essentially Spider-Man’s Peter Parker, while there are certainly elements of Power Rangers and Transformers evident here. Jackie Chan’s Master Wu is essentially the same character as Vitruvius from The Lego Movie, rather suggesting that the series is already cannibalising its own ideas.

It’s also a shame that much of the film looks like a marketing opportunity for new Lego toys, a trap that the previous films had just about managed to avoid.

In truth, The Lego Ninjago Movie may just be a victim of the franchise’s own success. The two previous instalments had raised the bar to such a high level that perhaps any subsequent films were simply never going to measure up. It’s certainly not a bad film, but it is derivative and does lack the humour, characters and Lego magic that made both The Lego Movie and The Lego Batman Movie such a pleasure.