Data-1001

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is by far the most thoughtful of all the PotA movies. It takes its time, and the result is that we see a lot of backstory and even character development before much action happens.

The weakest part of the movie is the part which takes place in the titular "kingdom" -- and the best parts are with the Eagle Clan and during Noa's journey with Raka.

The voice acting is superb. The CGI is better than ever, with such subtle emotions showing on the faces of the apes, we don't even miss the incredible motion-capture work of Andy Serkis in this outing.

Noa takes the hero's journey from a brash and impulsive youth to a character who proves to be more than capable of being a strong leader.

I didn't think I was going to enjoy this movie as much as I did, but it gives me new hope for the continuation of this franchise.

Look, I like Will Ferrell, okay? I think he's a very talented comedic actor. But stunt casting isn't always the best idea. And especially not when you hire one of the biggest names for your movie but decide to have him do a French accent which he cannot pull off and which makes his voice pretty much unrecognizable to the audience. (I think part of it was also that perhaps he was trying so hard to do the accent that he forgot to actually put any nuance into the role.)

Another poor casting choice was Sofia Vergara. Sofia was very funny on Modern Family, and on paper it probably seemed like she'd be pretty good in an animated role because her line delivery on that show was often the source of the humor. But she brings nothing to the table here, and as a result her character fell totally flat.

When you compare those two to nearly every other voice actor in the cast, the difference becomes even more egregious.

Other than that, however, this is not a particularly well-written or well-directed sequel. If your kids love the minions, they will probably have a good time, as there are enough of their shenanigans to keep the younger crowd entertained. For me, however, this movie was more of a resounding "meh".

After having heard so many good things about this, I was very excited to watch it.

Alas, it wasn't working for me at all. Action scenes were kind of boring, dialogue wasn't compelling, and sad to say that the voice acting didn't jump out at me as being particularly interesting, either.

The idea of an animated noir Batman series sounded great. But yeah, I couldn't get into it. Couldn't even make it through the first episode.

Don't care about the gender switching of a certain character, nor do I care what ethnicity certain other characters are. None of that makes any difference to me.

But when even a half hour show starts to feel like a slog, it's time to call it quits. I know I'm apparently in the minority on this, and that's fine -- don't mean to yuck anybody's yum, just giving my honest opinion of the show. I wish I liked it.