The LEGO Batman Movie Review

Reviewed by Lynn Barker on Feb 10, 2017

Rating:

Kidzworld checked out The LEGO Batman movie. How hilarious is it? Is it as entertaining as the first LEGO movie? Here is our movie review.

By: Lynn Barker

In The LEGO Batman Movie, Bruce Wayne/Batman (voice of Will Arnett) is doing his macho best to keep his city safe but at what cost? The dude is super lonely and isolated. Even when he is suave Bruce, he’s faking it. What will it take to make this dark superhero learn to play/work with others?

Bruce Wayne is approached by the future RobinCourtesy of Warner Bros.

Saving Gotham City….Again

The Joker (voiced by Zach Galifianakis), who has gathered together known villains and also some C-listers like Condiment King (who shoots ketchup and mustard), Gentleman Ghost, etc. is massively attacking the city. Batman counters with his own hilarious theme song. When plastic face to face, Batman tells Joker he doesn’t do relationships thus he can’t call Joker his main nemesis. Crestfallen, Joker just wants to hear three little words: “I hate you”.

Joker is ticked off!Courtesy of Warner Bros.

New Commissioner Gordon

Barbara Gordon (Rosario Dawson), later to be Bat Girl, is taking over for her father Jim as City Commissioner. She kicks butt since she proudly graduated from “Harvard for Police”. Batman refuses to work with her to halt crime. He is also attracted to her. Batman returns to Wayne Manor, which is on an isolated island, to microwave lobster dinners for one and ignore his butler/surrogate father Alfred (Ralph Fiennes) while laughing at the end of the movie Jerry Maguire by himself in his giant home movie theater.

Batman is sweet on Barbara GordonCourtesy of Warner Bros.

Whoops! Who is this Kid?

Bruce learns that, while paying extra attention to Barbara, he accidentally adopted a wide-eyed kid named Dick Grayson (voice of Michael Cera) from the local orphanage who wants to call him “dad”. In order to thwart Joker’s latest scheme, Batman coldly uses the kid, who puts on a skimpy outfit as Robin, to help him get into Superman’s Fortress of Solitude where a projector capable of launching people into the famous Phantom Zone prison is hidden.

The Batman vs. Superman rivalry continuesCourtesy of Warner Bros.

Party Without Me?

At the Fortress, Batman discovers a huge Justice League party going on and he wasn’t invited! Superman (voice of Channing Tatum) even asks him to take a picture of everybody while he is otherwise ignored. Meanwhile poor Robin risks his tiny plastic life to get the projector all alone. Joker is sent into the Phantom Zone but, yikes, it is what he wanted. He recruits a whole new baddie army and busts them out with him!

Good guys crammed into the one-seater BatmobileCourtesy of Warner Bros.

Can We Work Together?

When Joker and his new army bust into the Batcave (wait, is that a Bat-kayak and a Bat-Zeppelin?), it’s time for loner Batman to work with Barbara (Bat Girl), Alfred (who dons an early 1960’s Batman TV show outfit) and Robin as his new surrogate friend/family to stop Joker and this new mega-herd of villains from totaling Gotham City. Can he actually cooperate long enough to accomplish the task?

Barbara in battle as Bat GirlCourtesy of Warner Bros.

Wrapping Up

Even the opening of this movie is hilarious as we have a black screen with the voice of Batman telling us all important movies start with a black screen and edgy music…etc. Batman is afraid of nothing and nobody…except snake clowns.

Batman is proud of Robin at the Fortress of SolitudeCourtesy of Warner Bros.

Songs are hilarious. The old TV 1960’s Batman music is used a lot and both Batman and Robin have a theme song with great lyrics. Voice actors are wonderful, especially Will Arnett as Batman, Michael Cera as Robin, Ralph Fiennes as Alfred the butler and Zach Galifianakis as the Joker with Rosario Dawson as Barbara Gordon acting as a great straight woman for Batman’s humor.

There are jokes to appeal to all ages. Every Batman movie (and TV show) to date is lampooned and the theme/message of teamwork (from the first LEGO movie) and that friends can be a lonely person’s family is a very worthy one. This film has action, super humor AND heart!

Batman leading the Justice League

The ability for LEGOs Minifigs to snap together is actually used to help save the day and the filmmakers did a great job of mounting an amazing amount of sometimes over-the-top battle action utilizing these little plastic figures but wow, everything, everybody and the kitchen sink is thrown into this movie! Baddies from way more than the DC universe are used (Godzilla, King Kong, Voldemort, Gremlins from the 1980’s films, Sauron (Eye of) from LOTR, The Wicked Witch from Oz, Daleks from “Dr. Who” on and on. This is cool but hard to keep track of. Maybe the filmmakers expect us to see the film multiple times in order to register every entity in this super-stew of baddies.. and we probably will but that’s not really fair so we will go four stars.