by Scott Batchelor, Contributing Writer
If you are reading this review, it is because you think somebody hacked the SiftPop website and is now making up movie reviews for films that do not exist. I assure you, Ron’s Gone Wrong is a real animated movie that needs to be in the discussion for best animated movie of the year.
On first watch, Ron’s Gone Wrong may look and sound generic as we open with animation that feels like it was simply painted on, rather than individually crafted, and music that could be labeled as generic pop #23. Nothing particularly feels like this should be something great, but the story moves quickly to get to the point. Because it moves rapidly, many story beats are easy to predict. The early plot is unoriginal; our hero child, Barney (Jack Dylan Grazer), is the only person in the world without the hot new tech gadget, a B-bot… Barney’s dad, Graham (Ed Helms), is a widower working as a novelty telemarketer trying to make ends meet to take care of both Barney and Barney’s grandmother, Donka (Olivia Colman).
Along with being a low income family, Barney faces all the “normal” kid experiences. Bullies make fun of him, girls ignore him, and teachers embarrass him. The worst part is all he wants is a brand new B-bot for his birthday because everyone else has one and he doesn’t want to be left out or made fun of anymore. This is such a universal feeling that it is hard not to relate to Barney. Most kids go through the phase where everyone seemingly has the cool new toy and you have to wait for a birthday or Christmas before even getting a chance to fit in. And then the crushing blow comes when that present driven event comes to a close and you have failed to secure your ticket back in with the cool kids. Sadly for Barney, he too feels this blow. But fortunately for Barney, he is a fictional character in a movie that needs to move forward. So a quick scene to show how Graham is able to get a defunct B-bot later and we are now into the meat of our movie.
Everything that comes before this is a necessary evil in film making. I wish movies could get more creative with the exposition but sometimes, like in Ron’s Gone Wrong, it is easier to just quickly go through the motions to get to where the fun is. Barney opens his B-bot (later to be called Ron based on the completely original idea of using his serial number for a name) to find out his new tech buddy is damaged. This whole movie essentially turns into the best part of Big Hero Sixwhen Baymax gets a low battery and fails to do basic functions. Ron is the smaller version of Baymax, and much like Baymax, everything Ron does is simply just fun. He takes everything Barney says literally to a frustrating degree (for Barney, as a viewer it’s a grand ol’ time), he sings a little jaunty tune he picked up from Donka, and he is overenthusiastic about finding friends for Barney. As much as Barney hated the idea of a broken B-bot, it doesn’t take long for Barney to realize he has something special in Ron.
And Ron is special. This movie only works because Ron is funny. Voiced by Zach Galifianakis, everything Ron does invokes some type of emotion. He can be funny, heartwarming, sincere, and curious. Ron is perfect. One of the best parts about Ron is the subtle animation that goes into making him more than just a robot. He does some really funny bits in the background of the scene that is not directly the focal point of the scene, but Ron is always present and always learning, which makes him one of the best movie robots in film.
Without the relationship between Barney and Ron, this movie falls flat. Their friendship is easily a “squad goal” type friendship. They have wonderfully whimsical adventures that can only be found in animation like accidentally beating up the school bully and crashing the influencers pool-side vlog. Barney and Ron get into spats that are quickly resolved because this movie works better when they are able to interact. And the best part is how as the movie goes on, you truly get the sense they would do anything to protect each other. As unorginal as the beginning of this move was, the story takes some predictable threads and makes sure to string them back up to keep the well told story fresh.
I was worried at the beginning that the lazy opening would infest the rest of the plot, but I quickly found that was not the case. Early on, I was asking myself why not just return the broken unit for a new one, which I thought they were going to ignore with a throw-away line about how hard it was to find a B-bot. But they find a more original way to keep Ron and Barney together. When they have the inevitable break up, I thought that would be the next 20 minutes of the movie before they come back together, but it takes no more than three minutes leading to a better viewing experience. When Ron and Barney are riffing off one another, you can’t help but smile and laugh along. The innocence and camaraderie is wholesome and infectious; there is no way you are leaving the theater not wanting your own Ron.
Sadly, though, the end of this movie moves exactly where you would expect it to. [spoilers] The creator of the B-bots, Bubble, a tech giant on the scale of any large social media platform, notices that they have a broken B-bot in the field. Instead of sending the consumer a new unit to replace the broken toy, they desperately want to retrieve the broken tech before anybody realizes that Bubble is not a perfect company. We have the battle of power between CEO Marc (yes really, the CEO of the social networking knockoff is named Marc) and investor money hungry Andrew. Andrew might as well be called Steve Gates based on his appearance of black turtleneck and glasses. Marc sees the power in what Ron is able to do, think freely and learn, while Andrew sees a threat to his path to make money. You can see where this leads, which is a disappointment but based on how the movie started is no surprise.
Boring opening and predictable ending aside, Ron’s Gone Wrong is an above average kids movie. This movie is not made to shock you or reinvent the wheel, and it doesn’t even make an attempt to. This movie knows that the fun is the relationships between man and technology and it gets everything right. The satire of how we use our gadgets, the status that comes with having the newest models, and what happens when you fall behind on the latest trends. Ron and Barney have the best friendship that is built of trust and learning with each other. Friendship is hard when two personalities clash and this movie teaches kids that it is okay to be mad at someone, but still love and want to take care of each other. Relationships are not always going to be perfect; people drift apart for reasons that nobody can really figure out and sadly we just grow apart from those we once thought would rule the world with us. For kids, it’s a scary glimpse into the future, but for adults it’s a nostalgia coming-of-age milestone that we have all felt at some point. I am not sure I have seen a movie outside of Toy Story that handles what happens to your relationships when you grow up in such a magnificent way.
Ron’s Gone Wrong is not the most gorgeous looking or sounding movie. The story at times can be paint-by-numbers, but that is not where the fun is to be had. Barney desperately wanted the perfect B-bot and instead got Ron, which turns out is not what Barney wanted but what Barney needed. Barney and Ron are a wonderful team that comes across as one of the most believable and real friendships, even if it is between man and machine. Every relationship in this movie is touched on in some way. Dad wants to do right for his son, old friends reminisce about the old days, and new friends learn how to be good friends to each other. The characters in this movie feel like they are ripped from real life examples that anyone can relate to. While this movie may have a simple message about friendship, it certainly tells it in one of the most fun ways.
Grade: B+
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