Review - The Lego Ninjago Movie

The Lego Ninjago Movie [rating=3]

‘The Lego Ninjago Movie’ is the third instalment in the Warner Brothers’ ‘The Lego Movie’ franchise and is based on the popular toy-line and TV series, Ninjago: Masters of Spinjitsu. The film follows a group of high schoolers-turned-ninja warriors who are tasked with defending Ninjago City from the evil warlord Lord Garmadon (Justin Theroux, Megamind), who happens to be the father of the team’s leader, Lloyd (Dave Franco, The Disaster Artist) – the Green Ninja. With the help of their sensei, Master Wu (Jackie Chan, Kung Fu Panda), the ninja’s learn to band together in order to unleash their inner power in an all-out showdown to save the city from a greater threat than what they have faced before.

The film follows a lot of the same story beats as the previous two offerings (mainly daddy issues) in the Lego series, this time focusing on a lack of father-son relationship between Garmadon and Lloyd which provides most of the film’s comedy, as well as being the foundation for the story’s emotion. While it is a largely enjoyable film with fantastic animation and voice work it does have it’s flaws, especially with the lack of character development for anyone other than Lloyd or Garmadon, which is a shame with all the other ninjas simply being background characters to the pair most of the duration. I feel you would have to be particularly well versed in the Ninjago universe outside of the film to know anything about the other ninja’s in Lloyds team which feels like a missed opportunity both in story telling and for any potential follow-up. That said I still really enjoyed the film. There’s a lot of solid verbal and visual humour to keep the audience laughing throughout that both kids and adults will enjoy, something the Lego entries do very well.

The all-star cast each play their roles perfectly, and with a lot of fun action sequences the film is a great watch and one I would recommend checking out.

The Lego Ninjago Movie is available on Blu-Ray, DVD and Digital formats from February 12th.