Review of Hop (2011) by Bethany H — 16 Mar 2012

(2 Stars) I really, REALLY want to like Hop. I love bunnies, Easter candy, and cute ideas. But what could have been Arthur Christmas for Easter is unfortunately Alvin and the Chipmunks mixed with the worst parts of The Santa Clause trilogy. It has my absolute favorite element of current family films: pop culture references; I can't get enough of them! Do we really need to dumb down our humor for a joke that ages quickly? Our the attention spans of children really that low?

Ok, so Hop is not necessarily awful, but there's nothing magical about it. And this film should be magical; it's about the Easter Bunny, who is a smaller, fluffier Santa Claus in April. It does a good job making you want candy, but little else. The succession of the Easter Bunny is a great setup, but you're given a young, somewhat irritating E.B. (voiced by Russell Brand) who wants to be a drummer. He meets with Dave Seville... I mean Fred (James Marsden) and the two have a series of misadventures which leads to a David Hasselhoff talent show... yes, you read that right. It's hard to care about anything live action because you've seen that "whacky live action/computer generated hybrid laced with puerile jokes" movie before with The Smurfs, Yogi Bear, and Alvin. Hop could be so much more painful (like if they included singing chipmunks), but you're much better off watching the Rankin/Bass production Here Comes Peter Cottontail if you want a good Easter story.