Review of The Emoji Movie (2017) by Thequietgamer — 11 Feb 2018

Blessed with the high-quality animation and a cute, hip concept that could have made it a hit with the kids. But it doesn't have a soul. T.J. Miller is not leading man material. Not even when it's just his voice trying to carry the show. The whole cast sounds so generic I was genuinely shocked to find out that it wasn't comprised solely of D-listers. What was Patrick Stewart thinking?!

It starts off simple enough. A boring Wreck-It-Ralph rip-off that really has nothing going on. It's kind of smug in a "haha, look at me! I'm poking fun at how teenagers keep their heads buried in their phones!" sort of way. Self-satisfied with the fact that it even exists in the first place. It's bad, but not torture. Not then. But oh boy does it take a turn. It happens about the time Candy Crush shows up. That's right ladies and gentlemen, there's a lot of app-related product placement. Watching the little emojis play Candy Crush is just as fun as watching a real life person play Candy Crush. Not fun at all. But it doesn't stop there. We get to watch the little tumors play with other apps as well. Oh boy!

It's got more than just phone games though. We'll witness these poor excuses for characters visit Dropbox, YouTube, Spotify, and a few others. Now, this could have been a cute thing, but the implementation isn't clever or inventive. Nothing in The Emoji Movie is. The stale quest about being true to who you are is not only devoid of originality, but heart as well. Every emoji and phone creature thingy is a bland stereotype meant to carry the almost non-existent plot forward. Things get weird when it tries to preach feminism and has weird symbolism on things like divorce. It never manages to actually say anything about them, but you can tell they're there. Because, you know, I'm sure that didn't go over the heads of the 6 year olds in the audience out there. The ones that were scarred for life by their first truly abysmal movie.

What tiny bit of imagination it does have is only present on the surface level and is meant to cover up a rotten core created by a group of morally bankrupt individuals that created this film to exploit children in order to prey on the wallets of their unsuspecting parents who didn't know any better. The Emoji Movie is a humorless romp through cellphone land that is devoid of joy and personality. Don't watch it and certainly don't let it near your kids. That would be child abuse in my book. I'm sure there are judges who would agree.