'Puss in Boot: The Last Wish' Review

Hasta la muerte

More than a great movie, The Last Wish feels like a welcome return to a more classic era of animation, before a glut of hyperactive jangling keys locked down the box office - in contrast, the much-belated sequel is a beautifully balanced rollick of humor and heartache, aesthetically dazzling and deftly lifting its delightful cast of characters across the entire emotional spectrum to complete their arcs, with the patience to treat mature topics with maturity; one scene near the middle gambols with incredibly kinetic swashbuckling, only to plummet into the next with a jarringly grounded depiction of anxiety and panic, all without missing a step or pushing itself or its characters out of alignment to achieve such a switch. Most refreshing of all is a suite of villains who can be funny, but are themselves no joking matter - the central antagonist of the film is easily one of the most legitimately intimidating sadists I have witnessed in any movie aimed at a younger audience, animated or otherwise. When it's time to be serious, the film recognizes and obliges that fact, but buoyed by both bright and black humor, the movie stays enjoyable and never succumbs to its own gravity. As the second act sets in, however, so too does predictability's roots creep in tighter; where the characters end up is far from a surprise, aided by the frequent and outright articulation of broader themes, but said themes are not only handled with the care and severity they require, interlace and fractal across multiple symbols and character arcs, but are also quite heavy for a film directed at a young crowd - the value of a life, the inevitability of death, and cherishing everything in between - giving just as much to move the minds of the adults as the attention spans of the kids. Humorous, heartfelt, and going harder than a sequel to Puss in Boots of all things has any earthly right to go, The Last Wish is impressively solid, and one of Dreamwork's finest ventures yet.