I think it was when I first decided to get Disney+ I ended up binging through a lot of its animation catalog. Coming across some very popular shows that had been around for years but were totally new to me. I ended up cancelling my Disney+ subscription for a while over Christmas, then with the bear market I decided to cut down on expenses and save money. Though, while I usually cancel these subscriptions to streaming services, Disney+ was the only one I actually missed not having around. Grabbing it again, I decided to check out The Bob's Burgers Movie. The television series being one of the first animated series I got addicted to with Disney+; and these days it's very rare for a show to impact me this much that I end up watching episode over episode, not getting tired of it. Though, a movie was something I wasn't all that optimistic about.
When it comes to animated series, they tend to get their endings, but sometimes depending on popularity they get the odd feature length release to follow, highlighting a small narrative that doesn't really add to anything after the story. I usually find these to be quite weak. I recall The Simpson's Movie being quite lackluster, reduced in animation quality and having a pretty average story that wasn't very memorable. Though The Bob's Burgers Movie actually surprised me quite a lot. It felt very much like the show, almost like a very long episode of it. Not seeming any different in any way, still funny, enjoyable, and with the expected quality that matched the series in terms of the animation. No changes to the stylisation or a heavy reliance on special effects due to budget. I enjoyed it enough to consider revising the show and watching through it again, actually!
The Bob's Burgers Movie
A common theme within the Bob's Burgers television series is Bob's constant struggle with money. Having a burger restaurant that is neither growing nor crumbling, but challenges are often faced in the pursuit of maintaining profitability for bills and keeping things afloat. The idea of Bob's Burgers is that the place really is family owned, and fully reliant on their ability to bring in customers. Here and there as get a bit of extra worldbuilding beyond the restaurant, providing character development to the family and customers. The Bob's Burgers Movie takes a bite out of that formula and throws Bob's largest hurdle at him yet: the restaurant is behind on its loan payments and the restaurant has just one week to find the money. To match this, a giant sinkhole appears in the street just so happening to remove the ability to enter his restaurant. What ensues is a challenge to save the restaurant by raising cash while a larger mystery at hand is discovered, leading to the family attempting to solve it.
Juggling the narratives of a murder mystery and financial challenge, The Bob's Burgers Movie feels very much like the series and its regular episodes. It feels as if the film doesn't rely foo much on one aspect of the main themes and instead roams between its main characters as the two stories slowly collide. Its main difference being that sometimes the directing takes a rather creative turn when it comes to the transitions between scenes. It was an unexpected addition that made certain scenes and environments a bit more immersive, alongside the expected animation perspectives used. Familiarity works in the film's favour, however, and this is something that I feel many animated movies based on established series fail to realise. Too many shift things up and try something new, only to fail or somewhat tarnish the quality that made fans originally interested. The Bob's Burgers Movie sticks to what it knows, and the result was that I barely noticed the film's runtime passing by. Enjoying every moment of it.
Thankfully, given it is a more recent film to be released over an existing franchise, the writing was authentic to the what it is. That is to say that the writing respected each existing character and didn't stray beyond what's expected of them. No sudden political undertones or references, no agenda pushing of any sort. Something that seemed a bit surprised based on the story of Bob struggling against the grasp of the banks and landlords. This also meant that the characters acted the same way they usually do, and in Bob's Burgers fashion, that means with plenty of wholesome idiocies that makes their family so entertaining to watch. This only makes their struggles seem more relatable and real with each character's mannerisms. The children being independent but very intelligent and relaxed. Full of jokes and references, still very much childlike despite going on their own adventures to fix things.
One of the most notable ways in which the film managed to stick to what it knows was how it mostly relied on the familiar locations from the show to portray the characters and story. There were very few new locations that our characters ventured to, and this meant that things felt very much grounded and reliant on a small setting. But the way the film portrays some of these settings is quite creative with interesting lighting and compositions, mostly notable around the start of the film, as well as towards the end. Though none of this is a negative element to the film, it all works out well. That said, while it did stick to what it knew, it did also try to change a few things up with larger aspects of character growth. I won't mention what specifically as to avoid mentioning spoilers, but it's an aspect of growth that implies a more mature nature to one of the characters, part of their main features that is rather established within the television series. It ends up being almost closure to the show ending and the film being the final addition to it all. Something there for the fans to find and appreciate as a goodbye. Nothing that oversteps, nor seems too dramatic.
I really expected the film to be much worse, having put off watching it for a long time now. I'm quite glad I decided to give it a chance, and it remains one of the few decent additions to animated series that get the feature film treatment. As a send-off to these characters, I'd say it doesn't really have any flaws. Everything seems to be kept quite tightly that ensures the magic of the show isn't lost, and instead is just added to. Each character is given enough time to throw out their stories and also their whacky humour, and the main story is engaging enough to hold things together throughout the lengthier runtime. If you happen to be a fan of Bob's Burgers and haven't seen this yet, I don't see why you won't end up enjoying it too.
