This movie was so enjoyable. Gorgeously animated. I adored the fact that the best player of all time, the one our main character aspires to be since he was a young boy, is a woman. Specifically a flat chested woman. It's really great to see. Again, especially since her patterning and coloring leads to the coding that she is a darker skinned woman. This is significant because the other character who I would say is primarily dark skin coded is the antagonist of the movie. I will never get sick of a good optimistic rookie and cynical mentor dynamic, especially if there's legacy and people you want to prove yourself to. However this movie did really let me down. Specifically with the casting. Why were there so many white people in this movie. White people in lead roles. I view animal movies as an interesting opportunity to cast in interesting ways. If you have a character who's a rhinocerous, I would choose to cast a person who is from the region that the animal is from. I would not choose David Harbour, although he did a good enough job that I did not realize it was him until after the movie. And the ostrich, Olivia? Why is she British? Why is she a white, blonde woman? It just feels like an interesting choice to make a movie that is a direct allegory for a sport that has been primarily comprised of POC for many years now, and make about half of your main cast who plays that sport not POC. And it's not even like the white people you're casting are particularly special like I promise you Jelly Roll could've been anyone else and no one would've cared. And in the case of David Harbour the rhino, he's a family man, right? I think it would've sent a nice message to see a black, masculine character, someone whose prime motivation is love for his daughters succeed. The movie broke down a lot of anti-black stereotypes, but it had so many opportunities to do more, and that's really a missed opportunity that would've been incredibly easy to do, from my eyes. But whatever. Also why is the lizard man slavic, regionally that doesn't make any sense whatsoever the lizards he's based on aren't from any slavic countries or regions whatsoever and I really just prefer that if you're going to choose to make a character that is based off an animal that is from islands in Indonesia it feels like an interesting choice to not make the character Indonesian and specifically make them a white character. But whatever, it's fine, maybe I'm the woker, either way I really liked the movie. The voice actors all did really great, especially Caleb McLaughlin and Gabrielle Union.
