MARMADUKE (NETFLIX) (2022)

SYNOPSIS: Messy and mischievous Marmaduke has a big heart but can't stay out of trouble! Does he have what it takes to shine in the swanky dog show world? 

MOVIE REVIEW:

Not to be confused with the other famous Great Dane Scooby-Doo, Marmaduke actually started from a comic strip back in 1954 by the late Brad Anderson. While certainly not as well-known as the amateur detective, Marmaduke did received a live-action makeover in 2010 to generally unfavourable reviews. I guess history repeat itself 12 years later in this computer animated feature.

American comedian Pete Davidson lends his voice to Marmaduke, the big mischievous Great Dane who is always hungry and playful. After creating a chaotic mess at a party organised by his owners, the Wilson family, a famous dog whisperer, Guy Hilton (Brian Hull) offers to take Marmaduke under his wings and plans to enter him in a dog competition after his rigorous training. But when a sinister rival, Zeus (J.K. Simmons) pulls a trick on Marmaduke which resulted him being embarrassingly removed from the competition, Marmaduke feels he has letdown the Wilsons. Will Marmaduke make a comeback and bring glory to his family? Of course he will.

Running at a slim 90 minutes and much dismay to this reviewer, there’s hardly any interesting plot development and funny gags in Marmaduke to sustain the feature long movie. Writer Byron Kavanagh has to resort to pulling off a couple of flatulence jokes and another prolonged (boring) dog competition to pad out the entire runtime.

The humans are generally side-lined even though they are the main characters in the original comic strip and Marmaduke for one don’t even talk. In this animated version, Marmaduke is mostly surrounded by the wise household Siamese cat, King Tut and an array of colourful stereotypical animal characters liked a mystical pup from China, a taco-loving Chihuahua and a fashionable Poodle from expectedly France. It sounds like a blast on paper but it’s just plain excruciating.

And adding on to the nightmare, the visuals are atrociously bland and unappealing for an animation that is this recent. The animation looks incredibly awkward and 2D despite being 3D. This is not looking good for Louis Koo especially when the animation mainly comes from his production outfit, One Cool Animation. Definitely not cool.

The less is said about Marmaduke the better it is. Given the massive competition on the big screen and streaming platforms, we seriously don’t see the appeal of it. This is such a bad animation title that even little kids will reject. They probably want a rerun of The Secret Life of Pets or any other Disney titles.

MOVIE RATING:

Review by Linus Tee