Mr. Peabody & Sherman Review

I will openly admit that I am a sucker for animated movies. I remember one time I was tending my nephew and to keep him focused, I put on an animated movie that I hadn't seen. After a while, he lost attention on the movie, but I myself was glued. It was supposed to be the other way around. I guess they just bring out the child in me. Point being, when Mr. Peabody & Sherman came out this weekend, I was fairly excited to go see it. It didn't seem like the best Dreamworks movie, but it seemed like a lot of fun. Turns out that expectation of it was dead on. While not on par with the likes of Shrek, Kung Fu Panda, How to Train Your Dragon, or The Croods, Mr. Peabody & Sherman was loads of fun and certain a huge step above recent duds Turbo and Rise of the Guardians.

The premise of Mr. Peabody & Sherman I thought was rather genius. Mr. Peabody is a dog. But not just any dog. He's a dog that is more human than dog. He walks upright, he talks, he wears glasses, and he's a super genius. He's an expert chef, plays every instrument you can think of, is an inventor and trend starter, and knows math and science better than anyone. And of course he is also a history buff because one of his inventions is the WABAC (pronounced Way-Back). The WABAC is a time machine. Above everything, though, Mr. Peabody is a father. Not a father of a dog, but of a human. That human in this movie is 7-year-old Sherman, who Mr. Peabody found abandoned at birth and took in. Mr. Peabody has taken Sherman on many adventures through time, causing Sherman to be a history buff as well. This comes as a minor problem when on the first day of school, Sherman gets in a fight with classmate Penny after upsetting her by knowing too much. Mr. Peabody is threatened to lose the custody of Sherman, so he invites Penny and her parents over for dinner to fix this. Of course Penny, Sherman, and Mr. Peabody eventually get caught in an adventure through time via the WABAC. As most time travel movies go, things go way wrong.

What really makes this movie work is the three lead characters are quite fantastic. Our two 7-year-old stars Sherman and Penny are absolutely adorable and Mr. Peabody is really fun. In voicing those characters, they dove a bit into Modern Family by casting Ty Burrell and Ariel Winter as Mr. Peabody and Penny respectively. Max Charles, who plays the young Peter Parker in The Amazing Spider-Man is the voice of Sherman. All three do great with voice acting. But them alone don't make this excellent. It's them added to the huge host of side characters that they run into throughout their journey through time. A selection of these voice actors are Stephen Colbert, Leslie Mann, Stanley Tucci, Tom McGrath, Mel Brooks, and Patrick Warburton. The creme of that crop is of course the great Patrick Warburton, aka Kronk from The Emperor's New Groove. 

Like I mentioned, Mr. Peabody & Sherman won't rank in the top tier of Dreamworks' animated films, but it's right there below in the second tier. In trying to think of a comparable title, the movie I came up with was Over the Hedge. When asked what the best Dreamworks movies are, not many will say Over the Hedge, but most will agree that it is a super fun Dreamworks movie that is better than plenty that they have put out. That's the case here. Mr. Peabody & Sherman is a ton of fun for both kids and family. It attempted to do what The Croods did last year by having a touching parent/child story and while it wasn't as powerful as The Croods, it was still good. The only real complaint I had was that it kinda implemented a 7-year-old love story between Sherman and Penny, and that didn't feel right. However, it's definitely worth your money. I give the movie an 8/10.