Shield Reviews: Astro Boy

The 2009 movie, Astro Boy based off the Japanese television show and manga comic book series is a pretty good film. The movie has a star-studded cast for a lesser-known non-blockbuster film with actors like Freddie Highmore, Elle Fanning, Bill Nighy, Kristen Bell, Nicholas Cage, Nathan Lane, and even Samuel L. Jackson appearing in the animated 'toon of the boy named Toby who is replaced by his dad after his human version dies during a test operation. The new Toby who later becomes known as Astro Boy has some of the memories of his late human version inside of him with some little additions like the ability to fly, arm cannons, and even butt guns - yes, butt guns. He has to save the city of Metro City (as if that name hasn't appeared elsewhere before) and also save his friends like Cora from the junkyard village below. The star-studded cast is pretty solid - some adults play kids (like Kristen Bell for example playing the 16-ish Cora) but Bell, for example, sounded like a kid - so the actual age factor didn't matter a whole lot and actual teenagers like Freddie Highmore (who plays a twelve-year-old-ish Toby in the film) also do well. As stated many times in my reviews, it's hard to have or notice bad voice acting in an animated film, but when it's really bad, it's noticable and that wasn't to be found in this, so overall, the star-studden voiced cast is well-rounded and appropriate for their respective characters in the film.

The action was pretty good - it wasn't nonstop as the action would sometimes go a few minutes in a few unnoticed, but then it would pick up again and get you interested - the non-action parts were good, too, but the action stole the show like Astro vs the Robot was pretty neat and the ending provided a very good message which I give props to the producers who gave a good message to younger ones watching this one which is the general audience this would appeal to. The graphics and effects are pretty good, but I kind of had to cringe at a few scenes that were just flat-out disturbing and poorly designed like the red and blue core clash at the end was just flat-out bad looking, while other scenes like Astro going through the rock surface was well designed, so the designing and animation involved in the movie were very mixed and a little disappointing, but it wasn't bad the whole way, at least.

With all that being said with the well voiced cast to the solid action to the mixed animations, this gets a 4/5 for me. Worth a rent.