OJ99 reviews...The Little Mermaid!! Team Jock went to the movies Saturday evening and saw the new version. TL/DR? Meh, it is fine.
-Halle Bailey was EXCELLENT as Ariel. Great voice, great acting. If you were mad about her casting, eh, that's on you.
-Ryan Gosling Jr (not sure if that's his real name) did good as Eric. I was bored during his new solo song, but he and Ariel had great chemistry.
-Melissa McCarthy was great as Ursula. Dark horse "best supporting actress"? Maybe so.
-Poor Javier Bardem. King Triton was a shadow of his animated self. Which will be a common theme going forward.
-The one "live" animal that was better was Scuttle. They changed the bird to a her, and the voice actress, who is named for a hairspray?, was great. The kids have been singing the new Scuttlebutt song nonstop.
-Poor poor poor Sebastian and Flounder. Daveed Diggs was a good choice for the voice for the crab, but "live" version of both were so flat compared to their 2D originals.
-The UN casting...I just chuckled. I did find it interesting that they were specific enough to state that the black queen-led kingdom was a sugar cane island in the (assumed) 18th Century.... Is Disney about to tackle the highly complicated topic of black-owned slavery? Spoiler: they did not.
-The big-production songs in the animated version, Under the Sea and Kiss the Girl namely, were significantly more tame in the "live". Not nearly as fun.
-The new "Market Frolic" song was fun and colorful...but a direct ripoff of Aladdin.
-Overall, it was pretty, and had some high notes (welcome Ms Bailey), but it just wasn't a "fun" as the first. And expands on the highly problematic "ignore all the wise council to follow your teenaged heart and everything turns out great" theme that was certainly not the case in the H-C Andersen tale.