While not utterly terrible, Tom and Jerry left me feeling lukewarm.

By Scott Wood, Staff Writer and Artist

To be quite frank, my feelings toward the live-action Tom and Jerry reboot started off being very lukewarm. After watching it finally, I’m proud to say that I’m still lukewarm on this film. 

I was relieved to know that the comedy stays very visually based in Tom and Jerry, and the animation is excellent, using a 2D/3D blend reminiscent of Klaus. It’s important to note that these are not things that made me like the movie, but not completely hate it, if that makes sense (visually based comedy in a Tom and Jerry reboot does seem like a dead giveaway, after all). But this movie falls into the same pitfalls as every other live-action remake: boring real-life stories. And believe me, there are a LOT of those.

Some of these tiny boring plotlines include a couple getting married, a woman who cons her way into a high-ranking hotel position, the same woman’s relationship with a bartender, and many, many more stories I didn’t REALLY care about.  However, this is particularly odd because I didn’t really care about what happened to Tom and Jerry either, whose antics only work in a 15-minute time slot. This created a very tepid watch, which would’ve been downright tedious had I not worked on homework while watching it (Scorcese would be ashamed of me, I just know it). 

Some moments did brute-force a chuckle out of me, however, such as the once-in-a-blue-moon good dialogue (“How do I look?” “Good for a phone call”) and visual gags, but that was the only really notable part of Tom and Jerry, a film which is perfectly good for entertaining your kids while you do the dishes.