Peter Pan Return to Neverland

This is a great kids movie - was it really made by Disney?
I have three children - ages 6, 4 and 2. I will be reviewing this movie from their perspective, not that of an adults. They really enjoyed the movie. Since they are not professional cartoonist, they did not care about the quality of the drawings. If anything, the 'old style' cartoon movie (similar to the first Peter Pan) kept the feel of the first movie. If they had used too many computer graphics, it would not have flowed well from the first movie. My children also liked the story. It was exciting, but not scary - even for the youngest. Each of the characters was reasonably developed, although Jane is the focus of the movie. She is Wendy's daughter, and Peter gets a supporting role in the plot. Hook is back and is mean without being frightening. Even the octopus, Hook's tormentor, is pretty tame. As for the quality of the music, my kids liked it and even asked for the soundtrack. (It is OK, but mostly instrumental takes from the movie. There are three good songs on it...

I thought this would be junky...
...but it is actually very nice! I usually hate Disney sequels because they are cheesy and ruin the first film. We usually stay away from movies that say on the cover, "All new feature-length adventure", because that's a sure sign of a cheapo sequel. That's what I was expecting when we got this movie, but I was impressed with the computer animation, the soundtrack and with the way Disney tried hard to get actors that sounded very much like the ones in the first movie. The one thing I didn't like though was the lack of indians! They didn't even mention the word "indian". Sure, they showed the camp, but it was as empty as a ghost town. Oh well.
This is a good movie for the younger group, although the adults will probably enjoy it as well.

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There have been numerous Peter Pan movies, several of which take place AFTER the original story ("Hook" being the best rendition so far). However, Disney, with it's Direct to video roll, for some odd reason, decided to put this one on the big screen!

As an animator myself i can honestly say that this is far below disney's usual standard. The animaton is stiff and akward. The voices of the characters are not even remotely close to the original (especially the lost boys) and Peter Pan himself comes across as nothing more than a brat without his charm that has made him such a beloved icon.

Disney is also 'getting with the times' and instead of confrunting and trying to debunk the horrible stereotyped "injuns," the indian camp looks more like they were wiped out and aren't even mentioned in the movie, just to be safe.

As for the story, it had a lot going for it. The material was all there, it's just a shame the writers just took whatever came by first. Jane is non-empathetic, and...

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