Everyone’s favourite cartoon character is back and he’s brought the gang along. As bumbling Officer Dibble fails to keep Top Cat and the gang at bay, someone else is brought in to do the job. The new police chief is a technology maniac and decides to replace the entire police force with robots. With T.C. in doggy prison and Officer Dibble off the block will the gang survive or will this be the end of T.C. and his mafia style mates?
I loved Top Cat and the gang when growing up, watching them in the morning before school. So when I heard they were bringing T.C. back I had to admit, I was rather looking forward to it. The result though was not all that I had hoped for.
The main problem I found was the fact it was in 3D, as most films are these days. The film was using a 2D effect which I believe was used to attempt to keep the essence of the original cartoon. This I could agree with, this I actually liked, what I didn’t like was the fact they then endeavoured to release the film in 3D. The end result being the 3D effect being rendered almost ineffectual and when mixed with the 2D style caused confusion and a little nausea to myself and undoubtedly other members of the audience. I am not completely against 3D, just as long as it adds something to the film and unfortunately in this case, it didn’t.
I also felt the dialogue lacked speed and fluency, the pace was excruciatingly slow at some points and at others seemed to stop completely. I also noticed an almost complete lack of interaction and response from the children in the audience, which for a cartoon aimed at children is a huge miss. I notice the few laughs it did get was at the beginning, but as the film progressed the children seemed to completely disengage.
On the bright side however there were a few good points. Although I found the main majority of the jokes lacked any originality and substance, there were a few points which made me laugh. These were the few subtle jokes added in for the adults, but when I say a few I do mean a few. I was also happy they kept the original theme tune from the cartoon series at the beginning of the film, but unfortunately that was the highlight of the feature.
I do hate to give bad reviews but I just couldn’t find it in me to be positive about Top Cat. He was a beloved children’s character of mine of which I had such high hopes for. Little did I know those hopes were to be tarnished along with the good name of Top Cat himself. Sorry T.C., it’s nothing personal, but you should have remained on the small screen.
Written by Oliver Willis
