Sony’s Emoji Movie is ☠️ on arrival, according to critics, who have given it a resounding ?.
It sounded like the worst idea in the world. And — you guessed it — the Emoji Movie is indeed terrible, if critics are to be believed.
Despite vague hopes that the Tony Leondis-directed animated movie might actually pull a Boss Baby and surprise us, The Hollywood Reporter‘s John DeFore has deemed it “a very, very dumb thing” that “offers nearly nothing” to audiences, though he allows that the pace and colors might appeal to small children.
But not so fast! Over at The Guardian, Charles Bramesci flat-out declares that “children should not be allowed to watch” The Emoji Movie, calling it “a force of insidious evil,” and Alex Welch at IGN cautions that despite hints of a worthwhile plot, “its inability to deliver emotionally or thematically keeps it from ever feeling like a worthwhile experience.”
Similarly, Vulture‘s Emily Yoshida calls the movie “one of the darkest, most dismaying films I have ever seen,” rife with product placement and soullessness, any moral message “drowned out by the wall-to-wall cynicism that is The Emoji Movie’s entire reason for existing in the first place.”
The New York Post‘s Johnny Oleksinski goes so far as to proclaim this movie the beginning of the “end of the world,” opening his review with a bitter, “please restore my eyes to factory settings.”
Glenn Kenny of the New York Times calls The Emoji Movie “nakedly idiotic,” and Vadim Rizov at the A.V. Club confirms the movie’s reason for existing: “The dialogue invites viewers to marvel at all the wonderful things they can buy or subscribe to … [the movie] appears to only want teenagers plugged into their smartphones and constantly consuming.”
Slightly more forgiving, Forbes‘ Scott Meldelson gives it an ? verdict, writing:
“There are hints of a more poignant movie, hints of a rather upfront metaphor for young gay kids coming out of the closet, but they get trampled over by conventional plotting that almost seems designed to bury its subtext. I’d be lying if I argued that The Emoji Movie is unheard-of cinematic abomination. It’s visually spry, occasionally clever and relatively harmless. Yet it feels afraid of going where it wants to go.”
On Rotten Tomatoes, it has a stunning 0% critics’ rating right now, which really says it all. ?
The Emoji Movie might still be able to reel in a respectable box office count due to its surprisingly stellar cast, which counts T.J. Miller, James Corden and Anna Faris, with Sir Patrick Stewart in the role of poop.