*As always

Who does not love Dora? This lovable little girl has been on our screens for almost 20 years now! It even created a spin off for her cousin called Go, Diego, Go!

She has taught multiple generations geography, zoology, and Spanish! Now Dora, her cousin Diego, and her monkey Boots are on a new live action adventure in the theaters. The Dora universe is clearly thriving.

I sat down to watch Dora and I just had a smile on my face for most of the movie. Mainly, because I am seeing director James Bobin take me on an adventure with all pieces from my favorite adventure movies. One minute were in Raiders of the Lost Ark, next we are in Jumanji, a little stop off at Tarzan and finally of course National Treasure. Now, it is 2019 and there have been thousands of movies made so of course you will always see elements of older movies in new movies. However, these moments in Dora felt like homages rather than rip offs and I felt it worked very well.

This movie starts with Dora being sent to the city by her parents because they are going to try and find the Lost City of Parapata (more on the worst parents of all time later). In the City she has trouble fitting in with Diego and his friends, but that changes when her and her friends are kidnapped and sent back to the jungle. From there the hunt is on to find her family and find the Lost City  before getting killed by mercenaries. As I said above, pretty standard adventure movie tropes here, however the execution to seamlessly make this a kids movie and adult movie was really the achievement here.

James Bobin seems to be in that lane right now where he made 2 Muppet movies and the Alice in Wonderland sequel. None of those were that well received but he seems to be getting better at his craft. The music choices, the animated hallucinations, and quick pacing all helped move this movie along for a fun and quality flick.

Stock Watch

Stock Up – Isabelle Moner is only 18 years old but she has had some big time roles already. Transformers 5 (I know LOL), Sicario 2, Instant Family, and now her major starring role in this. She is very funny, and has some singing talent as well, so clearly there is a bright future ahead of her. I thought her whole Dora schtick was amazing and was as quirky and weird as she was compelling and heartwarming.

Stock Down – Eva Longoria and Michael Pena were the worst parents of all time in this movie. Did they even love their daughter, who knows? They just left her for no reason to be honest and then at the end were just like “we are leaving again, but oh yeah you can come too if you want.” All the way out on their characters in this movie.

*A couple other tidbits

• The Old Lady transforming into the Queen really just made no sense.
• Diego really was douchey as hell from the moment Dora stepped down into the City.
• Nicholas Coombe did some incredible work playing Randy who’s about 8 years younger than his real age.

At the end of the day this is a fun adventure movie for kids, and I think it does exactly what it needs to in order to fill that genre.

Juice Rating:

*You can find all my Movie Ratings here.