Cute movie, but yes, essentially a ripoff...

Rating: 5/10 (31 July 2015)

Sorry, those who so vehemently protest that "Big Hero 6" was not a ripoff of "How to Train Your Dragon" -- in its core plot elements, it is. "Big Hero 6" is cute, no doubt, but the central elements -- the oddball but talented boy who has suffered loss and finds redemption in a creature or creation that is essentially innocent, but devoted to him, and who then forms a team of similarly young misfits who will use their individual talents to save their respective worlds from destruction at the hands of an angry super-creature whose motives are sympathetic but who has lost sight of those motives, or anything else but the desire to rule all he sees and inflict punishment -- well, that's really enough, although there's far, far more. I don't know why Lasseter didn't see it: moving the story to the world of high tech instead of the Middle Ages really doesn't change the basic elements. It's like updating Shakespeare or opera productions: "Big Hero Six" is interesting and fun, but does it have the heart and heartbreak of "How to Train Your Dragon? Not by a long shot. They should have really caught the similarities and changed them and made the story and the movie their own. Bad move.