Middle-of-the-Sea Pixar Outing

Rating: 7/10 (27 June 2016)

Finding Nemo was a groundbreaking feast of state-of-the-art oceanic visuals and piercing emotions. With Dory, Pixar used 13 years of experience to take the animation even further, while slightly bogging down with overly familiar storytelling. Luckily, that familiarity is mostly forgiven. Through some smart retrofitting of our absent-minded protagonist, they've managed the difficult task of taking a comic-relief side-character and giving her pathos and passion (take note, Minions). Outside of Toy Story, Dory is the best Pixar sequel to date. We pick up one year after Nemo made it back home, with some distant memories of her parents conveniently creeping back into Dory's memory, leading her on a journey to find them. She is still the lovable short-term memory loss loser we grew to love, but director/writer Stanton takes her disease a much more seriously here. Surprisingly, the film has some really insightful things to say about dealing with mental illness, both for the individual and the people who care for them. This being a Pixar film, the tears flowed freely (i.e. an emotionally wrecking scene involving paths of shells). Not that this purely a dreary occasion; far from it. Dory is arguably one of the LOL funniest films in the Pixar cannon. Including an effective horror movie spoof in the form of a fish-touching pool, a perfect use of Louis Armstrong's "Wonderful World", and a hilarious use of Sigourney Weaver, it's filled with clever humor. If only that cleverness spread into the plotting a little more (Dory's memory loss is full of inconsistencies to further the story), this may be slightly more unforgettable. So while Dory's not top-tier Pixar, it's still solid family fare.