Nice but not quite there

Rating: 4/10 (22 July 2019)

The visual effects are great with this one. At some point it does feel like you're basically just watching a nature documentary, that's good in terms of the visual department but bad when it comes to the story. This adaptation doesn't live up to the 1994 classic.
While the casting was great, with the exception of Scar - feel like in this one, Scar lost what made him a memorable character and just became the typical "bad guy doing bad guy things" and who evidently can't sing his iconic villain song; this was probably the most disappointing part of this film. There wasn't as much as an emotional impact as it's predecessor.
Prior to seeing the film I had read the complaints about the cgi animals looking emotionless and at the time felt that it wouldn't be that big of a deal, boy was I wrong. That really took away from some of the most powerful parts of this film (i.e: Mufasa's death and when his soul visits Simba by the river) the emotional impact was missing. At the end of it all, you're left feeling empty, really.
I liked the casting for Timon and Pumba, these two worked wonderfully and made me laugh. The same for the two hyenas as well, they were enjoyable. Rafiki was good too, as well as the two young actors who brought young Simba and young Nala back to life. Still, it wasn't enough to let this production shine as bright as the animated version. It's not that bad of an adaptation but it's definitely not great either. It's definitely just a nostalgic cash grab, they would have been fine just re-releasing the original into theaters again. In fact they would have been better off doing that.