Wish is the latest Disney movie to celebrate its 100-year anniversary. The initial teaser intrigued me but the latest trailer put me in a more cautious state to see this movie. It wasn’t one I was itching to see but I took one of my kids to see it and while I have some issues with it, we still had a good time.
One item I overlooked was that this movie was meant more to be a nod to the past 100 years of Disney vs. an original movie. We’ve seen this countless times over the past few years with numerous reboots or sequels from big IPs. This is what, for me, really hurt Wish.
The core of this story is based on “Wish Upon a Star”. The story takes place in the land of Rosas who is ruled by King Magnifico (Chris Pine). He’s educated and trained himself to be a powerful sorcerer with the ability to grant wishes. Asha (Ariana DeBose) is our main character who is in line to become the new apprentice for King Magnifico. She’s sharp and cares deeply for her family and others. The rumor is whoever becomes the apprentice for the king will have their wish granted along with their family’s wishes, which is the driving force for our main character. This setup is great, but everything that follows ends up getting bogged down with generic songs and numerous easter eggs.
While the songs are okay, none have that spark to them to make me feel they’ll become a hit like past music from Disney movies (We all remember the virality of Frozen, right). This could be due to Disney hiring a pop songwriter (Julia Michaels) for these vs. any of the past writers who have the experience of landing those Disney classic staples.
The art style is what I love the most with Wish. You get a lovely mixture of classic hand-drawn styles with newer computer animation. I found it was done quite well & this is what kept me glued to each scene.
The plot, while simple, does a good job of landing the message in the end by teaching everyone to keep destiny in their own hands and go after their dreams. The easter eggs throughout, while fun at times, became a big distraction for me and would take away from the story.
All-in-all, it’s a fine Disney movie with a good enough story and some enjoyable characters to watch, but not one I’d jump to revisit anytime soon. I do hope we get more original movies in the coming years as in the past few I have quite enjoyed. At the end of the day though, I loved getting to spend time with my son and hear his little laugh as we made memories together of seeing Asha take on King Malifico.
Wish is currently playing in theaters.
Rating: 2.5/5
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