At one point in the movie they were facing the firewall. It was a pit bull song where it says "Im a fireball" when it clearly should've been 'Im a firewall'.

Overall the movie was 'meh'.

I tried. I really did. I went in with an open mind. "This could still be like The Lego Movie," I told myself. "Just give it a chance."

Turns out we were right all along.

The Emoji Movie, from Sony Pictures Animation, was written and directed by Anthony Leondis. Eric Siegel and Mike White joined as co-writers. To these men I ask, what compelled you to birth this? The Emoji Movie is a grating movie. It gives us characters flatter than actual emojis, and replaces world-building with ads!

The movie opens at a schoolyard where human teenager, Alex (Jake T. Austin), receives a text from a girl he has a crush on. As he tries to formulate a reply, we zoom in to his phone to see the city of Textopolis. In this world, each emoji has to be their one "thing" their whole life. Crying emojis need to always be sad, laughing emojis need to always be happy, and so on. We're then introduced to Gene, voiced by T.J. Miller, who's supposed to be a "Meh" emoji. The problem is, he doesn't seem able to control his expressions, and his first day on the job he messes up everything. The head of the texting department, Smiler (Maya Rudolph), holds a meeting where it's decided he should be deleted. Gene then tries to escape, running into Hi-5 (James Corden). Together, they decide to find a famous hacker named Jailbreak. (Anna Faris) She can take them to the Internet and reprogram Gene's code to make him normal again. It's a race against time though, because if it's not fixed, then Alex will erase his phone.

So, I do want to start with what I did like about the movie. The animators did their jobs well. When Textopolis is introduced, there's a lot going on in the background. Movements look good and smooth enough. The designs leave much to be desired though. Most of the background characters are just their respective emojis with little dot eyes and arms and legs attached. For what they were given to work with though, the animators did a good job at capturing movement. I also found a couple of good gags. The old-fashioned emoticons (like ":)") were depicted as the elderly citizens of the world, which I found clever. Other than that… there was little else.

Now, for what you probably came here for. To start from the top: the setup of this entire movie is ridiculous! Apparently, it all starts when a human selects an emoji from their touchscreen. The order is sent down to a massive complex where there's a huge finger-shaped scanner. All the emoji citizens line up in their little boxes. If they are chosen, the scanner then takes a snapshot of them. That picture is then sent up to appear in the text box. It's such a round-about way to send emojis!

There's also the world they live in. Gene has two parents, and it is revealed in the movie that he inherited his multi-facial malfunction from his father who had hidden it all these years. Does that mean emojis have children? It's Gene's first day on the job. Does that mean his father is retiring? Do emojis age and then die? Did Gene have to qualify for the job? There's so little explanation here that it leaves me more confused than anything else.

And then there's the world outside Textopolis. We peek into different apps where activity is going on. When Gene and his allies jump into them to do stuff though, the app suddenly opens on Alex's phone causing disruptions. But why did the other apps humming with activity not cause any disruptions? Also, they say they have to go through different apps to reach their destination. It very clearly shows, though, that they can simply walk around them! Sure, you could say the anti-virus robots would get them… but the robots find them inside the apps anyways. Just save time and make a break for it!

Now, getting down into the "characters". First of all, the dialogue in the movie is badly written and badly delivered. No high schooler actually says to another, "Play it cool, just send her an emoji." The poor delivery only trims any potential impact the decent lines have. As for the characters themselves, they're all really bland. Gene says he wants to fit in, but he can't due to his varied expressions. Later in the movie though, it shows that he can change them just fine! Hi-5 is flat-out obnoxious: think Animal House-style frat bro.

And then there's Jailbreak. T.J. Miller has stated before that he believes this movie sends "a feminist agenda, but not in a preachy way." Well, he's wrong on both counts. Of the few "feminist" things Jailbreak says, they're so out-of-place that they come across as annoying. For example, as she explains the way to the cloud, Gene ends up finishing her sentence in excitement. She immediately reprimands him, saying "Men are always taking credit for women's ideas!" Now that's a pretty solid point, but… he was just excited about what she was saying. He didn't try to steal her idea at all.

Not to mention, after being built up to be a "strong female character"... she ends up falling in love with Gene. She abandons her dream to be free in the cloud so she can come back home and be his princess, complete with a princess costume. For a movie touted to have such feminist ideas, I don't see very many here.

Which brings me to the romances...

~TRUNCATED FOR LENGTH. READ THE WHOLE REVIEW ON GOULDTHORPECREATES.TUMBLR.COM~

'The Emoji Movie" is a new children's film. One of the posters for it has a picture of whipped poop on the front of it. Was there a focus group done that says kids really want this?

This masterpiece takes place inside of some kid's i-phone in a place called Textopolis. Gene is a Meh emoji who just wants to cut loose and show a whole range of emotions, which apparently counts as a malfunction and gets him scheduled for deletion.

Now before you think i'm just going to crap on this movie, know that it is kind of fun for a certain age.

These killer robots chase Gene and two of his buddies around which always keeps things fast-paced, there's all sorts of promotional tie-ins with Candy Crush, Instagram, and Spotify that while cheap product placement, also are kinda funny and exciting.

Like all kids movies nowadays with fairly weak scripts, there's also a soundtrack filled with dance songs that should have kids dancing in the aisles, and guess what, it's not just stuff from your kids generation but some from yours too.

Take the stuff that's for you where you can cause a lot of the jokes are either literal bores (Internet trolls are trolls, etc.) or center a lot on cartoons having overly cartoony personalities. There's an overly smiley emoji who borders on the psychotic, joyless Meh emojis. This stuff is kinda funny, but the joke is thin.

Then there's the stuff you should expect already going in. Like the jokes centered on the poop emoji, or the Hi-Five emoji saying "talk to the hand." Does anyone say this anymore? It's amazing this movie was co-written by Mike White, writer of "School of Rock" and Jennifer Aniston's "The Good Girl".

It's sporadically funny and you can tell it's trying be a kind of "Wreck It-Ralph" meets "Inside Out" but it's not really inventive enough to be either.

The kid whose phone this is never really becomes much of a character and probably the funniest part of this movie is that among a plethora of other scattered and unsubtle messages about including everyone and real friends are better than online ones, this also comes with a message of "be yourself" told primarily through emojis who want to be more than themselves.

Lastly, and for the love of God I hope this was meant as a joke, there are scenes where the emoji is given way too much credit in the scope of love and life in this film. If this is true then it really does go all the way down from here folks.

But that's "The Emoji Movie" in a nutshell. You'll laugh in parts, wanna reach over and tell your kids movies used to be so much better than this in others, and finally, just want to weep for the future.

If you liked this, please check out Craig James Review on Youtube for more.