Kung Fu Panda 4 2024

It was already clear with Kung Fu Panda 3 they'd run out of story to tell, but now they've also run out of visual ideas. There's a general cheapness and disposability to this not found with previous installments. I rewatched the original trilogy not too long ago and I'd argue 2 & 3 are way stronger visually (both in terms of technical execution and imagination). Even the sound mix seems more than a little wonky to me (voices are generally too low in the mix; cheap echo effects pop up everywhere). Doesn't this all feel a little underbudgeted to anyone else? I understand cutting out the Furious Five for budgetary concerns, but bringing in Awkwafina instead isn't much of a creative fix. The story, which has never been a real strength of this series, doesn't leave much of an impression either. I doubt even the target audience will get much out of it with all the poor comedy, underdeveloped new characters and lack of interesting twists. The whole film feels straightforward to a fault and it's forgettable because of that. I still remember bits and pieces from the original trilogy and I just know that's never going to happen with this one. It’s still a small step above the best Illumination films, but very disappointing overall.

3.5/10

Jack Black delivers in his role as Po as usual, with some great animation and solid jokes, funny moments, and the usual beautiful visuals. However, it couldn't make up for how much it lacked as far as pacing and finding its own footing as a story.

Following up from the 3rd movie this one really struggled to find its footing especially since the third film felt like a really solid conclusion. The story felt incredibly out of place and the main plot point of Po finding a successor really didn't help. Given that he is still in his prime, and despite the fact that Oogway didn't pick a successor until he was well beyond his prime (or possibly just super old in his case), made the dragon warrior cycle feel incredibly less of an epic, long lasting journey, and more of a temporary position. This alone being introduced so early in the film just makes you ask, why?

The fact that the Furious Five are no where to be found in this film hint that this might've been more of a rushed cash grabbing fan service, which is disappointing.

If this is to serve as the conclusion of Po's story and saga as Dragon Warrior, you are better off stopping at Kung Fu Panda 3. I give Kung Fu Panda 4 a 4/10.

I don't have a great recollection of the 2nd and 3rd films, but I still feel comfortable saying that this is the weakest of the bunch. Based on reporting, the budget for this entry was significantly reduced compared to the previous films ($85M vs $135/$150/$145), and you can tell. The animation is noticeably less detailed and the absence of the furious 5 was almost certainly a cost cutting measure. However, the lower budget isn't what drags the film down. In fact, I think it makes sense to push back against bloated animation budgets. Do we really think the primarily younger audiences are going to care about the graphical fidelity of the animal fur or how realistic the water simulations are? I think studios are realizing that there are diminishing (perhaps even zero) returns at higher budgets. While I couldn't find any reported numbers, I expect that animation budget for Adam Sandler's recent Netflix film, Leo, was comparatively low, as they leveraged a stylized/simplistic style that still allowed for all sorts of visual creativity. The point being, creative and engaging visuals don't need to be expensive and ultimately it's the story/characters that do the heavy lifting. Unfortunately, that's where this film disappoints. The story is incredibly rushed, at some points feeling like they cut entire sequences (e.g., when Zhen gives Po a cryptic quote about footprints, we cut to him following foot prints through the snow, and then we cut back to Zhen following up on the cryptic quote. The movie feels like it's going through the motions, relying heavily on call back material in lieu of anything more original.

This movie feels out of time and out of step when the Kung Fu Panda series in its day was one of the freshest and exciting movies in the CGI scene. Kung Fu Panda 3 could come out today and visually many of its sequences could stand with today’s movies, and Kung Fu Panda 2’s have enough artistry to still stand up. There’s neither of those things here, or even Kung Fu Panda 1’s stellar execution of a basic hero’s journey. 4 is formulaic with no spark, and the things that made KFP stand out are sanded down.

The Furious Five are functionally absent, most keenly felt with Tigress and the understated bond she had with Po that buoyed 2 and 3, and when the plot is about a new Dragon Warrior them not even being candidates is a bit glaring. They’re replaced with Awkafina’s Zhen, and her performance is Awkaward. She rarely improves a movie, and this is no exception. There’s no energy or commitment to her performance. Jack Black is fine, but the script for Po is entirely rote and beat by beat. The whole script is like that. There’s no surprises and no killer lines, no big laughs. It’s feels exactly like a fourth movie produced years after a finished trilogy in stakes and tone and energy.

The Chameleon has nothing to her. Viola Davis does her able best, but her big establishing moment is throwing a guy down some stairs? Non lethally? There’s no hook to her. Tai Lung had the tragic fall and relationship with Shifu (who is purely perfunctory here with no moments of heart or depth to soften him or make him more realized). Chen had his ambition, his fear of the prophecy, and his self destruction by refusing every chance to let go of his hate and power. Kai had his relationship with Oogway and tie to the spirit realm. The Chameleon has… kung fu masters being mean to her? And the thing is that could really work if played right! A dark mirror of Po in the first movie, locked out of something they love for not being the right ‘type’, that longing turned to bitterness. But the Chameleon doesn’t really get that space to be an ex ultra fan or anything. And her relationship with Zhen is just as underplayed and flat.

And speaking of the previous villains, Tai Lung’s arc does not hit at all. It’s not given the time to be believable. So imagine how flat it is when Kai and Chen bow respectfully to Po after having no lines in the movie at all. With context of the previous movies the moments aren’t believable. Without it, they mean nothing at all. The action scenes are serviceable but nothing exciting, and compared to KFP3’s radiant and vibrant spirit world sequences and style, this one’s visual identity is. Action lines? For some reason? Even swings like a shilouetted fight in the fog are so flat.

Hong is as endearing as ever, and Cranston is a treat, and they have a fun gay dad’s dynamic, but it’s not enough. I’d give it a 2.5 as a completely mediocre kids movie, but the kids I saw it with didn’t even like it that much! There were no big laughs or gasps or anything. It’s not even a funny movie. If you’ve lost the kids, you’ve lost everything. I don’t especially have faith they’ll turn it around with Zhen as the next generation, either. Maybe it’s time to just let Kung Fu Panda take the next step into memory.

This afternoon, my husband and I took our four-year-old nephew on a Guncle Movie Day, filled with popcorn, gummies, and a stop at the donut shop afterwards, as promised. On the way out of the theater, with a vocabulary fueled by one of Illumination’s trailers, our nephew offered his review:

“That movie was despicable. I never want to see it again.”

While even I am not so harsh a critic, I can’t deny that he’s on to something.

Over the past week, I had the pleasure of catching up on this series of animated films for the first time. Released from 2008 to 2016, they vary in their degrees of success, but there’s a heart that ties a through line across them. Eight years ago, the third movie was undoubtedly planned to be the finale, wrapping up a trilogy of family trauma, self-discovery, and belief in one’s self. Now, the franchise has returned from the Spirit Realm with a hollow, heartless 90 minutes that feels like little more than a cash grab.

Master Shifu (Dustin Hoffman) has decided: Po (Jack Black), our beloved panda and Dragon Warrior, is to become the spiritual leader of Peace Valley. He must pass down his mantle of “Dragon Warrior” to a successor of his choosing; Po has a difficult time with accepting this change. All the while, a witch chameleon (known only as “The Chameleon”, voiced by Viola Davis) with shapeshifting abilities and non-existent motivation is bent on collecting the kung fu abilities of masters from the Spirit Realm to use in her conquest of China. The catch? She needs Po’s Staff of Wisdom to do it. Teaming up with newcomer fox Zhen (Awkwafina), Po sets out to stop The Chameleon.

Animation has jumped leagues in the near-decade since the last Kung Fu Panda movie, and it’s visible all over the screen. There’s a depth of field to many shots that didn’t exist previously, and a fluidity to the character movement (particularly The Chameleon) that’s really impressive. The environments are also much more ambitious, this time around bringing us to a massive, bustling city (that, in a running joke, has never heard of Po or the Dragon Warrior). The Chameleon herself is an interesting visual feat as well, changing shape and size frequently and, when necessary, in a pretty frightening manner. The production makes a smart choice of keeping her scales in the texture of whatever character’s skin she is in, making identification easier for audiences.

Unfortunately, both The Chameleon and the film itself are lots of fun to look at, but fail to thrill otherwise. Where Po’s previous nemeses were driven by relationships and paranoia, our villain this time around simply sets her eyes on world domination for the heck of it. Similarly, Po’s personal journey of growth has fallen completely by the wayside to allow for the inclusion of a bland new protagonist, Zhen, voiced by an underwhelmed Awkwafina. Ian McShane turns up to briefly voice Tai Lung, along with James Hong and Brian Cranston as Po’s dads (long story), but other than that, there is an absolutely deafening silence from the stars that previously voiced the Furious Five. Though their absence is quickly explained away, it reads glaringly as both a lack of belief in the material and as a cost-cutting measure.

Po’s arc had been completed; through discovering where he belonged in the world and who he belonged with, he unlocked his own true potential for kung fu mastery. Here, he’s predominantly been dragged back out to facilitate the introduction of what’s positioned to be the new headliner for the foreseeable future.

Don’t be too surprised when we get Kung Fu Fox in a few years.