OUR MOVIE REVIEW:

As the latest victim of the plague of live action remakes, Peter Pan & Wendy is Disney’s carbon copy of Universal’s 2003 live action Peter Pan for their catalog. Although I was pretty excited for this one, it doesn’t do much to solidify itself as anything more than just additional streaming service content fluff.

My hope was for Peter Pan & Wendy to offer something a little more than the same story audiences know by now, while maintaining the wonderful whimsy. What we end up with is a shoulder-shrug re-telling with some mild backstory tacked on to certain characters. On paper it sounds kinda neat, but the little extra story we get didn’t move me the way the film intended. 

The overall visual palette feels entirely washed out, giving a somber mood to what should feel magical and alive. If it weren’t for the occasional pixie dust, you’d be forgiven for thinking you were on Depression Isle rather than Neverland.

I must say though, that these kids acted with their entire hearts. I loved every one of their performances, even though they had lackluster dialogue and direction to work with. 

Maybe I’ve just lost some of my own magical spark that comes with age, or maybe it’s just another one of Disney’s feeble attempts to capitalize on nostalgia while beefing up their catalog to add to the background noise of modern children’s programming. The entire point of the original story is to accept the fact you have to grow up, but to not forget what it’s like to feel the magic you felt when you were a kid. This film just doesn’t do that in the way it so badly wants to. For me, and I hate to be that person, I’m going to stick to the 2003 version.