Bob’s Burgers: The Movie
This animated offshoot feels like an extended TV episode, rather than a cinematic experience.
The Belchers are having restaurant troubles, with the bank about to foreclose on them. With only a week for Bob (H. Jon Benjamin) and Louise (Kristen Schaal) to pull together the cash, their hopes are scattered when a giant sinkhole opens in front of their store. The sinkhole reveals a dead body, whose murder is attributed to Calvin Fischoeder (Kevin Kline). Convinced that saving Calvin, and revealing the real killer of the long dead carnie, will buy their parents time, Tina (Dan Mintz), Linda (John Roberts) and Gene (Eugene Mirman) ditch school and go on the hunt for clues; but their search pulls them into the path of danger.
Off the bat, I should say that I have never watched the television show this film is based on. While for the first fifteen or twenty minutes, that definitely impacted the viewing experience as I worked overtime to catch up with the world (with questions like who are these people, why is one of the characters wearing ears/does she actually have ears, and where is this story going percolating in my mind), for the most part that didn’t really matter. Once the film gets going, it is easy enough to slip into a gentle understanding of the piece and the story that makes the watching go by just fine.
From a story perspective, this feels very much like something that has been vaguely done in TV shows a million times before. There’s nothing overly dramatic, not too much danger, and next to no stakes. The plot is certainly there, but it’s a TV plot - present, enjoyable, but not must see.
The film is undoubtedly humorous, even for the casual passerby with the content, and the dry witty observations, and Drax-like obstinate literalism of Gene certainly hits the spot in terms of laughs, with quite a few emanating from him. It’s wry smile humour, rather than laugh-out-loud belly laughs, but that is OK too.
Ultimately, the whole piece begs for a TV audience and a Netflix or other streaming service release. It’s sort of strange these days to see an animated TV series turned into a movie for the big screen. Even back in the day, it felt odd when The Simpsons did it. Now, with the advent of streaming services and with so much content going there instead of to cinemas, it is shocking that this made it to screens. I’ll leave the argument of whether it deserves to be on screens, and whether the fact it hit cinemas is commendable, for another time. Fundamentally, this feels like a TV experience; fun, fleeting, utterly missable, but also perfectly fine entertainment if you find yourself watching it.
