Movie Review: Dawn Treader

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Synopsis: Lucy and Edmund Pevensie return to Narnia with their cousin Eustace where they meet up with Prince Caspian for a trip across the sea aboard the royal ship The Dawn Treader. Along the way they encounter dragons, dwarves, merfolk, and a band of lost warriors before reaching the edge of the world.

I'm still a bit surprised this franchise isn't more popular than it is. The movies usually have very simple, straight-forward plots with good, fun characters and lots of action, and that's exactly what this one delivers once again. Perhaps it drags it's feet a bit at the start but once it gets moving in the 2nd half of it things are pretty exciting.

There's a new really annoying character introduced and for a while I thought the series had found it's Jar-Jar Binks, but an unexpected twist (by me at least, I didn't read any of the books) happens and he actually becomes one of the cooler characters of the franchise so far. The big final battle with a sea monster is as exciting as any film this year and the special effects are spectacular. Somehow the fight scenes are violent without being really violent. Got that? I mean they have sword fights and such but there's never any blood or limbs hacked off or that sort of stuff, it's more of a fun, sanitized, swashbuckling nature.

I think one of the things I like most about this series is that there's really something for everyone. For the small kids there's a talking mouse (well, large mouse) that wields a sword and teaches lessons of life. For the more mature kids there's a battle of some of the teen characters to overcome their inadequacies. For the adults there's more of a subplot of Christians values and overcoming. I think the movie is as simple or deep as one makes it. But on the surface, it's a simple plot with strong characters and plenty of excitement. Good enough for me.

7/10