Following a bit of surgery that might have made “Dr Jekyll” proud, a police officer and his dog have been combined into the one formidable crime-fighting force determined to bring to book the evil menace that is “Petey” the stripey cat and criminal mastermind. No matter how many times he is captured, he still manages to escape - much to the chagrin of the police chief and the mayor! His latest scheme involves cloning but what he gets is a disappointingly timid, perhaps even decent, smaller version of himself who just wants to be his son! Essentially, “Lil’ Petey” is abandoned, but luckily taken in by the kindly “Dog Man” and so after a dose of bonding, off we go on a slightly sentimental round of detective work whilst just about everyone falls in love with the tiny little kitten with an heart of gold. It’s actually quite good fun, this, with plenty going on for the adults as well as for the sprogs. A little bit of literary effort has gone into the script and the messages of family, loyalty, hope and of nobody being entirely irredeemable are presented obviously but not too cloyingly. The standard of the animation is engaging enough and it mixes sci-fi with some heartstring tugging quite amiably, too. You’ll almost certainly never remember it afterwards, and at ninety minutes it is too long, but it’s an easy, colourful and vibrant film to watch.

A must-watch

Dog Man definitely has its shortcomings. The story is weak, and the humor is 80% cringe and 20% spot-on hilarity. But those 20% easily make up for the other 80% if you don't hold a grudge and get too annoyed.

Add to this the absolutely beautiful art direction. This world I wanna live in. It's my new favorite style. I could watch it all day long. The Coraline world was stunning, and The Nightmare Before Christmas' was beautiful if also scary and deliberately ugly. Dog Man's art is the best. Ever. We need a video game set in this world, like stat! And we need a Dog Man 2, with tighter writing and better jokes.

I was also a bit disappointed with Petey's voice actor. Dog Man was great, the chief was fantastic, Rickey Gervais as Flippy was perfect, but Big Pete? It should've been someone with more presence and villain quality, like Sylvester Stallone or something.

The movie was also very sweet and enormously kid-friendly. I think any kid anywhere will love watching this movie. I'll watch it again, for sure, perhaps with my niece 😊

Watch it!