{"id":475440,"date":"2026-02-12T16:40:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T16:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/475440\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T16:40:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T16:40:11","slug":"stephen-currys-animated-basketball-movie-goat-is-a-disappointing-air-ball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/475440\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen Curry\u2019s animated basketball movie \u2018GOAT\u2019 is a disappointing air ball"},"content":{"rendered":"

You\u2019d expect an animated basketball movie with four-time NBA champion Stephen Curry<\/a> in the producer\u2019s chair to be an easy lay-up. So why is \u201cGOAT\u201d such a brick?<\/p>\n

Despite a wondrously textured, kinetic world and some interesting oddball characters, the movie is undone by a predictable, saccharine script. It\u2019s as easy to see the steps coming as a Curry three-pointer arching into the net.<\/p>\n

The movie has the kind of lazy, thin writing that feels like it all could have derived from a boozy Hollywood happy hour gettogether: \u201cBro, bro. Wait. What if the GOAT was an actual goat?\u201d<\/p>\n

It centers on Will Harris, a goat with dreams of becoming a great baller, voiced by \u201cStranger Things\u201d star Caleb McLaughlin.<\/a> Undersized and an orphan \u2014 again with the orphans, guys? \u2014 Will is a delivery driver for a diner and late on his rent. He\u2019s a great outside shooter but a liability in the paint, unless he learns, that is.<\/p>\n

He lives in Vineland \u2014 a hectic urban landscape with graffiti and living vines that choke the playgrounds \u2014 and is a rabid supporter of the local franchise, the Thorns. His idol is veteran Jett Fillmore, a leopard who\u2019s the league\u2019s all-time leading scorer, nicely voiced by Gabrielle Union.<\/a> The Thorns are a bit of a mess, despite Jett\u2019s brilliance.<\/p>\n

The game here is called roarball, a high-intensity, co-ed, multi-animal, full-contact sport derived from basketball with a hollow ball that has small holes. It\u2019s a \u201cMad Max\u201d sport \u2014 ultraviolent, unofficiated and the dangers lurk not just from the beefy opponents but from the arena itself. The championship award is called the Claw.<\/p>\n

The best part of the movie may be the environments for the other arenas \u2014 lava in one, a swamp with stalagmites and stalactites in another, plus an ice-bound one and another with desert sandstorms and rocks. Homefield advantage is a big thing in this league.<\/p>\n

There seem to be only two kinds of points scored here \u2014 blazing windmills, cutting tomahawks and spectacular alley-oop dunks or slow-mo threes from so far downtown they might as well be in a different zip code. No mid-range jumpers, bro.<\/p>\n

This universe is divided into \u201cbigs\u201d and \u201csmalls\u201d \u2014 rhinos, bears and giraffes on one side, gerbils and capybara on the other \u2014 and Will is deemed a small. \u201cSmalls can\u2019t ball,\u201d he is told, condescendingly.<\/p>\n

But Will \u2014 thanks to a viral video \u2014 improbably gets signed to the Thorns by the team\u2019s owner (a cynical warthog voiced wonderfully by Jenifer Lewis). It\u2019s seen as a shameless publicity stunt that no one wants, especially Jett, who needs a winning season after being taunted by \u201cAll stats, no Claw.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, predictably, in Aaron Buchsbaum and Teddy Riley script, comes the bulk of the movie, giving a steady \u201cThe Karate Kid\u201d or \u201cAir Bud\u201d vibe as it charts Will\u2019s steady rise to honored teammate and franchise future, despite Jett insisting she\u2019s not ready to go: \u201cI\u2019m the GOAT. I\u2019m not passing the torch.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lessons are good \u2014 the importance of teamwork and believing in yourself \u2014 but the testosterone-fueled violence on the courts is WWE extreme. There are unnecessary plugs for Mercedes and Under Armor, and hollow slogans like \u201cDream big\u201d and \u201cRoots run deep.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of the most interesting characters end up on the Thorns, a fragile, somewhat broken team that includes a rhino (voiced by David Harbour), a delicate ostrich (Nicola Coughlan), a gonzo Komodo dragon (Nick Kroll) and a desultory giraffe (Curry).<\/p>\n

The Komodo dragon, named Modo, is the best of the bunch, an insane, unpredictable creature full of electricity. \u201cIf Modo was any more of a snack, he\u2019d eat himself,\u201d he declares. Could he get his own movie?<\/p>\n

Directed by \u201cBob\u2019s Burgers\u201d veteran Tyree Dillihay and Adam Rosette, \u201cGOAT\u201d is targeted to Gen Alpha, leveraging cellphone screens and online likes, virality and diss tracks. It\u2019s not as funny as it thinks it is and tiresome in its overly familiar redemption arc.<\/p>\n

Another potential basketball GOAT \u2014 Michael Jordan<\/a> \u2014 gave us a clunker of a live-action- animated basketball movie in \u201cSpace Jam\u201d exactly 30 years ago and \u201cGOAT,\u201d while not as bad as that mess, is an air ball none the same.<\/p>\n

\u201cGoat,\u201d a Sony Pictures Animation release in theaters Friday, is rated PG by the Motion Picture Association for some rude humor and brief mild language. Running time: 100 minutes. One and a half stars out of four.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You\u2019d expect an animated basketball movie with four-time NBA champion Stephen Curry in the producer\u2019s chair to be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":475441,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-475440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=475440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475440\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/475441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=475440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=475440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=475440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}