I lost track of the Chinese Zodiac. Is it the Year of the Dog? It must be. Isle of Dogs, Dog Days, Sgt. Stubby, Show Dogs, Alpha, not to mention the litany of dogs from Samson to Gotti. All signs point to 2018 as the cinematic year of Fido Green Tomatoes, Malcolm Rex, and Hairy Spot-ter. Who’s a good movie year? Who’s a good movie year? Go fetch the stick. Whoops, I forgot. “Fetch” isn’t happening. Seriously, I think every studio in existence saw the 2017 melodramatic turd A Dog’s Purpose and decided, “I can cash in on that crap, too!” So everybody set out to make a dog movie and today, the dog is mechanical.
Basically, a government military contractor lost their expensive and pedigreed pet dog. And yet, for unknown reason, they proved really bad at getting it back. Look, dudes, if your dog ran away and you can’t find it, why didn’t you just put a poster on a bunch of telephone poles like everybody else? “LOST DOG. Looks like a metallic cougar. Answers to ‘A-X-L.’ He’s very sweet except for when you approach him with automatic rifles or rocket launchers. If found, dial 1011101100001100101011 and say, ‘the cobra redacts at midnight.’ Reward: $50 and a memory wipe.”
Like every local over-worked under-educated misunderstood motocross prodigy, Miles (Alex Neustaedter) is a hunky loner with a strong grasp of metallurgy and mechanics. Against none of the odds, he manages to attract the attention of Sara (Becky G). Sara has been left alone at the racetrack despite being the only female there. Apparently, when it comes to motocross, girls have cooties. Miles’ bike blows a chain in what appears to be a race that didn’t count (?!) and his brand new Tom Brady-lookin’ frenemy yanks his chain over getting a replacement. Sara takes time off from sketching distant self-portraits (that’s quite a talent, huh?) to give Miles what he needs. Naturally, Miles wins the “big” race and gets invited to the party where Tom Brady shows off his new flame thrower, a toy every teen should own. Tom don’t like the way Miles and Sara get along, so the following day, he makes sure his rival falls short of Miles 22 and leaves him for dead. This is one of those movie injuries, of course, where at first it looks like Miles has a collapsed lung or several broken ribs, but it turns out he just has a blood-colored rash on his neck.
This is when the cougar, er dog shows up. Aw, it looks like Miles has new friend in A-X-L, which stands for Attack Exploration Logistics; congrats fellas, not only can you not spell, your acronym doesn’t work on any level; it sounds like you flipped open a dictionary a few times. Ok, I’m gonna spend five (5) minutes and see if I can come up with something better: How about … Mobile Urban Terrestrial Technodog (MUTT)? No? Pet Artillery Weapon System (PAWS)? No? Aww, Canine Robot Ultimate Defender. Anyway, before long Miles and SteelDogBlog are doin’ stunts and playing tag and all sorts of skatepark type maneuvers (the dog has built in rockets so it can behave as whatever vehicle its owner chooses). I would like to point out that all this stupid stunt crap is the FUN part of the movie. The rest of the film feels like, “Oops. Sorry. We forgot to write a story.”
I’m not kidding here; I really think these folks created a colossal comic-book canine conquistador and then forgot to write a story to go with the thing. It’s not easy to create a likeable hero; I give Oliver Daly full credit here. I wanted to see what superhawkrobot cougardog was capable of. She seemed to have a lot of accessories. Sure, I was curious as to why they wanted A-X-L to behave like a real dog, but that allows the audience to fantasize about their own pets. Yet the plot for A-X-L is AWOL. You couldn’t fabricate something about the thing learning ASL after tearing an ACL in the AFL? A-X-L is Netflix TV in movie form. This is a character meant to pal around with his human owner solving crimes, righting wrongs, and superhumping table legs. (Or singing “Sweet Child o’ Mine,” of course) No, I can’t say the show I’ve imagined has a big audience … but the venue is better than the theater.
My dog is less canine than ‘bot
She barks in waves beyond ear shot
She doesn’t need any praise
Her “stay” can last for days
She caught the mailman she chased
Her crap goes to hazardous waste
Her nose can smell South Carolina
She dug up the lawn and hit China
She chews on an engine for kicks
Reciting π is one of her tricks
She’s destroyed everything in the flat
Yet beats the heck out of the cat
Rated PG, 100 Minutes
Director: Oliver Daly
Writer: Oliver Daly
Genre: A boy and his (robot) dog
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Anti-government dog-loving motocross junkies with a big chip on their shoulders
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Anybody who works security
