Directing: B
Acting: B
Writing: B-
Cinematography: B+
Editing: B
Animation: B+

There’s a lot to like about Raya and the Last Dragon, which is finally available at no extra cost to Disney+ members as of today. It features two princesses, one the protagonist and one the antagonist; neither of them are given a love interest in a story about learning and earning trust; it features representation and influences heretofore not seen in Disney animated features (in this case, Southeast Asian). It also has some impressively rendered CG animation which, I’m sure, must have looked quite nice on a big screen, for the people that went ahead and saw it in movie theaters.

I just really wanted to like it more. All of the above features are great and all, but they could have been helped a lot further along by better writing. Granted, this is an animated feature and thus aimed at children first and foremost, but there’s still no reason to patronize them. As Raya (Kelly Marie Tran), our heroine, moves about her journey, the coming beats of her story are telegraphed to us well before they occur, as is the lesson she is meant to learn. In the end, this film just serves as an example of how the animation may be on par, but the storytelling over at Disney Animation Studios remains almost pointedly inferior to that over at Pixar.

Also, I’m not the biggest fan of the dragon design. Much of the animation in this film is great—particularly the symmetrical patterns throughout the prologue sequence offering an overview of the history in this fantasy world—but the dragons look like the love child of a unicorn and a ferret. Or, imagine the luckdragon from The NeverEnding Story with a horn, eyeliner and a blowout.

There are ten credited writers on this film—two for screenwriting and a whopping eight for story. You’d think they’d be able to brainstorm a bit more wit than actually winds up in the dialogue here, although it’s not for lack of trying. There are plenty of attempts at gags and punchlines in Raya, but most of them are surprisingly limp, particularly by usual Disney standards. To be fair, I did get a few good chuckles out of two or three visual gags. Awkwafina voices Sisu, the “last dragon” of the title, and there are shades of Robin Williams in Aladdin in the spirit of her performance. Yet, she’s far more charismatic than she is funny, and her raspy voice feels somewhat incongruous with the polished visual sheen of the dragon character.

I don’t want you to think I actively disliked this movie, which most of this review thus far no doubt sounds like. I’m a big fan of the under-seen representation at play here, and of the multiple new directions given to princesses: it can’t be denied that young women have never been depicted so independent and self-sufficient in past Disney features, not to mention there being more than one of them, even existing on both sides of conflict. That alone makes it a great movie for impressionable young girls to see—and boys as well, of course. If nothing else, it passes the Bechdel Test early and often. Between that and the often beautiful animation, Raya and the Last Dragon undeniably has a lot to offer. And I haven’t even mentioned the several pretty exciting action sequences—more than one of them, again, featuring martial arts battles between two women.

I just wish it weren’t all at the expense of sharp writing. This team of writers was so busy broadening their horizons—and, to their credit, doing it well—that they neglected the narrative polish needed to make this the great movie it could have been. As it is, it merely hovers somewhere in the space between fine and good.

Overall: B