'Cars 3' Earns a Podium Finish, but It Doesn't Have Much Left in the Tank

When the Cars 3 teaser trailer was released – in which there’s footage of Lightning McQueen crashing – everyone was intrigued.  It seemed to be going to a darker, more mature direction.  But that’s not the case.  It turned out being just another Cars movie.

The story goes like this: faster, state-of-the-art rookie racers, led by the arrogant Jackson Storm (Armie Hammer), enter the sport and begin to dominate it.  This prompts the veterans to be fired or retired by their sponsors in order to make way for the new generation.  In order to get back in the game, Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) must work under a new sponsor named Sterling (Nathan Fillion), who only intends to use him for endorsing products rather than support his racing career, and an enthusiastic young trainer named Cruz Ramirez (Cristela Alonzo).

The plot actually has some poignant and profound elements.  But it’s also quite predictable that none of great value really came out of them.  It’s well-told, though.

Now, the Cars movies don’t exactly suck.  Quite the opposite, actually.  By themselves, they are pretty good as far as animated kids’ movies goes and then some.  However, compared to other Pixar movies – most of which are masterpieces – the Cars movies are “below average.”   If you rank all Pixar movies, the Cars movies would be among those in the bottom four, with the last spot belonging to Brave (the only Pixar movie I didn’t like).  I had some fun with Cars and Cars 2 when I watched them, but they were forgettable that I only have a vague memory of how they went.  In addition, as a rule when it comes to Pixar and Disney animated movies, I’ve always tend to watch them over and over again.  But with the Cars movies, I never had the yearning to re-watch them.  In comparison, I’ve seen each of the Toy Story movies at least a dozen times.

With this in mind, most of my problem with the Cars movies is the fact that there are three of these already.  Meanwhile, other superior Pixar movies that are deserving of sequels have not been given sequels yet.  Yes, The Incredibles 2 is, at last, happening.  But only after two Car sequels have been made.  Pixar has some misaligned priorities.

Anyway, Cars 3 seems to be a tad better than its predecessors.  But this might be so because it’s a recent movie in my mind.  I’m not really sure.  Nevertheless, it’s not mindblowingly good.  It’s just adequate – adequately entertaining, adequately funny, adequately thoughtful, adequately solid – for a decent podium finish.  But it won’t make any Pixar fan go wish for more Cars movies.  Especially since nobody really asked for a Cars 2 or Cars 3 in the first place.

It’s time for Cars to take this win and retire.