Good Boy! is a 2003 comedy movie directed by John Hoffman and starring Liam Aiken as Owen, a lonely boy who wants a dog.
When Owen's parents agree to let him get a dog after he shows responsibility for walking those of the neighbors, he adopts one that is more than it seems. After watching his new dog, Hubble, sneak off at night, Owen follows him to the remnants of some sort of crash landing site. After a sudden flash of light, Owen wakes up the next morning with the ability to understand dogs. It turns out that Hubble (voiced by Matthew Broderick) is an agent sent from the dog star Sirius 7 to take a look on the long standing process of dogs becoming the dominant species on Earth after they were dropped off centuries ago. With the current state of things, Hubble must prepare a successful illusion for their leader, the Greater Dane, to believe dogs have successfully taken over the world in order for global recall to be avoided.
Notable for having special effects from Jim Henson's Creature Shop. A movie novel of Good Boy! was released alongside the film, written by Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld. A children's picture book titled Good Boy! Meet The Dogs was released as well, written by Kate Egan and Raina Moore.
Not to be confused with the horror game Good Boy!.
This work provides examples of:
- A Boy and His X: Or, in this case, a dog and his boy. As the dogs note, "you don't see us picking up your poop!"
- Dogs Are Dumb:
- Hubble is appalled that the dogs of Earth have become spoiled domestic pets that don't use their own intelligence while human beings clean up after them.
- A group of dogs get high on paint fumes in a garage and stumble around acting foolish.
- One dog remarks that she "makes nice doodies" when Hubble asks her about her duty as a supposedly intellectual being.
- The Dog Is an Alien: EVERY dog.
- Double Entendre: After the bullies who have been harassing Owen become afraid of the dogs and decide to let Owen keep their ball, Owen asks if that was the only ball they had. After they reluctantly tell him it was, Owen points out that they have no balls.
- The Inspector Is Coming: The heros must impress the Greater Dane, to avoid having all dogs being removed from the planet.
- Product Placement: Iams dog food, at the rehearsal of the formal dinner they are planning for the Greater Dane.
- Road Apples: Within the film's first act, the number of dog poop jokes ranges from mere references to an actual scene where a dog farts and poops on the ground, repulsing a girl who the main character has a crush on. Lovely.
- Shout-Out: The order for "global recall" could be a reference to the film Total Recall (1990).
- Smart Animal, Average Human: Basically describes the two main characters to a tee.
- Take Me to Your Leader: Uttered by Hubble after Owen gains the ability to understand him. Not realizing that the rumor about dogs being pets is true, he mistakenly believes that the other neighborhood dogs who Owen walks are his leaders.
- Uranus Is Showing: Shep tells the group his grandfather had to travel through Uranus to get to Earth from Sirius 7.
- You Are Number 6: Hubble's real name is Canid 3942.
