YMMV / The NeverEnding Story III: Escape from Fantasia

• Accidental Innuendo: The great threat is called "the Nasty", leading to perhaps one of the most unintentionally funny lines ever: "We must not give into the Nasty!"
• Awesome Music: The movie's soundtrack could be considered one of its redeeming qualities, if not the only redeeming quality. It was even the first movie to feature "Kiss from a Rose" before Batman Forever popularized it!
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Rock Biter singing "Born To Be Wild" happens out of nowhere, is absolutely jarring tonally, contributes nothing to the plot besides filling time and is never meaningfully used again outside of playing in the credits.
• Designated Hero: Bastian. The Old Man of Wandering Mountain describes him as "a special young human, a voracious reader, with great imagination and extraordinary courage", traits that Bastian does not possess this time around. Bastian never does anything with the power of the AURYN and sits around hoping the problem will go away, while the bratty sister and even the villains use the power they are given.
• Designated Villain: Bastian's stepsister may be witchy, but she actually does something with the power she obtains, and while what she does with it is selfish, Bastian's calling her out for screwing things up falls flat since he could have avoided it all by actually doing something with it himself when he had the chance. Also, she's part of why he wins the final fight, by using the book to give him super kung-fu moves. While he's still got the amulet and still isn't using it.
• Fanon Discontinuity: Most fans prefer to forget this movie exists. There's even a canon reason, as the first two movies each adapt one half of the novel, so the third is an original story that can easily be ignored.
• Ham and Cheese:
  • Jack Black's gloriously over-the-top performance as Slip is widely considered to be a saving grace in the movie.
  • Thomas Petruo (Large Head) said in an interview that he had a lot of fun in the role.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Bastian's gelled-up hair. According to The Agony Booth's recap:
  Over the next few scenes, everyone laughs at Bastian's hair, but to be honest, his hairdo looks completely ordinary and commonplace circa 2008. You could go to any shopping mall in America and see plenty of kids with their hair just like this. So, in fact, NeverEnding Story III was a trendsetter, and well over a decade ahead of its time!
  • Slip, played by Jack Black, engages Bastian in a martial arts fight.
  • One of the guests at the Empress' castle bares a striking resemblance to a pale-skinned Megamind.
• Jerkass Woobie: Nicole. She treats Bastian like crap before she's given a reason to really hate him and she abuses the power of the AURYN (which was a result of Bastion leaving it in the open). However, the movie shows that she misses her biological father and was concerned about her mom and stepdad. Also, some Character Development led to her bonding with Bastian, despite the earlier conflict.
• Questionable Casting:
  • The difference in voice actors for Falkor and Rock Biter is jarringly noticeable.
  • Julie Cox, who played the Childlike Empress in the third film, is an example of both this and Dawson Casting, considering that she was 19 during filming and a good couple of inches taller than Jason James Richter, who played Bastian. In fact, Cox is only slightly younger in real-life than Tami Stronach, the Empress from the first film — which was made ten years before the third. That being said, Cox would actually have been a decent casting choice if the Empress had a Plot-Relevant Age-Up in the film, as she is believable as an older version of Stronach's character. Thing is, the Empress is supposed to be The Ageless and is called the Childlike Empress for a reason. She should not have gotten any older between films.
• Retroactive Recognition: Jack Black plays the lead bully Slip.
• Rooting for the Empire: Slip, the villain, shows more initiative and charm than Bastian, who spends the whole film sitting around trying to hope his problems away. As a result, viewers tend to hope that he wins out in the end. Being played by Jack Black also helps.
• The Scrappy: The Rock Biter baby and the Bark Troll literally contribute absolutely nothing to the story.
• Sequelitis: While the second film was already seen as a disappointing follow-up, it is high art compared to this film, to the point where practically no fans of the book and film series will even begin to defend it. Having nothing to do with the source material, along with drastically dumbing down many existing elements of the films, did not help matters either.
• So Bad, It's Good: At best, many people see the movie as this, finding its artistic and creative decisions so baffling and backwards to the previous movies that they become unintentionally funny.
• Special Effect Failure: The lower budget is apparent in this film, in spite of them having the otherwise well-regarded Jim Henson's Creature Shop do the puppets and costumes. The CGI present is also rough, feeling flat and artificial even upon release.
• Tear Jerker: Throughout the movie Bastian's stepsister Nicole has been a major bitch to him. Near the end she admits she is afraid to get attached to anyone new since she doesn't want to get hurt again, resulting in a tearful bonding scene between the two.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
  • Falcor's redesign and re-characterization in the third film; suffice to say, fans were not pleased at the result.
  • The Rock Biter has it even worse. He and his family have been turned into bad The Flintstones ripoff. We get an odd sit-com-esque scene at his home (which even has a TV(!!!) with his wife and son when he first shows up. Even worse, we then get a really weird scene where he gets in his rock "car" and drives while singing Steppenwolf's "Born To Be Wild".
• Took the Bad Film Seriously: Everyone, but especially Jack Black, who plays a poorly written, one-dimensional character like a diabolical mastermind.
• Viewer Gender Confusion: Coil's boyish short hair and androgynous face can make it easy to mistake her for a boy if you only look at images of the movie. Only her voice and her new look following her Heel–Face Brainwashing make it clear she's a girl.

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