Joshua and the Promised Land is a 2003 low-budget All-CGI Cartoon about a young anthropomorphic lion named Joshua traveling back in time and living out the adventures of the biblical Joshua so he can learn a lesson about courage.
The film is almost entirely the work of one man going under the name “Jim Lion”. It probably would have been largely forgotten if not for the review and the reanimated Multi-Animator Project remake done and led respectively by Saberspark.
This film provides examples of:
- All Just a Dream: Played With. The film implies all the adventure was just a dream but Chris is still around and then the floating head attacks Joshua outside of his dream which leaves the whole situation ambiguous.
- Amusing Injuries: In a completely unexpected moment of silliness in the middle of a serious war scene, one soldier uses a giant mallet (à la Super Mario) and whacks an enemy to send him flying towards other enemies and knocking them all down like bowling pins complete with the low quality sound byte.
- Anthropomorphic Animal Adaptation: The film is a retelling of the Book of Joshua, but with the people of Israel and Jericho depicted as (very anthropomorphic) felines (mostly lions) and bulls, respectively.
- Attack! Attack... Retreat! Retreat!: In the battle scene where Moses holds up his arms to signal that God is with the Hebrews, they initially do well. But then Moses gets tired and his arms drop, resulting in the Hebrews getting pushed back with their enemies chasing them down. Then Moses gets people to hold his arms up for him, and the combatants immediately do a 180 and the chase goes the other way.
- Big "NO!": One is let out by Moses when he discovers the Jewish people being blasphemous by worshiping the golden calf.
- Bittersweet Ending: As in the Bible, only Caleb and Joshua are allowed into the Promised Land because the rest of the Hebrews worshipped the idol and Moses bashed a rock for water. Moses passes on his title of leader of the Hebrews to Joshua. Joshua then returns to the present day, parts ways with Chris, defeats some sort of demonic being, and has apparently made his family more happy by being happier.
- Cartoon Creature: Most characters are either lions or demons and Chris is clearly a wolf, but some examples are rather ambiguous due to the fact that the character designs more or less all use the same base. Moses, for example, looks like a chimpanzee/panther aberration.
- Chekhov's Gunman: A TV in the background of the opening is playing a show/movie starring the floating head that attacks Joshua near the end.
- Child Soldier: Although he is possessing the body of an adult, Joshua is still only a kid and is the one who leads the battle during the war.
- Cool Old Guy: Moses is pretty down to earth and is the only character who is respectful to Joshua.
- Death of a Child: One of the sights Joshua sees at Jericho is a baby getting sacrificed, and it is one of the things Chris uses to justify the Guilt-Free Extermination War.
- Disproportionate Retribution:
- Moses punishes the slaves for worshipping an idol by making them drink wet cement.
- Moses gets punished by God after bashing a rock for water instead of asking for water and as a result is not allowed to enter the Promised Land, only to view it from afar.
- Dull Surprise: Joshua remaining quite stoic when he remorsefully tells Chris that the people of Jericho killed a baby.
- Family-Unfriendly Violence:
- Subverted when Joshua's parents have a near domestic violence scene happen in front of him.
- The war scene is pretty bare bones but shows Joshua and his soldiers clearly stabbing and killing their enemies.
- Funny Animal: Every character resembles a nude or mostly nude humanoid with animal-like heads as their only beastly characteristic.
- Furry Confusion: A regular cow appears in Jericho, which is populated entirely by red cow-people.
- Furry Female Mane: Joshua's mom has one, doubling as Animal Gender-Bender since she's a lion.
- Furry Reminder: Only at the very end does the movie acknowledge they are lions where Joshua randomly does a lion roar.
- Guilt-Free Extermination War: Chris justifies the murder of the previous occupants of the Promised Land to Joshua by stating they're Always Chaotic Evil and deserve to die. Mind you that the kid brought up the legitimate point of how this sounds horribly wrong.
- Half the Man He Used to Be: Joshua defeats the floating demon head by slicing it in half. At least, that's presumably what it's supposed to be, since the animation makes it look more like the head just smacks into the wall and breaks in two.
- Interactive Narrator: The narrator eventually becomes part of the plot.
- Jerkass: Chris encourages Joshua to come with him on a journey and refuses to tell him what it entails, only that it will be fun. Said journey winds up starving him, nearly killing him several times, forcing him to kill, forcing him to wait in solitude for forty days without food or water, and condemning him to spend forty years walking a desert before Chris finally complies to Joshua's request to take him home.
- Kid Hero: Joshua, a child, leads the slaves to victory and leads them in a war.note
- Lantern Jaw of Justice: Moses has a prominent cleft chin that takes up over a third of his face.
- Large Ham: The pharaoh."GET ME MY CHARIOT!!"
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: We're led to believe everything was a dream but Chris exists outside of the dream as well as the evil floating head.
- Meaningful Name: The spirit that advises Joshua on religious matters is called Christopher, meaning "the bearer of the Christ".
- Misery Builds Character: When Joshua waits for Moses to get the Ten Commandments, he doesn't have anything to do to pass the time other than just sit there for several days. The narrator notes that it must be mindnumbingly boring, but it's okay because it builds character.
- Nepharious Pharaoh: The Pharaoh of the Exodus serves as the movie's Starter Villain.
- Non-Humans Lack Attributes: Although the characters have completely humanoid bodies and wear no clothes, they lack any visible genitalia, which is probably for the best.
- Our Angels Are Different: Chris is a luminiscent tiny wolf who takes Joshua across time.
- Our Demons Are Different: A floating fire head emerges from the remnants of the wall and chases Joshua into the present.
- Overly Long Name: The Best Friend a.k.a. Christopher Andrew Eugene Bazioni a.k.a. Chris.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Nobody questions why the adult lion has a kid's voice like Joshua's.
- Post-Climax Confrontation: The red demon head that arises from the ruins of Jericho follows Joshua back home, and attacks him once Chris - the angel accompanying Joshua - leaves.
- Protagonist-Centered Morality: While killing a baby is wrong, merciless conquest and outright genocide is apparently completely okay when the protagonists do it. Chris and the narrator try to justify it as being for a good cause, though Joshua is clearly still a bit reluctant compared to Chris.
- Some Call Me "Tim": The guardian angel introduces himself to Joshua as "Christopher Andrew Eugene Bazioni", but he tells him to just call him "Chris".
- Space Whale Aesop: If your parents are having a fall-out, just find the courage to push through by having a magical spirit take you to relive a biblical story in order to spark the courage inside you.
- Spirit Advisor: Chris serves as this for Joshua.
- Stock Sound Effects: The sounds used for the impacts and "angelic" effects are ripped from the old Windows Space Cadet Pinball game of all places.
- Ungrateful Bastard: The former slaves spend most of the journey complaining, and when they have a falling out with Joshua they try to stone him. They even lament that they should have died as slaves back in Egypt instead of following Joshua.
- Viewers Are Morons: The narrator informs the audience about obvious things like pointing out what a pyramid is and it's bad to enslave people.
- Vocal Dissonance: Joshua talks with a child's voice despite having an adult body when living the story of his Biblical namesake.
- Wham Shot: When Moses and Joshua return to the Hebrews, Moses lets out a Big "NO!" when he sees what has happened since they've left: the Hebrews are worshipping an idol.
- Year Inside, Hour Outside: When Chris offers to take Joshua on a trip, the latter worries that his mom will get mad that he's late for dinner, but Chris promises that he'll be back in time for it. True enough, Joshua spends decades reliving the story of the biblical Joshua but returns on the same night, but he was late for dinner after all.
