The Angry Birds Movie / YMMV

Accidental Aesop: If someone new comes to your land, they're probably thieves who are going to steal your children.
Alternative Character Interpretation:
- Did Mighty Eagle really pull a Trickster Mentor routine on Red, Chuck and Bomb? Or was he lying in an effort to make himself look good? It warrants noting that Red doesn't believe the claim for a second.
- Did Red decide to search the pigs' ship out of legitimate suspicion and concern for Bird Island, or was he trying to find any incriminating evidence to get back at the pigs for destroying his home?
Awesome Music:
- Several of the score pieces: "Red on the Run", "Birthday Party", "Ready, Aim, Fire!", "I Used to Believe in You", "Risky Idea", "We Want Eggs!".
- As for existing songs that appeared in the film, we have:
  - "Friends" by Blake Shelton, the film’s Theme Song that is both fun and sweet. Sadly, the pigs’s friendship with the birds was nothing but Blatant Lies.
  - "Paranoid" by Black Sabbath, a great heavy metal song that plays during Red’s anger montage in the beginning.
  - "Rock You Like A Hurricane" by Scorpions, (despite the questionable choice of including an Intercourse with You song in a family movie) is an awesome rock anthem that plays during Chuck and Bomb’s Imagine Spot about the Mighty Eagle.
  - "I’m On Top Of The World" by Imagine Dragons, a fun pop-rock which plays when the pigs return to their island with the eggs.
  - "I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor, covered by Demi Levato which plays during the Dance Party Ending and fits nearly perfectly.
Base-Breaking Character: Is Red a Jerkass Woobie or Designated Hero? In the former case the argument how he's right on many topics, especially pigs, while in the latter the argument how Red's past and him being an outcast doesn't excuse him being a jerk to other birds.
Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: The rather out-of-place Shout-Out to the Grady Twins from The Shining when Red opens one of the door in Leonard's castle.
Pigs: Redrum...
Red: Uh, nevermind.
Broken Base: The typically limbless birds and pigs suddenly gaining arms and legs for the movie has Angry Birds fans and non-fans alike divided over whether or not the designs work or if the characters with arms/wings and legs was something man was not meant to see.
Cliché Storm: Let's see. The protagonist is an orphaned outcast who sees a possible threat when the Pigs visits Bird Island and tries to warn everyone but no one believes him because everyone is oblivious while his biggest hero turns out to be a lazy slug (even if the whole thing was meant to be a Secret Test of Character), The visitors betrays the birds and they steal their eggs, the bird community chooses the protagonist as their leader when they realize he was right all along and after the final battle, everyone thinks the protagonist dies, but it turns out he's alive. And let's not forget about the Dance Party Ending.
Comedy Ghetto: The films' emphasis on comedy is one of the most oft-cited reasons for its divisiveness, since emotional animated films like Zootopia and Finding Dory were more popular at the time.
Common Knowledge: Many people assumes that Leonard is King Pig Smooth Cheeks' movie counterpart like everyone else in the film and that he got Adaptation Name Change. This is not the case. Yes, they are both kings, but not the same character. This became very noticeable once Leonard started appearing in games like Angry Birds 2, giving to understand that Leonard and Smooth Cheeks are completely different characters.
Critical Dissonance: While reception for the film was mixed in its entirety, audience reception still leaned more in the positive direction.
Crosses the Line Twice: Oh, where to even begin?
- Red landing headfirst in an egg and saying, "Congratulations, it’s a boy!" This crosses the line enough on its own, but as CinemaSins said, it’s the bird-equivalent to falling headfirst into a pregnant woman’s vagina.
- During the anger management scene, Matilda said that Chuck used his speed to take a police officer’s credit card, trash his office, buy everyone drinks at the coffee shop, and drip melted ice cream onto him. It’s funny enough on it’s own, but it gets even more hilarious when Chuck says it probably wasn’t ice cream.
- In the same scene, Matilda reading Terence’s… previous incident, which involves police sirens blaring, crashing noises, and a woman screaming is darkly hilarious, and it’s made even better when he simply gives the camera a Slasher Smile shortly after.
- When Red, Chuck, and Bomb get to the top of the mountain, it’s revealed to be the wrong mountain, so Bomb attempts to jump off said mountain.
- Bomb and Chuck gargling the water from the Lake of Wisdom, spitting it back and forth, and eventually swallowing it: Squick. Then Mighty Eagle takes a leak in said lake, at which point it becomes hilarious, especially due to Chuck and Bomb’s faces after seeing what they just drank, (and perhaps then goes right back to Squick).
- Whenever the birds were trying to figure out how to get their eggs back, Chuck suggested that they replace the kids, which is pretty coldhearted. But when he says "Ladies, let's get BU-SY! We're gonna be laying some eggs tonight!" while thrusting his pelvic, that’s when it’s funny. It’s absolutely hysterical that a PG-rated movie about Angry Birds got away with this joke.
Designated Hero: Red is interestingly a back-and-forth example of this. The first scene and the jury show him clearly mistreated and isolated from the others, providing also a sad background of him being bullied and having no parents. That said, he is shown acting like a complete Jerkass both around Matilda (who, unlike the judge, is not treating him unfairly) and the others, who are outcasts just like him, and defies every one of their attempts to befriend him (albeit in a polite manner). When the pigs come, he gets immediately antagonizing due to a wrong-doing. He is right about the fact that they destroyed his house (although unwillingly), and no one is offering to help repair it; however, he did something similar by destroying the puppet Chuck made (willingly), and he never offers to Chuck any help. Chuck even lampshades the analogy, and that goes over his head (though to be fair, Chuck does drop the whole thing with his puppet and later him and others after his "funeral" step on the puppet without second, and also Red does apologize in a Deleted Scene at the banquet). Then he spends a good chunk of the movie being antagonistic toward the pigs due to this personal wrongdoing and pointing every single difference between them as ominous. After his meeting with Mighty Eagle, however, he steps into a decidely heroic role, becoming The Leader for the birds as a whole, facing personally the pigs to retrieve the eggs and risking his life to recover the one egg that Mighty Eagle doesn't recover.
Ensemble Dark Horse:
- The mime bird. "Oh my Gawwwww....”
- And possibly to a lesser extent, Willow (it helps that this is one of her last appearances in the franchise).
Epileptic Trees: "Angry Birds is anti-refugee propaganda".
Fanfic Fuel: What adventures Mighty Eagle had in his glory days?
Fridge Horror:
- While the games and other media have often portrayed it as somewhat Black Comedy, the fact that these pigs are basically attempting to eat the unborn children of the birds (and they are definitely eggs that will hatch) is pretty unnerving.
- What was Terence incident?
- It's a heroic moment for Red, but when he knocks off Foreman Pig to get a pilot that controls net with eggs, it leads to mustached pig falling from the window, with no confirmation if he survived that.
Harsher in Hindsight:
- The part where Bomb tries to jump to his death becomes this after, in Sausage Party (another film made by Sony that was released three months later), Honey Mustard (who is voiced by Danny McBride, the same actor as Bomb) was successful in his attempt.
- The whole thing with Red's anger management issues. Colossal has Jason Sudeikis, the voice of Red, as someone who's gone off the deep end with them.
- The scene where the Mighty Eagle takes off while playing "Never Gonna Give You Up" becomes this in the second movie when it is revealed he did in fact give up, let down, and desert Zeta and their daughter (though he was unaware of the second), which may have led to the former’s Start of Darkness.
  - Similarly, the scene where he uses binoculars to spy on an old lady in a bathtub becomes this because of Zeta, and Psycho Ex-Girlfriend doesn’t even begin to describe her.
Heartwarming in Hindsight: While Leonard initially use his vision of the friendship between the birds and the pigs as a decoy to steal the eggs, it does eventually happen in the sequel after both sides' successful team-up against the greater forces. No string attached as well.
Hilarious in Hindsight:
- Chuck being depicted as Ambiguously Bi, if you know about Josh Gad's next role in Beauty and the Beast (2017).
- Kate McKinnon voiced Stella in this movie and would later become a Ghostbuster. Her co-star in the 2016 Ghostbusters movie, Leslie Jones would later become an Angry Bird in the sequel.
  - Similarly, Mckenna Grace, who voiced one of Red's classmates during two flashback sequences, would also become a Ghostbuster herself five years later.
- The painting that Red made of him slingshotting Leonard away became funnier in retrospect thanks to Angry Birds 2, which features Leonard as one of the playable characters.
Jerkass Woobie: Red. While he is a short-tempered introvert, the fact that he's shunned and ignored by the other birds in the community (save for a few) and having grown up with no family, it actually makes perfect sense why he's so short-tempered and antisocial, and it's hard not to feel bad for him at certain points (especially the scenes in which Red losing his temper is totally justified).
Jerks Are Worse Than Villains: Despite Leonard being a character who literally Eats Babies, he can actually be quite an entertaining character due to his Large Ham (heh) and Affably Evil tendencies as well as being an actual effective antagonist despite seeming like an idiot. Judge Peckinpah on the other hand is a bitter Jerkass to Red and only Red just because he has anger issues, and encourages the other birds to look down on him for it. He even coldly tells Red in court that "Birds, they may smile at you on the street, but that doesn’t mean they like you." It’s safe to say that nobody missed him when he was completely absent from the sequel outside of making a small cameo on a painting in Red’s house.
Memetic Mutation:
- Mighty Eagle's Blunt "No" with triumphant Beat has become one recently.
- Matilda reading Terence’s card.
- Bomb's on his way. ^Explanation
- The entire "movie is an allegory to Europe's immigrant situation in 2010s" theory.
- "WOOP-WOOP THAT'S THE SOUND OF DA POLICE" ^Explanation
Moe: The titular Hatchling from the The Hatchling and the Worm shorts. Likewise, any hatchlings shown in the film. Some fans find them adorable.
Nightmare Fuel:
- Terence’s reason for being in Anger Management Class was so bad that they couldn’t show what he did. This is chilling enough, but the way it’s presented is even worse, as we get the lovely sounds of women screaming along with police sirens. Also, Terence seems to be proud of this, as he gives us a Slasher Smile. It makes you wonder why Bird Island doesn’t have more severe punishments than Anger Management Class.
- The sheer fact that the pigs are okay with eating the bird’s eggs, even after they learn that there are children inside those eggs.
- The Shining parody scene is a bit unsettling and unexpected.
- The fact that Leonard wanted Red to be boiled alive alongside with eggs that the former tried to rescue.
Older Than They Think:
- Contrary to what fans who dislike the movie's character designs think, this isn't the first time that the Angry Birds and Bad Piggies have been depicted with limbs, as other Angry Birds media have already done that, such as the Super Angry Birds comics, the Agri Birds April Fools trailer, and we can't forget the obvious Angry Birds: Transformers.
- Likewise, this isn't the first time the Angry Birds and Bad Piggies speak, as they already did that in the comics.
- Leonard's last name, Mudbeard, predates the movie by three years, as it was first mentioned in The World of Angry Birds Official Guide book, released in 2013, stating that he is father of King Pig Smooth Cheeks.
- Judge Peckinpah wasn’t the first Angry Birds character to stand on another character to make himself taller. The Bird-ified version of Darth Vader did the same thing with two pigs back in Angry Birds Star Wars.
Questionable Casting: Downplayed with Terrence: while it's strange that Sean Penn was chosen to play him, seeing as he's The Quiet One, Penn himself has has been known to have anger issues of his own, so the jokes work on another level.
Retroactive Recognition: One of the Blues is voices by Noah Schnapp, who would later go on to play Will Byers in Stranger Things.
The Scrappy: Cyrus, the sneezing bird. Even by fans of the movie, he's often listed as one of the criticisms of it due to all of his humour being sneezing.
Signature Scene:
- The scene where Mighty Eagle pees in the Lake of Wisdom is, for better or worse, one of the film's better remembered moments. Even Rovio Entertainment seems to be aware of this, as it got a reference in a cutscene of Angry Birds Reloaded.
- The Final Battle where the birds use the iconic slingshot from the games. In particular, Red launching himself into Leonard's castle.
So Okay, It's Average: The general consensus is along the lines of this, seeming to have a flaw for every good thing about the movie. As far as movies based on video games that were released before Sonic the Hedgehog go, however, that's saying something.
Superlative Dubbing: The Polish dub, which makes all jokes more funnier than original version, and even adds some new ones (such as Red saying at the banquet that pigs go completely naked because they have no feathers, with Chuck saying that he likes them for that).
Squick: The "Lake of Wisdom" scene: Immediately after Bomb and Chuck drinking and swimming in the lake for a while, Mighty Eagle is shown urinating in the water for a long time, much to their horror alongside Red's exasperation.
They Copied It, So It Sucks!: The Mighty Eagle being washed-out and overweight after everyone looks up to has been criticized for being copied plot elements from Surf's Up where the Mighty Eagle is also a basically like "Big Z", even though the trope has long existed before the said movie came out.
They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: The new style threw long time fans for a loop. Likewise most weren't keen on hearing the characters speak.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Stella, despite being one of the main characters in the franchise — not to mention getting her own game with it's own story and characters — and having the voice of Kate McKinnon, is Demoted to Extra in the movie.
Take That, Scrappy!: For those disliking Cyrus the sneezing bird, seeing Red shoving his popcorn box on Cyrus face at the beginning of the film could make you cheer for our eyebrowed protagonist.
Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: Even if Red is a jerk, it's very hard to sympathize with the bird community when (almost) everyone treats him like a moron.
Video Game Movies Suck: A minor case. Though not necessarily bad, it has received mixed reviews from critics and has only a 73% on Rotten Tomatoes, with an average rating of a 5/10 (Which is still pretty high as far as video game movies go... or it was, before the release of Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)).
Vindicated by History: The Angry Birds Movie gathered middling reviews during its original release, around the time when its home series had long since peaked in popularity and the period where Video Game Movies Suck was still strong in the consciousnesses. After a Surprisingly Improved Sequel and more well received video game adaptations in the 2020s, the film was revisited and became praised for how much of a strong comedy it was, now being considered one of the better video game movies prior to 2020 alongside its sequel.
Visual Effects of Awesome: Despite the changes, one thing that was agreed that the film does look gorgeous.
What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?: Other than the infamous "Lake Of Wisdom" scene, there are a lot of innuendo and sexual references that the film doesn't shy away from showing. There's also the expression of "Pluck My Life" which is the movie's way of getting away with saying, "Fuck My Life." The film definitely earns it's PG-rating.
What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?: It's about a technologically-advanced society that goes to another land and exploits the locals for their own amusement, so the movie is easy to read as either anti-immigration or at least anti-imperialism.

YMMV / The Angry Birds Movie

Edit Locked