SPOILER ALERT
I do not like the Trolls. There, I said it and I stand by it. As a stay-at-home dad I feel like I’ve sat through the Trolls movie an infinite amount of times. Therefore, when I say I don’t like it, I really mean I do not like it. Yes the colors are bright and happy, yes the music is good, but beyond that, it has scenes that are questionable at best. It’s like the people working on the movie didn’t realize they were making a movie for children. So without further ado, here are my top 5 reasons I do not like the Trolls movie.
1. There is no redemption for the villain.
The villain in the Trolls movie is a woman known only as Chef. Basically, the only way for the Bergens to be happy is to eat trolls. Therefore, Chef has a lot of influence within the Bergen kingdom because she’s the one who prepares the trolls for the town. At the end of the movie, the Bergens come to the realization that they don’t have to eat Trolls to be happy. Even though all the other Bergens understand this, Chef seems incapable and tries to make one last effort to have a Troll eaten. This doesn’t go over well and she is kicked out of the king’s castle on a flaming food cart. At first she rolls away and the audience doesn’t know what happened to her, which is fine with me. However, after the credits roll for a little while, it is revealed that she gets eaten by some hill monster thing. She never sees the light and realizes that she doesn’t have to eat Trolls to be happy. She never finds happiness at all. It’s all so bleak and unnecessary in my opinion and it would be nice to show kids that people can change for the better.
2. The villain in the movie looks overly scary.
I wish I could attach a picture of Chef here to fully illustrate my point but I obviously don’t have written consent to do such a thing. Therefore, you’ll either have to take my word for it or google it. When you see Chef hunting for Trolls with those red, demonic looking eyes, you’ll know that SUPERishDAD warned you and you should have listened. Don’t get me wrong, “The Exorcist” is a million times scarier, but still, this is a movie meant for kids. Would it have killed them to make the villain just a tad bit less scary? Gargamel from the Smurfs is a villain, but he never seems like he’s going to devour your soul.
3. The fact that the Bergens eat the Trolls for happiness.
Why is that necessary? They had so many other options and somehow they landed on eating Trolls for a kid’s movie. I mean, kudos to them for not showing footage of a Troll being ripped apart in a Bergen’s mouth, but seriously, why is this the plot of a kid’s movie? Maybe the trolls build the most beautiful buildings and the Bergens are constantly trying to capture the Trolls to steal their secrets. Maybe the Trolls accidentally took something of great value from the Bergens and now the Bergens are out for revenge due to the misunderstanding. Maybe the Bergens want the Trolls’ land. These are 3 random ideas off the top of my head that would have made a more appropriate plot than Trolls must be eaten as a path to happiness.
4. The tale of Branch’s grandma getting eaten.
One of the main characters in the movie is named Branch. He’s a super stressed Troll who is so scared of the Bergens eating him that he’s built a bunker underground just to survive if the Bergens come to snatch Trolls. He’s not as colorful as the other Trolls and shows signs of depression. Some of the Trolls are captured by Chef and are going to be eaten in a few days at the Trollstice celebration. While they are in the king’s castle, the Trolls actually find a Bergen named Bridget to befriend. Bridget is Chef’s scullery maid who wants to date the king but lacks the self confidence to see that dream as a possible reality. Therefore, the Trolls decide to sing to her as a sort of pep-talk. The Trolls quickly realize that Branch isn’t singing and start badgering him to talk about why he refuses to sing. Branch eventually breaks down and states that a Bergen ate his grandmother while he was singing and he blames himself for her death. But just telling the story isn’t enough for the sociopaths who made this movie and they have to show a flashback. The scene shows a very cute, more colorful, version of young Branch singing his heart out when the terrifying Bergens come and snatch away his grandmother. What’s even worse is the Bergens were actually going for Branch, but his grandmother sees it and sacrifices herself to save him. Maybe you hear this story and you think, “Surely they reveal that his grandmother somehow survived all these years and escaped.” Nope. She is never heard from again.
5. The inappropriate sarcasm joke.
In one scene, Branch is talking to Poppy and asks the question, “Don’t you know anything about sarcasm?” Then, out of nowhere, a character named Cooper sticks his head on screen and says the line, “I think I had a sarcasm once.” Then he looks into the camera with a big smile. It’s obvious what the joke is referencing. Why put that in a kid’s movie? What’s the point of adding such an innuendo? Let a kid’s movie be a kid’s movie. If I want crude adult humor I will go see a movie made for adults without my child. I think what makes it worse is animators had to spend time making that scene and nobody said maybe we should leave it out. I’m sure it’s over most children’s heads but it just didn’t have to be there.
With all these things said, my 2 year old daughter loves the movie. She asks to watch it by name on Netflix. She knows most of the character’s names. She has a Poppy doll and a big pillow with all the Trolls on it. She used to have a ball pit that had the Trolls on it until she popped it. When I drive her somewhere she sings along to the songs from the movie. It’s like she doesn’t know how terrible that movie is and doesn’t care what SUPERishDAD thinks.
SUPERishDAD 
ROFL. We LOVE Trolls over here! I think the creators of kids movies have wisen up to the fact that adults will be the inevitable victims of INFINITE reruns. Nowadays, tons of kids movies have something for adults as well. I know it’s super gross but I find it hilarious that one of the characters in Trolls poops cupcakes when nervous! Or that another shoots glitter out his butt!! LOL. As far as that sarcasm joke..that totally went over my head as well! Jajaja. I just thought it was silly fun to compare sarcasm to an illness you can catch! To me the main premise of the movie is girl power. Poppy was initially dismissed by Branch as a Princess that was only good for creating cutesy invitations, throwing parties and scrapbooking. Not a heroine capable of rescuing her friends from the evil Bergens. Branch aka Mr. Doom and Gloom underwent a transformation. He went from being a grouchy hermit that only thought about himself to being inspired by Poppy’s courage and joining forces with her to save others. In the end Branch found happiness in the service of others!!! My favorite quote is from badass Smidge. She is a tiny gal with a deep baritone voice whose hobbies are weight lifting and listening to heavy metal. In the movie she says to Poppy’s,, ” Your confidence (in me) gives me strength!! In Trolls, girls are complex and diverse from evil world domination Chef to super happy, scrapbooking heroine Poppy to shy, awkward Bridget to hardcore fitness buff Smidge. It’s a GREAT movie David!!
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Well Estefani, I have no idea who you are but you are obviously wrong. Hahahaha! Just kidding! I totally get where you are coming from on most of this. I too really like the female lead in this movie. I’m really happy animated movies are finally embracing female leads. I’m glad Zoey gets to see that. I think it’s important and truly has an impact. I grew up with Ninja Turtles, G.I. Joe, and He-Man and I can only think of a handful of movies back then that centered around a female lead. I’m glad Zoey has movies like Brave, Frozen, Moana, Inside Out and yes… even Trolls. Haha. I think it creates a narrative for children to see things in a different light. It seems like a lot of things are shifting for girls now, like how the new Ghostbusters movie had an all female cast for the main roles. There’s a lot of other movies where women are the leads and feel empowered like Gravity, Wonder Woman, and Hidden Figures to name a few. I’m also glad to see that girls’ toys are starting to change to more educational things that are centered around building and science. I think these things are positive changes and will benefit Zoey. Side Note: I really appreciate you taking the time to write a thoughtful response and making me feel better about letting Zoey watch this movie. Although, Zoey has moved on from Trolls now and we are watching Coco a lot these days. I love that movie so much.
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Oh. We are DEEP into Coco territory. Mateo can watch it for 15 min straight which in toddler years is like an ETERNITY. It is even better to listen to it in Spanish.
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Agreed! We didn’t love Trolls either, but are kind of obsessed with Coco. Can’t WAIT to see Incredibles 2.
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I haven’t seen the Incredibles 2 movie either but I’ve heard a few people say it’s great already.
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We’ve gotten picky with the media our kids consume. Listening to some of the stuff out there drives me absolutely batty. And don’t even get me started on the kids disney tv shows for tweens. If I have to see one more episode of “OMG adults are so dumb/we rule the world/it’s all about me!!” anything, I think I may vomit. Some vids I do love? Well, for my younger kiddos, I absolutely adore Kipper (I think these are on netflix and amazon). It’s a nice, slow moving tv show that isn’t into visual-sensory overload. The kids love it, and it’s never gotten on my “I-can’t-stand-another-episode” list (unlike, let’s say Pingu). And, believe it or not, my kids have found the old Mr. Rogers shows (free on Amazon prime) really interesting. Again, I like that it’s not a frenzied visual format (I swear, I still can’t watch the Lego movie because my brain can not keep up with some of the fast paced images). My older kiddos really enjoy WildKrats and even though that’s a little more “in your face”, they are learning something, and I like that. My oldest two have finally come to realize that the Nature and Nova shows on PBS can be extremely interesting. Good luck, and hang in there. We went through a period of a two year old requesting “Whitening Macqueen” every day for about a year.
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I’ll have to check out Kipper. I’ve never heard of it before. And I hear you on the whole “frenzied visual format” stuff. It drives me crazy too. I watch it now and I feel like I understand why I never wanted to pay attention in school. I don’t think the cartoons were as bad when I was a kid, but they were still flashy. I think MTV was one of the first places to really go crazy with visuals. Their cameras were never steady and there was usually a lot going on in every shot. How can teachers compete with that? But don’t get me wrong, I think they all do it for the same reason, money. If one TV show or cartoon is doing something crazy, the other station has to top that to get your attention. If they can’t grab your attention away from the other show, their show sinks. I see it so much on the internet now too. People were just posting memes on facebook before. Then I started noticing the meme was acting like a video but it didn’t add anything to the meme itself, it might just have a few little floating specks flying around. Just recently I’ve noticed the trend of memes having a line through half of it. We live in a world now where everyone is doing everything in their power to get noticed. So unfortunately for us and our kids I think it’s just going to get worse. But there are some good shows out there that try not to overload you. Probably my favorite kids show (and I plan on writing a blog about it at some point) is Kazoops!. It’s very low key, most of the stories revolve around things that happen in the home and I love the way the family interacts with each other. The son and daughter never bicker, the parents are very involved but let their children figure things out for themselves and the grandmother is very active rather than being portrayed as some weird old person that tells long stories. The music is good too. It’s on Netflix.
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