Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters (2007)

What's great about Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters is that it never tries to be something it's not. The bizarre Cartoon Network show it's based on is a niche show for a niche audience and the movie caters to exactly that crowd with its usual complete non sequitur jokes, biting stabs at pop culture, and unabashed, unapologetic chaos. To the movie's immense benefit, the producers clearly never try to open the characters up to the mainstream: they look to have approached the project as if they were producing an hour-and-a-half long episode. In fact, the runtime probably presented them with their only challenge, since the show is normally only 15 minutes long. Oddly enough, by making little or no attempt to change the structure of the story (despite it being six times longer than usual), the filmmakers avoid almost all the typical trappings of a small-to-big-screen transition. The things we love about the show are all there: Carl is a slovenly New Jersey stereotype, Master Shake is a pompous idiot, Meatwad is adorably gross, Frylock is the voice of reason, the Mooninites are elitist delinquents, and Dr. Weird is terrifyingly insane. The movie does step it up though, with appearances by Neil Peart of Rush, a time traveling Abraham Lincoln, a new, watermelon-shaped alien, and, of course, a totally inane object serving as a cross-dimensional evil force that threatens to extinguish all life on Earth if our heroes don't intercede (the powerful object is, in this case, an exercise machine). What's particularly funny about the Aqua Teen movie is that it only adds the typical Hollywood-level epic plot twists (mainly through a random subplot about the origin of the Aqua Teens) in order to parody those cliché "I am your father"-type moments. Every time something supposedly important is about to be revealed, it turns out to be silly or hilariously pointless, sure to affect nothing about future episodes of the show. The only place the movie really fails is in that secret hope the fans all had that the producers would inject a little in-joke somewhere to acknowledge the infamous Mooninite-terrorist-scare debacle that took place in Boston in January of 2007, when promotional neon signs of Err and Ignignokt extending their middle fingers were mistaken for bombs. Nothing about the Aqua Teen movie pulls any punches or plays it safe, so we'll just have to assume that sadly, there wasn't time to add a quick wink to the audience on that matter. Thankfully, it's still a fine piece of awesomely stupid cinema. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide