Cinematic Releases: Space Jam: A New Legacy (2021) - Reviewed

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Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

Just a few years ago, Warner Brothers and director Steven Spielberg made a deep swan dive into pop cultural references particularly involving their own back catalog of movies and games with their adaptation of Ernest Cline’s science fiction novel Ready Player One.  Some twenty-five years after striking box office gold with the 1996 basketball, Michael Jordan and Looney Tunes mashup Space Jam and only three years after Ready Player One, Warner Brothers have dove even deeper into the pop cultural vortex of movie, videogame and animation lore with the long delayed but eagerly awaited Space Jam: A New Legacy.
 
The plot involves LeBron James and his son Dom (Cedric Joe) literally getting sucked into a computer server run by Warner Brothers and computer algorithm played by Don Cheadle ala Tron by way of Jumanji.  To save his son, LeBron recruits the Looney Tunes in a game against the computer algorithm and his newly assembled team of ultra-powerful adversaries.  Like the first film, the picture is a fluid combination of animation and live-action though this new film pushes the technical envelope even further with the same animation team behind the recently released Tom and Jerry film.   

Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
 
While the film lingered in development hell for years with the first film’s director and lead actor Michael Jordan dropping out before the project was reshaped into a star vehicle for LeBron James, the film more or less follows in the footsteps of its predecessor with the basketball star and the Looney Tunes teaming up for a game of basketball.  Though the first film was from a director noted for Nike television commercials, Space Jam: A New Legacy this time around hands the reins over to Undercover Brother director Malcolm D. Lee and the results are much more rewarding than the first film. 
 
Much has been made of the controversies involving the excision of Pepe Le Pew, the body modification of the Lola Bunny character and the curious inclusion of characters from Warner Brothers’ own previously X rated titles A Clockwork Orange and The Devils.  In spite of these areas worth noting, Space Jam: A New Legacy is ultimately a colorful and harmless entertainment for younger viewers littered with Easter eggs fans of both the Looney Tunes and Warner Brothers library will appreciate. 

Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
 
As it stands, it works better as a movie than the first film which felt like a series of vignettes strung together into something resembling a film and watching Don Cheadle ham it up as the film’s villain is an unexpected delight worth reveling in.  Whether you seek out or not this new big summer release in theaters or HBO Max may or may not depend on your enjoyment of its predecessor, though comparatively this new Space Jam had a more well-rounded overall narrative design than what came before.  If nothing else, it’s a reason to see the Looney Tunes on the big screen once again.

--Andrew Kotwicki