Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken Movie Review

“Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken” is so colorful and pretty. It’ll attract most little ones for this reason alone. The story itself is a bit antiquated and banal, but younger audiences who haven’t seen every cartoon available more than once will thoroughly enjoy what Ruby has to offer them.​

This is directed by Kirk DeMicco (Vivo, The Croods) and Faryn Pearl, who has been in the art department of the filmmaking business for several years. She worked on “Trolls World Tour” and “The Croods: A New Age, among others.” That could explain why this film is so gorgeous to the eyes.

DeMicco and Pearl start the film by telling us that the Krakens have been misunderstood. That they aren’t monsters but rather noble protectors. In this somewhat gratifying story, it’s a teenager that hopes to make this known to us all.

Ruby (Lana Condo) is a teenage student, and like most others, Ruby has a crush and wants to go to prom. She hangs out with a small group of friends, her besties, where she can be appreciated and have some input, but be hidden away. She and her family are, against Ruby’s Grandmamah’s wishes, living on land… with the humans. By the way, Grandmamah is voiced by Jane Fonda.

Fifteen-year-old Ruby just wants to live the everyday teen life, but hiding that she’s a Kraken makes it difficult when Krakens are seen as something to be feared and hunted. She does nothing to stand out and the family all agreed that if anyone has questions about where they’re from, they are to say “Canada.”

Her mother, Agatha (Toni Collette), has strict anti-ocean rules that Ruby feels have ruined her young life. This day, she’s not going to listen.

Taking a chance and going near the ocean anyway, Ruby walks with Connor (Jaboukie Young-White) down to the beach. He’s the boy Ruby likes and wants to ask to prom. A little while after getting to know one another better, Connor falls into the water, and she jumps in after him.

As the ocean water surrounds her, something happens that she wasn’t expecting. Ruby not only begins to glow, but she begins to grow. She becomes as large as the school library… and eventually bigger.

What’s worse is she never gets a chance to save Connor. That honor instead goes to the new girl, Chelsea (Annie Murphy). Hmmm… she’s the spitting image of Ariel from “The Little Mermaid.” I wonder if there’s something to that??

Anyway, Ruby knows she’ll be in trouble for revealing that she’s a Kraken, but it was a chance she was willing to take to talk to Connor. Interestingly, she has disagreements with her mother. Agatha has trouble dealing with her mother. What is it with the females in this family?! Later in the film, her uncle Brill (Sam Richardson) helps her understand who and what Ruby really is. He explains everything. He takes the upset teen to the kingdom where she once lived. She learns that all the females in her family are royalty and that she, Ruby, is a princess!

Her grandmother tells Ruby about the evil that Mermaids are and how they want to control the ocean. Luckily, her warrior queen grandmother got hold of the trident, which holds power over the seas, before the mermaids did. She keeps it safely hidden away.

There are many similarities to “The Little Mermaid,” which you’ll have fun spotting, but the ways these two films aren’t alike make all the difference in the world. Kids will like this. You’ll be amused. You’ll find the score incredible, and everyone will have a good time, especially when it sinks in that it’s okay to be different. Fearing to let the truth out all of her life, to find out she would have always been accepted no matter who she was. Ruby is loved. This is a vital message to get through to kids.

One more thing. The captain is played by Will Forte, and his name is Gordon Lighthouse. I just can’t help but wonder if someone behind the scenes is a Gordon Lightfoot fan.