(SPOILERS AHEAD!)
The Dean Fleischer Camp-directed remake of Lilo & Stitch was pretty much what I expected: a remake that felt uninspired and uninteresting. A lot of it in the beginning also felt like a shot-for-shot copy, which wasn’t good news to me since I’m one of the few people who was never fond of the animated 2002 Disney Canon film in the first place!
I guess Maia Kealoha and Sydney Agudong portrayed sisters Lilo and Nani, respectively, well enough; you can tell that they were trying. But I didn’t care about them as characters in the original film and this time around, it wasn’t any different. Chris Sanders returning as the voice of Stitch was also a bit annoying, not for his voice, but for the fact that I never liked Stitch as a character anyway and this time, he talked way more!
I felt that Zach Galifianakis’ voice did not fit the character of Dr. Jumba at all! (And making him the villain and getting rid of Gantu completely was definitely a choice!) He was more believable as the human version of Dr. Jumba. Billy Magnussen wasn’t bad as Pleakley, both in voice and human form.
Cobra Bubbles’ (played by Courtney B. Vance) character felt way less hardcore than he should have been and David’s (played by Kaipo Dudoit) character felt pretty useless.
The ending on the spaceship felt rushed and I’m not fond of Nani going off to college and leaving Lilo.
I dunno, I wasn’t a fan of the original film and I’m not a fan of this one either!
So, my final score for this film is 17/35 = 48.57% (F) !
The next review will be posted on June 16, 2026.
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