Titan A.E.: A Review

This is a film that I did not watch until the age of 22. I did not get to experience this movie due to it being released a year after my birth, and the fact that it flopped probably obscured it from my parents when I was old enough to start watching films. However, I think that this is one of those films that is perhaps loved due to the nostalgia the film holds, many of my childhood films are viewed the same way for me.

I can say however that the ideas for Titan A.E. are excellent. The idea that humanity has become drifters in the universe after a more powerful alien race has destroyed Earth due to what we "could have become", and our characters are literally looking for their place in the universe has all the building blocks for a great science-fiction romp. However, the execution of this idea kills it before it began to walk.

First, the animation in this flick has not aged as gracefully as other films in this style, mainly the Disney films of this era. Look to Atlantis, and Treasure Planet for my comparisons. It was a weird time where traditional cell animation was being used in unison with 3-D animation for the first time. For films like Treasure Planet, it meant that Disney could render these massive worlds for the characters to inhabit and interact with. It was an expensive albeit beautiful technology that enhanced traditional cell animation.

For the case of Titan A.E., it created one of the roughest looking animated films possibly ever. It's due in large part that Disney's 3-D technology was much better, but Disney also utilized this tech to support the cell animation. This film it almost feels like the other way around. Or, at the very least, the animators were either too lazy, or stretching for something they weren't able pull off. Either way, there is more 3-D animation than cell animation in this film than its Disney comparisons.

It's also a unique animation style that, in my opinion, is a lot harsher and edgier(?) than the Disney counterpart. I think this style is perfect for the film, as it fits within the nature and tone of the story. It is arguably one of the greatest strengths of the film. It's a shame that the 3-D aspect as not aged as gracefully as the rest of the film.

Another flaw about this film is the pacing. The film opens with Earth being attacked and blowing up, and then hits the ground running twenty years later with our protagonist (voiced by Matt Damon) operating as a scrapper on an alien station far away from where the Earth once was. Soon Matt Damon is whisked away on an adventure to find the ship his father was on, as it holds the key to saving humanity.

Basic science fiction premise. However, it is so poorly paced. The characters are jumping from location to location at the speed of the light, and for a universe that could be super interesting, the world building is surface level. A betrayal that you could see a mile away, and soon, Matt Damon is saving humanity and destroying the alien race that destroyed ours.

Genocide is good as long as it's not Human.

It's a science fiction story that only sees a select number of characters grow throughout the film and lessons to be learned. Maybe Humanity is better than their alien foe, and spares them the plight our kind has experienced the last few decades or so? All I can say is that in a film that needs it's story, one isn't there to support it.

One interesting world building element to me, and a thing that I like about the film is that humanity is few and far between when it comes to inhabiting the galaxy, besides making up most of the main cast, and when the crew visits a human station, mankind hardly inhabits the universe. This is to be expected from a society who had their home world blown up. It's a visual storytelling element that I appreciate.

That's about it.

The movie hasn't stuck with me, and as you can already tell, I'm pretty disinterested in the flick. It's a smart premise that was poorly executed, both in storytelling, and animation, that doesn't live past the realm of nostalgia. I personally can't recommend this film.

2/5.