The Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland

The third and final entry in the dreaded "Care Bears" trilogy. This time the titled characters are basically playing off "Alice in Wonderland" with mostly ho-hum results. The youngest of audiences will be entranced by the vibrant colors of the film and the cute bears, but everyone else should stay away. Amazing to me that this concept became a marginally successful franchise. Once again though the stuffed animals made a killing during this time period as they dethroned the dreaded Cabbage Patch Kids as hug-worthy novelties we all had to have. Honestly the toys were better than the movies, at least the toys never talked or annoyed me. 2 stars out of 5.

I saw this as a kid in the 80s and loved it and for that reason it will always remain a part of me. I was not a Care Bears fan or anything, but this movie was a lot of fun. The characters were very developed. The story was a lot of fun. The animation was decent. And the songs really stand out. Usually, the music in animated children's movies is pretty pitiful, but these songs are good! "Everything is wonderful in wonderland", "Mad about Hats", "Dont forget to use your heart", and a whole bunch of others. It's funny, it has good messages for kids, Alice is cute, and the animations is really psychedelic because this is set in *Wonderland* of course. The wizard is scary and his two assistants are hilarious. So is the Chesher Cat. See it!

After watching "Surf Nazis Must Die", ANYTHING would seem like "The Princess Bride" from that. This movie did the trick and even though it was still bad, it was legions ahead of SNMD. I have to admit that I was never a "Care Bears" fan as a kid. I may have had a book or two about them, but that was about it. I guess this was something that was done more for the fans. The most positive thing is that the animation is pretty good. I actually do like the Cheshire Cat character and he had a lot of personality to him.

I feel bad for not knowing any of the names of these guys except Grumpy Bear. I actually do like how they're doing something different in the series. The silliest scenes are probably when they're searching the whole world for Alice! Wow, they're pretty fast. The characters, especially the wizard's henchmen are really annoying. I do understand that this is a film made for little kids, so it should be alright for them. At least this doesn't have anything offensive in it. The plot does make little sense, so it's just forgettable. **

I am not the biggest fan of The Care Bears, but I loved the show from the 80s and the first two movies. The rest of their stuff(movies/specials/shows-wise) have been hit and miss. Luckily The Care Bears in Wonderland is one of their better outings. The dialogue is corny and over-simplistic at times and the whole explanation about the jabberwocky being mean was a little cliché and lame. However, the animation is quite nice, with the colours vibrant especially. Some of the visuals are on the psychedelic side, but considering the oddball nature of the original story and Wonderland itself it works. The music I was surprised by, the score is whimsical enough but the songs are memorable and fun, Rise and Shine, Has Anyone Seen This Girl and Mad About Hats were the standouts. I don't care for rap usually, but Grumpy's rap song was surprising and funny. The story is full of charming moments with a great, identifiable message and maintains the bewitching feel of the timeless original story. The characters also delight, the care bears are likable enough and better than their rep, with the best being Grumpy(they're saccharine sure but I think evil is far too harsh considering there are far more annoying franchise characters anyway). Alice is cute, the wizard is another memorable and scary villain to match Spirit and DarkHeart and the henchmen are hilarious. Plus I don't think I've ever seen the Cheshire Cat as cool as he is here in other incarnations. In conclusion, I like it, I've seen better movies but this is nowhere near the worst either. 8/10 Bethany Cox

Time to clarify something. This is the movie most people accuse the FIRST Care Bears adventure of being: a saccharine squirm fest. Now I happen to like the Care Bears (I pretty much ran to their defence in my review of their first movie, which I STILL recommend), but this was just a really bad concept to begin with.

It's as if the producers wanted to do an "Alice in Wonderland" movie, then got bored about halfway through and decided to throw the Bears in. Oddly, this isn't based on the Lewis Carrol books but on Disney's version of Wonderland (so it's a movie inspired by another movie inspired by a book). Even so, it has it's moments. The way they envision the Cheshire Cat is very inventive and possibly the best reason to give this movie a look (if you've seen it already you know what I'm talking about, otherwise rent it and fast forward through any scenes that don't involve the Cat). There's a nice message about believing in yourself, but it's nearly negated by the stupid cop-out ending.

There is, however, one more thing that totally saves the movie. Three words: Grumpy Bear RAPPING!!!