Dexter's Laboratory: Ego Trip

This TV movie has stylish animation, and there was clearly ambition here, but the result is an awkwardly-paced, surprisingly dull film.

The plot is simple: Boy genius Dexter travels through time, teams up with 3 of his future selves (young adult Dexter, middle-aged Dexter, and elderly Dexter), and then they stop his rival Mandark from taking over the world.

As an adventure, it's very disappointing. The interesting parts are all told in flashback, so most of the movie is Dexter passively wandering from one setting to the next, just looking at the situation and hearing some horribly tedious explanation about it. They took "time traveling boy genius on a quest to save the world" and made him the most boring character they possibly could.

Mandark is the only other real character in the movie, and he's in "completely generic villain" mode with nothing remotely interesting about him.

The movie basically has 2 notes: occasional action scenes, and lots of long scenes where characters talk and talk and TALK and TALK. This could be OK if the dialogue was funny, but most of it just repeats points that we could already see onscreen, like the writers thought it was a radio play. It's also a problem that a TON of dialogue goes to "young adult Dexter," whose voice is like nails on a chalkboard. I found myself skipping through scenes where the characters droned on and on and on, just wishing that they'd actually do something fun or interesting with the time travel gimmick. The tedious, talky writing was a gigantic misstep that bogs down the entire movie.

The creators put more effort into the action scenes, but even these are dull and forgettable... Dexter runs away from generic baddies, he fights the pretty wimpy Mandark at the end, and he smashes some robots who stand there waiting to be beaten. Action isn't fun when you're defeating such lame bad guys.

For me, the biggest letdown was that Dee Dee is barely in the movie. The original series worked entirely because Dexter and Dee Dee were a great double act who played off each other so well. There's so much you could do with Dee Dee getting involved in a time-traveling adventure! And a stoic character like Dexter *needs* a fun foil, especially in a 50-minute runtime. But since Dee Dee has only one line in the whole film, and it sounds like a recycled sound clip from the show, I'm guessing that her voice actress couldn't take part. It's a real shame.

The creators clearly got the VAs for Dexter's parents to do a couple lines, but they chose not to use those fun characters either. If the series was like a tasty stew of varied flavors, this movie is like a bowl of plain oatmeal.

I honestly wouldn't recommend this movie to fans of the show. Almost everything that made the show fun and great is gone, and the only reason to see this is the animation style. (And honestly, the style peaks in the opening seconds, with a very cool and classy black-and-white sequence of Mandark in silhouette. Nothing else in the movie looks as good as that first part.)

There just isn't much entertainment value here. Only bother watching it if you're really curious, or if you're studying the creators' overall work.

Finally! Cartoon Network surprises us with a kick-butt movie! Genndy shows us an awesome finale to the series, filled with Action, Adventure, and a load of Dexter comedy that the new series lacks significantly (probibly cause he's not in it.) Anyways, the movie shows us the future in the dexter universe and reveals many new pieces in the show. I remember when I first saw it on a Sunday morning after taping it the night b4. It retains all the quality and Hana-Barbera goodness we don't see now, after it became Cartoon Network Studios. This should have been the last entry into the series, (as Genny wanted,) but was continued with not much of acception, (i didn't like it either,) My advise: If you liked "Last but not Beast" you'll love this one..... I hope.

Simply funny. The Phantom

Awww. I love those girlies. The girlies who gave Mandark a bath, Sarah (the blonde) and Rita (the brunette), while Mandark was yelling at that teenage Dexter and exposing his ass to the whole wide world (AKA the Viewers). Ohhhh, I love those sweeties. I love those girlies. But wait! that scene is highly erotic in my lifetime, and should have got Genndy Tartakovsky and his Hanna Barbara and Cartoon Network animators condemned by some, if not, many parents, for animating such an erotic moment for TV. But, I love those girlies who Mandark a bath, one blonde haired, the other, black haired. I love those beautiful and pretty sweeties. Kootchy, Kootchy, Kootchy, Kootchy, Kootchy...xxxxxxxxxxxxx (kisses)

Dexters Ego Trip is a good animation story about a boy, which is travelling through time to stop the Mandark to "take the world". The battles is very realistic, but I didnt find any satiric elements, which is naturally showed in the series(except one in the end), but i like the story, when dexter meets the dexter in the future, which is different, its kind of funny:) The animation is brought from the series. If you like the series, you got to watch this.

The show is really good and this movie is great too! It has a more serious story line that's true, but the overall humor and great characters bring the whole thing together so that it fits like a glove! The whole style is awesome too, the coloring is real good, varying from the green colorful dexter scheme to the dark red Mandark scheme (which in one moment overrules the entire world). The robot in the fighting sequence is unbelievably good designed and the ending is as unexpected as it is hilarious! I can't believe some people rate this as a bad movie. The only thing that is negative is it's duration, I'd like to have seen a evening filling dexter presentation.