The Boss Baby: Family Business is now in theaters. It will also stream on Peacock on the same day as its theatrical release date for 60 days.
Ted and Tim Templeton are back and this time...they're adults!
Er, and...also babies! And...it's been, like, 30 years since the first Boss Baby movie? But also they drink a magic formula and get turned into babies again!
After a hit film and then several years as a Netflix series, the bossy babies of Boss Baby are back on the big screen with the kinetic, peculiar The Boss Baby: Family Business, in which a now-grown Ted and Tim are de-aged and ordered to infiltrate a suspiciously precocious school. The movie hits some nice, sweet notes, and has insanely busy action that will keep restless minds occupied, but overall it's a mid-level animated distraction that doesn't check off any exceptional boxes.
There's nothing inherently wrong with the underlying premise of the Boss Baby franchise, but it can't be denied that it's all mildly unsettling. "Creepy" might be a strong word, but there's definitely a meager discomfort involved in watching animated toddlers "adult" everywhere. Family Business adds an extra layer of oddball unbalance by having a grown Tim (voiced by James Marsden, who sounds a lot like Andy Samberg while doing this heightened animated voice) become a young kid who befriends his own daughter, Tabitha (Ariana Greenblatt), at her advanced elementary school. Sure, Tim's on a mission for BabyCorp but his secondary, more personal op is to spy on her. He even gets himself invited over to his own house, by his own wife (Eva Longoria), so that he can be shown around her room as a child peer. It's bizarre and off-putting.
But the Boss Baby saga as a whole is kind of gently icky, so what's one more layer of uncomfortableness, right? The film just eventually becomes a whirring blur of chaotic colors, creating perfectly fine fare for young kids looking for content and parents yearning to not watch something totally atrocious. It's clever enough, and the sentiment -- involving Ted and Tim reconciling after years of estrangement -- is pronounced enough to pack a soft and noble punch.
Jeff Goldblum and Amy Sedaris liven up this funky follow-up as the villain and new Boss Baby, respectively. Goldblum works his Goldblum magic here, just doing his own thing (which is basically a form of self-parody that we've all come to love) as Dr. Armstrong, the head of the prestigious Acorn Center for Advanced Childhood - a kid academy hatching a nefarious plot to turn adults into controllable puppets. Again, Goldblum isn't doing anything we're not used to, but the film also noticeably perks up whenever he's yukking it up.
Sedaris too is a great addition, as Tina, Tim's youngest, who acts as the talking BabyCorp catalyst for this new parade of mischief. She and Ted, while both BabyCorp superstars differ in opinion over corporate climate, with Tina valuing teamwork over cutthroat climbing. Alec Baldwin is the big returning star here (though Jimmy Kimmel and Lisa Kudrow also pop back in a grandparents role) and he still provides some very dry, droll Jack Donaghy-style laughs. Especially when baby Ted finds himself saddled with other regular-brained babies and must work to "Shawshank" himself out of their daycare clutches.
Ariana Greenblatt, who's seemingly in everything right now, from In the Heights to the upcoming Borderlands movie, provides the bulk of the film's heart as Tabitha, Tim's Ted-leaning daughter. Tim mistakenly feels she's pulling away from him, but in reality, it's because she's ashamed she didn't inherit her dad's caring creativity. At times, the movie goes way overboard with its presentation of parenthood, as stay-at-home dad Tim sees himself as an immediate failure whenever anyone in his family experiences sadness, but the general message is in the right place. Again, this is a satisfying, though not outstanding, family adventure. For a bit of leveling-up, catch Netflix's The Mitchells vs. The Machines.
The Boss Baby: Family Business Review - IGN
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