Sherlock Gnomes Review

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OH MY GOSH! It's Sherlock Gnomes! The sequel to the cinematic masterpiece that is Gnomeo and Juliet! You see, back in the day, someone had a brilliant idea: "Wha-what if we remade Romeo and Juliet but it's- uh- they're- ah- gnomes! HA!". And then Elton John was like, "I'll throw my money into this potential Oscar candidate as long as you play one of my songs at every waking second". And then we were given Gnomeo and Juliet. We thought that this movie was all we would get from the Citizen Kane of gnome movies. BUT THEN! But then, out of nowhere: Gnomeo and Juliet 2: Sherlock Gnomes. Now I know what you're thinking: what the heck does Sherlock Holmes have anything to do with Romeo and Juliet. Well, I have an answer: they're both British stories. Because, of course, there aren't any other British stories in existence. Children, no need to fret anymore. Sherlock Gnomes is finally here!

IT'S SO BAD!!!!!!!!

I couldn't even fathom that this absolutely inane idea of a movie could this bad as bad as it actually is. BUT IT IS!!!! It's worse than I ever imagined it would be! I was somewhat depressed when I started watching this on Amazon Prime and I KID YOU NOT, this movie made me even more depressed. I couldn't even laugh at how bad it was. It was just unrelentingly and irredeemably terrible. And no one even asked for this to be made. No one saw it. No one liked it. It simply exists, even though it shouldn't. To quote Jeff Goldblum from Jurassic Park, Paramount was "so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should!"

This movie has one of the best Rotten Tomatoes consensuses: "Sherlock Gnomes is sadly, utterly stumped by the mystery of the reason of its own existence." It's funny because it's true. This film is one of the most unfocused, jarbled messes that I have ever seen. The main arc is an exceptionally boring Sherlock Holmes story where someone kidnaps all of the gnomes in London.... and that's it really. It's up to Sherlock Gnomes and John Watson (they couldn't come up with a gnome pun, how lazy) to save the gnomes and save the day! All clues point to Moriarty. BUT HOW? Moriarty died at the begin- oh who am I kidding? It's so obvious that the Moriarty "death" scene at the beginning is fake. Also, throughout the story, you notice Watson starts to become visibly uneasy. Eventually, he even (AHEM) "dies". But the real plot twist, (MAJOR SPOILER FOR SHERLOCK GNOMES! LIKE ANYONE CARES!) is that Watson was the real kidnapper and he did it because Sherlock made him feel like garbage. Wow, I totally didn't see that coming despite the fact that every time Watson is left alone, he gives Sherlock a mean glare. That's foreshadowing that he's gonna do something naughty. BUT EVEN BIGGER SPOILER PLOT TWIST!!!!! Moriarty is alive and he kidnapped the gnomes that Watson kidnapped so he can crush them in the Tower Bridge! And that's about it. I know what the two people who are reading this review just thought: "But what about Gnomeo and Juliet?" Oh, they're there too. They serve absolutely nothing to the plot except just being there I guess. It's kinda stupid. This movie is supposed to be a sequel to the other, yet the main characters don't affect the plot in any meaningful way. They're just..... there. For some reason. Oh yeah, and one of the other gnomes is in love with a frog garden sprinkler. And in case you're wondering: yes, the frog and the gnome do make out. So you've got a Sherlock Holmes movie, with Gnomeo and Juliet thrown in for brand recognition, even though Sherlock Holmes might be an even more recognizable. I think Paramount overestimated how many people were actually looking forward to a Gnomeo and Juliet sequel. They thought it would be a good idea to make a sequel to this mildly amusing property 7 YEARS LATER!

If the plot wasn't terrible enough, it certainly doesn't help that the animation has some issues. Except for those awesome, 2D-animated Mind Palace sequences. For the record, the gnome character designs are fine, I guess. I mean, they're gnomes. As long as you give them a beard, big nose, and a pointy hat, you win. You competently designed a gnome. But when the characters happen to NOT be gnomes, problems arise. For example, if it wasn't obvious, this movie is pretty low budget. This budget certainly shows when you look at the only visible non-statue character: the hound that is owned by the Baskervilles (YA GET IT????).  Despite the fact that they could make well-animated garden gnomes and stuff like that, they tried to make a realistic looking dog and failed miserably. Just look at it:

But that dog is nothing, I MEAN NOTHING, compared to how poorly animated Moriarty's character design is. They decided it would be a funny gag if Moriarty was a pie-company mascot, but in practice, I don't think it turned out as well as the animators hoped. I have no words.

Lastly, I just need to talk about the thing that bugs me the most about the film: the clear indication that not one person involved gave a single crap. The cast is stacked: James McAvoy, Emily Blunt, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Stephen Merchant (I'm a fan of Portal 2), Michael Caine, and Maggie Smith are just a few of the people involved with this dumpster. Heck, say what you will regarding Johnny Depp as a person, he's still a very talented actor. Yet not one of these talented actors put any care into their roles. Emily Blunt (who I personally think is the most talented of the bunch) QUIETLY put her talent into another Paramount movie. No one put any passion into their work because why should they? Why bother writing a decent script when you are working on a sequel to Gnomeo and Juliet that absolutely no one wanted called SHERLOCK GNOMES?! There's just no point for this even existing. No one went to go see it. No one who has seen it likes it. Being aware of the existence of this film was enough to scare most people away. I thought this was going to be so preposterous that it would at least make me snicker at the end. Kinda like I do at the end of every Sharknado. Or at the end of The Hurricane Heist (I wanna watch that masterpiece again). But nope: Sherlock Gnomes made me groan when it finished. It was probably the shortest movie I saw from 2018 (1 hour and 10 minutes), but it was easily the most unbearable. It makes The Darkest Minds seem like an incredible film. So if you've been keeping up with reviews, you know what that means.....

SCORE: 1/10

This is the worst thing I saw from 2018. Period. I don't think it will get much worse than this. I sincerely hope it doesn't get worse than this.

Also, Paramount, you should be ashamed of these posters you made. They're terrible.

I find this last one particularly disgusting, especially considering it's parodying an film about a historical event in which thousands of people died (it's also my all-time favorite film).

Also you made this:

Th-thanks?