Combining a cute, soft-voiced, monochromatic robot with a story of tech-addiction and malfunctioning A.I., it’s not unreasonable to describe Ron’s Gone Wrong as a blend of Big Hero 6 and The Mitchells Vs The Machines. However, it would be a mistake to write the film off with a “seen it, done that” shrug, as it has a huge heart and a lot to say.
Created by a team of ex-Aardman and Pixar people — not to mention the co-writer of Borat (Peter Baynham) and the production designer of Tenet (Nathan Crowley) — it strikes just the right balance of laughs, spectacle and good ol’-fashioned tear-jerking. The core of the tale is a friendship between a pair of loveable rejects. There’s 13-year-old Barney Pudowski (voiced by It’s Jack Dylan Grazer), who just can’t click with the other kids in his school. His existence is primarily analogue (not by choice) while they spend most of their time online: posting, gaming, liking and subscribing, all via the latest tech-craze, a Kinder Egg-capsule-shaped robot which crunches all their data to serve up their favourite things and connect them with other kids. Then there’s Ron (Zach Galifianakis in ‘sooth’ mode), the ‘B*Bot’ which literally fell off the back of a truck. Because he can’t connect to the internet, he’s a free-spirited naïf who must learn about the world through Barney, with the old-school help of a corkboard and a bunch of Post-it notes. “Are we having fun with me?” he keeps asking.
Unlike all the other children glued to their Bots, Barney’s relationship with Ron is earned rather than processed, and it’s a delight to watch as their differences come to define the buddiness, rather than shared likes.
The film is at its strongest when it homes in on Barney and Ron.
There is a higher-stakes-than-you’d-expect action-adventure element, which kicks in after a panicked attempt to recall Ron by a profit-over-people tech-slime voiced by Rob Delaney. Meanwhile, Olivia Colman (who must have a thing for robot-themed animations after doing Mitchells) is a hoot as Barney’s eccentric, drill-wielding Bulgarian grandmother. It’s hard to miss the script’s digs at social media and personal data harvesting; obvious targets, but also deserving ones. Those non-Ron B*Bots are cute and cool, but there is something really creepy about them (you know, like Siri).
However, the film is at its strongest when it homes in on Barney and Ron. Like The Iron Giant and How To Train Your Dragon before it, it’s the kind of big-screen friendship that, well… It just gets you.
