Lego Dimensions (film)

Lego Dimensions is a 2022 American computer-animated comedy film based on the 2015 video game of the same name. Produced by Warner Animation Group distributed by Warner Bros., it is the sixth film in the LEGO Extended Universe. The film was directed and written by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, based on a story by Seth Grahame-Smith, and features an ensemble cast that includes Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, Emma Stone, Will Arnett, Elijah Wood, and Zack Galifianakis. Lego Dimensions acts as a crossover for the franchise, bringing the characters from previous films together. In the film, an extraneous event triggers the destruction of the multiverse, forcing different heroes to come together and try to stop the threat, unaware that the criminal Gotham City mastermind Joker is setting in motion an evil plan for domination.

The film was announced in early 2018, after creating an initial writers room for the story. Lord and Miller were signed on as directors and writers, and Grahame-Smith later stated that the film would be inspired by the Lego Dimensions video game, but clarified that it would follow an original premise. The film is also inspired by narrative elements from the comic "The Joker War". Production began in late 2019, however it was delayed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Lego Dimensions premiered in Dublin, Ireland on September 17, 2022, and was released in the United States on September 23 on IMAX, 4DX and Dolby Cinema. The film experienced a strong debut setting box office records and ended up grossing $1.037 billion worldwide, making it the fourth highest-grossing film of 2022. It received positive reviews from critics, for its animation and voice acting and earned numerous accolades; including Golden Globe and Annie Award for Best Animated Feature Film

Cast

 * Chris Pratt as Emmet Brickowsk.
 * Elizabeth Banks as Lucy / Wyldstyle, a Master Builder, next chosen and Emmet's girlfriend.
 * Emma Stone as Jane Dangerburger, a hyper-intelligent girl and the right hand and love interest of Brody Reyes.
 * Will Arnett as Bruce Wayne / Batman, a DC Comics superhero who is a Master Builder.
 * Elijah Wood as Brody Reyes, a man previously persecuted by the FBI and the law after being wrongfully framed.
 * Dave Franco as Lloyd, the Green Ninja and leader of the Secret Ninja Force.
 * Zack Galifianakis as Joker, a clown-themed villain in Gotham City and Batman's archenemy, who defines himself by his conflict with him.
 * Rosario Dawson as Barbara Gordon / Batgirl, a police commissioner of Gotham.
 * Alison Brie as Unikitty, a A Master Builder who is a unicorn-horned cat.
 * Michael Cera as Dick Grayson / Robin, a 18-year-old teenager who was adopted by Batmanr.
 * Michael Peña as Kai, the hotheaded red Ninja of Fire and Nya's brother.

Development
The film entered development in late 2017, with plans to release the film in 2020. Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were tapped as writers and directors and like the previous films. It received the green light in April 2018, after a basic outline was drawn up to form the story arc. A directors' room was set up the following month to properly develop the film iterations of the franchise and to discuss the central plot points. Producers Dan Lin and Roy Lee reiterated plans for the film later in 2018 and said that Lord and Miller had a story idea for the film.

Kevin Tsujihara mentioned that the story treatments were being viewed "closely, very closely" from the video game Lego Dimensions. Lord and Miller were later asked how much planning they had put into the film while it was in development in previous months, to which they replied that they knew how far they wanted to go with the story and the implications it would have on the franchise. They said that by planning the film they were also actively designing the future of the franchise in advance "it's crucial what we're doing; It can't be arbitrary but it's solid [... ] Until now, the previous Lego movies had pretty clear definitive endings, and of course, they weren't particularly connected." The directors also said that the film would introduce many more characters from popular culture and stated that future films could explore them properly.

Lord and Miller chose to make a behavioral outline before starting the script to adopt an idea that involved the coexistence of the characters: initially, four central characters were identified, who would be followed closely and then their paths would meet in the climax of the film. However, that factor was removedafter confirming that a centralized plot would make the film easier to watch and it was eventually abandoned entirely by the filmmakers. In total, the film spent five and a half years in development, with a budget of approximately $100 million. Lord and Miller described this as a long and intricate process.

Writing
Lord and Miller agreed to be writers after discussing a basic set of ideas they had for the film. By June 2018 they began to work on the script and devised the basic story, although at that time the treatments began. They described the film as "definitely more narratively mature than the previous films." Although the screenplay is credited to Lord and Miller, Seth Grahame-Smith spent a sixth-month stint working as additional support before leaving the project in late 2018. By August 2018 announced that the first draft of the script was completed. Lord and Miller stated that the film would not adapt the story of the original video game and would only be loosely inspired.

In the writing process, the script would go through "a lot of crazy iterations of what it could be", although in the evaluation of the film it was found that some of these complementary stories did not work and Lord and Miller were reluctant. After various projections and suggestions it was evaluated after three months and by May 2019 it was revealed that the script for Lego Dimensions had been completed. Editor Jeffrey Ford said that seven versions of the film were created before the script was turned in. The directors were asked if it would be difficult to meld the film's environments, "No," they said, "because we actually designed the film specifically to show a story organically." The initial storyboard differentiated the importance of separate arcs with different groups of characters, but Lin felt that the balance of the film was a combination of confluence between the different stories told. As of January 2019, seven to ten different ending scenes and endings were made for the film from the start of writing. Lin stated in July 2019: "My personal opinion is that Lord and Miller's work has been fantastic, they will do a great job and we support them in their ideas".

Production
Warner Bros. announced in July 2018 that a untitled Lego film, would be released on July 16, 2021. By October 13, 2018, the title of the film was announced. Animal Logic signed on in April 2019 to provide animation during production, the studio had already participated in the previous films of the franchise. Due to directors' scheduling conflicts, production did not begin in Canada until August 19, 2019 and then was put on hold in March 2020 as a safety measure due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A decision on when to resume production was originally expected in several weeks, but was pushed back to May. Production resumed on June 28, 2020 and continued until December 19, 2021, concluding after two years.

Casting
Casting began in October 2018 with the signature of Chris Pratt. In December, Elizabeth Banks and Will Arnett confirmed their return. Elijah Wood and Emma Stone, who played Brody Reyes and Jane Dangerburger in The Billion Brick Race (2019), stated that they were willing to return to their roles in the film and by April 2019, The Wrap reported that he would appear in the film. Later that month, Laurence Fishburne joined the film's cast to play an unknown central character.

In August 2019, Zack Galifianakis, Rosario Dawson, and Michael Cera confirmed that they would reprise their roles after placing requests with producer Dan Lin and executives at Warner Bros. That same month, Dave Franco, Alison Brie, Dwayne Johnson, Daniella Pineda, Channing Tatum, Jason Momoa, Cobie Smulders, Anika Noni Rose, Kristen Wiig joined the cast of the film with Momoa playing his role as Aquaman from the DC Extended Universe.

Theatrical
Lego Dimensions premiered on August 20, 2022, at the Regency Village Theater followed by an August 25 premiere at the Sidewalk Film Festival. The film was originally scheduled for general release on July 16, 2021, but due to scheduling conflicts and then the COVID-19 pandemic, it was pushed back to May 20, 2022 and later to September 2, 2022.

Home media
Lego Dimensions was scheduled to stream on and HBO Max streaming service 45 days after its theatrical release, but was pushed back indefinitely on September 1.

Box Office
Lego Dimensions grossed $457.1 million in the United States and Canada and $591.4 million in other countries for a worldwide total of $1.048 billion, against a budget of $100 million. Its the 2nd highest-grossing film of 2022 and the 8th highest-grossing animated film of all time. Box Office Mojo estimates that the film sold close to 60 million tickets in the United States and Canada. On November 4, the film crossed the $1 billion mark, becoming the second film of 2022 to do so (after Top Gun: Maverick) and first animated film to do so in the pandemic era. Deadline Hollywood calculated the film's net profit as $327.1 million, accounting for production budgets, marketing, talent participations, and other costs; box office grosses and home media revenues placed it second on their list of 2022's "Most Valuable Blockbusters".

The film had a worldwide opening of $396.02 million, which stands as the third-largest for a studio and the second-largest of all time for an animated film. It also had a worldwide IMAX opening weekend with a total of $26 million from 945 IMAX screens. Although the film had a strong initial load and dropped significantly in its second weekend, it quickly leveled off and had better daily and weekly holdings. It earned 3.1 times ($457.1 million) its opening weekend numbers ($156 million) and according to many box office analysts, "acted like a summer film in the middle of fall."

United States and Canada
In the United States and Canada, pre-release tracking suggested the film would open to $80–90 million from 4,327 theaters in its opening weekend. After earning a massive $31.7 million from Thursday's previews, (the biggest for the month of September, for an animated film and the second biggest of the year) many experts and analysts predicted a gross of between $120 and 150 million for its opening weekend, with projections of up to 175 million dollars. The film also became Fandango's best-selling animated film in advance, surpassing Incredibles 2, accounting for 90% of the site's weekend ticket sales. A survey conducted showed that the introduction of DC Comics characters was one of the main attractions for moviegoers. On its opening day, it grossed $75.59 million, including previews, marking the biggest September opening day of all time, the second biggest for an animated film and of 2022, with $12 million coming from IMAX screenings. It held up well on Saturday, dropping 30.1% and in total, it earned $156 million for its debut weekend, setting records for the biggest September openings and outside of grand-holiday months, the fifth-biggest for Warner Bros., the biggest debut for the franchise and the third largest for an animated film. In contrast, the film experienced large drops from Sunday to Monday, during the week after the premiere. It earned $9.1 million on its first Monday, the biggest in September, but it was a big drop from 71% of its Sunday gross. It continued to break records for the biggest Tuesday (13.4 million), Wednesday (8.2 million), and Thursday (7.4 million) in September.

The film earned $10.35 million on its second Friday, falling 82.2% and breaking the record for the biggest Friday-to-Friday drop for an animated film, not including $30 million worth of trailers which represented an even bigger decline. It continued to have a rocky weekend, topping the box office but plummeting 67.1% in its second weekend, grossing $51.3 million from 4,340 theaters (an addition of 14 theaters), attributed to a massive initial load and the nature of the market during the initial fall period, even if it faced little or no competition or new releases, according to ComScore. In its third weekend it continued to lead the box office and had better retention, after falling just 39% to $38.1 million. It also passed the $320 million mark. Forbes called the retention "very fantastic" and said that the film could have a better stability than expected due to its good word of mouth and its positive reception.

Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 90% of 278 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7.0/10. The website's consensus reads, "Lego Dimensions is a great continuation of its predecessors although it does have merit as a brilliant animated adventure in its own right." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 81 out of 100, based on 44 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale, while PostTrak reported 91% of audience members gave it a positive score (with an average rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars), with 79% saying they would definitely recommend it.

Johnny Oleksinski from The New York Post rated the film 3 out of 4 stars, stating that "Although it may seem a bit over the top and explosive, Lego Dimensions is creating an eloquent story and characters." Serena Puang from Boston Globe gave the film 3.5 stars out of 4 and wrote: "The film is eye-catching, and though its plot isn't the most prominent, it unfolds satisfactorily."

Peter Bradshaw from The Guardian rated the film two stars out of five, writing that "the plot is shallow, with weakly conceived character development."