Space Buddies

Space Buddies

Dogs are the worst animals to launch into space on account they chase every comet they see.

Unfortunately, the shuttle carrying the canines in this family- comedy is incapacitated.

Golden retriever pup Buddha (Field Cate) and his newborn buddies: Mudbud, Rosebud, Budderball and B-Dawg stowaway on an experimental rocket ship and are unknowingly launched into space.

But when they run out of fuel, their ship must dock at a Russian space station, where a cosmonaut (Diedrich Bader) and his dog (Jason Earles) have been living in seclusion. While the Russian wants to stay his dog doesn't, so the buddies formulate an escape.

The third entry in the Air Bud spin-off, this 2009 offering is on par with the previous installments, save for worse special effects and storytelling. However, the Buddies are still adorable.

Moreover, if they make it back, the Buddies will be the first dogs to ever return from space.

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This has got the be the worst talking animal movie I've ever seen.

Space Buddies was a horror. Not a horror movie, just... Ugh. It's like if three years after the semi-realistic "Air Bud: Spikes Back", the creators probably stopped caring about what the franchise is all about and decided to put in talking Golden Retriever puppies, lame fart jokes and less sports. Disney's just becoming lamer and lamer (not to mention greedier and greedier) and more targeted to dumb girls, who care more about looks and voices, than boys (especially with the crappy pop music). I've seen the first two Buddies films, and they were bad, but realistic compared to this.

Buddha is the leader of the Buddies though he doesn't seem Chinese or Hindu at all. You don't even get any proof of his religion. If he were Chinese or Hindu, he'd seem like a fat, Chinese puppy or just a dog that failed at an audition for Roadside Romeo. Rosebud is the girl, B-Dawg is a hip-hop black stereotype (just like his owner), Mudbud is a puppy version of Pigpen from the Peanuts franchise and Budderball is always dressed as a football player, hungry and gassy when his paw gets pulled. C'mon, I've seen much funnier fart jokes! It's just getting old.

OK, on with the plot. Buddha's owner is interested in what the moon is like. Much later, the Buddies sneak into a school bus on a trip to space station Vision 1, where they get to see all the cool things about space. They wear some goofy-looking blue and black outfits, travel onto the space ship (the whole station looks like an airport, but then again the ship acts kinda like an airplane and the whole setting was filmed at an airport in Vancouver, Canada) and set off for a wild adventure through space while their owners find that their puppies are missing. Hey, it was possible with Laika but not with annoying puppies! I mean, weren't these puppies supposed to play sports? It's just another way of Disney asking for money. Walt is probably spinning in his grave.

While in space, the buddies meet up with a Russian dog named Spudnick who wants to see his young owner Sasha but is stuck with Sasha's immature stereotype father named Yuri. Later, they have a walk around on the moon to see what it's like. But will they survive the journey home with the help of a talking ferret at Vision 1 named Gravity? There is hope that they won't!

First of all, the idea is just freaking stupid. It's just like Snow Buddies with elements of Space Chimps, Fly Me to the Moon, Beverly Hills Chihuahua and Good Boy. Second of all, the quotes are just cheesy ("We're lost in space, dog!"), the puppies talk too much, they sometimes speak campy pop culture references ("It's just like a ride on Space Mountain!" "It's the Death Star!") and their computer-generated mouths are the only thing that makes them express themselves, but it doesn't really help. You wouldn't really be able to tell if they're frightened, angry, sad, shocked or happy. It just takes the cuteness away from them, aside from the farts. Films like Beverly Hills Chihuahua had more creativity and emotion! The chihuahuas in that film could actually feel happy, scared, sad, angry or all that stuff. They could even act startled or something like that to show their expression, which Space Buddies doesn't do. For example, when B-Dawg thinks Spudnick is an alien at first, the only way we know he's scared is his dialogue. He doesn't move and his face isn't computer-manipulated enough.

My final word - DO NOT RENT OR BUY SPACE BUDDIES. You just might fulfil Disney's corporate greed and let them make more crappy stuff. Do not even see it online. It's for your own good. Enjoy much better sci-fi or dog movies, such as Star Wars, some of the Star Trek films or 2001: A Space Odyssey or 101 Dalmatians, The Fox and the Hound or Lady and the Tramp. And what the hell is up with the tagline? "One Small Step For Dog. One Giant Leap For Dogkind." See? It's not just the idea itself that makes Space Buddies unwatchable! Usually, I enjoy movies that are stupid when they're meant to be, but this was meant to be funny. It's just not right. Now if you excuse me, I'm going to go and watch WALL-E to calm myself down.

Well, it looks like there's a fair number of people who are defending this film and I am certainly not one of them. I don't like the argument that you should lower your standards just because it's something made for kids. While not a good movie, "The Adventures Of Elmo In Grouchland" did a far superior job of having more interesting characters, backgrounds and everything else. In fact, I might have just given this a 3 out of 10 if not for this one major factor: fart jokes. Yeah, I tried to avoid the first one but in one of the latter parts of the movie, they actually have the dogs fart because they need his methane gas.

I don't even think that was a joke. It was meant to be something serious. There's this one character who suddenly becomes a villain out of absolutely nowhere. The visuals are simply terrible. Whenever the pups are on the Moon, you can easily tell they're just ugly CGI models. The worst thing about the movie is probably the lip movement. We get these creepy lines coming from their mouths. Look at the "Babe" movies and see how they did it much better. I guess it didn't help I hadn't seen most of the other movies. This was a sequel or I guess a spin off of Air Bud. Disney stopped making direct to video animated sequels at this point but they still had some awful live-action ones left.

Why even put talking animals into the mix? The original "Air Bud" was mediocre at best and didn't need these constant followups. The characters in this are just not smart. There's a scene where a kid can literally just use this machine to put on a spacesuit. Why would anyone have a machine turned on during a tour that just immediately gives you one of those? Shouldn't they maintain their equipment better? It gets rather dumb when we see five dogs do it. Learn the first time. This movie features a cosmonaut who looks like one of the Geico caveman and boy, is he obnoxious. I think even people who liked the other ones didn't care for this. Even for this length, it went on too long. This is why I'm a "Gravity Falls" fan. *

I watched this film as a joke with my girlfriend, as both of us were looking for something really awful to laugh at. Sadly, the movie wasn't that funny and really wasn't that poorly made either. Now, that certainly isn't a bad thing, and I would've been very happy had the film been good. Unfortunately, the film's biggest problem comes from the fact that it's way too boring and serious for its own good.

Now, sure, the film is about a gang of token puppers that get lost in space, and there are the occasional fart jokes (the "fat" dog gets most of the abuse here), as well as a few puns (they say the phrase "one small step for dog, one giant leap for dogkind" at least five times), but other than that, the humor is almost non-existent. The script almost feels like it was written for adults staring adults, but someone decided to change it to a G- rated talking dog movie at the last minute, forgetting to remove all the long and boring science talk scenes. Trust me, there are a lot of long science talks sequences. Every time we cut back to the humans on earth, there's always a large spiel of exposition explaining the scientifics behind what's going on in space. Kids don't care about scientific details or the true-to-life accuracy of the facts, they want to see silly puppies doing silly things. And even when they cut back to the dogs, it's mostly serious dialog discussing their situation. Sound exciting to your kid? Probably not. The film is also unnecessarily cruel to a Russian who gets abandoned in space and tries to get revenge on the puppies after they nearly blow him up in a fiery explosion. Seriously.

That's about it. Also, the rapping wigger dog is probably the most annoying character in the history of cinema, and I do not approve.

Space Buddies is just plain cute and fun. Parents with younger children don't have a lot to choose from these days and the lack of swearing, sexual and drug references make it a perfect choice for the little ones to watch anytime Mom or Dad need a break.

As in all of the Air Bud and Air Buddies franchise films, there are lessons to be learned. Lessons about cooperation, teamwork, friendship and tolerance, responsibility and following rules. Despite all of that the movie is not preachy, the puppies are cute and personable and every child is sure to have a favourite. I especially appreciate that they did not use adults speaking in baby-talk as the voices of the puppies but have child actors doing the voices.

I recommend this movie to parents & grandparents of small children and babysitters everywhere.