Barbie and the Secret Door

I am aware I've missed a few Barbie movies compared to when I did about 27 of them back in 2013 (Christ, it doesn't feel that long ago), so I'm gonna do my best to make up to it now. Since the last one I did was The Pearl Princess, I thought it be best to review the next movie on the list, Barbie and the Secret Door, advertised as 'the ultimate fairytale musical'. There isn't really anything I could find for this in terms of behind the scenes facts other than this is actually the very first Barbie movie to be directed by a woman. Bit strange that it took Mattel about 15 years to achieve this feat given the target demographic...So, should The Secret Door be a movie that deserves to be known by all little girls, or is it best for this to be kept a secret? Let's take a look!

Story: Centring on the shy bookworm Princess Alexa, she enters a magical world through the titular secret door after being given a book by her grandmother, where she's chosen to defeat the evil Princess Malucia...because! Anyway, they have to try and defeat the magic stealing brat and protect a 'Queen Unicorn' otherwise she'll have all the magic which will...umm...noticing a problem here? There are many things which are never explained or acknowledged in this movie and it just left me both confused and bored. Like, why is Alexa the one to defeat such a spoilt brat despite having no connection to the world of the secret door? Why would Malucia stealing all the magic have disastrous consequences? Why are the unicorns so important? Why is everyone afraid of a bratty ten year old when it seems it's not the first time she's tried to take over (SPOILER ALERT, yet I don't care)? Why does she think she'd be a good monarch despite having no concept of politics? This also leads to another problem: the inconsistency. The world of Zinnia itself feels so inconsistent with how the rules and limitations of magic work that it left me baffled over why the writers decided to add it in in the first place. It doesn't really help that the movie tries to compensate for the terrible writing with musical numbers, but they're all pointless filler which stop the movie cold instead of carrying it forward. I can see that it's trying to do some sort of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe premise, but the fact that Alexa is trying to escape her 'hard' responsibilities as a princess (i.e dancing and drinking tea with princes) instead of actual problems makes it hard to feel for Alexa's plight. This is on top of any attempts at emotion or action really falling flat because of the poor execution, leaving me uninvested in the characters' relationships or the conflict. However, I can see a concept behind this premise. If it was in the right hands, it could have been a sweet little fantasy adventure which acknowledged some of the ridiculousness of it all. But unfortunately, what we're left with is such a bland fantasy movie that does absolutely nothing to make it new other than adding glitter and unicorns for 5 year olds who'll eat it up.

Animation: Again, despite the small improvements compared to the first generation movies, the animation still has many flaws. The character designs are still creepy with their dead eyes and plastic looking expressions on top of the obvious reuses of character models both in the main characters and the extras. It's arguably worse this time round because despite Malucia being a 10 year old girl, she clearly has the face of an adult woman, making you fall face first into the uncanny valley. This also applies to the character animation because while a few movements are a bit smoother, the rest can feel really clunky due to the lack of thought put into the weight or timing and the use of motion capture. Although I will give credit that some of the lighting and texturing has really improved in some areas like clothing, stone and grass, the backgrounds and effects don't make them worth watching. Zinnia feels like such an utterly generic fantasy world except smothered in rainbow kisses and unicorn stickers, leaving me nauseated with how overtly cutesy it is. This is on top of the creatures looking really generic and equally as creepy as the humans because of how over the top they act and move. This is on top of Alexa's world looking like a bland fairytale castle against a futuristic version of what looks like New York City, really making it feel jarring. It doesn't really help when the movie tries to incorporate 2D animation for Alexa's fantasy sequence because not only is that overtly cutsey and clunky, but the designs also look really out of place since it's never used again. In fact, the whole thing feels like a PS3 cutscene both in quality and design. That's the best way to describe the animation in all of this actually...

Characters: I think it's safe to say that the characters in this are all as bland as a rice cake. Princess Alexa is the cliched 'shy girl' who shuns her responsibilities as a princess in favour of her love for reading which is never acknowledged afterwards. All she is after that is the cliched 'chosen one' to defeat Malucia who barely does anything despite the attempt at giving her an arc of gaining confidence. Her friends, Romy and Nori are annoying with few character traits other than struggling with being human instead of being fairies or mermaids and pressuring Alexa to be 'the chosen one'. The villain, Princess Malucia, is easily the most annoying Barbie villain ever because not only is the obnoxious spoilt brat stereotype, but nothing about her makes her interesting, let alone threatening or 'scary'! She grated on my nerves so badly that I was in disbelief that all the fairies and mermaids were afraid of her. I can see they were trying to go for a Darla Dimple style villain, but the big difference between them is that her put-on cuteness compensated for her bat-shit crazy nature. And given her parents at the end revealing it's not the first time she attempted to take over Zinnia, it makes the movie feel like an utter waste of time! Her minions, the Sniffers, were also annoying in their attempts to be 'funny', while Grodlin is the pushover 'trog' who was meant to take care of her while her parents were away. The characters in the real world are no better as they're all either valley girls/ her grandmother who support Alexa despite her laziness, or really strict and 'proper' like her mother and Mr Primrose. The movie tries to give Alexa a love interest with Prince Kieran, but it's barely acknowledged other than in 2 scenes when they're clearly trying to have them be in a relationship.

Songs: Well, what do you know, every single song in this is pointless cliched filler. Although it's advertised as having seven songs and being a full blown musical, it's actually not. In reality, it's about four with the rest being reprises for no reason other than to make the 80 minute mark. What's Gonna Happen is utterly pointless as it does nothing to help the audience get to know Alexa other than making her come across as a selfish hermit for ignoring her responsibilities as a princess in favour of reading which she could do any other time. If I Had Magic has really repetitive lyrics and does nothing to explain why magic would solve Alexa's 'problems' other than for materialism. What makes this worse is that this song becomes the motif and it gets annoying really quickly. You're Here is a really obnoxious way of explaining the conflict in Zinnia with Malucia and pressuring Alexa to save everyone despite not explaining how or why she's the one to do it. I Want It All is an obnoxiously 'catchy' villain's song which doesn't explain Malucia's motivations other than being a spoilt brat. But the worst part about all of these songs besides their superfluous nature is that they're crappy bubblegum pop. Not only does this make them utterly forgettable immediately after you listen to them, but it also gives the movie a very dated feeling. To call this movie the 'ultimate fairytale musical' is an utter farce because the songs don't reflect this hyperbole whatsoever!

Barbie and the Secret Door is nothing more than an obvious cash-grab to sell dolls. The writing is lazy, the animation still looks creepy, the characters are annoying and bland and none of the songs are memorable or charming. I highly recommend avoiding this movie. There aren't many good messages for kids or adults other than 'magic will solve all your problems' and there are much better fantasy movies with good messages about gaining confidence in yourself, most namingly, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. It's definitely not the worst Barbie movie (I'd probably give that distinction to Barbie Presents Thumbelina) as I can see the intentions behind this, but for what it is, it's just a waste of time you'll immediately forget after watching.
Story: 😠
Animation:😠
Characters:😡
Songs:😡
Overall:😠