Bee Movie ,.5/5

Rated PG. Click to view the trailer.

The "Bee" in Bee Movie (we're working with phonetics here, people) could stand for blah, bland, banal, boring or barf. Then again, it also stands for (b)lame, (b)crap, (b)unimaginative, (b)weak and (b)retarded.

I genuinely like Jerry Seinfeld so even through Bee Movie didn't sound the most cerebral of films, I went into it optimistic. I can't say I'd rather be stung by a bee, but I probably would opt for a single mosquito bite than be forced to pay $3 at the (3) Dollar Theater to see this again. Jer, you let me down. You too, Matthew Broderick. Ferris Bueller ought to know better.

Rotten Tomatoes has Bee Movie listed as 53 percent fresh, which is not good. But with jokes like, "She's bee-utiful" and "none of your bees-wax," I'm flat out impressed they're ranking the double digits. The movies is just so... I don't know, blah. It's everything Shrek, Robots or any Pixar film is not. It's dull, both as in not exciting and as in not sharp. That's probably the best way to describe it: dull. The animation is dull too. Imagine yourself as a child and your watching those old, crappy, generic, non-Hanna-Barbara/Looney Toons cartoons, you know, the ones with the non-Porky the Pig? That's Bee Movie, accept the colors haven't faded and the audio isn't blown out.

I won't even both with the plot, other than to say it's dull. The movie gets minor bonus points for including Sting (HA! GET IT? STING? HOLY CRAP, THAT'S HILARIOUS BECAUSE HIS NAME IS STING AND BEE'S STING! WHY AREN'T YOU LAUGHING?) and Ray Liota, but it's far too little to salvage this train wreck.

Go rent A Bug's Life and thank me in the morning.