The Grinch (2018) despite being a reboot is, in my opinion, actually pleasantly surprising. Benedict Cumberbatch offers a refreshing voice for the timeless character and the the film generally does a good job of rehashing a beloved family name. Furthermore, the animation is very well done, it’s cute and bubbly, very fitting for a modern, kid-friendly, reboot the The Grinch.

The film does have several shortcomings though. For one, it simply isn’t rated very high, IMDb gives it a 6.4/10 and rotten tomatoes, a 59%. Not awful per-say, but nothing to brag about. More importantly for me though is the ending. When I think of the Grinch I imagine the super cheery and uplifting song, the signing around the tree, the Grinch cutting the roast beef. While the new 2018 version does have these, they aren’t to the same effect and in my opinion, the ending was rushed, it just did not hit the same as the original.

However, the original Grinch is one of my all time favorite Christmas movies and is hard to compete with. For a movie that I came into with incredibly low expectations, The Grinch (2018) actually did an adequate job of emulating the feeling of the original (spare the ending) without feeling like a total copy. Overall I would give the film a 7.3/10 and would definitely recommend it to kids and maybe adults who have fond memories of the original.