Danny’s dog, Charlie, is nabbed by space aliens and given some superhero powers. Problem is, Puddy, the evil cat next door, got powers, too. There are a few nice pet-loving moments here, marred by some colorful expressions and potty humor. But frankly, there’s not all that much that kids will wag their tails over.
9-year-old Danny has been the bestest of besties with his pup, Charlie, since, well, forever. The two first rubbed noses right after Danny was brought home from the hospital, and they’ve been inseparable ever since.
Problem is, Charlie’s not quite so spry these days. His back is weaker. The old hips have a hard time with stairs. He’s even slow to gobble up treats. But nonetheless, Charlie is the first one at the gate every day when Danny gets home from school.
Danny, however, has started to notice that his old pal is slowing down. And it’s making him sad.
Then Charlie actually disappears for a few days. His dog house is left empty. Charlie’s never done that before. And Danny has a hard time sleeping at night while he worries.
So when Charlie comes bounding back into Danny’s bedroom one morning, it’s kind of a shock. Not only did the dog run up the stairs, but he looks at least five years younger. He’s jumping around so much, you’d swear he was flying. Oh, and one more big change: Charlie, the most faithful and true canine in the world … can talk!
Charlie quickly explains.
It turns out that a space-alien queen snatched up potential pets for her son from across the galaxy. Charlie and Puddy, the rather foul cat next door, were part of that sweep. But the alien prince wasn’t a kid who’s easily satisfied. So he began genetically altering the animals to fit his liking.
Right about the time that the bratty princeling began ejecting his rejected pets into space, the queen stepped back in. The spoiled boy obviously wasn’t ready to take care of a pet. So she gathered the animals and sent them back to their home planets.
That has left Charlie with what amounts to the abilities of a superhero. But on the flip side of that, Puddy, too, is now superpowered and imbued with his own powers. And Puddy isn’t as joyfully happy to be back with his owner as Charlie is.
It’s all pretty crazy. But it’s a brand-new day for Danny and his newly supercharged best friend. Why, maybe they can work together and help people who are in trouble.
What could possibly go wrong … besides, perhaps, everything?
Charlie is a good dog who loves his owner, Danny, dearly. And that devoted affection goes both ways. Charlie also begins using his super abilities to help people in need. He stops a jet from crashing, pulls a bus full of people out from large hole in the ground and puts his life on the line to save a falling satellite.
“You always helped others in need,” Danny notes. To which Charlie replies, “Doesn’t everybody? It just makes you feel good—like a service dog.”
When either of these friends gets sad about difficult things in life, their counterpart is always there to encourage and help. And when things really seem dire, Charlie immediately declares that they should turn to Danny’s mom for help. “That’s her superpower,” Charlie says. “Mom always fixes everything.” When the two buds turn to Mom, she does have an idea of what to do. And the three family members work together to save the day.
For all of the space aliens’ misguided choices, the alien queen dearly loves caring for pets. She goes to great lengths to keep pets from being hurt, including reversing the ill effects that she and her son caused. She speaks to Danny and other gathered humans about their human/pet relationships. “Listen to each other. Support each other,” the Queen advises. “And most of all, enjoy your time together. It is precious.”
There are no biblical references in the story. However, the alien queen does wonder if fate guided her and her ship to Earth to take place in a “greater purpose.”
Obviously, the film deals with aliens and science-based superpowers.
There’s an odd “gender identity” gag in the mix: When a dog wants to join Puddy’s all-cat crew, the male pup says he identifies as a cat, and Puddy instructs the canine on the correct way to move and react like a feline
Charlie the Wonderdog is not an overly thumping or violent movie, but after Charlie and Puddy are given special abilities, we see them both unleashing their powers.
Charlie, for instance, uses his powers in defensive and helpful ways. He saves crashing vehicles and keeps potential accidents from happening, such as when he stops a large satellite from colliding with a space station. But he sometimes causes a bit of destruction, too, like when he uses his strength to rip off a vault door or smash falling debris.
On the other hand, Puddy doesn’t care who’s hurt or how. In fact, he’s more than happy to eventually make humans extinct. Puddy starts off by using his levitation powers to rip objects apart and slam Otis, his owner, around their home. He hits the man with pots and pans and knocks him unconscious. The powerful cat also uses cans of dog food as projectiles to demolish a nearby tree, causing it to smash down on the roof of a neighbor’s house.
From there, Puddy graduates to greater and greater destruction. He levitates vehicles and buildings. And he even rips apart an abandoned amusement park, attacking foes with the resulting debris.
Highly acidic mucus dribbles out of a creature’s mouth, burning an animal’s fur. Charlie falls onto a cactus and then yells in pain as the long spines are removed, one by one. After losing consciousness in space, Charlie falls down to Earth in a fiery ball of flame. The doctor who attends him after the fall says the heroic canine broke all his bones, but somehow, Charlie’s body repairs itself.
The struggle between Charlie and Puddy sometimes puts Danny and his mom in peril. Charlie works hard to protect them, but Danny is sent hurtling from the top of a roller coaster at one point. A huge tower almost crushes several people.
There is no foul language in the dialogue other than a potential misuse of God’s name and the use of “frickin’.”
However, a few characters spew some off-color comments, such as “They all suck,” “Get off your sorry buttocks,” “dimwit,” and “Oh, gosh.”
Puddy discovers that his DNA can grant superpowers to other felines after a kitten licks up his spit and becomes super smart. He then uses this information to raise an enlightened cat army. And he uses a similar genetic construct to make humans cat-brained.
Puddy’s crew uses a gas to render Charlie unconscious.
When the alien queen asks why her son is ejecting animals into space, the boy responds, “I flushed the toilet.” Some other toilet humor pops up during the course of the film.
Puddy forces a man to kneel and lick up spilled, spoiled milk from the floor. The powerful cat demeans the man in other ways too, including pushing him into a litter box that he just vomited into.
There are some jokes designed to wink at the destructive nature of AI and cancel culture. For instance, Puddy releases a deepfake video of Charlie stealing something. Puddy otherwise runs a criminal scheme that makes Charlie look like a villain.
There are some political elbows to the ribcage that focus on a bombastic female president who wants to fire her staff for small infractions and is swayed by the temptation of selling personalized products and making huge profits. President Rose lies to the cameras repeatedly. (Charlie has to try and support her without lying at one point.)
Charlie the Wonderdog is neither mongrel nor champion. It’s just a kids’ pic that sorta … exists.
The movie’s animation is pleasant. The voice acting is OK. There are even some nice things said in the script about caring for your pet and mentions of how dependable moms can be when the chips are down.
But it’s the movie’s “script” that’s so, uh, ruff.
There are some colorful expressions and potty jokes, here. But frankly, the story and humor of this film is so drool-worthy and blah that even kids will find it hard to sniff out a giggle or work up an ounce of concern for the central characters.
And the stuff tossed in for adults—goofy political character gags and winks at AI, cancel culture and gender ideology—aren’t even worthy of a typical mom-and-dad eye roll.
In fact, other than a few “I love my dog” moments, 99% of this movie’s dialogue feels like stuff hung in place until the real dialogue gets written. The most immersive moments of the film come as the credits roll, when we see pictures of Charlie and Danny comforting sick kids and helping elderly neighbors.
In short, Charlie the Wonderdog doesn’t really offer much to wag your collective family tail over. In fact, the movie is much like taking your dog for a walk in the park: Everything that happens here has happened a thousand times before, and each sniff and scratch is forgotten as soon as it’s performed.
After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.
