Twenty years ago, Pixar Animation Studios changed the world of animated films forever with the release of the instantly classic Toy Story. Featuring the imagination, heart and sharp wit the studio is now famous for, that film introduced moviegoers to a pair of iconic characters in cowboy Woody and Buzz Lightyear, chronicling how the two playthings’ relationship evolved from a competition into an unshakeable bond that is due to hit theaters once more in the announced 2018 release Toy Story 4. So Pixar isn’t exactly operating outside its comfort zone with the unlikely friendship at the center of The Good Dinosaur.

The new film is set in a world where an asteroid never hit the Earth, and dinosaurs were able to live on, evolving to the point that they are accomplished farmers thousands of years later (yes, really). A young scrawny Apatosaurus named Arlo (voiced by Raymond Ochoa), however, is having a tricky time pulling his weight in the family cornfields and ends up tracking the mischievous caveboy (voiced by Jack Bright) who has been ravaging his family’s crops. That simple task becomes much more than Arlo bargained for, as he and his new human companion find themselves far from home and fending for themselves in the treacherous wilderness.

Early on, The Good Dinosaur‘s straightforward setup may make moviegoers believe they are in for another Brave, namely a Pixar film that doesn’t transcend its medium but succeeds in telling a well-crafted tale despite the absence of that established Pixar magic. After all, the studio has already tackled the underdog elements of the plot before in films like A Bug’s Life, Ratatouille and WALL-E. Plus, the visual aesthetic of The Good Dinosaur — which installs its cartoony cast into near-photorealistic environments — threaten to compensate for any relative unoriginality in its storytelling.

Still, despite its undeniable beauty, the film’s plot is a narrative jumble that never quite gels together into a cohesive or even thematically satisfying whole. Rather, the story leans on established tropes of family-friendly storytelling as Arlo and his silent human friend — who takes on the name Spot mid-film — journey home, encountering myriad creatures along the way. Most memorably, this includes a trio of uncharacteristically friendly Tyrannosaurus rex voiced by Sam Elliott, Anna Paquin and A.J. Buckley. The film’s episodic feel is most apparent during this segment, in which The Good Dinosaur morphs into a prehistoric Western for some reason.

The film notoriously faced a great deal of creative reinvention during its production, even scrapping its voice cast at one point (McDormand is the sole remaining original cast member) as the story changed gears. As a result, it stands as one of the most bizarrely disjointed films in Pixar’s repertoire, ranking alongside the Cars films as one of the studio’s weakest entries to date. For most other creative teams, perhaps The Good Dinosaur may have been a passably entertaining romp with enough poignant material to keep children entertained and parents engaged.

However, during a year in which audiences have seen the far superior The Peanuts Movie and Pixar’s own surefire Oscar winner Inside Out, The Good Dinosaur stands as just the latest piece of evidence that the animation studio is fallible. Despite the animators’ best efforts, the story at hand lacks almost any semblance of magic and, upon closer inspection, doesn’t even stay true to its central conceit, creating a false sense of closure and hoping that audiences are too teary-eyed to notice. Shame on you, Pixar. Let’s hope Finding Dory doesn’t follow suit.

Rating: 3 out of 5

Follow Robert Yaniz Jr. on Twitter @CrookedTable!

Click here for more Crooked Table reviews!