Review of Trolls Band Together, directed by Walter Dohrn

Under most normal circumstances, Trolls Band Together is not one of those movies I would have ventured out to a movie theater to go and see. I simply had no interest in seeing this movie, especially after I was blasted with the trailer every time I went to my local theater—and I go a lot, as I have AMC A List, which is basically a subscription.

There is only one person who can get me going to movies that I really don’t care to see: my older sister. She ends up going to the movies with me once a week, and it was her turn to pick.

So, for some reason, she wanted to see Trolls Band Together.

And that is how we went to the movies one Sunday night, surrounded by families (why were people bringing their kids to a movie this late? That’s my question.), watching the Trolls movie. I will admit, it was better than expected, considering I have not seen the previous movies in the franchise.

Let’s get into the review!

An adventure to get the band back together to save one brother.

We begin this movie in the past: Branch, who is an infant, performs with his four older brothers in one of the land’s most popular boy bands: BroZone. Together, when they come on stage, it’s magical, but friction is driving the brothers apart, especially when it comes to their individual egos and interests.

When they try to make the Perfect Family Harmony happen, by being fully in sync, they fail, leading to disastrous consequences on stage. This leads to a massive fight where the band is broken up, and Branch is left behind by all of his brothers with his grandmother.

We come back to the present day. A month after the events of Trolls World Tour, Bridge and Gristle are getting married. Branch and Poppy are on their way to the wedding, but then John Dory shows up in the middle of the wedding, revealing he realized their one brother, Floyd (who Branch was close with), has been kidnapped by two rising pop stars.

They’ve put him inside of a perfume bottle, and they steal his essence in order to be better singers (they can’t actually sing). This is slowly killing him, though they don’t care. Branch, Poppy, Tiny Diamond, and John Dory set out to find the other brothers, and first find Spruce, now known as Bruce, with his wife and kids on Vacay Island.

He doesn’t want to do it, but with his wife and kids’ help, they tell him to go along with the group. The next stop is an abandoned golf course, where Clay is working as an accountant for the trolls that are living there. No one there has realized that the Bergens stopped eating trolls, and so they’ve been living isolated for years.

Poppy learns that the leader of these trolls is Viva, who is her long-lost sister that her father refuses to talk about because of what happened. She’s overjoyed to do sister things with her. But when the crew finally convinces Clay to leave with them, Viva stops everyone in their tracks, thinking it’s too dangerous to go outside.

Poppy and crew escape narrowly, but not without her telling Viva about how Bridge, a Bergen, is her best friend. Bridge and Gristle are on their honeymoon, and eventually end up at the golf course, where Viva recognizes her and stops the other trolls from killing them.

Meanwhile, Floyd is dying as the two pop stars prepare for their big concert. One of them admits that she forged the note that convinced John Dory to come rescue Floyd, as she wanted all the brothers to come and rescue Floyd so they can be kidnapped and their essences stolen from.

The trolls are trying to get the Perfect Harmony on their path to the mountain, but fail. This leads to another argument, and Branch yells at everyone for the trauma they caused. Branch, Poppy, and Tiny Diamond end up finding Floyd after breaking into the compound, but discover the other brothers have been kidnapped.

At the red carpet, they confront the pop stars, but they escape and begin the concert on the road, zapping the kidnapped brothers of their energy. Along the way, Bridge and Gristle show up, as well as Viva to keep the superstars at bay. As Floyd lays dying, Branch gives a speech about how they’re a family, and they hit the Perfect Family Harmony, freeing them of their confines.

The superstars are shocked, and the brother confesses their crimes live on camera, getting them an automatic prison sentence. The BroZone band gets back together, and Poppy and Viva join as honorary members.

Overall Thoughts

This is a cute movie, not gonna lie. While I thought the music was going to be absolutely terrible, it fit the nineties boy band aesthetics quite well in a trolls fashion.

One of the more fun elements throughout was a technical one—they mix animation styles, especially when it comes to speeding up the vehicle they’re running against time in. I liked those kinds of sequences a lot, as well as the diversity of the trolls world.

Granted, not knowing the lore might’ve made some of the smaller details more confusing at first, but I found myself not feeling like I was completely left behind with what was happening.

I’m not mad at it. That’s a positive sign, and my sister also really like the movie, despite neither of us usually going for this kind of movie to watch.

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