With 2021’s Rumble, we find an animated mix of fantasy, comedy, and action. The film takes place in a future society where “monster wrestling” acts as a huge draw.

In the small town of Stoker-on-Avon, shark-like Tentacular (voiced by Terry Crews) becomes the champion. However, he sets his sights on bigger pastures, and that leaves Stoker in need of a new monster wrestler or else they will lose a major source of revenue.

Teen Winnie Coyle (Geraldine Viswanathan) tries to fill the void, and she recruits an inexperienced beast named Steve (Will Arnett) to become her pupil. Winnie and Steve bond as they attempt to rise through the wrestling ranks and topple Tentacular at the top of the heap.

Though I can’t claim we get too many movies about monster wrestlers, not much about Rumble seems original otherwise. It falls into a well-worn “coming of age” genre about young people who bond with/learn from unusual creatures and doesn’t ever seem interested in much beyond the cliché basics.

Actually, Winnie does differ from the expected “struggling loner” part that dominates this genre. Usually the lead character attaches to the beastie because he/she doesn’t fit with his/her peers, and this connection allows the main role to mature.

By contrast, Winnie comes across as self-confident from Minute One. The movie gives her a challenge in that her dead dad Jimbo (Carlos Gómez) was a legend in the monster wrestling field, so she needs to live up to the family name.

That creates a smidgen of self-doubt, but not much, as Rumble prefers Steve in the “insecure underdog” role. Actually named “Rayburn Jr.”, Steve’s also dead monster dad Rayburn (Charles Barkley) was Jimbo’s wrestler, so the movie gives Steve his own journey in that regard.

All of this feels like a lot of plot for a movie about wrestling monsters. Given that Rumble can’t find anything original in terms of characters or themes, it should rely more on the wacky antics of its enormous competitors.

And at times it does, but too much of Rumble sticks with dull narrative exposition. Sorry, but we just don’t care about the flimsy backstories of either Winnie or Steve, so if the movie can’t deliver fun comedy action, then it becomes tough for it to succeed.

Rumble occasionally shows some signs of mirth, largely thanks to an overqualified cast. In addition to those already named, we find folks like Tony Shalhoub, John DiMaggio, Fred Melamed, Ben Schwartz and others. They add some spark on occasion.

However, they can’t overcome the banal, predictable nature of the script and its gags. Is a “smells like victory” joke a sure sign of creative bankruptcy?

Not absolutely, but that Apocalypse Now reference got stale decades ago. Though Rumble doesn’t become a poor animated adventure, it seems mediocre at best.

Footnote: a tag scene shows up early in the end credits.

Rumble appears in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. Computer animated films tend to look good on Blu-ray, and Rumble followed that rule.

Sharpness was fine across the board. The movie delivered satisfying definition, with no obvious softness on display.

No signs of jagged edges or moiré effects occurred, and edge haloes were absent. Of course, print flaws never manifested themselves.

Colors tended to be broad and bold, though the film opted more toward orange/teal than expected for an animated tale. Even with those choices, the hues still boasted nice range and impact, and a fair amount of purple added to the presentation as well.

Blacks were dark and deep, while low-light shots offered nice clarity and smoothness. This became an appealing visual presentation.

With Rumble, we got a DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack that offered a lively soundscape, especially during the action sequences. Those fleshed out the spectrum in an involving way and gave us many chances for movement.

This allowed the surrounds to play an active role. The track worked well enough in the early stages but it picked up more as it went, especially as the film neared its climax. The various channels got a good workout in this engrossing soundscape.

Audio quality seemed pleasing. Speech always sounded distinctive and concise, while music was peppy and rich.

Effects offered solid reproduction, with clean highs and deep lows. I liked this mix and thought it gave the movie life.

A mix of extras round out the disc, and The Super-Secret Playbook runs four minutes. It offers a glimpse of the contents of the text composed by Winnie’s dad. It offers a cute but forgettable bonus.

The Mon-Stars of Wrestling spans four minutes, 40 seconds and offers an overview of various monster characters. It acts more as movie promo than anything else.

Next comes Salsa With Rayburn Jr., a two-minute, 21-second segment that delivers minor “tips” about Latin dancing. It becomes another superficial extra.

Massive Monsters, Wrestling Moves and Dazzling Dances goes for five minutes, 14 seconds and brings notes from director Hamish Grieve.

The piece covers character design and animation. Grieve gives us a few insights but seems fairly mediocre.

For the last featurette, Four Rounds in the Animation Ring fills one minute, 52 seconds with a look at various stages of animation. Experienced viewers will already know this material, but it acts as a good summary for neophytes.

Five Deleted Scenes occupy a total of four minutes, 42 seconds. These offer fairly minor character beats but nothing special.

In an unusual touch, two of the five made it all the way to final animation, which rarely happens with cartoons. One got to crude animation and the other two bailed at the story reel stage.

At no point does Rumble become a poor mix of action, comedy and fantasy, but it also never turns into anything memorable or especially creative. This turns into a moderately watchable but largely ordinary animated tale. The Blu-ray brings excellent visuals as well as good audio and a handful of bonus materials. Expect something vaguely entertaining but no more than that.