Okay, so I have to admit that when I first heard there was going to be a movie based on LEGOs, I wrote it off as childish and made a mental note not to watch it. And then I thought to myself, “Who am I, OF ALL PEOPLE, to judge something for being childish?” As the movie was getting closer and closer to being released, I started to think to myself, “Okay, so maybe this is something I’d watch.” Finally, the movie came out and all my friends who had seen it opening weekend loved it and kept saying, “Everything IS awesome!” So, cut to today, when I finally saw The LEGO Movie.

Once the movie started, it took me a while to get used to seeing things I played with as a little kid starting to move and talk on their own. I know Toy Story is based on the same concept, but most of those toys I didn’t play with when I was younger, with many of them becoming real toys after the movie came out. But once I got immersed into this world of LEGOs, it was awesome to see the limitless possibilities the animators had. It was great to see Wyldstyle create a motorcycle from her surroundings. It was cool to see Batman zooming around in his Batmobile. And I was blown away to see blue LEGO pieces creating a living ocean. On top of that, the vocal talents were spot on, and the amount of comedy in this movie is too good for words (“Come with me if you wanna not die!”).

Most of all, the story was amazing, and this is where it starts to get spoilery, so please don’t read further unless you’ve already watched the movie.

Still with me? Good. As I was saying, the story went from great to phenomenal once you realized that the entire LEGO world you’d been watching was the product of the imagination of a young child named Finn, and that the LEGO villain, Lord/President Business, was actually the toy version of Finn’s father, a.k.a. “The Man Upstairs” (masterfully played by Will Ferrell). Turns out, everything we’d seen before we saw the human side of the movie was Finn’s way of using his imagination with his father’s LEGO creations. Finn didn’t like the fact that his father was using Krazy Glue to keep the LEGO builds permanently stuck that way, and this is where I saw the true beauty in The LEGO Movie.

LEGOs are meant to build practically anything, so when a creation is super glued, it’s practically done. There’s no more room for imagination with it, since that’s pretty much its final form. In Finn’s LEGO world, you could transform something into anything you wanted. In his father’s LEGO world, things stayed the way they were once they were created, and creativity was limited, if not discouraged altogether.

This is what I loved about The LEGO Movie, and, dare I say, what caused my eyes to water at a few points towards the end. The imagination is a powerful thing, and it’s very unfortunate any time anyone’s imagination, no matter how young or old, is subdued. The LEGO Movie encourages young kids to let their imaginations take them to new and exciting places, and reminds the older crowd not to lose their sense of adventure and creativity. It is because of all this that I am ashamed that I ever doubted this movie, because it was absolutely amazing.

So, if you haven’t seen it yet (which hopefully you have because whoa was that a big spoiler up there!), go out and watch The Lego Movie. It more than likely will surprise you, and will make you buy some LEGOs afterward (as I did).

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Did you see the movie? Leave a comment or drop me a line on Twitter to let me know what you thought of it!