If I recall correctly, last summer's marketing campaign for Underdog focused on the tagline, "One nation, under dog". I don't think you need me to tell you how inherently idiotic that line is to all but the movie's target audience of little kids. What you might not know, is that Underdog has nowhere to go but down, much like most of Disney's recent live-action movies.

All you need to know about Underdog is that it's a "re-imagining" of the classic cartoon of the same name. In this incarnation, Jason Lee (what happened, man?) voices Shoeshine, who due to the experiments of Dr. Barsinister, a mad scientist played by the dependently quirky Peter Dinklage, develops superpowers. The rest of the plot has something to do with Barsinister's schemes of world domination, but I am incapable of describing the plot any further, because I'm easily distracted by crappiness, and Underdog is full of it. Even for a kid's movie, this really sucks.

It bothers me greatly when studios think they can pass off any piece of drivel they wish to and critic-proof it by marketing it as a "family film". What the suits fail to realize is that even families have standards. This can be seen by Underdog's dismal box office take, which for a movie of this type, is bound to have been a disappointment. I'm sure that other people are just as fed up with the mildly vulgar slapstick humor and bad puns that comprise most of today's family entertainment, and I can't be the only one that thinks even American kids are too sophisticated for this trash.

If you want proof of, just how brutal Underdog can get, look no further than this quote, one of the many gems of dialog, when Dan Unger (James Belushi) brings home Shoeshine, and informs his son Jack that they will be caring for him.

Jack: All he does is eat, sleep, and poop.

Dan: Well then, I guess the two of you have a lot in common, don't you?

No, I did not misquote the movie, those are their exact words. I severely doubt you would want your children absorbing this kind of toilet humor, the lowest of the low, and I surely would not want them to if I had my own. There is no variety on the dialogue-based humor, and as for the physical aspect, you feel extremely fatigued after watching people fall down upwards of twenty or thirty times. If you are over the age of six, there is nothing for you in this movie and that might even be stretching it.

Underdog is a film that is to be avoided as much as humanly possible. This does not make a good family movie, because all but the youngest of viewers will most surely despise it. I admit it packs some fairly harmless humor with the potential to entertain younger viewers, but I would like to remind you that just because kids can keep themselves busy with something, doesn't mean they should.