A Dog’s Journey Review

Bruce Cameron is an author who has made a career writing novels about dogs. Two have been adapted into films and A Dog’s Journey is now the third, a sequel to 2017’s A Dog’s Purpose.

Following the events A Dog’s Purpose the spirit of Bailey (Josh Gad) has found his way back to his original human, Ethan (Dennis Quaid). Bailey has been able to reunite Ethan with his lost love, Hannah (Marg Helgenberger). Because of this Ethan’s family has grown because of it – gaining a granddaughter, Clarity June, or CJ for short. However, CJ is taken away from Ethan and Hannah and just as Bailey dies Ethan gives the dog spirit a new purpose – find and protect CJ.

A Dog’s Purpose was an emotionally manipulative film that clearly struck a core with audiences. It made $202 million from a $22 million budget. From a financial standpoint a sequel seems like a no-brainer, even if Bailey’s story was complete.

The first film was Bailey’s story – a decade-spanning story that showed Bailey’s various lifetimes. To continue the series the sequel was really about CJ and the dogs were just along or the ride. After Bailey dies the film follows CJ from the age of 11 as she tries to make her way in the world. Along her journey she is neglected by her alcoholic mother (Betty Gilpin), falls into bad relationships, attempt to make it as a musician, and explores her friendship with Trent (Henry Lau).

Because of these themes A Dog’s Journey seemed to more at home on TV. The drama where the young CJ is left to fend for herself, being threatened by a boyfriend, and finding out a friend is sick. These sort of story ideas are the signature of broadcasters like Lifetime and Hallmark Channels. Coupled with this was the change of director from Lasse Hallström to Gail Mancuso. Mancuso is an experienced TV director, working on shows like Gilmore Girls and Modern Family. Her direction is functional but she doesn’t tug at the heartstrings as the first film did. This was partly due to sequel having much less doggy death.

The previous film was a collection of vignettes, mini-stories of the lives of Bailey over the years. It required Gad’s narration to tell information and it worked in context. The sequel’s dialogue was much more expository. An early example of this was Ethan and Hannah are talking about what happened to CJ’s father who died before she was born and saying that the insurance settlement was meant for CJ’s education. It came off as clunky and unnatural. The acting was perfectly fine, especially from Kathryn Prescott playing the adult version of CJ, but the cast was hampered by some of the dialogue.

Most of the humour comes from Gad’s narration. Basically he gives a dog’s perspective to the world around him such as when two humans look like they are about to kiss he thinks lick faces or when two women are challenging each other they marking their territory. It was similar to ZeFrank’s Youtube videos ‘Sad Dog Diary’ and ‘Humans are a Dog’s Best Friend.’ It lightens the mood and animal-loving kids should enjoy these jokes.

A Dog’s Journey is an inoffensive drama with comedic moments but is more of a cynical cash grab.