Revenge in the dough
In 2008, the year of Wallace and Gromit's penultimate adventure, director Nick Park mentioned in The Telegraph the difficulties encountered during the collaboration with DreamWorks, which produced the studio's feature films at the time. Dismayed by the notes coming from the executives of this animation giant, he therefore returned to the half-hour format which was the heyday of the two characters. Would Netflix patronage be different?
There remained the danger of too much nostalgia, which necessarily threatens a saga so popular and endowed with such longevity, especially in the clutches of another giant, streaming this time, in perpetual search of lucrative franchises. The promotion of The Palm of Vengeance proudly brandishes the argument for the return of Feather McGraw and therefore as a direct result of Bad Pants. The short film broadcast 32 years ago now (yes…) being Aardman's unsurpassable pinnacle, the announcement was as tempting as it was worrying…
And we could indeed blame him some redundancies, as well as a string of winks that are a bit invasive. Some gags have an air of déjà vu (the robotic arm) and the scenario, at least in its first part, replays almost identically the plot of the Bad pants : broke, Wallace offers one of his machines, particularly autonomous (electronic pants or all-purpose dwarf), to Gromit. Sidelined by his friend, he will have to intervene when his invention turns against him, because of the burglar Feather McGraw.
Palme d’or
The film does not become as dense and delirious as its predecessor, of course. Unsurprisingly, and partly because of the long format, The Palm of Vengeance is not at the level of Bad pants. But it is very far from suffering from comparison with this stop-motion monument. For those who appreciate the networks of mischievous gags in the saga (that is to say any normally constituted film buff), it is a new fuel feast with 20 ideas per minute.
From the usual enjoyable domino effect of Wallace's inventions to the sculptures of evil dwarves, including the parodies of the prison film and… Matrix, this new episode is a pure delight at every moment. A new demonstration of inventiveness, culminating in a long final chase which ridicules the last Mission : Impossible on the grounds of the big show. Who needs a motorcycle and a parachute when you can take flight with a wheeled chair, a rope and a leaf blower?
Certainly, Wallace et Gromit returns to its fundamentals, even if it means enjoying it. But we could also talk about getting back on the right path. By finding Feather McGraw, even more pastiching the codes of the classic Hollywood antagonist, the saga moves away from the bizarre cynicism which weighed on Sacred Petrin. The learned naivety of Wallace (now voiced with talent by Ben Whitehead after the death of Peter Sallis) is once again tinged with an irresistible humanity, at the heart of the story and its climax.
Evil AI
Car The Palm of Vengeance came at a time when we needed him. At a time when mainstream animation is relying on its achievements and where the specter of a certain “innovation” hovers. So it doesn't completely repeat The Bad Pants : he updates his perspective.
The 1993 film, like all the duo's adventures up to that point, always dealt with in fine of the relationship to technology. The craftsmanship of its creation resonated with the bond that unites Wallace and Gromit, the inventor and the intellectual, science and consciousness. It was up to Wallace, not to give up his prodigious machines, but to learn how to use them, thanks to his faithful doggie. This is the secret of their complementarity. This last part reaffirms this necessity, by introducing artificial intelligence into the equation without much subtlety.
More explicit than before (Chicken Run 2 was of the same barrel), Aardman spins the metaphor with these automatic dwarves, who transform Gromit's teeming garden into a temple of generic perfection and plunder the tools of others to assert their independence. And in the greatest tradition of the saga, the speech skillfully dodges easy technophobia to move forward sincere tenderness as a solution.
We are far from the revolution, but remains proof that the studio has lost none of its relevance even though the temptation of easy nostalgia is very present. Among the last defenders of a century-old technique, he nevertheless remains upright in his boomerang boots, representing after all these years a standard of mainstream entertainment. Fortunately he's still there.
Wallace and Gromit: The Palm of Vengeance is available on Netflix since January 3, 2025 in France
