Parents' Guide to Bobbleheads: The Movie

Parents need to know that Bobbleheads will appeal to kids familiar with the dolls. It has positive messages about teamwork and friendship, as well as a cameo by a Cher (in doll form), but it also relies on stereotypes. An overweight, white couple with Southern accents are characterized as not-particularly-bright, camo-wearing, Jell-O-toting petty thieves. It's never explained why Jim's brother has a thick country accent. A skater girl doll acts tough and uses slangy language, a British cat is snooty, and a doll with a Japanese-sounding name appears to do meditation or yoga moves and has computer and video game skills. The film also goes for some easy laughs with gross-out humor, like a man mistaking a dog's fart for his girlfriend's breath. There's plenty of cartoon violence, some of it gratuitous, like when the dolls purposefully trip a woman down a flight of stairs, a man is hog-tied and shoved into a car trunk, and a doll gets catapulted onto a ceiling fan, where she hangs by her neck temporarily. Nobody is actually injured. Language ranges from insults like "low-class," "loser," "sleazeball," and "moron" to words like "crap," "butt," "turd," "blows," "dumb," and "stupid." A male and a female bobblehead flirt and kiss. A woman mistakes a toy for her sponge in the bath, and the toy later complains he's seen things no toy should ever have to see.

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