Here Comes Peter Cottontail: The Movie

• Directed by Mark Gravas
• September 17, 2005

Voice Cast

• Peter Cottontail, Peter Cottontail Jr., Antoine-Tom Kenny
• January Q. Irontail-Roger Moore
• Chunk-Dee Bradley Baker
• Montresor-Greg Berg
• Munch-Miranda Cosgrove
• Sophie-Terri Douglas
• Chipmunk, Dad Mouse, Hawk-Pat Fraley
• Bee, Worker Bunny-Jason Harris
• Elroy, Wind-David Koechner
• Seymour S. Sassafras-Christopher Lloyd
• Mother Mouse-Mona Marshall
• Mama Robin-Niecy Nash
• Jackie Frost-Molly Shannon
• Mama Cottontail, Little Girl’s Mother-Jill Talley
• Flutter-Kenan Thompson

January Q. Irontail returns and joins forces with Jackie Frost to prevent spring from coming.

Peter must not only contend against Jackie Frost but the return of January Q. Irontail. This time around the evil plan is to stop spring from coming so Easter won’t come because Irontail just wants to screw everybody over and Jackie Frost wants eternal winter.

As direct to video sequels go this one is bad. The story itself was just dull. While being a kid’s movie, Here Comes Peter Cottontail: The Movie doesn’t do much of anything. It’s extremely safe and rather bland.

Aside from the two villains of Jackie Frost and January Q. Irontail and the hero I’m hard-pressed to name a character off the top of my head. Mostly because I didn’t care about them. Whatever happens to characters even in a family friendly film should matter enough that you can recall a name. No character here really stands out.

Our hero is not Peter Cottontail but his son Peter Cottontail Jr. in this direct sequel to the Rankin/Bass special. And apparently Peter Sr. converted the role of Easter Bunny from a title anybody could have to a hereditary title. In the original Peter Sr. was personally selected by his predecessor and not a figurative ‘prince’ inheriting a title.

Aside from Irontail returning we have a few other characters that make a comeback though their presence there is more to establish that this is connected to the first film than it is to actually participate in the story. “Oh look at how connected this is!”

They had access to footage from Peter Cottontail as displayed in the opening moments of the film which implies that they had the rights to Here Comes Peter Cottontail so why did they redesign Seymour S. Sassafras? I am curious if it perhaps had something to do with the character being modeled on Danny Kaye and perhaps there was some rights issue. But then why something so radically different?

For CGI animation it’s not bad. It’s a little stiff and slow but it looks better than some stuff that is the same age. I wasn’t expecting something that looked this good considering it was a direct to video release. The film itself is bright and colorful. Given the sensory and general presentation of it this is aimed at the extremely young and not just the young.

And being a kids movie I guess they had to end with a weird rock version of “Here Comes Peter Cottontail” complete with music video. The general music for this feels as if it came from a Casio keyboard demo kit button. This was a halfhearted effort.

This whole production was weird and lazily slapped together. They had some adequate voice and a good foundation from which to start. The thing is why is Here Comes Peter Cottontail: The Movie not entertaining in general or can be seen as entertaining to a particular age group. It feels like they were trying to lose money. Was this a tax write-off?

Here Comes Peter Cottontail: The Movie might go over well with extremely young children. If you’re an adult that enjoyed the special you won’t like this. I say just skip it altogether.