The premise is an NPC in a video game is "woken" (in every sense of the word) to the game world around him. What follows are his attempts to fit into his world while reaching his full potential as a... huh. And this is where the movie goes off the rails.

We're meant to think about a video game cartoon character as if it were a real human. The problem is: what happens to a cartoon character is of no consequence. Early in the film the main character is hit by a speeding bus. No damage. Because he's a cartoon. There are literally no stakes here. Wile E Coyote can make us laugh, but we will never be interested in his life life.

There are a number of attempts at humor. The setups are there and there's plenty of source material. Yet the jokes fall flat. I can only assume the jokes were reworked by someone who had their sense of humor surgically removed in response to studio notes.

Studio notes are orders to the production crew to "fix" things the money people and self-styled creative studio executives consider to be problems. Invariably these orders annoy the production crew and their implementation is half-hearted at best. I assume one of the notes after the first cut was: "My kid didn't laugh. Make it funny." or words to that effect.

There's enough here to entertain someone with a primary school mental age, but not much more. Five stars for that target audience, one star for adults wishing to be entertained. Three stars.