See, Arlo is the runt of the litter of Apatosaurus. By it’s big sappy ending, I just felt numb. And in the film’s runtime I don’t think I recovered. However, how we get to that plot rattled me hard. It plays well into the plot of Arlo (Raymond Ochoa) forging through a wilderness and adventure he never imagined. I was delighted to discover that writer-director Peter Sohn ( “Partly Cloudy”) created a dino-centric Western that reimagines towering T-rexes as loping longhorn ranchers, long-necked Apatosaurus as hard-working crop farmers, and sharp-toed raptors as rascally rustlers. So I allowed myself the rare film-critic luxury of knowing next to nothing about The Good Dinosaur beyond it being a boy and his dog tale, where the boy is a young dinosaur and the dog is a human child. I’ll admit, I haven’t been watching trailers for this flick. I was not prepared for the depressing drama of The Good Dinosaur. But gang, I wasn’t prepared for Pixar to put out a movie that had me yelping with fear and gaping in horror. It’s something I steel myself for this time of year. We’re in award season now, which means I’m required to face a barrage of movies that are full of depressing elements, from forbidden romances, to child soldiers, kidnapping and rape, child molestation cover-ups, murder and revenge.

The good dinosaur pixar intro