'Fixed' review: R-rated animated canine comedy chases its own tail

Courtesy of Netflix

---

A one-note joke gets played ad nauseam in Genndy Tartakovsky’s R-rated animated comedy “Fixed.” Tartakovsky, best known for shepherding the “Hotel Transylvania” franchise, presents a premise with some promise: a dog discovers he’s scheduled to be neutered the next day and sets out to have the best night of his life. Cue plenty of naughty, raucous hijinks and more humping than you ever thought you’d see in a family of talking animals. Unfortunately, the film leans so hard on its central gag that it runs out of steam long before the credits roll. There’s only so much animated nutsack one can endure before craving a punchline that isn’t just “dog wants to fuck everything that moves.”

If your target audience is middle schoolers, “Fixed” might be pure catnip—er, kibble. I’m all for a raunchy animated comedy, especially Sony Pictures Animation’s fellow R-rated brethren “Sausage Party,” but “Fixed” lacks both the belly laughs and the emotional core to carry it.

The story follows Bull (Adam DeVine), introduced in the least subtle way possible: going to town on his sleeping nana’s leg. Bull’s in his prime, eager to mount anything with (or without) a pulse. When he learns of his impending castration, he bolts, accompanied by his already fixed friends: a boxer voiced by Idris Elba, a beagle voiced by Bobby Moynihan, and an adorable dachshund voiced by Fred Armisen.

Tartakovsky and co-writer Jon Vitti assemble a sharp comedic cast (Kathryn Hahn and Beck Bennett also pop in as a pair of purebreds) and the voice work brings as much credibility as the material allows. But the film is convinced that a steady stream of profanity, crude humor, and cute animals in compromising positions is enough to cross the finish line. At only about 80 minutes, it’s brisk, yet still manages to feel like an SNL sketch stretched far past its expiration date.

We get it. Dogs, especially those in heat, like to bone. But the film never pauses to give us a reason to care about Bull’s journey. It tries to wedge in a message about relationships being more than just sex—that it’s what’s inside that counts—but undermines it with sequences featuring giant, bouncing dog testicles played for slapstick. The closest “Fixed” comes to inspired comedy is a scene in a nightclub/brothel, but even that earns only a mild chuckle.

“Fixed” could have been a clever, heartfelt spin on an absurd premise. Instead, it’s a shaggy-dog story that mistakes relentless crudeness for comedy and chases its own tail until it collapses.

Grade: D 

FIXED streams on Netflix Wednesday, August 13th