Show Dogs is a 2018 American buddy cop comedy film directed by Raja Gosnell and written by Max Botkin and Marc Hyman. It stars Will Arnett, Ludacris, Natasha Lyonne, Jordin Sparks, Gabriel Iglesias, Shaquille O'Neal, Omar Chaparro, and Stanley Tucci. The film follows a Rottweiler police dog and his human partner who go undercover at a prestigious dog show to stop an animal smuggling activity. The film was released in the United States on May 18, 2018, to negative reviews from critics.
A week after its release, the film came under fire when several critics and parents' groups accused it of including a scene normalizing child grooming. The studio apologized and recut the film, re-releasing it on its second weekend in theaters. The film grossed $39 million against its $5.5 million budget.
Plot
A macho Rottweiler K-9 police dog named Max (Ludacris) attempts to rescue Ling-Li (Delaney Milbourn), a baby giant panda, from being sold by an animal smuggling ring but inadvertently foils an FBI sting operation involving his human partner Frank (Will Arnett), who blames Max for letting the criminals escape. The two enemies must now work together and pose as a show dog and his trainer at the Canini Invitational dog show in Las Vegas to stop the animal smuggling ring.
Cast
Will Arnett as FBI agent Frank Nicholas, Max's human partner
Natasha Lyonne as Mattie
Omar Chaparro as Señor Gabriel
Oliver Tompsett as Chauncey
Andy Beckwith as Berne
Kerry Shale as Thin Man
Bradley Gosnell as Stage Manager
Flaminia Cinque as Spa Manager
Voices
Ludacris as Max, a Rottweiler working as a K-9 police dog
Jordin Sparks as Daisy, an Australian Shepherd and Max's love interest. RuPaul as Persephone, a Xoloitzcuintle Gabriel Iglesias as Sprinkles, a Pug Shaquille O'Neal as Karma, a Komondor Stanley Tucci as Philippe, a French Papillon Alan Cumming as Dante, a haughty Yorkshire Terrier Anders Holm, Blake Anderson, and Kate Micucci as a trio of pigeons that are deputized by Max. Kerry Shale as Sarge, Luther, Deepak the tiger, Chicago Rottweiler, backstage dogs Bradley Gosnell as Caesar's announcer, Rottweiler, male Labrador Retriever, king Poodle, agility dogs, backstage dogs Delaney Milbourn as Sparky, Ling Li, Mama Rottweiler, Afghan, female Labrador, cannonball Terrier, cowabunga dog, backstage dogs Stephen Hogan as Bullmastiff, Canini Announcer Andrew Ortenberg as agility dogs, backstage dogs
Production
Show Dogs began filming on November 28, 2016, at Pinewood Studio Wales in Great Britain, with additional scenes filmed on location in Las Vegas.
Release
Show Dogs was released in theaters on May 18, 2018. The film was then released on DVD and Blu-ray on August 21, 2018.
Reception
Box office
Show Dogs grossed $17.7 million in the United States and Canada, and $20.9 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $38.8 million.
In the United States and Canada, Show Dogs was released on May 18, 2018, alongside Deadpool 2 and Book Club, and was projected to gross $7–9 million from 3,145 theaters in its opening weekend. It ended up debuting to $6 million, finishing sixth at the box office. It dropped 49% in its second weekend to $3.1 million, finishing seventh.
Critical response
On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of based on reviews and an average rating of . The website's critical consensus reads, "Show Dogs may entertain very young viewers, but for anyone else, it threatens the cinematic equivalent of a rolled-up newspaper on the snout." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 31 out of 100, based on reviews from 14 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A−" on an A+ to F scale.
Christy Lemire of RogerEbert.com gave the film 0.5 out of four stars and said that from "the barely-there characters to the cheesy visual effects to the flat attempts at knowingly corny laughs, this reeks of the kind of material you'd have the misfortune of discovering in the bargain bin under the merciless fluorescent lights of your local soulless superstore. It is bleak indeed. Your family deserves better."
Peter Hartlaub of the San Francisco Chronicle gave the film zero out of four stars and strongly criticized (among other things) the production, jokes, and pacing; ultimately concluding that "Show Dogs is really bad, even for a talking-dog movie" and that "we all deserve a better live-action talking-dog movie than this."