No, Speed Racer, No

It's like Akira meets Blade Runner meets Carmaggedon meets Dragon Ball Z meets Every Which Way But Loose meets Fifth Element meets Gran Prix meets Herbie meets Indy 500 meets J-pop meets K-pop meets Lone Wolf and Cub meets Matrix meets Nascar meets Otaku meets Pole Position meets Road Warrior meets Sesame Street meets Tokyo Drift meets Ultron meets Videodrome meets WipeOut meets X:1999 meets Yakuza meets Zoom... all tossed into a digital blender and tossed up on the big screen for your viewing enjoyment.

Or lack thereof.

After breaking in with Bound, breaking thru with The Matrix, breaking down with the Matrix sequels and breaking out with V for Vendetta, The Wachowski Brothers break off more than they can chew with Speed Racer. Much was made of how they'd bring their signature visual style to the screen, but what it ends up meaning is an exercise in hyper-kinetic over-editing. The much-ballyhooed race sequences featuring auto fight scenes called "car fu" are almost impossible to follow, given that all the cars look alike, none of them are on-screen for more than a split-second, they rarely stay on the ground and we're given little to no idea where they are – on the track or in comparison to each other.

And that's only a small fraction of this two-hour-and-fifteen-minute ordeal; the rest consists of pedantic plots and amateurish acting that details a laborious screed against corporate culture set against life lessons like "be true to yourself," "family is good" and "everybody loves monkeys and/or smartass fat children."

Unless you're a completist that can't resist or have wet dreams of cargasms, do yourself a favor and pass on Speed Racer.