Although my son was looking forward to it, I didn't really expect much going into Speed Racer. The annoying Spritle and wooden dialogue didn't do much to change my mind through the first hour. Even the visuals seemed boring. As soon as the movie hits the cross-country race midway through the film, that changed. Spritle was thankfully pushed aside, the race scenes became much more exciting, and I actually started to enjoy the characters (except for Spritle of course.) Although it was about 20 minutes too long, I ended up liking the movie far more than I could have believed by the time it was over. For pure popcorn entertainment, it works.