Spy Kids: Armageddon Review: Not the Best in the Franchise but Far From the Worst

This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the series being covered here wouldn’t exist.

Spy Kids: Armageddon revives the Spy Kids franchise for another adventure, capturing the spirit of the original and capitalizing on nostalgia but failing to add anything particularly new or noteworthy to the series.

The film is the first official reboot of the series, introducing an entirely new family of spies. The new spy kids are tech-savvy Tony Torrez-Tango and Patty Torrez-Tango.

Together, Tony and Patty are forced to become spies to save their parents, Terrence Tango and Nora Torrez, and stop a game developer from taking over the world with a global computer virus.

Spy Kids: Armageddon is an entertaining film. All these years later, there’s still something so enjoyable about watching pint-size spies living out every child’s wildest dreams.

Additionally, the film avoids all the pitfalls plaguing the franchise’s last film, Spy Kids: All the Time in the World. Primarily, it doesn’t scrimp on the special effects or delve into too silly of territory and features pretty strong acting.

Connor Esterson and Everly Carganilla genuinely steal the show with their adorable and authentic performances. They capture the child-like wonder, innocence, and occasional hilarious snarkiness wonderfully.

Zachary Levi and Gina Rodriguez also give strong performances. Although they portray relatively flat, stereotypical parents, they do the best with what they’re given and have a few compelling moments as the sweetly embarrassing, madly-in-love, quirky couple.

The story isn’t particularly captivating, as it’s largely the same story viewers have seen played out before, just with a different family and slightly different villain. Meanwhile, the villain’s storyline isn’t particularly unique or intriguing.

Fortunately, Spy Kids: Armageddon makes up for its rather basic storyline with fun, silliness, and spy shenanigans.

The film finds the perfect balance of silliness. It’s enough to amuse older audiences and enrapture younger viewers, but not so much that it drowns out the plot and acting.

Mainly, the silliness captures the fun side of the spy genre and embraces the fact that this genre can get a little zany and ridiculous with its endless technology and fancy gadgets, such as wedding rings with a hidden compartment of sleeping potion.

Meanwhile, there is also a hefty dose of nostalgia. This is because Spy Kids: Armageddon embraces the spirit of the original films.

Like its predecessor, it embraces silly, family-friendly, wholesome fun while capturing a family’s bond and not being afraid to depict parents who can stand to learn a thing or two from their kids.

However, Spy Kids: Armageddon adds nothing particularly new to the franchise. It’s the same nuclear family, same story, and same silliness, which is okay but keeps it from being very groundbreaking.

The special effects are decent, but they should be better. Over a decade has passed since the last film, during which a lot of technological advancement has occurred, so the graphics should’ve shown a more drastic improvement over the past films.

Similarly, with it being a completely different time than 2011, one would’ve also hoped the film would’ve expressed some new ideas or themes, but it essentially rehashed the franchise’s main ideas.

Another disappointment was that the film seemed to lose some of its celebration of Latino heritage. The Spy Kids films were always notable for bringing Latino heroes to the forefront of pop culture.

Meanwhile, the films were always filled with little references and family dynamics that celebrated the family’s heritage. The family is biracial in Spy Kids: Armageddon, so the Latino representation isn’t wholly washed away.

However, aside from a few things, like the kids giving their seemingly endless full names at one point, there’s definitely not as much of that celebration or acknowledgment that the other films had.

Ultimately, Spy Kids: Armageddon has the right idea. It’s a faithful reboot filled with nostalgia that partially recaptures the joy of the original franchise.

At the same time, it may be too stringent of a reboot. The film almost seems afraid to really add something more to the franchise, to the point it even stifles some of the progressiveness of the originals.

Hence, it doesn’t top the original film and sequel, but it certainly beat its more recent predecessors and successfully revitalized the stagnant franchise.

What did you think of Spy Kids: Armageddon? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Spy Kids: Armageddon is streaming now on Netflix.

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