The Sheep Detectives (2026)

Rated PG.  I heard somewhere that this movie was darker than PG and I suppose I can see where that opinion is coming from.  It's really weird to think that there is a PG murder mystery that is almost tailored for a family audience.  In terms of tone, the movie feels genuinely PG.  There are a few moments that get a little darker than I think I'm comfortable in a PG movie.  There is this whole concept of death and intentionally forgetting the important things.  There's also a really scary scene with dogs that leads to a character death.  Still, it really does feel PG, so go from there.

DIRECTOR:  Kyle Balda

Honestly, I don't want to write about this. I hate starting off so many blogs with "I don't want to write about this. (Hey, I just realized that the image I chose for the movie looks like the sheep are looking in on my writing with dismay and disappointment.  Sorry, sheep.  I just don't feel like writing about your movie.)  It's just that I have to write when the opportunity presents itself or I fall behind.  I don't want to fall behind.  I want to be a good little blogger.  I'd also like to play video games until I fall asleep on the couch, but that's an almost never happening thing nowadays.  

When I saw the preview for this movie, I was honestly stoked.  I don't know what it was.  I wanted a wholesome murder mystery told from a unique perspective and, if I have to give the movie the points it deserves, it accomplished that.  It just didn't tickle me in the way that I really wanted it to.  I don't blame my wife because she's amazing at these things, but she figured it out (for the most part) even before the victim died.  She told me and I immediately said, "Yup, that's it."  Just because this is a murder mystery, I do have to make a SPOILER WARNING.  I hate doing it, but I'm going to talk about the killer and why this exact story disappointed me for a big murder mystery that (I have a feeling) is going to open the door to a franchise. 

Because it was a Nathan Fillon vehicle, my wife and I used to watch Castle.  We were big Firefly nerds and we were going to follow Captain Tightpants to whatever vehicle he was headlining.  (Note:  Castle burned us pretty hard by the time we got to the wedding, so we have yet to watch The Rookie.  I do not have regrets about this.) But while we watched Castle, I realized something pretty quickly.  I realized that you could figure out the killer by paying attention to Act I and seeing which person had the camera on them long enough to be considered more than an extra, but didn't have the camera on them long enough to be considered "Guest Star" or "Special Guest Star."  Soon, it became a competition to figure out who the killer was as quickly as possible.  The story be damned!  You could figure it out by format.  

The same kind of holds true for The Sheep Detective.  Yes, you could piece together motive and clues to figure out that Elliot was the killer.  I'll even say when he goes into the hallway to make his phone call, that was a nice touch (That we all figured out because we knew he was the killer).  But from a screenwriting perspective, you had two characters doing the exact same job: the police officer and the reporter.  In a lot of detective stories, the police officer OR the reporter act as the ways to organize thoughts.  They unpack things that other characters aren't allowed to see, giving the audience and inside scoop into what is really happening behind the scenes.  With the case of Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Sherlock Holmes is almost inhuman, so you have to have someone like John Watson to translate and act as an avatar for the audience.  With Tim and Elliot, there's no need for a translator.  They're doing the same bit.  That means that one of them did it.  It made no sense for Tim to do it and they made him way too likable for a kids' audience, so it came down to Elliot.  Sorry, but it's a bit of a disappointment.  

But let's ignore the fact that a 43-year-old film blogger is dunking on the mystery that he didn't even solve before his wife did.  She's really good at murder mysteries, so I'm not even slightly offended or jealous that she did so.  It's the way it works and I'm honestly in awe of how good she is at these things.  I do want to talk about what I really dug about the movie.

Weirdly enough, the things I liked most about the movie had nothing to do with the actual crime itself.  It was a little too zany and a little too far-fetched for me.  I'm sure my little ones wouldn't have hated that stuff.  The stuff I found much more interesting is the sheep-as-commentary on the human condition stuff.  Golly, I really dug the notion that people are desperate to forget when things get bad.  Because I'm being a good boy and writing a blog instead of playing video games, I'm going to give myself permission to talk politics.  I'm not saying that The Sheep Detectives movie is overtly political (although they do have a lot to say about racism).  What I'm saying is that the notion that people will do anything to forget to justify their worldview was a bit of a kick-in-the-pants that I adored.

Now, I don't know if there's folklore about sheep being notoriously forgetful.  George Hardy starts his book about sheep farming talking about how there is an assumption that sheep are the dumbest animals on Earth.  I don't know if that is even a thing that's said.  But the conceit, in this movie at least, is that sheep, when they are confronted by something that is bleak or uncomfortable, will willfully erase their own memories of the events that made them sad.  To make the story somewhat deep, the character of Mopple has lost the ability to wipe his own memories, so he is burdened by being the carrier of truth, unable to share reality with the flock around him.  It's really interesting and I think its the best part of the movie.

The thing that drives me crazy --and here's where the politics / allegory comes in --is that humanity prides itself on the same thing.   (Brace yourself.)  Donald Trump daily goes on Truth Social or has a press release claiming that he never said X, Y, or Z.  He rewrites the narrative to make himself the victim of every situation and he depends on his voter-base to willfully forget everything that used to make them sad.  Do you remember when QAnon regularly fought to find out about child predator rings (I write this in a blog for a movie with a PG rating?  What is wrong with me?) and now claim that the victims in the Epstein files weren't really victims or were old enough to know better?  They can't make direct connections, yet were obsessed with a pizza parlor being code for something far more sinister?  How about how Donald Trump ran on no new wars?  Literally yesterday, he claimed that he never said that.  There's footage everywhere.  

Sorry to get so up my own butt about this (This is a blog for The Sheep Detectives, a PG movie.  I hate myself right now.)  But the crux of this movie, at least when it comes to character choices for the protagonist Lily, is whether or not to let a tragedy go because it makes her happier to live in ignorance.  My biggest frustration is the fact that most people get angry at me for pointing out things that horrible in the news because it doesn't directly involve them. There is a part where the flock is following Lily and Mopple to fight back against Caleb and Ham, who are planning on slaughtering the flock for meat, and the flock outside of Lily willfully allows themselves to be victims because it is more comfortable not knowing.  They are thinking that George's death is someone else's problem that Sebastian has to remind everyone the importance of this man and the fact that they used to love him.  I adore this so much.  Added points for the fact that it seems like their ignorant bliss is going to keep them safe when all it does it make them easier victims for later.

Also, I dig the Winter Lamb as a concept for a story like this.  It's really easy to like every member of the flock, especially Lily.  Lily seems like a wholesome children's protagonist.  She's termed the Smartest Sheep in the World".  Yet, (and, again, I hear how insufferable I'm coming across) she's the representative of "I'm not racist" versus actually being anti-racist.  There is a cultural norm within the flock to treat any lamb not born in the summer as less-than.  Sebastian, a black ram, reveals that he used to be a winter lamb, explaining his separation from the rest of the flock, despite his wisdom and bravery.  Yet, Lily often --while not being outright cruel to the Winter Lamb --accepts the injustice that is aimed at the Winter Lamb.  She even catches herself saying something pretty derrogatory in front of Sebastian and has to check her own privilege.  Do I think that the flock gets over its prejudice pretty quickly, considering how ingrained that racism was?  Probably.  It is a kids' movie.  But I do like that the element is in there.

I probably liked what no one else really cared about.  If I had to show this to my little kids, would they have been okay with it?  Sure.  They would have laughed at sheep and rams hitting things hard and doing human things.  It had Wallace and Gromit vibes at times.  Maybe a little bit Babe.  I kept thinking of the movie as a PG Hot Fuzz.  There's something about cottage core murdery mysteries that people really glom onto.  In terms of mystery, I could take or leave it.  In terms of taking some pretty heavy swings with character intentions, I dug that.  But again, I'm truly insufferable.