I finally saw this last night with my spouse and godkids and just got done reading through the last ~70 pages of this thread (deranged, I know) and thought I'd drop my impressions of the movie. Overall, it was an enjoyable time. Definitely worth seeing, but nothing like the greatest animated film of all time. I had actually stayed pretty clear of spoilers, so I didn't know much about the plot, etc. heading into it. I'd heard the songs a couple of times on SiriusXM, but not enough to really know them. Star was absolutely adorable and the goat was... fine.
Story:
I'm a little surprised to see so many people being confused by the story or saying that there's nothing/little in it for adults. To us, it read as a very strong warning against authoritarianism. Life under Magnifico seems perfectly fine, except that you have to give up your most closely-held dream and forget you ever had it, all for the chance that it might come true someday. Except for most people it will never come true. Not because of lack of merit or even just random dumb luck, but because someone explicitly decides that it can't. In exchange, you get a safe and quiet life that's actually empty in comparison, if you know what those dreams were. Willful ignorance is pretty sweet, right?
Easter eggs/References:
I didn't really find them obtrusive at all. Certainly not as much as in Super Mario Bros. That movie was a literal nonstop cavalcade of references to one thing or another in the Mario universe. Don't get me wrong. I've played most of the Mario games and really enjoyed that movie, but there they were distracting for me. I didn't even really cotton on to the seven dwarves connection until really late in the movie, even though it is blindingly obvious.
Music:
I thought the songs worked really well in context, elevating them beyond what they are on their own. Not as good as the Anderson-Lopezes and Lin-Manuel Miranda, but certainly worthy of the Disney mantle. The one bit of research I did ahead of time is listen to some of Julia Michaels' and Benjamin Rice's music to know what I was getting into. I really thought some of the writing on Michaels' Not in Chronological Order was pretty clever. I'd recommend it to folks who enjoy modern female pop vocalists.
