Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 18% based on 62 reviews, with an average rating of 4.1/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "Much like the toys it advertises, Playmobil: The Movie seems sadly destined to be regarded as a superficially similar yet less desirable alternative to the competition." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 25 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale, while those at PostTrak gave it an average 1.5 out of 5 stars, with 36% saying they would definitely recommend it. In the PostTrak grade, adult audiences made up 31% of poll, children under 12 69%; the adult gave the film an average 2.5 stars, the kids under 12 around 3.5 to four stars.
The New Zealand online publication Stuff named it "a strong contender for the worst film of 2019." Reviewers primarily criticized Playmobil: The Movie for being more of an advertisement than a compelling story that practiced its moral about being bold and adventurous. In a Rotten Tomatoes editorial, the site said critics generally called it "a regrettably mediocre outing that offers little aside from a barrage of colorful images and a brisk but ultimately generic and uninspired story." As Entertainment.ie, calling it "the worst animation of the year so far," put it, "the story is boring, the characters are utterly unlikeable [...] one is increasingly struck by the lack of anything new or interesting in the film whatsoever. Its lack of imagination or creativity is painful." A couple of reviews viewed it as part of a major problem of poorly-done toy films from Hollywood. Several reviews made negative comparisons to The Lego Movie, such as a Variety review by Day Lodge that summarized Playmobil: The Movie as The Lego Movie "but without that blockbuster's dizzy, self-aware wit and visual invention."
Nell Minow wrote that "it does not even work as a commercial, never showing us why these toys could be especially fun to play with," and called the settings and toys "bland and generic." Some critics found it way too safe for a film about imagination, including Katherine McLaughlin of The List: "The references are simply too familiar to excite, as it coasts along on nostalgia and a well-worn formula." According to The Observer, "Playmobil shamelessly steals ideas. This eyesore of a cash-in lifts plot elements from Thor and Jumanji, then thinly threads them together with a few songs and shrill mantra about the need for adventure."
Multiple errors in worldbuilding were spotted by critics, such as its odd mixture of replications of historical and fictional settings; and the overly-realistic textures and movements of the Playmobil figures. As Minow explained, "After a whole scene establishing the limited mobility of the Playmobil characters, they suddenly switch to being able to have human-like joints and range of motion." Clariss Loughrey asked, "Shouldn't everything be plastic? Then why do the horses have fur?" Yolanda Machado noted, "Marla can't figure out how to walk without the use of knees and yet, a minute later, she's running." Maryann Johanson noticed even more issues with the figure movements: "A big joke is made out of how Marla, in her Playmobil body, can't walk because she has no knees... and then knees inexplicably appear and she can walk fine. Everyone has elbows, too, which the toy figures also don't have. And everyone is stuck with those clamshell hands, yet are still able to manipulate chopsticks." As Paul Whitington felt, "the themed kingdoms they visit only seem to have been chosen because Playmobil do toys based on these scenarios: sometimes, as in the wild west sequence, they are passed through virtually without comment." The live-action sequences also garnered some derision; one reviewer opined it felt "like something out of an '80s movie," while another panned the sequence's stiff direction.
Salt Lake City Weekly called all of the film's concepts "all pointlessly random and head-smackingly dumb, even when it sounds on paper like it might be funny." According to Machado, Playmobil: The Movie suffered from storytelling "whiplash," using the "mishmash of odd characters" and the sudden death of the main characters' parents as examples. The A.V. Club criticized the choppy plot and erratic pace, reasoning it made Playmobil: The Movie "poorly conceived at every story turn, unable to even stick to a particular generic message to make up for its extremely basic humor." The film's hurried speed also came up in a Radio Times review that stated it "never stops long enough to make its story memorable." Lodge wrote the film had so little amusement it was absent of sight gags, while Minow bashed the inclusion of parental death as too dark for a kid's film. An RTÉ.ie review called its emotional moments "heavy-handed and forced," and criticized the parents' death as "solely a plot device for the sake of plot device." The songs were also called forgettable, generic, and "terrible" by several journalists; one wrote that they "have remarkably little melodic staying power," and another analyzed, "there's no chorus and the characters simply just say things to a tune." However, some reviewers did highlight Taylor-Joy's singing on the opening number.
Playmobil: The Movie wasn't without supporting reviewers. Siede was appreciative towards the "low-key, non-judgmental" writing of the film, praising it for being more "heartfelt and earnest" than other "crass and cheap" offerings usual for children's flicks. O'Sullivan summarized, "for a movie so clearly doubling as product placement, it's also fun, a cartoon (bookended by live-action sequences) which allows talented actors to riff on unexpected themes." She called the characters of Del and Rex "properly funny." Most admirations came towards the characters and performances, especially Radcliffe's voice-acting, the campy villain Emperor Maximus, and Taylor-Joy's acting. Hasted opined, "Taylor-Joy's tendency towards introverted, perhaps dangerous outsiders [...] finds little outlet in mostly mild Marla, but still makes her harassed heroine warmly sympathetic." Sandie Angulo Chen of Common Sense Media gave the film two stars out of five, saying that it was "bland and unoriginal but may still amuse young kids."
Empire gave the film two stars out of five, describing it as "little more than a feature-length commercial" and "old-fashioned, stiff and only suitable for those between the ages of four and ten, but it sure isn't much fun".
