Movie Thoughts: Tafiti: Across the Desert (2025)

• Released: June 28th, 2025
• Directed by: Timo Berg, Nina Wels
• Running time: 1h 21min
• Rating 3/5

Synopsis

When his grandfather is bitten by a venomous snake, a meerkat named Tafiti goes on a journey through the desert to find the legendary flower who can cure him. On his way he's joined by a bush pig named Bristles.

My Thoughts

This movie was...decent. Yeah, it was pretty okay, honestly. I was expecting it to be mid, and it kinda is, but it wasn't as bad as I was expecting. It had a few redeeming qualities.

The story is a simple journey, but it works. The stakes are pretty high as Tafiti's grandfather is one of the only family members he has left. And while we don't like Grandpa at first (on account of the whole "racist against other species"-thing), you do still feel for Tafiti when one of his only family members is dying. So even if the character we're trying to save isn't sympathetic, you do still root for the main character on his quest.

I also quite liked the friendship between Tafiti and Bristles, they have pretty solid chemistry. At first they start off on the wrong foot as Bristles accidentally gets Grandpa bitten by the snake, and of course Tafiti has been taught racism from a young age by his grandparents, but eventually the duo help each other and across the journey they genuinely develop this nice friendship. To the point they're totally ride or die for each other in the end, which was sweet. It was also good to see Tafiti overcome his racism against other species, despite his grandfather's wishes. 

Bristles was a surprisingly likable character, too. I was really expecting them to lean more into him being the annoying sidekick, or maybe gross-out humor (he is a pig, after all), but he's honestly not annoying at all, just really genuine. And they made only one fart joke regarding him, otherwise the movie is pretty much devoid of gross-out, which I appreciate. The humor they opt for with Bristles instead is mostly him being a bit of a klutz and pig puns. But this was fine, honestly. 

They're also joined by a mouse on their journey, but this character was pretty minor and more so exists as a brief tag-along to hammer in the anti-racist message (as he falls in love with an elephant, which shows Tafiti that relationships between different species can exist) than to genuinely be one of the main cast. 

Speaking of him... Yeah, if I do have an issue. Tafiti is one of them. Now, I don't mind him and his anti-racist arc, of course, this was all pretty well written. But my main issue is that...he's bland. Like, extremely bland. To the point he almost doesn't seem to have any personality or any distinct traits outside of the whole "overcomes racism" thing. 

Tafiti is just not distinct at all, and since he's our main character this is kind of an issue. Bristles, despite not even being the protagonist, has a distinct personality. Grandpa has a distinct personality. The mouse (I forgot his name, forgive me) has a personality. But Tafiti, outside of his anti-racism arc, feels so utterly bland and forgettable. I legit can't name anything that really sets this character apart from other generic protagonists you see sometimes in animated movies. He's just generically nice, brave, clever, etc. And since he's our lead, this is an issue. 

I also need to talk about the visuals. I mean, the animation itself is okay. The environments are as well, though they desert does start to get a bit old after a while. The character design, though, is where I have an issue. Tafiti and the other meerkats look decent enough, no issues there. But then there's Bristles...who looks like a pig but then has a human mouth with human teeth. Eek. This design screams uncanny valley. If they'd either leaned into making him more anthro (similar to Tafiti) or more piglike (like Pumbaa from The Lion King, for example), this probably wouldn't have been an issue. But since he does look like a pig with an uncannily human mouth and teeth, the design just feels wrong. Again, I do like Bristles as a character, he's probably the best-written character in this entire movie, but his design is so repulsive to look at, it threw me off each time. 

Overall I'd say that this is just a decent children's animated film. Nothing bad or offensive about it, it does have a good message of not being racist and working together to overcome problems. But it does have a very bland main character and the designs can be a bit abhorrent.