The Lego Movie begins with Emmet, a mini-fig Lego living in Bricksburg, the city within the Lego universe, and he is especially good at following directions. Every morning, he wakes up and follows the step-by-step instructions on “How to Fit In.” He does the same thing every day, from getting dressed to buying overpriced coffee to going to work as a construction worker. One day, he sees a girl messing around in the construction site, and when he goes to tell her she can’t be there, he accidentally falls down a mining shaft and through a portal, where he is prompted to open a door, behind which he finds the Piece of Resistance, and as President Business’s robot officers begin to swarm, the girl he saw earlier, who introduces herself as WyldStyle, rescues him, declaring he is the Special.

The Special, Emmet learns, is a person prophesied to stop President Business from destroying the Lego world as they know it by using the Kragle to freeze everyone forever, in perfectly positioned poses. Emmet, the Special, must put the Piece of Resistance on the Kragle, but as he comes to learn, he is incredibly unequipped for the job. When WyldStyle rescues Emmet, she takes him to Cloud Cuckoo Land with Vitruvius, who calls a meeting of the Masterbuilders. Masterbuilders are minifigs that have the ability to build anything they can think of, no instructions needed. Emmet, on the other hand, has never strayed from an instruction booklet in his life. A ragtag group of Masterbuilders and Emmet forms, including Batman, an astronaut, a unicorn-cat, and a pirate, and they make it their mission to up with a way to break into President Business’s headquarters and slide the top on the Kragle before he freezes everyone.

A humorous and entertaining film, The Lego Movie was unique, heartwarming, and had a few good lessons to teach its audience. For one, it inspired creativity. Lego is known for having thousands and thousands of sets with very specific building instructions, but on the flipside, every Lego, no matter what set it comes from, can fit into any other Lego, that’s the magic of the Lego system. So this movie acknowledged the mastery it takes to create the different sets, but also encourages creativity and uniqueness, which is part of its core mission: to inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow. This was an incredible film, that preaches creativity and encourages kids to believe in themselves, because sometimes the most unique, creative, and unexpected solutions are the ones that work.