★★½

In the animated film Ron’s Gone Wrong, Barney Pudowski (Jack Dylan Grazer, Luca) dreads recess since all his classmates have cool high-tech bots, which are walking, talking, digitally connected devices shaped like eggs and reminiscent of the character Wall-E. The bots are acclaimed by their creators as the “perfect companion” and a “whole new world of connection,” and soon after their unveiling, everyone in the middle school has a bot, except Barney. The bots somewhat sort the students into like-minded friend groups, capture and broadcast videos, make friend requests and like posts which hype their owners.

Barney, of course, craves his own bot; however, his widower father (Ed Helms, The Office) and eccentric grandmother (Olivia Colman, The Crown) are too poor and ideologically opposed to get him one. “I don’t want you addicted to some device,” says his dad who is sells novelty goods and is addicted to his own device. But after seeing Barney so sad, grandma and dad buy him a model that has fallen off the back of a truck. It looks like a normal bot, but it’s damaged, has lost code, and can’t connect to the internet. It must be taught about friendship.

Barney’s B-Bot (Zach Galifianakas, The Hangover), Ron, eventually comes to the attention of its creator Marc Wydell (Justice Smith, The Voyeurs) and his senior partner Andrew Morris (Rob Delaney, Catastrophe). Marc is enthused by the idea that Ron has achieved a level of friendship that the algorithm couldn’t unlock. The money man Morris is more interested on how to capitalize from all B-Bots. All this results in a grand adventure that proves transformative.

By now, audiences are very used to movies that feature kids with adorable robots, from The Iron Giant to Big Hero 6, Next Gen and Bumblebee of the Transformers. These steel, childlike creatures somehow make people more human. However, Co-directors Sarah Smith (Arthur Christmas), Jean-Philippe Vine, and Octavio E. Rodriguez, working from a script by Smith and Peter Baynham (Arthur), could have gone many ways from this premise.

This is a film that screams for everyone to deactivate their robots and go play stickball. But then what would happen to the toy versions of the bots in every Happy Meal, the airline commercial tie-in or the Walmart night-lights? This is not surprising: the film is a co-production of Disney subsidiary 20th Century Studios. As with any other movie released today, it depends on a heavy social media presence for promotion.

Still, “Ron’s Gone Wrong” dares to ask the subversive question, “How can you have fun offline?” as we scroll our devices in search of the next piece of entertainment that peaks our attention. Perhaps we should spend more time at the movies?