E171 | Emotional Animal upgrade! #netflix #cartoon #leo #billburr #adamsandler #therapy #lizard #pets

Let's Netflix & Chill Podcast

Leo is a 2023 American animated musical comedy film directed by Robert Marianetti, Robert Smigel and David Wachtenheim (in Marianetti and Wachtenheim's feature directorial debuts), written by Smigel, Adam Sandler, and Paul Sado, and produced by Sandler and Mireille Soria. The second animated feature from Sandler's production company Happy Madison Productions, it stars him in the titular voice role, alongside Bill Burr, Cecily Strong, Jason Alexander, Sadie Sandler, Sunny Sandler, Rob Schneider, Jo Koy, Allison Strong, Jackie Sandler, Heidi Gardner, Robert Smigel, and Nick Swardson. It tells the story of a tuatara longing for the wild and worried about dying who is taken home by different students per the assignment of a strict substitute teacher.
Leo was released by Netflix on November 21, 2023 to generally positive reviews.

Leo is a jaded old lizard with a heart of gold who’s been stuck in the same Florida classroom for longer than he can remember, alongside his terrarium-mate Squirtle the turtle. He’s watched generations of students come and go but feels like he’s missed out on life. When Leo learns he only has one year left to live, he plans an escape to experience the world. Thanks to a new substitute teacher who task the kids with taking one classroom pet home for the weekend, Leo has a chance to escape. His hilarious attempt to head for freedom and him opening his mouth to break the one simple role that seems to be the theme in the movie, you can’t let humans know animals can take, which is pretty dope, like imagine if that was the case in real life, talk about restrain.
In Florida, Leo the tuatara and Squirtle the turtle are the class pets of a fifth-grade classroom at Fort Myers Elementary School and are prepared for another year with a new set of students. During a parent-teacher conference night, where the students' pregnant teacher, Mrs. Salinas, announces that she must go on maternity leave, Leo overhears one of the student's parents say that he's old, making him despair that he never accomplished anything with his life. The next day, Ms. Malkin, the students' strict, no-nonsense substitute, arrives and is quickly loathed by the students.

Leo is taken home for the weekend by Summer, a girl who is highly talkative. While trying to make his escape, Leo accidentally reveals to Summer that he can talk, and suggests to her that she ask more questions after saying that her constant talking tires everyone out. As a result, Summer becomes more popular among her classmates. Soon enough, the students begin to request that they take Leo home with them, where they share with him their own personal dilemmas, to which Leo offers them life advice. Before long, each of the students have taken Leo home with them and offer them their phones so that they can keep in touch with him.

Fed up with the attention Leo is getting, a jealous Squirtle decides to expose Leo by revealing that he can speak to all of them, as he lied that the only ones who could understand him are the ones he was taken home with. Feeling betrayed by this revelation, they decide to disregard him, and Ms. Malkin, having caught on that Leo can talk and that the students' changes in behavior are the result of his advice, decides to take him to her home.

While at Ms. Malkin's home, Leo learns that the reason she's grouchy is because she never got to accomplish her dream of being a real teacher, always getting relegated to being a substitute. The next day, the school is having a history fair, and the students manage to win the grand prize of a field trip to Magic Land Park with their reenactments of famous historical figures. When she is praised for her work, Ms. Malkin, wanting to take all the credit, decides to abandon Leo at the Everglades, and proceeds to lie to the students by telling them that he abandoned them, much to their dismay, as they had wanted to apologize to him.

As the students head to Magic Land Park, Squirtle catches up with them and reveals that Ms. Malkin lied about Leo, to which she confesses. Upon arriving at Magic Land Park, the students and Ms. Malkin hijack the bus so they can drive to the Everglades. Meanwhile, Leo, while trying to fit in with the wild animals, learns from other lizards that he can live to be more than 75 years old, reinvigorating him. While trying to find a way out, he suddenly encounters a congregation of alligators, but they are successfully scared off when the students arrive and reunite with Leo.

On the final day of the school year, the graduating students ask Leo how they could get through middle school without his advice, to which he says that they just have to look out for each other. Ms. Malkin is given a full-time job as a teacher and is promptly assigned to the kindergarteners, with Leo and Squirtle as the class pets.

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★