Convinced they’d be better off raising themselves, the Willoughby children hatch a sneaky plan to send their selfish parents on vacation. The siblings then embark on their own high-flying adventure to find the true meaning of family.
The Willoughbys Trailers & Clips
Movie Details
- Release Date: April 22, 2020
- Run Time: 1hr 32min
- Directors: Kris Pearn, Cory Evans, Rod Lodermeier
- Writers: Kris Pearn, Mark Stanleigh, Lois Lowry
The Willoughbys Cast and Characters
- Will Forte – Tim
- Maya Rudolph – Nanny
- Alessia Cara – Jane
- Terry Crews – Commander Melanoff
- Martin Short – Father
- Jane Krakowski – Mother
- Seán Cullen – Barnaby A & B
- Ricky Gervais – The Cat
- Brian Drummond – Baby Ruth, Phil, Yokel
- Kris Pearn – Spoons McGee
- Fiona Toth – Travel Agent
- Michael Dobson – Taxi Driver, Guides, The Perfect Dad, Hippie Dad
- Nancy Robertson – Irene Holmes
- Kathleen Barr – The Perfect Mom
- Kiefer Bahrich – The Perfect Son
The Willoughbys Movie Links
The Willoughbys Quotes
As long as we stick together, we will be okay. With or without parents.
A perfectly imperfect family. And why they didn’t get everything they wanted, they got what they needed.
The Willoughbys Box Office
The Willoughbys debuted on the streaming service, Netflix. There are no box office sales reports for The Willoughbys, however, the movie debuted during the COVID-19 pandemic and was likely well-received at home theaters.
The Willoughbys Games & Apps
Emoji Trolls
Now you can add some sparkle and shine to your messages with stickers of your favorite characters from DreamWorks Animation’s TROLLS! Join Poppy, Branch, DJ Suki, Guy Diamond, Biggie, Cooper, and more to show your true colors with messaging stickers and photo stamps from the heart!
The Willoughbys Plot Summary (Spoilers)
As we enter the world of The Willoughby’s, we are introduced to the family which is both creative and proud. For generations, they have brought the world amazing women and men.
The story is narrated by a blue tabby cat, who introduces us to Helga and Walter Willoughby, a couple who like each other but not their four children; they happily neglect and abuse.
We first meet the kids when Jane decides to adopt an orphaned baby that wreaks havoc in the Willoughby living room. The parents throw all of them out of their homes and refuse to return.
Jane and Tim argue until she exclaims that she has found the perfect home for the baby. Tim names the Baby Ruth, and they decide to leave it at the doorstep of Commander Melonoff, the owner of a local candy factory.
Related:
The kids have never stepped outside the door of their home before. Their concept of the world is skewed. Following their adventure at the candy factory, they decide to plan a way to get back into their home.
They come up with the idea of getting their parents to leave on a dream vacation packed with locations that the children know their parents will love.
The parents fall for the plot and immediately leave home without any thought for their kids left to their own devices. The siblings struggle as they have no concept of how to prepare their food.
Thankfully their parents did have the foresight to hire a cheap nanny before they ran away, and she arrived on the scene to help the kids. Tim is immediately distrustful of her and won’t eat any of the food that she makes.
Jane and Barnaby warm to her very quickly. Even though Tim was busy misbehaving and hadn’t eaten for days before her arrival, he still refused any of the food offered to him.
The nanny begins to understand how neglected the children are. She drags them off to the candy factory to find Ruth and saves her from an assembly line. Both Melanoff and the nanny feed the baby some oats.
She explains that Ruth should be left at the Department of Orphan Services. But the kids convince the nanny that Ruth will be perfectly safe living in the factory.
Although the children planned for their parents to fall foul of many different disasters during their adventure vacation, they managed to survive despite going broke in the process.
Instead of returning home and facing their children, they decide to continue their adventures and sell their home. The parents tell the nanny of their intentions and demand that she find out what she should do with the children.
Tim still doesn’t trust anyone and decides to steal her phone. He accidentally overhears and misinterprets a voicemail left for the nanny. In the message, Tim hears his father telling him when they would arrive back and, more importantly, about their plans to sell the home.
The kids immediately set up a plan to scare off any potential buyers and ensure that their nanny can set up the perfect home. Tim picks up the phone and calls child services as he’s mistaken in his belief that the nanny has bad intentions towards them.
The plan backfires as both Tim and his siblings are forced to leave in tears. Jane turns on her brother and calls him the most rotten, selfish boy she knows.
Disaster strikes as the children are sent to separate foster homes. Jane becomes depressed, and Barnaby stops inventing. Tim doesn’t try to fit in with his foster families and even tries to escape from every Foster Family he’s assigned.
We flash forward to find Tim sitting in the orphan services headquarters after watching the Willoughby house demolished. The tabby cat intervenes while she leaves the city on the bus. Bringing Tim his helmet, he’s encouraged to get the children back together.
Linda disguises herself as a janitor and sneaks into HQ’s orphan services to track him down, and the nanny offers Tim help but refuses it. Eventually, the kids managed to escape orphan services and reunite.
The Willoughby kids learn that the only way they’re ever going to be free of orphan services is that they find themselves new parents. They follow a trail formed by their mother’s yarn that leads to the top of a mountain.
Here they find their parents nearly Frozen the cat, and the siblings save the parents and confess to them that they’re at fault for sending them away from the beginning.
Jane, the twins, and the cat asked the parents to come back home and reunite the family. The parents are awakened to their neglect of the children and selfish ways. They promise to care for their children and take responsibility for the situation.
However, we see the Willoughby children fooled once again as their selfish parents steal the dirigible. Their selfishness comes back to bite them as they have no concept of steering the device and crashing it into the mountain.
Unfortunately, it appears that we may not have a happy ending for the Willoughby children as we see them nearly freezing at the peak of the snowy Alps with no way for them to get down to safety.
As they succumb to the cold, Jane hugs Tim and tells him that she forgives him and starts singing. Thankfully Nanny and The Commander have tracked them down and save them before they freeze to death.
Now the children are open for adoption. Melanoff and Linda happily adopt the children and provide all of them a happy home in The Candy Factory.
As the film ends, we are shown that the parents survived the crash, but we see them in the movie’s final scene floating in the sea being circled by a shark who is just waiting to devour them.
Brandon Crombar
Editor In Chief / FounderBrandon is an animation enthusiast and animated film critic. He has been writing about animation since 2013 to celebrate animated movies, characters, and songs. His favorite animated movies include Finding Nemo, Aladdin, and The Lion King.