“Cars 3” is a solid final lap for a rickety franchise

Pixar’s Cars films are awkward contraptions that defy straightforward characterization. They boast some clever design, but unlike most of the studio’s features, they are thematic and emotional clunkers. (Let’s not even get into the disturbing King-meets-Cronenberg implications of the series’ premise.) Happily, Cars 3, while thoroughly mediocre as Pixar films go, is unquestionably the best chapter in the trilogy.

In this respect, the film improbably resembles Toy Story 3, and while Cars 3 doesn’t remotely perform in the same class as that film, it similarly seems aimed at the adults in the audience. Notwithstanding its enduring passion for roaring engines and speed-fueled adrenaline, Cars 3 is a story of aging, retreat, and diminishment.

After a long career of victories, champion stock car Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) abruptly finds himself lagging behind a new line of precision-engineered competitors on the racing circuit. Resolving to muscle his way back on top, he begins training at his new sponsor’s high-tech facility under the eye of the enthusiastic Cruz Ramirez (Cristela Alonzo).

The original Cars was a sports film at heart, and while the first sequel spun out with a shrill James Bond plot (and far too much of bumpkin tow truck Mater), Cars 3 puts the series back on a more familiar track. The film’s pacing is a bit flabby and the plot arc is predictable, but there is an unexpected, glowing gratification in watching the story reach its destination.

Fundamentally, Cars 3 is the story of McQueen’s slow, sputtering acceptance that his time in the sun is nearing its end. Director Brian Fee and the film’s numerous writers could easily have cheated their way out of this bleak but authentic scenario, and they consistently refuse to do so. That alone makes Cars 3 oddly notable in the annals of contemporary kid’s fare.

Opens Friday, June 16 in wide release.