Did we really need another typical Jesus movie? Apparently.

The King of Kings

Directed by Seong-ho Jang (Angel Studios, 2025)

The King of Kings, a new animated film directed by Seong-ho Jang, doesn’t start out like your typical Jesus movie: It opens, rather, on Charles Dickens, who is giving a dramatic reading of A Christmas Carol when his rambunctious youngest son, Walter, interrupts the performance while playacting as King Arthur with a wooden sword. A slapstick sequence ensues, culminating in Dickens shouting at young Walter and sending him home without his sword, despondent. Later, to make it up to Walter, Dickens tells him the story of the true “King of Kings,” a king even greater than Walter’s beloved King Arthur.

From here on out, The King of Kings does in fact become your typical Jesus movie, with the exception of some didactic digressions from Dickens (for example, his explaining of Adam and Eve and the concept of sin) and a little Victorian boy (Walter) running about most frames with his pet cat. Despite an incredibly star-studded voice cast—Uma Thurman, Forest Whitaker, Oscar Isaac, Mark Hamill, the list goes on—there isn’t a whole lot for them to do to flex their collective talent, as the film rarely, if ever, covers new ground in its approach to the gospel. It’s an adequate, if somewhat dull, retelling of a story most Christian adults have heard countless times.

There are some points of interest that keep the film from being completely bland: For example, Dickens’ constant foiling of Walter’s expectation of Jesus becoming the kind of king who solves problems with a sword could be a nice discussion-starter on Christian nonviolence, and its working definition of sin is refreshingly fire-and-brimstone-free. But all told, The King of Kings is at best a serviceable introduction to the life of Jesus for small children, and not a whole lot more. Your Sunday School class at least won’t be bored to tears by it.

The King of Kings is available to stream through Angel Studios.