PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie Review: Humdinger Wants Diamonds, Not Redemption This Time

PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie sends the pups to a dinosaur-filled island, and Mayor Humdinger's dynamite habit is what turns the trip dangerous. The Hollywood Reporter calls it a threequel that's exactly what you expect, which for this franchise is not a knock.

Director Cal Brunker sends the crew crash-landing on a tropical island during a storm rescue, where they meet Rex, a pup stranded there for years who's become the island's resident dino expert. Marshall spends the film wrestling with self-doubt after a string of on-mission mishaps, giving the movie's teamwork message an actual character to hang on.

Humdinger's diamonds are more dangerous than his usual schemes

Fresh out of prison, Humdinger goes after buried diamonds on the island using dynamite, and the mining inadvertently wakes a dormant volcano. That's a meaner motive than his usual small-time scheming, and it gives the pups a real disaster to manage rather than a cartoon inconvenience.

Common Sense Media rates it PG for mild action and peril, flagging river rapids, a dinosaur stampede, and volcano sequences with fireballs and lava as more intense than the franchise's first two films. Variety's review lands cooler, calling it diverting but regressive as a kidpic, which is really a complaint about ambition, not execution.

Even Humdinger's own crew turns on him

The one detail that separates this from a standard villain-of-the-week plot: Humdinger's own accomplice can't forgive his recklessness by the time the film ends, a small but real consequence for a franchise that usually resets its antagonist to zero every sequel.

Rex, voiced by Hayden Chamberlen, gives the film its emotional hook: a pup who's been surviving alone on a dinosaur island for years, which is a stranger and more melancholy premise than the marketing lets on.

Quick Facts

• Release Date: August 14, 2026

• Director: Cal Brunker

• Voice Cast: Carter Young (Marshall), Mckenna Grace (Skye), Rain Janjua (Chase), Henry Bolan (Ryder), Hayden Chamberlen (Rex)

• Studio: Paramount Pictures

• Rating: PG (mild action and peril)

• Status: In Cinemas Now

Diaspora line: PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie opens through Paramount Pictures across North America on August 14, 2026, with the franchise's usual same-week or near-same-week rollout to Indian multiplexes and Nickelodeon's international audience.

FAQ

• Is PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie appropriate for young kids?

  Mostly, but Common Sense Media flags the volcano and stampede sequences as more intense than the first two films, so very young or sensitive viewers may find parts unsettling.

• Who is the villain in PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie?

  Mayor Humdinger, whose dynamite mining for buried diamonds triggers the island's dormant volcano.

• Who is Rex in PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie?

  A pup stranded alone on the dinosaur island for years who becomes the team's dino expert, voiced by Hayden Chamberlen.

  
  

More on AltBollywood: for what actually happens with the volcano and Humdinger's diamonds, read our PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie ending explained. Catch the rest of this week's releases under Pop Culture Prachaaran.