What to Know About Vivo on Netflix For Kids | Parents' Guide
Vivo: What to Know Before Watching the Sweet and Silly Animated Musical With Your Kids
Netflix's latest animated feature for kids, Vivo, is a colourful and lively musical filled with songs your kids will want to play on repeat and comedic moments the whole family will laugh at. When a kinkajou named Vivo (Lin-Manuel Miranda) leaves Cuba to track down a famous singer in Miami, he finds himself on the adventure with a new friend, a young girl named Gabi (Ynairaly Simo). Along the way he learns important lessons about embracing second chances, following your dreams, and marching to the beat of your own drum.
Vivo is a sweet and funny family movie that is worthy of being added to your kids' on-repeat rotation, but if you're watching with your toddlers or particularly sensitive kiddos, keep scrolling for a few things you may want to note before hitting play.
What to Know About Vivo Before Watching With Kids
- There's an unexpected death early in the film. Although nothing is shown, it's a really tragic scene. Vivo and other characters are seen in mourning, and the kinkajou struggles with processing the loss, so it's definitely an emotional part of the otherwise silly movie and may catch your kids off guard. The themes of death and loss run throughout the story, and the same character is mourned by others later in the film, but those first scenes are definitely the most heartbreaking.
- Characters get into dangerous situations. From jumping an open drawbridge to rafting down a river in a storm to a run-in with a huge snake, Vivo and Gabi get themselves into a few perilous situations. However, at its core, Vivo is a comedy, so that, plus the fact that it's an animated movie, makes it so nothing is lasting or super intense.
- Some of the lyrics are fast, making them tough to keep up with. Some of the singing and rapping may be too fast for kids to keep up with. (There's big Hamilton energy in a few of the numbers!) Most of the time it's OK if they don't catch all the words in the songs, though, as the scenes provide plenty of context clues that should help them to get the full picture of what's going on.
