To put it bluntly, dolphins are cute. They are smart, Flipper enchanted an entire generation, people fly across continents just to pet them, and some get really pissed off when you try and kill them. So when an inspirational story comes along about a boy and his injured pet dolphin, you know Hollywood is going to go crazier than Gary Busey with a mountain of cocaine to get it on film. Be prepared to saw "aww."
According to THR, Alcon Entertainment has hired Charles Martin Smith (the guy who directed Air Bud) to write A Dolphin's Tale, the story of a dolphin, named Winter, who, after losing its tail in a crab trap, is rescued by a boy who then rallies his home town to build the aquatic mammal a prosthetic tail before sending it off to live in the local aquarium. The story was previously featured on NBC's Today, which you can watch here.
I'll stomach the fact that this is yet another cutesy animal flick, because I know that I am not the target demographic, but making the title a pun on animal deformities? That is simply in bad taste. The story is supposedly an inspiration to people with disabilities, but the title would seem to suggest that it would be okay to nickname a one-legged man "Hoppy."
