Most of children’s entertainment is rooted in the idea of changing your circumstances when life deals you a rotten hand. From Cinderella to Dumbo, and even Angels in the Outfield, the basic formula of the fairytale is in going from nobody to somebody. Thelma the Unicorn, coming to Netflix on Friday, takes the tried and true formula and cranks the energy up to eleven thousand. Netflix has a relatively solid track record with animation, but Jared Hess and Lynn Wang’s film often feels like a rejected Illumination project that Netflix picked up off the scrap heap.

In a Bojack Horseman-esque world where humans and talking animals coexist and become celebrities, Thelma the Unicorn follows Thelma (Brittany Howard), who is not, in fact, a unicorn. She’s actually a simple farm pony whose daily routine mostly consists of hauling manure. She dreams of making it big as a musician with her band-mates Otis the donkey (Will Forte) and Reggie the llama (John Heder), and making it to something called Sparklepalooza. Within the first 10 minutes, after Thelma’s band is rejected because they simply don’t have “the look”, you’ll understand where the film is going and what the ultimate message is.

It’s not until a rogue truck spills buckets of pink paint and glitter onto Thelma and she’s mistaken for a unicorn that she garners some attention, but at the behest of Otis, who insists she stay true to herself and wash the paint off. She makes it big by attracting Vic Diamond (Jemaine Clement), a soulless talent manager who thrusts Thelma into the spotlight and forces her to begin a tabloid romance with Danny Stallion (Fred Armisen).

Hess and Wang throw in enough music sequences and visual gags to distract kids from the film’s utterly unimaginative story – written by Jared and his wife, Jerusha Hess. Human characters have the same elongated features that call to mind the look of the Despicable Me films, and the animals look like they could almost belong in the misbegotten Sing franchise. Thankfully Thelma the Unicorn peppers in enough original songs to distinguish itself at least a little bit. (Though eagle-eared millennials will be equally delighted and flabbergasted to notice not one but two songs from fake MTV band 2gether later in the film.) The highlight comes with the deranged banger “Here Comes the Cud”, which Thelma and Danny Stallion literally create in a lab thanks to an algorithm that caters to audience tastes. Netflix will, occasionally, tell on itself in humorous ways.

Marketing an animated film with talking animals about the power of staying true to yourself to kids is almost as old as the medium itself. Thelma the Unicorn proves that, easy as it may be, it’s harder to make a film in the genre that feels fresh and distinctive. The film has the glossy shine and frenetic energy that kids will love – mine have already watched it at least 5 times since Netflix granted me press access – but at the end of the day, Thelma the Unicorn feels a little like Thelma herself: covered in glitter and bright colors, but ultimately an ordinary pony carting around a load of manure.

Thelma the Unicorn is available on Netflix now.

OSCAR POTENTIAL:

• The animated field is light this year, and Netflix almost always finds a spot at the table with under-seen films that premiered early in the year, but there will surely be better offerings coming along as the year drags on. The same goes for Original Song, which usually sees at least one entry from an animated film receiving a nomination.