Rumble is a 2021 American computer-animated sports comedy film directed by Hamish Grieve with a screenplay by Grieve and Matt Lieberman. Loosely based on Monster on the Hill, a graphic novel by Rob Harrell, the film stars the voices of Will Arnett, Geraldine Viswanathan, Terry Crews, Stephen A. Smith, Jimmy Tatro, Tony Danza, Susan Kelechi Watson, Tony Shalhoub, Bridget Everett, Greta Lee, Ben Schwartz, Roman Reigns and Becky Lynch.
Produced by Paramount Animation, WWE Studios, Walden Media and Reel FX Animation Studios, the film was released in the United States on December 15, 2021 on Paramount+. The film received generally mixed reviews from critics with criticism for its writing, characters, and pacing, although the animation and voice acting received some praise.
In a world where giant monsters and humans coexist, monsters compete in a popular professional wrestling global sport known as monster wrestling, with each city having its own monster wrestler. After the current wrestler for the small town of Stoker, the shark-like Tentacular becomes the new world champion, he announces he no longer wants to represent Stoker. The townspeople are later told if they do not find a new wrestler, they will lose the town’s stadium and its revenue, which prompts wrestling enthusiast Winnie Coyle to search for a new monster representative for her town.
Winnie heads to an underground fight and finds the son of the famous late Stoker champion Rayburn, fighting under the name of “Steve The Stupendous”. Winnie interferes in the match and causes Steve to win instead of taking a dive, as the underground arena employer wanted. Steve is confronted by his employer and threatened unless he can get the owner back the money she just lost. Winnie tells Steve she can help him get the money by training him to fight Tentacular. Realizing he has no other way to make the money, Steve agrees to be trained.
Steve initially is uninterested in learning how to fight properly and wins his first match by evading his opponent. Steve later tells Winnie he left Stoker because everyone saw him as an extension of his father and could not live up to his name. Winnie learns Steve loves dancing and decides to train him using dance moves. As they progress up the league’s rankings, Tentacular announces he and his agent have bought Stoker’s stadium and wants to demolish it as Tentacular sees it as a reminder that he will be always compared to Rayburn. Even though Steve manages to repay his underground arena employer, he decides to help Winnie, reveals his identity as Rayburn Jr. and challenges Tentacular to a match for the stadium.