If we could bring him back, we would.
When Disney released the special edition of The Nightmare Before Christmas on DVD (and later Blu-ray), it did well to include Tim Burton's two early shorts, the stop-motion animated Vincent and live-action Frankenweenie. Now, with Disney's full backing (something he didn't have when he was employed there in the early '80s), Burton has expanded the latter to feature length by employing the methods of the former -- and the help of screenwriter John August. Alas, there isn't that much more story to be had here, so compared to the 29-minute original, the new edition can't help but feel a bit padded out at 87 minutes.
Another in a long line of Burton-fide misfits and loners, Victor Frankenstein (Charlie Tahan) is a suburban mad-science prodigy whose parents (Catherine O'Hara and Martin Short, who both voice a number of other characters as well) encourage his creativity while bemoaning his lack of friends. Actually, he does have one friend: his faithful, ever-yapping dog Sparky, who's an annoyance to their cranky neighbor, the mayor of New Holland (Short again), despite being reasonably well-behaved. He's such a good doggy, in fact, that he blithely runs out into the street to retrieve the ball that Victor hits out of the park when his father goads him into joining the baseball team, whereupon Sparky gets hit by a car and killed. Naturally, this makes Victor more morose than usual, but inspired by the example of his new science teacher (Martin Landau), he sets about meddling with the forces of life and death, with unpredictable results.
In an effort to fill out the cast a little bit, Burton and August develop a few of Victor's classmates, including the mayor's vaguely goth-y niece (Winona Ryder), whose black poodle strikes up a flirtation of sorts with Sparky; a weird girl with wide, staring eyes whose cat can supposedly predict the future (O'Hara again); an Igor-like kid who meddles in Victor's affairs (Atticus Shaffer); and a Japanese boy who's determined to best Victor at the Science Fair (James Hiroyuki Liao), so you know he isn't happy when he catches wind of Sparky's resurrection. The thing is, when Sparky comes back, he's the same happy, scrappy pup he's always been. When the other kids attempt to replicate Victor's experiment with their own deceased pets, however, the results are nothing short of monstrous. Any excuse for a Gamera spoof is a good one, though.