The film's writing and lack of humor received mixed reviews. Owen Gleiberman of "Entertainment Weekly" stated "With dismay, I realize that virtually everything in the movie – every character, every story twist, every song – is as generic as the two hygienic lovers. As a fairy-tale confection, a kind of "West Side Story" in Jamestown, "Pocahontas" is pleasant to look at, and it will probably satisfy very small kiddies, but it's the first of the new-era Disney cartoons that feels less than animated." Peter Travers of "Rolling Stone" bemoaned that there were "no funny, fast-talking animals – Meeko the raccoon and Flit the hummingbird remain silent pals to Pocahontas and make you miss the verbal fun that Nathan Lane's wisecracking meerkat brought to "The Lion King"." Desson Howe, reviewing for "The Washington Post", likewise criticized the writing as recycling "elements from "Snow White" to "The Lion King," with a father-child clash, a heroine's saintly pureness that transforms an entire people, a forbidden love, consultations with an oracle/shaman (in this case a tree spirit, voiced by Linda Hunt) and the usual sideshow of funny, fuzzy animals." While calling the screenplay the "film's weakest element", Janet Maslin of "The New York Times" summarized that "Gloriously colorful, cleverly conceived and set in motion with the usual Disney vigor, "Pocahontas" is one more landmark feat of animation. It does everything a children's film should do except send little viewers home humming its theme song."