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Marlin is a nervous clownfish raising his only surviving son, Nemo, alone. When the boy vanishes, he crosses the ocean with Dory's help and learns that overprotecting is a way of losing someone too. In the second film he learns to trust the friend who forgets everything. Albert Brooks does the original voice.
A barracuda attacks the reef and takes his wife Coral and nearly all the eggs. Marlin wakes to find one cracked egg left. He names him Nemo and promises nothing bad will ever happen to his son. He raises the boy alone in an anemone, and fear becomes routine. Nemo has a smaller fin, and Marlin warns even the teacher about it.
When divers take Nemo, Marlin chases the boat and bumps into Dory. The two get past sharks trying not to eat fish, naval mines, an abyss with an anglerfish and a forest of jellyfish. Marlin tries to ditch Dory more than once, but she always turns up again and helps.
In the East Australian Current, Marlin meets the turtle Crush, who swims beside his son Squirt and lets him explore alone. Crush shows him that trusting isn't abandoning. Later a whale swallows Marlin and Dory. Dory begs him to trust her and let go. He does, and the whale carries them to Sydney.
Marlin believes Nemo is dead and swims away. Dory finds the boy and reunites them, but she is caught in a fishing net. Marlin lets Nemo swim into the net and lead the fish, who break the trawler. He praises his son's courage. Weeks later he drops Nemo at school and tells him: go have an adventure.
A year later, Dory lives next door to Marlin and Nemo. When she suddenly remembers she has family in California, Marlin hesitates but goes along, with Nemo. On the way, the turtle Crush carries the trio on the California Current. Dory is the guide, and Marlin has to trust what she remembers, even when she isn't sure herself.
In California, the Marine Life Institute takes Dory. Marlin and Nemo count on two sea lions and a bird named Becky to get inside the institute and find her. By the time they reach Dory, she has learned that her parents set out to find her years ago and never came back, and Marlin has to be there for her.
In the end, Marlin, Nemo and the octopus Hank land in a truck bound for Cleveland. Dory talks Hank into helping, and the truck plunges into the sea, freeing the animals. Marlin now treats Dory as family, and she returns to the reef with her parents, a neighbor again.
Albert Brooks voices Marlin in both films. William H. Macy was cast first and recorded most of the dialogue before Brooks took over.
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