Bob, I usually find your reviews to be spot on, but this time you seemed way off base.
Tim Burton's portrayal of Alice was a wonderful movie to watch. Alice herself stays fairly close to how I remember the character from the first book, very innocent to a world full of lunatics. It's a story of a young woman maturing into a young, confident adult. It's also about finding strength in yourself to believe in the impossible.
Have these things been done? Yes, and they've been done better for sure. But I do believe that you've already recently talked about how every trope has been done and we're all just reusing them. I'm merely finding it odd that you boiled down the movie to a basic formula when it should be seen for what it is, a richly decorated and crazy story with a story that plays second fiddle to the oddness. Which, seeing the source material, means this pays great tribute to the source material.
As for the last act, I was hardly bothered by it. Was it odd that the Mad Hatter was using a sword to fight the Knave, yes. I won't deny you that, but let us recall that even the Hatter was disturbed by his actions once the fighting was over. This ending was being led to through the whole movie, it had to happen. If it helps, we could all put on our big artsy pants and look at it as an analogy of how we must all confront the demons of our lives, the Jaberwocky, and own up to these things by making them on our own. Honestly though, this movie was a delight to watch. Once more Burton does what he does best, make a visually entertaining film that is a joy to see to the finish. Watching a Burton film is like going through an art gallery with a far more disturbed mind flashing images at you constantly.