Quote:
"Fans of Back to God's Country [...] might discover [in A Bear, a Boy, and a Dog] at least one reference to it, in the form of an ironic reversal of Dolores' dream. While Dolores, in her city apartment with her husband, dreamed of her Arcadian forest home with the animals, Henry, with Brownie and Laddie free but hungry in the woods, longs for home and for his mother offering them supper. And while Dolores' dream was bound to come true, Henry's wish does so only in part: he eventually returns, but without his new friends. In terms of the plot, then, the film only half fulfills its subversive promise of rebellion against 'the shackles of grown-up inhumanity'. While the threesome from the title does catch the criminals, and are otherwise up to some harmless mischief, each of them eventually returns or is returned to the 'inhuman' captivity from which he or she sought to escape."
-- Annette Förster

Source:
Förster, Annette. "Nell Shipman and the American Silent Cinema." In Women in the Silent Cinema: Histories of Fame and Fate. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2017. (p. 375)