Incredibles 2 review

 

My opinion right after watching the movie

My opinion right after watching the movie is that………. I REALLY HATE that I ended up being right. I had a feeling that people were going to overhype the movie because it was the only Pixar sequel really wanted, and was afraid that the sequel was going to be pointless. It just seemed really pointless, and while there isn’t much of anything that’s bad, there was not a lot that was very good. I feel like the message about parents being the real heroes are nice, but I feel like it was executed better in the first movie, and everyone else just seemed more one-dimensional.

Production

Over the years, director/writer Brad Bird made it known that he would only make a sequel to The Incredibles if he had a good enough story for it, and in May 2013, he kind of hinted about a sequel being in the works, since it’s something he thought about for a while. The sequel was confirmed at a Disney Shareholder meeting in March 2014 by CEO/Chairman Bob Iger.

Since so much time has passed between the release of the first film, and the production of this film (with the amount of superhero films coming up in between especially the Marvel Cinematic Universe), Bird wanted to avoid superhero tropes, and wanted to use story elements that were cut from the first film. It was always intended from conception that Elastigirl would be the main character of this film.

Like in Toy Story 3 (and probably Finding Dory), due to there being such a large gap of years in between its successor and the current film, the animators had to create the character designs from scratch due to how much the technology has improved since then. They also use physically-based human eye models for the first time, despite the eyes being larger and more stylized for animation exaggeration purposes.

Story

The movie begins with Dicker (Jonathan Banks) interviewing Tony Rydinger (Michael Bird), who gets his memory erased of the vents that happened in the conclusion of the final film, when he saw them as superheroes. Back to the present, as the action is taking place, someone named Winston Deavor (Bob Odenkirk) oversees them, and ends up recruiting Frozone (Samuel L. Jackson) to give him a visit.  After the battle happens, the government is pissed off at them, and Dicker tells them that the program to keep them undercover has been shut down, so the supers are on their own, and they only have 2 weeks at a hotel. Frozone visits them about the hotel to tell him about the man he met, and that leads to the rising action.

The three superheroes go to Winston’s house, where they meet him and his sister Evelyn (Catherine Keener). We hear the backstory about how their father would help superheroes throughout the years, and how he ended up being shot, which caused Winston to want to help the supers become legal again. Ultimately, they choose Elastigirl to be their prototype for their first talk, which Bob does not react well to.

Winston gets them into a new house, as Helen starts her training, while Bob gets used to being a stay-at-home-dad. I’m sorry (not really), but this is WAY too repetitive. So far, there is very little distinguishing itself from the first film, and there has been a lack of development so far. There are some funny moments, like Bob teaching Dash (Huckleberry Milner) math, but it just makes everything seem so pointless, since there’s so little that is new. Anyways, Elastigirl completes her first mission, and there is some filler where Bob learns that Jack Jack has powers.

So while the other kids are doing that, Violet (Sarah Vowell) comes to the realization that Tony doesn’t know who he is. Helen ends up meeting a bunch of superheroes (they never really go into other details about where these other superheroes come from, since in the first film, they make it clear that all of the supers but the Parrs and Frozone have been killed), and after a conversation with Evelyn, Helen realizes how they can get the Screensaver, but they will need a TV to set it up.

So Bob has a meltdown over being sleep-deprived while dealing with his children, so Frozone suggests him take a visit to Edna (Brad Bird), after they all see that he has powers. He apologizes to Violet for screwing things up with Tony, as Jack Jack is over at Edna’s, which was relatively nice. The entire point of this was to show how to control Jack Jack’s powers.

Elastigirl is celebrating at Winston’s place with a bunch of the supers, as he announces that there is going to be a Summit to make supers legal again, but she goes off to investigate, and ends up realizing that the Screenslaver wanting to be caught. This causes us to reveal that Evelyn is the villain, and is doing all of this because she blames supers for the death of her parents, and wants revenge. Honestly, it seems very convoluted, and it isn’t very satisfying overall.

What you expect to happen afterwards ends up happening. Al of the supers are wearing these goggles that causes them to be brainwashed by Evelyn (which includes Elastigirl, Mr. Incredible, and Frozone), and the kids end up saving the day. The movie ends with Supers being legal, and the family assisting Violet’s date with Tony, before deciding to take on a villain before the movie starts.

I remember feeling unsatisfied the first time I watched it in theaters, and after waiting a few more months to rewatch it, I am even more unsatisfied. People have complained about Monsters University, and Finding Dory being pointless sequels, but I feel like at least those moments had some purpose, and were not complete rehashes. I seriously do not see the point in this film. The film literally ended in almost the exact same manner that the first film did, we only had Helen and Bob switch roles, though there wasn’t even a decent resolve with that storyline, and there was very little original about it. I had a feeling that this film’s hype would be higher than it’s quality, but while it isn’t a bad movie, I am extremely disappointed. Honestly, I think this film is the second weakest, only behind Cars 2. To me, it seemed like a cash grab, since Tomorrowland did not work out for Bird, and was kind of forced back into Pixar. I have not been so underwhelmed by a Pixar movie in YEARS.

Characters

I am going to keep this very simple. They are enjoyable like they were in the first movie, but I feel like they were a lot more one-dimensional, and had similar retreads from the first film. I think the lack of character development is why I think this film is so aimless.

So I did say in the first film that it would have been nice to see him more with his family, and we got that. He had the gender reversal, and learned how strong parents are, which is fine enough I guess. A lot of his resentment towards his wife seemed like it was going somewhere, but it lead to nothing. They could have handled his arcs a but better, but at least he learned something.

While Mr. Incredible had a lot to learn in the last film, she learned not to overexert herself as well. Despite being in the main character for this film,……….. I don’t really remember or know what she supposedly learned from the film. I found her to be more disappointing personally.

So, she has the whole insecurity thing, but it’s more tied to Tony once again, though it’s more emphasized, but not as character-centric at the same time………

He is just there…… Literally.

I really do not care to talk about the newbies or Frozone, since they left ultimately no impression on me, and are really forgettable. Even the supers that are introduced make no impact, and nothing is done with that.

Animation

Like everything Pixar, the animation is breathtaking, and the 14-year gap between the films has made this animation standout even more. The details in the clothing, hair and skin textures is so brilliant, especially after knowing how hard it was for them to animate humans in the last film, and how many tricks they used for that film. The superhero effects were nice, though there was some epilepsy aspects to a lot of the animation.

Music

The score is fine, and by fine, I mean pretty good. It is what you would expect from Pixar, and from an Incredibles film, though it did not stand out much to me this time around. Generically fine and unmemorable is how I will describe it.

Reception at Release

When the film was released on June 15th, 2018 it has (as of August 23rd, 2018) made $595 million domestically, and $527 million in other territories, adding up to a worldwide amount of $1.123 billion, being the third Pixar film to gross over a billion dollars. It outgrossed the original film’s total gross ($633 million) on July 1st, is currently the 9th highest-grossing film of all time domestically, and is currently the highest-grossing domestically animated film.

From what I gathered critically, people did claim that it was not as good as the first film, but it was almost as good as the first film, which is good enough. A lot of people did criticize that there would be epilepsy issues, and some did not like how they found it to be unoriginal, though mostly everyone praised the animation and action segments.

Score

Story: 6/10

Characters: 6.5/10

Animation: 8.5/10

Music: 6.5/10

27.5/40 = 69%

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