William Jass

(Some Spoilers) I'm finding it hard to describe how I feel about this movie, it may be because I absolutely love the first and I have some internal bias because of it. This movie was by no means an awful movie IMO, however I have to say I do not feel that it lived up to the first. Like you will see in many of the other reviews, I don't feel that this soundtrack brought much to the movie. The first movies soundtrack added depth and emotion to the events taking place. The songs in Moana 2 all gave me this feeling of they were trying to match the energy of the first but fell short. While I'm not against the addition of other characters joining moana and maui on their adventure, they seemed to just be thrown into it, there was no introduction in terms of who they were or what they really brought to the table until a niche moment called for them, and even then sometimes there wasn't a moment and it was like well why are they here. They also added an interesting new character, she had one song and then she was not to be seen until a post credit scene. As well the plot line made sense, but something about it felt off, in the first, you could SEE why she had to go on her adventure, there was build up. In Moana 2 it was like okay well here's a vision go do something about it and it felt like a very linear adventure, point A to B to C and then they save their world. The big bad guy was never really introduced nor was he actually seen until post credits. To give it credit, the story did touch on an older/younger sibling dynamic and what comes with it, which I thought was decently done. Moana herself was as full of life and adventure as ever. The coconut dudes were pretty cool too.