Morally Conflicted Tortoise

The movie jumps from being a fantastic dissection and continuation of the first movie... To a truly tone-deaf musical which completely destroys the dark and sombre tones built by the rest of the plot. I understand the intention of using the musical scenes as a motif for Arthur's further descent into psychosis, but they feel so out of place that they mostly serve to break the immersion of the audience. The decision for the sequel to a dark, gritty, and depressing psychological thriller about a mentally ill man (and the society that failed to care for him, though the second never addressed this to the same degree as the first) to feature energetic big band musical sequences is so truly BAFFLING to me. I can't help but be frustrated by this movie. It feels like every time I was invested in a scene, the tension that was carefully built was immediately trainwrecked as Phoenix or Gaga spontaneously broke out into song, and I feel like hurling the closest object at the screen out of annoyance as I'm immediately brought out of Arthur's plight. I wish we could've seen this movie without these scenes.