Late last year Disney decided to shadow drop a teaser for a sequel that no one (myself especially) was expecting; Disney had been planning something big for the franchise but more on that later. For now here’s Moana 2.
Taking place 3 years after the first movie, Moana’s legend has grown exponentially and she is now known as a wayfinder, a leader of her people tasked with connecting the island of Motanui with the rest of Oceania. She discovers a clue of another island called Motufetu, which due to machinations of the storm god Nalo and his (unwilling) accomplice, Matangi has disappeared from the rest of the ocean. And after receiving a vision from her ancestors, learns that she has to find it as its fate is connected to Motanui.
As far as sequels go this was fine, there were a few noticeable changes but nothing that disrupted the DNA of either film, thankfully; they managed to get most of the band back together.
The big exception being Lin Manuel-Miranda as songwriter, whose absence was quite noticeable; in his stead was the duo of Emily Bear and Abigail Barlow or as I referred to them, “We have Lin Manuel at home!” Most of the songs were extremely derivative and ever rap lyric made me cringe. The soundtrack’s only saving grace was “What lies beyond”, which I found more inspired than “How far I’ll go” I will die on this hill.
The returning cast didn’t miss a beat, Auliʻi Cravalho and Dwayne Johnson were just as entertaining as in their previous outing, Temuera Morrison and Nicole Scherzinger return as Moana’s parents as well; with Morrison doing his own singing this time. Rachel House is back as Tala, Moana’s late grandmother. And of course voice acting legend, Alan Tudyk returns as Hei Hei.
Newcomers were plenty; Awhimai Fraser voices the duplicitous Matangi, David Fane plays curmudgeon farmer Kele, Gerald Ramsey is Tautai Vasa, the previous wayfinder and ancestor of Moana, Hualālai Chung voices Moni storyteller and Maui fanboy, and Rose Matefeo is the voice of Loto the socially inept engineer. However I would be remiss to ignore Khaleesi Lambert-Tsuda voicing Moana’s little sister, Simea; one of the better child characters I have seen in cinema.
The bright vibrant colors, and use of Pacific Islander imagery was outstanding.
This is a story about leadership, as Moana navigates through Oceania and her role as chief and wayfinder, she is tested relentlessly by the gods, her position, and herself.
That said I feel like it didn’t stick the landing, because it was built initially to be the beginning of a show on Disney plus (WHICH I WAS LOOKING FORWARD TOO BTW!) This felt like a truncated backdoor pilot and I find that disappointing because there were a lot of good ideas and amazing bits of worldbuilding that just like in the previous film were underutilized. This felt like a bloated combination of Return of Jafar mixed with the pacing of the first Frozen movie.
Moana 2 should have stayed a series, because the story needed more time in the oven, it’s mid at best; and I’m mad about it, just disappointed.
I give Moana 2 a 3 out of 5.