The Media Man Reviews: Inside Out 2

And here we are at last, my most anticipated movie of 2024. :D

Released in 2015 Inside Out has become one of Pixar's most critically acclaimed and beloved movies in their impressive library with heavy praise going towards its creative concept, gorgeous animation, strong emotional core and incredible voice-acting. It is one of the highest grossing Pixar movies of all time, having made $858.8 million worldwide and won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. I even named it as my number 1 favourite Pixar movie of all time in last year's favourite Pixar movies list I made. So as you can imagine, when a sequel was announced, I was immediately hyped for it and knew I had to see it. Of all the movies coming out this year, this was my number one must-see given it's A: a Pixar movie and B: a sequel to Inside Out.

So having seen the movie, we now answer the big question: was this a worthy sequel to a legendary movie? Or is this movie going to give me negative emotions? Let's go into Riley's mind and find out...

Section 1: The Story

Remember the puberty alarm from the last movie? Well it's time for it to go off now, for Riley's a teenager and is moving onto the next step in life. But with growing up comes new emotions and Joy and the gang are going to find the new arrivals more trouble than they're worth as they attempt to take over Riley's mind in a well-intended, but misguided attempt to make her happy in her new life.

Just like with the first movie, Inside Out 2's strengths lie within its strong emotional core, which is kind of expected for a movie about emotions. However, while the first movie goes with a message about it being healthy to feel sad sometimes and that you need both positive and negative emotions to get through life, this movie's message is more about not letting your emotions define you and finding your own sense of self, which is metaphorically depicted here as an object that helps influence some of Riley's decisions without any inputs from the emotions. It's always important not to let ourselves be defined by our emotions, so this was a good message for the story to teach us and is also a logical evolution of the film's previous moral.

And just like with the first movie, this movie is very relatable in what it presents us with. As anyone can tell you, the amount of stress and crazy feelings we get within ourselves after going through puberty are anything BUT joyful and it's show so well here with Riley's struggle to fit in and make a good impression to the Fire Hawks hockey team while also remaining good friends with Bree and Grace. How many of us have been through something like that in our lives? A good number, I'm sure. And it's depicted so well here with Anxiety taking the wheel and trying to dictate how everything goes in Riley's mind under the misguided belief she's doing what's best for her. Having gone through periods of extreme anxiety myself back in the 2010's decade due to changes in my life and growing up, it really felt like my own anxiety was taking control of me and forcing me to feel this way so much, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who went through that.

As this is a sequel, naturally somethings are elevated from before to make the sequel seem bigger than last time, namely how the cast are expanded on and in cases like Anger, Fear and Disgust, are given more screentime than before, which was a huge plus for many as the main gang didn't spend that much time together before. Even I enjoyed seeing more of the gang together than last time. And of course, the action is escalated to higher levels than before. Seriously, you watch this movie and compare it to the first and you'll notice there's a lot more action scenes than last time. We see plenty of scenes with Riley in hockey games be it practicing or playing for real, and the emotions go through quite a lot of different scenarios that test their capabilities too. Given we're in the mind of a teenager now, it makes sense that things will be more action-packed and the thrill levels are higher than before. All this makes for a pretty engaging watching and a very exciting one too, as well as intense when we get Riley breaking down into a panic attack (seems we're still in that phase of animated products and realistic panic attacks).

I don't know if it's just me, but I also felt they ramped the comedy up more compared to last time. No joke, I was surprised at how many times I found myself laughing while I was watching this. I expected the film to have some good humour, but I didn't expect to be laughing at it THIS much and THAT often! There's so much good comedy here with clever puns, visual gags, slapstick, one-liners and the like. I know the "sar-chasm" especially was a top-tier pun and the gag was executed to perfection. And no, I'm not being sarcastic when I say that. XD

Another top-tier moment of writing for me was the scene where Joy snaps at the other emotions. Not only did Amy Poehler just nail Joy's angry ranting, but the scene is especially poignant because of what a cynical, negative, pessimistic world we live in. As Joy says, it's EXTREMELY hard to remain positive when all people these days do is complain, complain, complain and especially in today's society, you're kind of looked down upon if you're not a miserable son of a gun. As someone who genuinely can't understand that kind of behaviour and wonders why people are often so negative, I felt for Joy at that moment, and I really hope this scene will get people to look at themselves and learn to stop being so cynical and pessimistic all the time. That never gets anybody anywhere after all. Only with positivity and optimism do you ever achieve anything in life and feel it's worth living. Also, this line REALLY hit me hard...

"Maybe that's what happens when you grow up, you feel less joy..."

Damn, really telling it how it is, aren't you Pixar?

And can I just say that despite the potentially crowded cast, the film managed to juggle them really well here? I was worried the film would seem overcrowded with all the characters we have and the new emotions would potentially play into that problem, but they managed it quite well and it never once felt as if the film was trying to fit in too many characters, nor did it feel like anyone was fighting for space. Maybe Chris Chibnall could with looking at this and taking notes if he ever decides to write for Doctor Who again...

So yeah, this movie has a lot of great stuff in it that makes it a worthy sequel to the first. But does it have any flaws that keep it from being a great sequel? Unfortunately...yes. Inside Out 2 is a good sequel, but it could've been a GREAT sequel if it wasn't for one tiny little problem...it's pretty much a copy/paste of the first movie. I mean, it's near note-for-note the EXACT SAME PLOT as before. You have an emotion that tries to be too controlling (Joy and Anxiety), the emotions get lost in Riley's mind and have to get back to headquarters before disaster strikes, Joy has to learn to get along and work with a negative emotion to make ends meet (Sadness and Anxiety respectively), they get into all kinds of trouble in trying to get back to headquarters, Riley steals something (her mum's purse in the first movie, the coach's notebook in this one) and has a scene where she breaks down in some way before making up to her friends or family (crying in the first movie, a panic attack in this one). Hell, we even have a scene of Joy at her lowest point moping whilst on top of a bunch of memories! Just why is this movie so recycled? You'd think they'd have been more creative with the story instead of pretty much just doing the first movie again, only bigger than last time. I talked with a friend about this, and he felt it fits because of how we often experience the same thing but in different ways in life. I'm not giving it that excuse, because it's still lazy writing. The plot could've done with being way more creative instead of being near identical to before, is all I'm saying.

Also, does anyone other than me feel like the movie somehow feels faster paced than before, despite the fact it's about a minute longer? I don't know, this movie just feels a bit more hurried than its predecessor to me, but I can't quite say why. It just feels like we needed more slow and quiet moments to get the same feeling we got last time. And just like the first movie where I felt we spent too much time in Riley's head, the sequel does not address this problem at all. In fact, I think we spend even MORE time in Riley's head than before! Can we spend more time outside of her head so we can see how she's thinking and feeling in the real world instead of being inside her head so much? Just saying, I'd be more interested to see that instead of spending so much screentime in her head.

But that's it really. Aside from a recycled story, the film has very few problems to list and that to me is a sign of a good sequel and a good movie. It's not as great as the first movie, but it is still very much a worthy follow-up and an enjoyable look into the expanding world of Inside Out as Riley continues to grow...

Section 2: The Characters

With growing up comes a new set of emotions, and we have a lot of those to cover!

The main five are back of course with Joy (voiced by Amy Poehler), Sadness (voices by Phyllis Smith), Anger (voiced by Lewis Black), Disgust (voiced by Liza Laparia) and Fear (voiced by Tony Hale). As mentioned earlier, we get to see more of the gang together as a group compared to before where it was mostly Joy and Sadness. It was a REALLY smart idea on the writer's parts to make it so Sadness gets her own little subplot in trying to stop Anxiety while Joy is left with Anger, Disgust and Fear, hence we get to see more of their interactions with one another. The emotions all play off each other so well and have a lot of funny quirks and idiosyncrasies that make them as fun as they were before. I also like how Joy's character development stuck from last time, which we see in how she's not as controlling as before and is more willing to let Sadness help out. The scene where she snaps also has a positive impact on the other emotions as Anger, Fear and Disgust become more helpful to her from here on out. The five were well used here and I loved seeing them all again.

Now for the new emotions. We have Anxiety (voiced by Maya Hawke), Envy (voiced by Ayo Edebiri), Ennui (voiced by Adèle Exarchopoulos) and Embarrassment (voiced by Paul Walter Hauser). I can't tell you enough how genius it was to make Anxiety the antagonist of the movie. If any emotion was going to kind-of be the villain here, it was her. While Envy, Ennui and Embarrassment aren't quite as important as her, Anxiety is the driving force behind the conflict of the movie, which only fits in how the feeling of anxiety works, and I like how she's not malicious or anything about her antagonistic nature. She just thinks she's doing what's best for Riley, even though she's doing more harm than good. Anxiety was expertly handled and written here and I don't think I'd change anything about her role and characterization.

And now we have Riley herself (voiced by Kensington Tallman). Now she's going through the dreaded puberty stage, the girl is an emotional wreck (as most teenagers are) and is just eager to fit in at the new hockey camp she's attending, even if it means she may have to sacrifice her friendships with Bree and Grace to do so. Like last time, Riley is a very sympathetic and relatable character throughout the movie as she struggles with her emotions and goes through a lot of challenges with change and growing up. Her struggles are our struggles and I'm sure many will see themselves in Riley as they watch this movie.

The only other significant character to talk about is Valentina "Val" Ortiz (voiced by Lilimar). I was worried she was going to be the typical jerk jock kind of character and be a generic bully to Riley, but no, she ended up being a lot nicer than expected and seems genuinely friendly, even if she could've done with calling out Riley's less than pleasant moments at times and definitely should've spoke up against her other friends more whenever they would put pressure on Riley or worry her. As is, I'm glad they didn't go the route I thought they'd go with her.

Aside from that, there's no other characters to really talk about. Riley's parents aren't in the movie much, which is probably for the best as the movie would've been too much of a rehash if they were in it more, characters like Lance Slashblade, Bloofy and Pouchy are one-off gags with Pouchy unexpectedly getting to be useful during the climax and Coach Roberts is just the strict but well-meaning coach of the hockey teams.

The characters are as strong as before, especially the emotions and Riley, and the new emotions definitely help give us more kinds of feelings than we had before as we see the cast expand in numbers and in depth.

Section 3: The Animation

Time for me to sound like a broken record again: the animation is amazing. What else do you expect from Pixar at this point? =P

What I can say is that the animation does get a noticeable upgrade compared to last time. Given the first movie came out nearly ten years ago, it's no surprise. The lighting effects and the textures are more realistic than before, which makes the film feel more real despite it being animated. I especially noticed that we'll more often see character's faces shining with sweat or at least have the light glisten off their faces and foreheads, which also adds that extra bit of realism to the animation. While this is all very good and all, I hope Pixar won't keep focusing on making the animation look more and more realistic as time goes on as then we'll be wondering why even make it animated to begin with.

Thankfully, that's where the stuff in Riley's head comes in to take advantage of the "animated" part. While the world outside Riley's head looks more realistic with a muted colour scheme to match said realism, the world inside Riley's head is basically a cartoon world with a much broader colour palette to make it more visually interesting to look at. It's those scenes where the film takes advantage of the fact it's animated and where much of the creativity is on display with the visuals. We have the familiar locations of the headquarters, the memory banks and even Imagination Land from before, but we also get new locations to explore that also play on several parts of the mind, like the stream of consciousness literally being a stream full of objects relating to whatever Riley's thinking about, hiding a secret being depicted as a security vault where deep dark secrets are locked away or the brainstorm our heroes encounter LITERALLY being a giant storm full of lightbulbs (aka ideas) spiralling towards them. I thought those were all pretty clever visual gags and fit in with the world of Inside Out. I also though the pillow fortress was fun to explore, especially in how it looks like an artist's studio with several of the little figures in Riley's head sitting at desks to draw up scenarios for Anxiety to observe. Does any other than me think that place was pretty much a visual metaphor for Pixar's animation studio itself? I'm pretty sure that was intended. XD

The character designs are as great as they were last time. We have the humans that have the usual semi-realistic Pixar design with more cartoonish faces to stop them looking too realistic, and we have the world in Riley's head where the emotions and other little people in there have more cartoon-y designs. Some people hated how the female emotions looked perfectly humanoid while the male emotions looked more cartoonish, so they'll no doubt be happy that this criticism was addressed here. Anxiety, Envy and Ennui look more cartoonish while Embarrassment is the least cartoonish looking of the bunch. Anxiety especially looks like she came straight out of a Muppets movie or show with her exaggerated proportions and wide, wiggly mouth. And just like before, the emotions are all given a distinct colour palette that fits them with Anxiety being orange, Envy being aquamarine, Ennui being indigo and Embarrassment being pink. I still like how the emotions are rendered with their trademark particle-like textures, and this movie still makes them look great and distinct with these textures. It really emphasizes their fantastical nature and how they're little figures inside the mind. And as you'd expect from a movie about emotions, the character animation is VERY expressive with a wide-range of emotions displayed from everybody. The expressions on Joy's voice during her angry outburst were especially pitch-perfect, starting off with a blunt stare that looks as if she's about to say "What did you just say?" and then becoming more crazed and over-the-top as she suddenly explodes with annoyance.

And as the film has a little more emphasis on the action this time round, the animation gets to play around with it a lot, whether it's the emotions journeying through Riley's mind or Riley in the middle of a hockey game. The animators made those scenes look so cool and fun to watch, as well as intense as it really does feel like anything the emotions run into could potentially kill them or when Riley's in a game, you feel the impact if she'd crash into some one or you'd feel her frustration and determination to do good. And while we're speaking of the action and how the tensity is raised from last time, I must mention that once again, we have an animated property that realistically depicts a panic attack. Seriously, why has this suddenly become a trend since Finding Dory first did it and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish got acclaim for it? XD But yeah, there's a scene where Riley has to take time out for a foul during a game and she begins to have a panic attack. I love how the movie depicts it inside the mind as anxiety racing around the console like she's The Flash, trying to do everything at once and she becomes this speedy whirlwind that seemingly can't be stopped. I was sitting there thinking "Yep, that's totally what a panic attack would look like in the Inside Out world". It was intense to watch and brilliantly executed from beginning to end and I loved how we got to see at least one Inside Out movie depict something like that.

While the writing isn't as strong as the first movie, it's unquestionable that the animation certainly is. It got a neat upgrade and is yet another visually gorgeous movie to watch from Pixar. As they continue to make more movies, their animation will only continue to get more amazing to look at...

Overall

Inside Out 2 isn't quite as good as the first movie, but it's still among the best Pixar sequels out there. The story is recycled, but still strong with its emotional core, the characters are complex and relatable, there's a lot of poignant dialogue that's insanely relevant and meaningful in this day and age and the animation is typical Pixar quality animation that you'd expect from them. If the story wasn't so copy paste, this could've been another Pixar classic on par with the first movie. As is, it's a solid sequel to a fantastic movie and I'd say this left me feeling emotionally satisfied by the end. If you're an Inside Out fan, I highly recommend giving this a watch. You're in for an emotional rollercoaster ride that'll give you all kinds of feels by the end...

And that's it for this review. I hope you enjoyed it and I invite you all to share your thoughts down below. Did you enjoy the sequel? Which movie do you think is better of the two? Do tell me.

Next week, I'll be reviewing The Bad Batch. See you then media fans!