Overview
After receiving an unexpected call from her wayfinding ancestors, Moana journeys alongside Maui and a new crew to the far seas of Oceania and into dangerous, long-lost waters for an adventure unlike anything she's ever faced.
Initially planned as a TV series sequel to Moana, before Iger asked for it to be restructured as a film to fill a gap in the release schedule, which resulted in negotiations to get the original voice cast back on board, and edit the footage already prepared into a big screen format, Moana 2 has landed with a splash at the box office this week. Following her last adventure, Moana now spends her days seeking other islands to find other tribes for her people to trade and communicate with, but is constantly dismayed to find nobody else. When a vision reveals to her that all the ocean dwelling civilizations were separated after a vengeful god Nalo sunk a legendary island named Motefetu which connected all the tribes, she assembles a crew and sets off to find this Island, restore it, and unite the people once more. Maui is also seeking the Island, and inevitably the pair are reunited in their search.
Knowing that this was salvaged from plans for a TV series, there was the worry that it wouldn’t feel cinematic, and would feel sub-standard when compared to the first film. However, the end result was pretty good, albeit not on par with the original film, and holds up well as a film. There are a couple of moments where the episodic nature of its origins feel present – you can genuinely sense the “end of episode” revelation or cliffhanger before a cut to a totally different scene would have been the start of the next episode – but as a whole it is perhaps telling of how TV shows are less episodic these days and more series story arc driven that it works fine.
Musical numbers are frequent, and generally fun, but not quite fizzing with that hummability of those of the first film. This is likely due to the absence of Lin Manuel Miranda in the songwriting role this time around. Whilst the songwriters here try to emulate his style, they lack the ability and skill he utilises. A couple of standout songs make an impact, but Maui’s new signature song, “Can I Get A Chee Hoo?” will only find love from the youngest of audience members (it’s a far cry from “You’re Welcome!”)
The animation is beautiful, and the characters we grew to love in the first film are easy to fall for again, in this decently fun animated sequel that will appeal to family audiences perfectly. A mid credit scene teases what to anticipate in season 2….I mean the third film, to round off a good but not great expansion of the Moana story.