Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke
I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative. However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, though better options may be on the horizon. (Note: Anything in bold blue [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)
My reviews’ premise: “You can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”
(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the song’s name)
Inside Out 2 (Kelsey Mann) rated PG 97 min.
Here’s the trailer:
(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size;
activate the same button or use “esc” keyboard key to return to normal.)
If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:
⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.
What Happens: Building on the strong success of Disney/Pixar’s Inside Out (Pete Doctor, 2015; review in our July 2, 2015 posting)—$858.8 million gross globally, Rotten Tomatoes with 98% positive reviews (of 383), Metacritic gave it an astounding 94% average score (Two Guys offered 4 stars)—the Disney empire turns to Pixar once again for this well-received sequel of the ongoing life of Riley Andersen (voice of Kensington Tallman), who, in the earlier movie, moved with her parents—Dad (Kyle MacLachlan) and Mom (Diane Lane)—from Minnesota to San Francisco when she was 11 as we got to observe the inner turmoil in her life back then as shown to us by the principal emotions in her mind, Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Anger (Lewis Black), Fear (Tony Hale), and Disgust (Liza Lapira)—these are the voice talents in the sequel, but there were a few differences in the earlier episode; they’re still there as they’ve now created a Sense of Self for Riley which has only happiness because Joy’s set up a mechanism that shoots negative memories to the back of Riley’s mind, so she’ll be able to easily overcome problems as we see in the opening scene where she’s now 13 (grown taller, has braces), a solid player on her school Foghorns ice hockey team with friends Bree (Sumayyah Nuriddin-Green) and Grace (Grace Lu), so even when she’s sent to the penalty box for tripping an opponent she keeps her cool, returns to the rink to win their game.
Afterwards, Coach Roberts (Yvette Nicole Brown), head of a strong high-school team, invites all 3 of these girls to a summer camp to see if they’d be good material for her Firehawks, but when they get to camp Riley learns her close friends will be going to another school which saddens her greatly, in league with the Puberty Alarm which goes off in her subconscious to disrupt her inner emotions who soon are disturbed by the appearance of 4 new ones: Anxiety (Maya Hawke), Envy (Ayo Edebiri), Embarrassment (Paul Walter Hauser) and Ennui (Adèle Exarchopoulos)—the latter a form of boredom connected to depression. As they arrived, clumsy workers came in to adjust the console the emotions use to generate Riley’s reactions to events, leaving any input they offer to overreact in Riley’s public actions, especially as she becomes a typical teenager often feuding with her parents.
Joy and Anxiety clash on how Riley should proceed at camp, Joy focused on the girl having fun, Anxiety wanting her to make new friends, become popular with the older girls, especially Val Ortiz (Lilimar), star of the Firehawks team. Anxiety then gets aggressive, imposes control, sending the Sense of Self to the back of Riley’s mind, imprisoning Joy and the other original emotions in a Memory Vault. The new emotions then create a new Sense of Self while the older emotions escape with Sadness finding a strategy to return to the mind’s Headquarters while the others go, via the waters of the Stream of Consciousness (cute!), to the far location of Riley’s mind to retrieve their first Sense of Self (as they escape the Vault they encounter a big Deep Dark Secret [Steve Purcell], but he’s not ready to come forward). As Riley tries to take control of her conflicting emotions, Anxiety causes her to sneak into the coach’s office where she reads in a notebook the coach doesn’t think Riley’s yet ready for the Firehawks; meanwhile, the old emotions find their Sense of Self on a huge pile of Riley’s negative memories so they start an avalanche which carries them back to HQ. Anxiety realizes the new Sense of Self creates self-doubt in Riley, causing her to do poorly in her final tryout for the team, accidently hurt Grace (who’s on the other team), resulting in another stint in the penalty box, but this time she’s overwhelmed with negativity (“I’m not good enough!”), so Anxiety creates a whirlwind around the console causing a panic attack in Riley. ⇒Back in HQ, Joy convinces Anxiety Riley doesn’t need to change who she is to have a better future, so with the help of Sadness and Embarrassment the other Sense of Selves are removed, followed by a new one being created with both positive and negative memories so Riley's able to calm down, reconciles with Bree and Grace; Joy takes control of the console again as Riley finishes her tryout, goes on to high-school to add Val to her close friends as all of the emotions now work together for her benefit as she seems to get good news about being on the Firehawks team. A post-credits scene shows Deep Dark Secret and Joy; he’s upset about setting fire to a rug, she thinks the real secret is Riley once peeing in a pool.⇐
So What? First, a clarification for any parents who might be reading this blog (if so, thanks, as I have very little idea of the demographic-characteristics of my mostly-anonymous readership); yes, Riley is now entering puberty but there’s no mention here of monthly periods or raging hormones so if you’re planning on showing this movie to your young children there won’t be any need for embarrassing discussions about teenage bodily functions (not yet at least; we’ll just have to see where likely-sequels to … 2 might take us in coming years). Now, back to what we do experience in this movie. I think it’s great this teenage girl is usually championed by Joy, which sends a great message to viewers (young and older) that despite all of the other negative emotions that prowl around in our heads we can ultimately find our way back to celebrating the best we’ve previously known, the good we’ll encounter today, our hopes for the future. It’s also useful to see what a mess uncontrolled Anxiety causes, always trying to find a better response to what’s around us, never feeling secure in what we’re currently involved in, making unwise decisions often leading into trouble.
As far as the production itself, it’s blissfully colorful much of the time, although appropriately more somber as we get into the nether regions of Riley’s brain where secrets are hidden away in the Vault, negative experiences intended to be inaccessible provide a means for the wandering emotions to get back to home base then become incorporated into an improved, more durable Sense of Self, so what we learn about Riley’s ongoing-complexity is made usefully-visible for better understanding of what’s on the screen and how it could help us better understand ourselves in the process. What doesn’t work as well for me is a bit of a disconnect between what’s happening with the conflicting emotions and how that manifests itself in Riley’s actual behavior. Sure, we see some of that, but if this story’s ultimately about cause and effect, I’d prefer to watch Riley in her world a bit more than we have opportunities to do. But, then, what do I really know—about teenagers or most anything else?
So, let’s see what a few of my more-erudite colleagues think, including a mildly positive perspective (but still matching mine) from James Berardinelli of ReelViews: “Inside Out 2 is about the best one could hope from for a sequel to a movie whose main selling point was its unconventional perspective. The original Inside Out worked brilliantly because of its freshness but that quality is diminished in the follow-up. When it was released, Inside Out seemed like a one-and-done deal and, arguably, that should have been the case. But with Disney desperately strip-mining familiar titles in its own (and Pixar’s) catalogue, Inside Out had the dual benefit of recognizability and profitability. […] Although Inside Out 2 is good enough to warrant a trip to the theater, especially for parents desperate for family-friendly entertainment, this isn’t one of 2024’s big-screen-must-sees. It will work as well on a smaller screen. It’s solid, middle-of-the-road Pixar, not quite as good as some of their better sequels but superior to the Cars follow-ups.” (I couldn’t agree more with that last statement.)
Or, to be more concise we can now turn to Katie Walsh from the Los Angeles Times: “The film’s representation of how emotions and memories create a belief system and sense of self are indeed useful for talking to kids about how their inner lives and brains work, and the imagery is smart, but it has the feeling of an educational children’s book. The movie‘s internal logic tests our own belief systems and fails to impart anything profoundly insightful to an adult audience.” Still, there are some who responded in a considerably-less-supportive manner than I and many others have, such as Barry Hertz of Canada’s The Globe and Mail: “Perhaps now more than ever, the Pixar folks seem to be stuck inside their corporate heads instead of listening to their beating hearts. […] it was decided that being merely good was good enough, a life lesson that Riley herself would balk at. This is not the innovative, cutting-edge filmmaking that Pixar built its name on. What was once the product of pure imagination feels reduced to brand obligation. [¶] Before work on Inside Out 3 inevitably begins – perhaps Poehler will ask for too much money and will be replaced by, I dunno, Sydney Sweeney – someone high up inside the company needs to give their heads a shake. There’s no need to second these emotions.” Certainly you’ll find more positive than negative responses to this movie, I do think you’d find it enjoyable, but please don’t expect a reprise of the fine impact of the original Inside Out.
Bottom Line Final Comments: Inside Out 2 has already greatly surpassed the financial success of its predecessor with a global haul so far of $1.667 billion, $651.3 of that from domestic (U.S.-Canada) theaters, coming out on June 14, 2024 in 4,440 North American venues (still in 2,660 of them so you could probably find it on a big screen in your area; it’s in a couple of places quite close to me, but the newest variant of COVID-19 is even more present in the San Francisco Bay Area, so I’ve gone with streaming where you can rent it for $24.99 on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+, or a few others I don't dabble in [oddly enough, it’s not on the Disney+ platform yet, but probably that’s because once you pay the monthly fee to Disney they usually don’t charge you extra for their movies so I’m sure Disney gets a cut of whatever Amazon, Apple, etc. rake in, thereby further increasing their own profit margin, although I assume it will someday find a home on Disney+]). The CCAC’s not quite as enthused about this one as they were for the first one; however, the Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews have only slipped to 91%, while Metacritic dropped considerably from before as those frequent MC tightwads offer (for them, a usually-lower) 73% average score, so if you’re willing to pay a bit, either at home or away (or maybe you can find a cheap weekday afternoon matinee somewhere) I think you’ll find this to be entertaining and, standard for Pixar, a bit heartwarming when you make your way to the end, although I was touched more by the original back in 2015 (maybe I’m drifting a bit into the grumpy Metacritic direction as I get older and am assaulted by this season’s fierce political news and constant appeals for my cash).
Anyway, much as I appreciated the animation and ultimate positive message for Riley (and the rest of us) I do think this sequel is a bit heavy on setting up crisis scenarios for the various emotions to flail around in until the next one comes along (even as I admit this kind of structure is likely necessary to keep the attention of the youngest members of the hoped-for audience) with Riley always shown in the grip of her feuding innerworks rather than being able to take better control of them at least some of the time. (OK, I know; she’s just entering puberty so she probably has little control of her emotions most of the time, but we might have enjoyed some appearance of her hormones as well—oh, wait, that’s probably the storyline for the next Inside Out sequel: emotions vs. hormones [if that happens, I’ll provide Pixar—not far away from me, with their HQ in Emeryville, CA—with an address to send my royalties checks].) All in all, though, I did find … 2 to be enjoyable, as I always have with this choice of a Musical Metaphor to wrap up my review, The Beatles’ “Fixing a Hole” (on the monumental 1967 Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album) at https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=UPBd8eHQqIw where the song may truly be about home repairs (although Paul McCartney says it’s about the mind-altering pleasures of pot, helping put aside the annoyance of fans camping out at his home wanting interaction with him), but it certainly seems to me about bringing peace to storms in the brain, allowing for better outlooks on life: “And it really doesn’t matter if I’m wrong, I’m right / Where I belong, I’m right, where I belong / See the people standing there who disagree and never win / And wonder why they don’t get in my door.” Riley, with the help of her-now-cooperating emotions, is fixing holes in her own consciousness, “taking the time for a number of things that weren’t important yesterday," a necessary task for all of us, no matter the age we may be.
SHORT TAKES
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