Incredibles 2: Honey, Where Is My Sequel?

The year was 2004.  I was in first grade and I remember my Dad taking me to see the masterpiece that was The Incredibles.  It was amazing.  It had heart, humor, and it was just a great film.  There was one little thing though.  At the end, the Parr family is leaving their son's track meet.  As this happens, a new villain named the Underminer rises from the street.  The last shot of the film is of Bob opening his shirt to reveal his super-suit.  Then credits.  That was 14 years ago.  Since then we've had three Cars movies, three Fifty Shades abominations, and way too many Fast and the Furious movies.  In my life, I had gone through elementary school, middle school. high school, and I was going to be a junior in college.  Finally, on June 13, 2018, I got to see the movie.  Holy crap, it was worth the wait.

Incredibles 2 is directed by Brad Bird and stars  Craig T. Nelson, Holly Hunter, Sarah Vowell, Huck Milner, Bob Odenkirk, Catherine Keener, and Samuel L. Jackson.  After Helen Parr/Elastigirl (Hunter) accepts a job that might make superheros legal again, Bob Parr/Mr.Incredible (Nelson) must stay at home to take care of the kids.  With that out of the way, I want to say something.

Before I start saying how much I loved this film, I have to say something.  I hate reading reviews that say the movie wasn't as good as the original.  I saw this in a review headline for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (which I'm seeing next week!).  That isn't a criticism.  Obiviously most sequels aren't as good as the originals.  Should that be used as a criticism to say why the movie is bad? No.  I got to see the Incredibles IMAX double feature, so I got to see the first one before watching the sequel.  Incredibles 2 isn't better than the original.  In other news, water is wet.  That being said the movie is still fantastic.  With all of that out of the way, let's dive into the review!

I loved this movie, plain and simple.   The cast does a great job.  Before the movie started there was a short featurette that had the cast and director acknowledging that it's been a while since the first one.  They looked like they had so much fun.  It shows in the movie.  Everyone is fantastic.  The story was great too.  It essentially puts Elastigirl in Mr. Incredible's role from the last film.  This leads to some hysterical moments like Bob struggling to help his son Dash (Hilner) with his math homework, trying to figure out how to help Violet (Vowell) with boy troubles, and discovering that the baby Jack-Jack (Eli Fucile) has a multitude of powers.  Speaking of Jack-Jack, he steals the show.  He has to be the cutest movie character ever put to screen.  His powers are very cool visually.  There's a scene he has with a raccoon that had the audience howelling with laughter.  What really is beautiful about this movie is that, yes, it has superheros in it, but it's really about family.  I connected with it so many times because it reminded me of things when I was little.  I think it will do this for a lot of families too.  Every parent, I think, can relate to trying to help their child with math only to find out they are learning it in a completely new way.  Like I mentioned before, the humor is great.  It all works.  There's stuff for kids and adults.  What I really appreciated was the fact that it didn't try to take something from the previous film and try to do it again.  This is a problem all sequels have (I'm looking at you Deadpool 2).  The story comes first here.  It feels like the most logical progression of the story that was told in the first film.  The animation is fantastic in this movie.  It's slightly more cartoonish than the first film, but it works.  Everything is incredibly detailed:  the furniture, water, hair, and fabric.  It's insane how much attention was paid to detail.   Like the first movie, the score is fantastic.  Michael Giacchino (who has composed the scores for movies like The Incredibles, Up, Inside Out, and Monsters Inc.) knocks it out of the park again.  He reuses the original iconic music, but updates it a little bit in a way that really works.

There are some negatives however.  Sometimes the movie becomes a little bit predictable.  I won't spoil it for anyone, but I figured out the identity of the villain pretty early on.  For me this isn't really a negative, but if you're looking for a lot of action in this movie, you might be disappointed.  These are very, very tiny nitpicks.

To sum things up, Incredibles 2 is a fantastic ride.  The cast, story, music, visuals, and humor are fantastic.  In some parts it becomes predictable, though and people who want to see a lot of action will be disappointed.  It's incredible (pun intended) that this movie finally came out.  I'm so happy it did.  It's amazing and I can't wait to see it again.  It was worth the wait.  If I were to rate it, I'd give Incredibles 2 a 9.5/10.  Also, like all Pixar movies (with the exception of Coco) there is an animated short before the movie starts.  The one before this movie, Bao, really hits you in the feels.