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This image released by Universal Pictures shows Cynthia Erivo, left, and Jonathan Bailey in a scene from “Wicked: For Good.” | Universal Pictures via Associated Press <\/p>\nAs far as I can tell, families looking to spend a night at the movies together have two options. Both feature talking animals and lessons on the importance of acceptance for all creatures. And both are sequels. Well, kind of. One is a sequel, and one is a part 2, I guess. Neither choice is as good as the original movie of which it is a follow up. But of the two options, \u201cZootopia 2\u201d holds far more enjoyment than \u201cWicked: For Good,\u201d or as I like to call it \u201cWicked: For Bad.\u201d I am confident I am the first person to come up with that joke. Please do not inform me otherwise.<\/p>\n
I really wanted to like \u201cWicked: For Good\u201d because I really liked \u201cWicked\u201d despite my annoyance that it ended on a cliff-hanger and was unable to tell a whole story in a THREE HOUR MOVIE. I was willing to overlook those irritations going into Part 2 because of how much I enjoyed the first movie, its performances, its visuals, and its soundtrack. But, having seen the stage production thrice, I had my doubts that part two could match the magic of Part 1. <\/p>\n
This image released by Universal Pictures shows Cynthia Erivo, left, and Jonathan Bailey in a scene from “Wicked: For Good.” | Universal Pictures via Associated Press <\/p>\n
The second half of \u201cWicked\u201d on stage does not have the musical caliber of the first \u2014 there\u2019s nary a bop nor a banger in the song catalog. Its story makes almost no sense. And its attempts to add context to \u201cThe Wizard of Oz\u201d leave viewers with more questions than answers. For example: [SPOILERS AHEAD]<\/p>\n
Why does the wizard reveal to the tin man that he always had a heart when we know for a fact that Elphaba turned Boq into the tin man so he wouldn\u2019t need a heart?How does the wizard being Elphaba\u2019s real father explain her magic powers when we know that the wizard himself isn\u2019t actually magical?Why can animals no longer speak but the cowardly lion can sing?<\/p>\n
These are questions viewers are forced to ask because sitting through the second act of the play is so boring that the mind has to wander. But I hoped I would be so swept up in the magic and musicality of the second movie that I wouldn\u2019t need to worry about such silly matters as gaping plot holes. Surely, I thought, the movie makers would do some major revisions to the back half of the musical to make it go down a little easier. But I am sorry to report no such revisions were done and I choked on the entirety of \u201cWicked: For Good\u201d even more than the stage production second act because instead of cutting the fat, the creatives decided to add more bad CGI animals. Which did nothing to hone in on the movie\u2019s message. They made what should have been an hourlong movie, nearly 2\u00bd and I could not wait for it to end. And when it did, I wasn\u2019t sure what the movie was trying to say.<\/p>\n
So I went into \u201cZootopia 2\u201d with low expectations, believing, with recency bias, that no good sequel can exist. But I was wrong. Because \u201cZootopia 2\u201d is good. Not as good as \u201cZootopia,\u201d obviously, because \u201cZootopia\u201d is a masterpiece. It\u2019s one of those movies made for kids that I beg my children to watch with me because I always want to watch it but it\u2019s weird for a grown woman to sit and watch alone. I find it genuinely captivating and hilarious and the best kind of imaginative \u2014 the imaginative that built a world that was a joy to inhabit for the movie\u2019s run time.<\/p>\n
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This image released by Disney shows Dr. Fuzzby, voiced by Quinta Brunson, in a scene from “Zootopia 2.” | Disney via Associated Press <\/p>\n
\u201cZootopia 2\u201d exists in that same world. In fact it picks up exactly where the first movie left off, with Nick Wilde the fox and Judy Hopps the bunny becoming partners in the Zootopia police department. <\/p>\n
The movie reunites most of the major characters from the first film and introduces some new ones. Including reptiles. Indeed, the plot of the second movie is an exploration of the history of Zootopia and the absence of snakes, lizards, and other cold-blooded creatures from the animal-inhabited metropolis. This story is at times interesting and at other times a bit shaggy and a little slow. It\u2019s also centered around a snake who is just not very interesting. It was, however, a clear message on the dangers of othering groups of people (or animals) and one I was glad we were learning as a family.<\/p>\n
The movie really shines when there are many animal characters in the frame. There\u2019s a portion where Judy and Nick visit a marsh neighborhood for the first time and we get to see a dolphin bartender, some sea lion buskers who do not appreciate being erroneously referred to as seals, and walrus gondaleers whose torsos are also the gondolas. <\/p>\n
The movie is punctuated by these short, detail-filled scenes that bring life to the idea that animals could live together in a society with jobs and clothes and modes of transportation. I just wish there were a little more of them. But as it is, I appreciate its snappy 1 hour, 18-minute run time \u2014 the exact length of time a family film should be. And, despite some shagginess, the plot had zero detectable holes.<\/p>\n
The same, sadly, cannot be said for the other Part 2 movie currently in theaters. But I\u2019m glad to have at least one good sequel out there for families looking for a chance to spend a couple of hours watching talking animals learn important lessons about belonging.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As far as I can tell, families looking to spend a night at the movies together have two…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":333824,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[88,206,5817,3125],"class_list":{"0":"post-333823","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-movies","10":"tag-news-division","11":"tag-news-feed-local"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=333823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/333824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=333823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=333823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=333823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}