Wreck It Ralph was a surprisingly good movie. It was a classic Hero’s Journey and there was no need for a sequel. So naturally, Wreck It Ralph 2 is not that great. But it was still fun.
The premise was a little thin to start with. An old guy runs a video game arcade where the game Wreck It Ralph, a kinder, gentler version of Rampage, has been sitting for thirty years. Ralph is a bad guy who learns that being bad doesn’t define who he is. We flash forward about six years and discover that the arcade still has the same general collection of classic games. Vanellope’s game Candy Crush is broken when Ralph attempts to make the game more interesting. The owner refuses to buy a replacement part because the game doesn’t even make $200 in a year. Let’s pause for a moment here. Are they saying the arcade owner actually cares about money? That can’t be right. He also hooks up a WiFi hotspot, so the kids in the arcade can play games on their phones instead of the games in the arcade? Uh, OK.
We meet all of the old gang from Wreck It Ralph, but they all just have cameos. The real action in the movie takes place is a Disneyfied version of the internet. It’s a cityscape where the tallest buildings are the most successful websites, such as Google, Amazon, and made for the film sites Slaughter Race and Buzztube, where Vanellope and Ralph discover internet success. They are on a quest to earn enough money to buy the part needed to repair Candy Crush that they bid up on eBay.
Among the fun bits are the many cameos sprinkled throughout Ralph Breaks The Internet. Tim Allen as Buzz Lightyear, Anthony Daniels as C-3PO, Vin Diesel as Groott, and a Stan Lee appearance that made everyone in the audience give a bittersweet sigh. It was also fun to see all the Princesses chilling out and enjoying more casual clothing.
Whereas Wreck It Ralph was filled with the consequences of personal choice and personal greed, Ralph Breaks The Internet falls back on the more recent movie fad of having a giant CGI monster stand in for real emotion and drama. It tries to tug on the heart strings a few times, but never reaches the depth of feelings achieved in the original. The constant product placement was kind of funny at first, but I think we all get enough ads in the real internet without being assaulted by them in a movie about the internet.
Ralph Breaks The Internet was fun, but the first one was better.
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