Thoughts on Incredibles 2 (2018)

I'm just going to say, right off the bat, that The Incredibles is one of my favorite movies, and it's certainly my favorite Pixar movie. I'm probably not alone in this considering how hyped Incredibles 2 was and how much people wanted to see it (I tried to see Incredibles 2 on Sunday and it was sold out for the next two showings), so I had my expectations quite high, especially as the same director returned. I wasn't expecting it to surpass the quality of the original as that only happens once in a blue moon, and it did not in my opinion, but I still enjoyed it quite a bit.

The presentation, for starters, is pretty great as usual for a Pixar movie. It looks at least as good as Pixar's ever been and the soundtrack, which is by the same guy who did the soundtrack for the first movie, is also very good. It also helped that all of the action scenes were pretty great, which definitely made it entertaining to watch. And I personally liked the sequences with baby Jack-Jack; some may find it annoying but I thought it was fine.

It also helped that the original voice cast returned, with the exception of Dash's voice actor, but his replacement is basically spot-on and I would probably have trouble distinguishing them. Granted, everyone sounded a bit older at times except for Samuel L. Jackson, but it wasn't that noticeable and it didn't take away from my viewing experience.

And speaking of the characters, it's mostly pretty good. The returning characters, while not as interesting as they were before, were still pretty interesting and I liked how they played off of each other (Frozone was the exception, as in, he was at least as interesting as he was before if not more so). I liked the new supers for the most part (some of them I didn't really care about) and Winston was kind of interesting.

But my main problem lies with the villain. The villian, Screenslaver, is not as well executed or interesting as Syndrome was from the first movie. Syndrome's motivations were clear and he was an interesting and entertaining character to watch. Screenslaver, not so much. I mean, I get the motivations, but once you look at it, it kind of falls apart. I don't want to get into spoiler territory so I can't really say much more, but let me just say that you'll be wondering why it wasn't done a different way.

A little personal thing here: if I saw this movie as a young child, I would probably have hated it because I was terrified of the concept of hypnosis, which plays a rather big part in the movie. It's not that bad to me now because I am an adult and I know it's not real or anything, but it might scare some younger viewers.

But overall, I thought Incredibles 2 was good, though not quite as good as the first. It makes for a fun movie that makes you think a bit without pandering too much to kids, and I'm glad I saw it. I might get this when the DVD comes out and I'd certainly watch it again, and I'm giving this a six or seven out of ten.