‘Moana 2’ Review – Like A Turd Out Of Water In The Wind

Chris Sawin   |  

Dec 11, 2024

SHARE

• Share on Gab Gab
• Share on Facebook Facebook
• Share on Twitter Twitter
• Share on Flipboard Flipboard
• Share on Reddit Reddit
• Share on News Break News Break
• Share via Email Email

Three years after the first film, Moana has been embraced as a wayfinder and now searches for other villages on islands located near Motonui. Motofefu, a legendary island that connected all the islands in the ocean, was sunk to the bottom of the ocean by the storm god Nalo since he desired power over the mortals. Now Moana must find a way to raise Motofefu or Motonui faces possible extinction.

In December 2020, Moana 2 was pitched as Moana: The Series with the intention of debuting on Disney+ in 2023. In February 2024, it was reworked into the sequel that was released in theaters. The issue with the film is that it feels like a generic idea stretched out over 100 minutes.

David Derrick Jr, the storyboard artist of Moana, was originally announced as the writer and director of Moana 2 in January 2022. By May of 2024, Jason Hand (head of story on Encanto) and Dana Ledoux Miller (executive story editor on the first ten episodes of Narcos) were added as co-directors. Miller eventually replaced Derrick Jr as co-writer along with Jared Bush (director of Encanto, co-director of Zootopia) and Bek Smith (Maleficent: Mistress of Evil).

This is all worth noting because Moana 2 doesn’t feel like a fully conceptualized story or film regardless of how many people are involved. A basic premise could have had the film over in mere moments if everyone didn’t have to stop and sing about their grievances every five minutes.

Lin-Manuel Miranda, the songwriter of Moana, doesn’t return here. Instead, you get newcomers Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear and it’s a serious downgrade. The songs aren’t catchy or memorable or good. These are musical numbers that fill up space and slow down the story’s momentum. The songs in Moana 2 are like stop signs with a musical beat.

The animation looks off and has awkward movement, especially in comparison to Moana. Walt Disney Animation Studios is still credited with doing the film’s animation, but the Burbank studio handled pre-production and storyboards while the Vancouver studio did the animation. Moana 2 is the first feature film to be handled by the Vancouver studio.

Faces and facial expressions are what took a hit in Moana 2. Maui somehow has more wrinkles on his face than Dwayne Johnson despite him being this ageless demigod. But everyone’s mouths have peculiar movements, especially Moana. Think of an actress that kind of talks out of the side of their mouth from time to time like Holly Hunter or Drew Barrymore. The animation looks like it tried to incorporate motion capture when it came to expressive animation and takes you out of whatever magical wonder animation typically provides.

The best part of Moana 2 is Matangi, who is essentially a vampire without fangs or bloodthirst and an army of bats that have the best facial expressions in the entire film. Matangi, voiced by Awhimai Fraser, is the most creative aspect of the film and has the best song (“Get Lost”).

Meanwhile, Moana’s little sister Simea is annoying as hell. She’s super clingy and never wants Moana to leave. She’s supposed to be this cute reminder of what Moana has waiting for her back home. Still, all you can think about when Moana heads out searching for Motofefu is that hopefully she’ll be gone long enough for Simea to grow into her wildly noticeable buck teeth (spoiler: Moana isn’t and Simea doesn’t).

Moana 2 somehow feels like a three-hour film crammed into an hour and 40 minutes. The animation is disappointing, the story is stretched well beyond its means, and the music is pure trash. Even Nalo, the big bad of the film, isn’t seen on camera until the mid-credits sequence after the closing credits.

Moana 2 almost feels like it’s unfinished and rushed and quickly dumped into theaters purely to capitalize on the Thanksgiving holiday. This formula paid off since Moana 2 had the best opening weekend of any Walt Disney Studios Animation film and broke the box office record for a Thanksgiving weekend release.