Directors: David Derrick Jr., Jason Hand, Dana Ledoux Miller
Writers: Jared Bush, Dana Ledoux Miller
Stars: Auliʻi Cravalho, Dwayne Johnson, Hualālai Chung
Synopsis: After receiving an unexpected call from her wayfinding ancestors, Moana must journey to the far seas of Oceania and into dangerous, long-lost waters for an adventure unlike anything she’s ever faced.
In Moana, a young, confident, naïve Moana (Auli’i Cravalho) sings about how far she’ll go. Every Disney animated musical has a song that becomes synonymous with the film, and the Oscar-nominated “How Far I’ll Go” (written by Lin-Manuel Miranda) became intertwined with Moana the film. Regarding Moana, the franchise, just how far they’ll go gets a bit more confusing. Over the past year, something has consistently been changing with this franchise, whether it be the announcement of a live-action remake, a Disney+ series, or that the once Disney+ series would be cut down and made into a film, that film being Moana 2. This announcement came as a bit of a shock since it was in February that Moana 2 would be released in November; this gave everyone involved only 9 months to change their show into a feature film. However, Disney seemed to be scrambling as their slate of releases seemed fairly weak; when I say fairly weak, I’m saying that for the first time since COVID in 2020, it looked as though there wouldn’t be an animated Disney film released theatrically.
Thus comes Moana 2, which begins sometime after the end of Moana. Moana is a little older, much wiser, and now considered the leader of her island. As a Wayfinder, she travels the sea, still with her trusty pig and chicken sidekicks, searching for other people on other islands. She can’t find much but uncovers a pot that shows different people on an island under the stars. She returns this pot to her home and has a vision of her wayfinding ancestors, who tell her the story of an island called Motufetu that connected all the people in the ocean before it was sunken by the storm god Nalo who believed breaking up the people would provide him with more power. If humans were to touch this island, it would restore the channels in the sea and allow people to connect once more. Meanwhile, the demigod Maui (Dwayne Johnson) is searching for Nalo for his own reasons but gets caught by Matangi (Awhimai Fraser), Nalo’s henchman, who Nalo has trapped inside a giant clam. Moana must find Maui and make it to Motufetu before it is too late.
Moana is one of Disney’s best works in the last 20 years. The songs are beautifully written and performed, the film is gorgeously animated, and the emotional beats work so well not just as a film but telling a Polynesian islander story, one that hasn’t been explored much in cinema. Moana 2, on the other hand, misses almost every mark that the original nailed. The performances by Crevalho and Johnson, especially in the singing parts, are strong, but the rest of the cast never melded as they should have. These characters were never given enough time to flesh out and grow and instead were mainly stuck to the tropes they were started with before the film began.
While the original songs were one of the first film’s best aspects, they are instantly forgettable here. I couldn’t even begin to think about which one would be the film’s theme, but that’s also because I don’t think there was a theme to explore. Because of that, nothing in this film comes close to the staying power of ‘How Far I’ll Go’ or even ‘You’re Welcome.’ There just was a different vibe, and the loss of Lin-Manuel Miranda (no matter how much he’s been meme’d) hurts the film’s overall tone. Every song was too on the nose (I wasn’t the biggest fan of one of the film’s opening numbers ending with “I am Moana”), or it felt incredibly out of place to the point it became unnecessary.
However, the biggest issue came in the pacing. As mentioned before, this was an almost completed Disney+ series that was transformed into a film that showed throughout. Scenes felt episodic rather than thematic, with some shots included that were clearly meant to serve as title cards or cliffhangers for the series format. It took far too long to get into the action of the story, and when they finally did, everything was resolved within a few scenes. Even moments assumed to struggle were set up as almost cheap ploys to bring these characters together; again, it felt like something that would take 3 or 4 episodes to get to. The third act also needed to be more complex to feel earned. The filmmakers tried their best to bring out genuine emotion, but even some of the best scenes had turnaround resolutions that killed any momentum the film might have had. It felt like a rushed project with much material that could have been used left unseen.
The visual aspect was also a hit or miss. One of Moana’s best traits was water use and the beautiful lights the water and some sea creatures could bring out. Moana 2, at times, looked gorgeous, but something about it felt artificial on the big screen. It became obvious early on that the animation itself wasn’t made for cinema, and this was a case where it almost became harder to look past. Some gorgeous shots and sequences began to feel misplaced as the scenes never lined up. The longer the film went on, the more apparent it became which scenes were finished before the change and which ones still could be adjusted.
Still, with all that, Moana 2 somehow finds a way to be at least average. There is enough good material to make a certain audience of a certain age while watching it, but it doesn’t hold a candle to the original’s beauty or wonder. It was a rushed project with rushed results that neither Cravalho nor Johnson could save, even if they tried their best to hold this thing up. Ultimately, I was just left massively underwhelmed and disappointed, but I guess that’s what I have come to expect from a studio that used to create joy. Hopefully, they can turn this franchise around, but with yet another live-action remake on the horizon, how far they’ll go might be too far to return.
