Moana’s life is relatively easy within the Disney fictional universe. She isn’t subjected to an unwanted marriage like the other princesses nor is she imprisoned up in a castle. Instead, she has trained her entire life to take up the chief position of leadership on the island of Motunui. She appears to be loved by everyone on the island just as her parents love her. So when she finds herself in a tough situation where she needs to lead her people yet can’t ignore her dream of becoming a Wayfinder and reviving the tradition of ocean voyaging, she ends up being able to do both! The lava monster Te Kā who appears as the antagonist of the film released in 2016, isn’t so bad herself. She is merely a hurt goddess who should be healed instead of fought against. Moana didn’t have much of a struggle, however there is one part of the film where Moana has to give the island of Te Fiti, back to her heart. The ending of the film was sweet enough that no one cared about Moana’s strife, and the music of the songs which were in part composed by Lin-Manuel Miranda & Opetaia Foa’i & Mark Mancina, was at the very least decent and on occasion terrific.
Moana 2, however, has a song score provided by the Unofficial Bridgerton Musical team of Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear. The score can be described as devoid of bangers or any catchy tunes, and not one single song is even remotely catchy enough to distract from the fundamental flaw in the movie, which is its absolute lack of tension, reasonable dramatic content, and antagonists, who were more developed than a cardboard cutout.
I’m sorry, but what does a girl have to do to get some more classic conflict within this environment? This is somewhat of a new Disney Animation problem. After a long history of villains that were, more often than not, more flamboyant, more interesting, and practically more queer than the heroes, the entertainment giant has in recent years banked away from having clear-cut villains at all, instead having their characters heroes face down systemic issues, their failure issues, or even only need to battle foes who are practically seen through the lens of the unfair perspective. Their approach to this is alright in all honesty. However, in the case of Moana 2, which was directed by David Derrick Jr., Jason Hand, and Dana Ledoux Miller, the outcome can be described as boring. So whenever Moana, once again voiced by Auliʻi Cravalho, comes across a blockage, a person who stands in her way turns out to be an ally, or an inspirational song pacifies them, or both. There are other directors, there are other movies. In this particular presentation, the film is a sequence of breaks or stops. What this means is, that this pattern, continues until we reach the ending, at the ending only there’s a real villain, a storm god by the name of Nalo, who has quite literally, for reasons of his own, hidden the k Cyclone, worshiped by the various pacific islands.
While it would be nice to hear them, until the mid-credits scene, Nalo is just a mass of dark clouds and purple lightning.
Moana 2 was initially pitched as a series for Disney Plus, but the project then evolved into a movie because the executives thought it was senseless to exchange huge box office collections for the imagined future growth of streaming. But embedded in its composition are traces of its origins, which partially explains why it appears rather clumsy. If Matangi, voiced by Awhimai Fraser, went from locking demi-god Maui, voiced by Dwayne Johnson, in an episode to assisting Moana, that quite literally wouldn’t bat an eyelash. However, that isn’t the case; this all takes place over a song, and not only is the order jarring, but it also renders that entire character’s situation unnecessarily intricate. Many aspects are confusing, and perhaps if they were transitions that took longer to build up, they would not be. So, for example, what is not ever really elucidated is why it became very important for Moana to re-establish inter-communal connections to other people out there, even after a song showed that the island of Motunui was healthy and expanding, lest it end up indeed being destroyed.
But away she goes, accompanied by Heihei the rooster and Pua the pig, and a new human entourage that includes a shipbuilder Loto (Rose Matafeo), a farmer Kele (David Fane), and a Maui enthusiast Moni (Hualālai Chung).
Moana 2 has quite stunning visuals, to say the least, as it features the beautifully rendered anthropomorphized oceanic waters that Moana saw in Moana 1. However, this feels less like a sequel to the original and more like a clip compilation of a film that goes straight to the shelves, a practice thought to be outdated by most theorists. Cravalho may be back, and the Rock may be back, and while the David Bowie–esque coconut crab isn’t back, there is a giant non-singing clam with lots of eyes and tentacles which the characters are required to make their way past. But, the ocean or the sea did not contain its original power and presence in the flow, it was there mechanically, repeating itself along with other nowhere scene transitions, lyrics, and beats, with weak yet catchy hooks, which were cringe. It’s all good, it does not, one may say, matter and Moana part two is setting itself up to be a conglomerate success, for two reasons: people love going to the movies with children, and fathers want to be brought along. Suffering comes from overcoming challenges and growing, but in the world of Moana 2, there are no such facets to deal with.
It’s an expansion of IP that has proven to be successful and established, why am I not surprised given the business in AV has always been about finding ways to milk the original success, even if they may struggle with creating new original content?
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