Ralph 2.0

"Ralph Breaks the Internet" seems like the poster child for "what could've been". I like the concept, and there are a couple of good laughs, but the execution is atrocious. I was really into the opening 30 minutes or so (everything inside the arcade is fun) but as soon as they actually make it onto the Internet, it's a downward tumble.

Not gonna lie, I'm disappointed on almost every level. What was heartwarming about the original "Wreck-It Ralph" is lost here. Yeah, it may be ambitious, but it's a waste of the Ralph/Vanellope relationship, the inherent humor of the arcade culture is gone and Disney hijacked the movie for their own (horrifying) studio marketing. Seriously, the Rodent's footprint is massive in this movie.

I'll avoid spoilers here and keep it simple. The original movie is one of my favorites, it stands up to repeated viewing, was excellent in pace and composition. It flowed well, consistently, didn't try to do too much at once. The story was excellent, the voice acting was outstanding.

The sequel here - some of the best parts unfortunately were what we saw in trailers, as it often is. That's not to say there aren't other funny parts - there are. But overall it just left me, and my son, with the impression of them trying to cram far too many bits into the movie. It really stuttered along in parts.

We had a lot of eye rolling at the deluge of Disney when they first got to "the internet" and began looking around. This was the first part for us that started to detract from the story, which is, at it's core, actually an EXCELLENT story.

I wish they had focused more on what made the story flow well, what brought it out the best, rather than just try to cram as many bit part cameos as they could from other Disney franchises.

Voice acting was again well done. I think this would have been a much better movie had more things ended up on the cutting room floor, but it's at least worth seeing once. I'm sure we'll get it on blu-ray when it comes out, but we won't watch it nearly as much as we did the original.

In the antihero's second adventure, he and his friend have a series of online adventures. Probably the most important scene is when Vanellope visits Disney's website (because apparently the Mouse House is a shameless self-promoter). The whole sequence is basically Disney's reminder to us that it's on a mission to swallow all popular culture.

Basically, I got what I expected with "Ralph Breaks the Internet". Just watch it anticipating a bunch of corny stuff that the tykes will find entertaining and you won't be disappointed.

I get that everyone felt that it was just one big advertisement. But its the Internet, all those things are literally on the Internet! I like the way they interpreted how the internet looks like if they were actual beings. My particular favourite part is the disney princesses, its Disney, I don't see why they can't use their own characters.

"Ralph Breaks the Internet" truly surprised me. I was resistant to watching it during its theatrical run, despite being a big fan of its predecessor and knowing the pedigree of Walt Disney Animation. The marketing for this movie, which focused heavily on its new internet elements gave me more "Emoji Movie" vibes than classic Disney. "Look, we have Twitter references! Snapchat! Oh, and Star Wars and Disney princesses!" While I'm sure this strategy successfully got the butts of a lot of kids in theaters, it kept the butt of this cynical-but-otherwise-Disney-loving adult, firmly out. So, when I gave "Ralph Breaks the Internet" a watch recently, I was pleasantly surprised to find it contained all the consistent world-building, charming characters, and genuine heart of the original.

The sequel finds Ralph, and his best friend Vanellope living a charmed but otherwise stagnant life after the events of the first movie. While this stagnancy doesn't bother Ralph in the slightest, Vanellope (in true Disney princess fashion), makes it clear she wants more, and it's this tension that forms the root of the struggle of the story, including causing the catalyst that sends them on their journey to the internet.

I found myself as charmed by the movie's handling of the physical manifestation of the internet as I did by the original's handling of the lives of video game characters. (Side note: although the focus isn't nearly as high on video games as the original, there are still some fun elements there, such as musings on the grooming habits of a certain "Street Fighter" character.) The internet is a living world here, and the filmmakers clearly thought about all the ways they could have its well-known quirks inhabit themselves in the form of characters. Standouts for me were the pop-up street salesmen that aggressively touted their click-bait articles, and the search-engine worm character whose auto-fill was "a tad aggressive."

More than the handling of the world though, what I found truly surprising and compelling about this movie were its themes and the way it handled them. "Wreck-It Ralph" was a movie about identity and self-acceptance. "Ralph Breaks the Internet," far from being the cheap cash grab I thought it would be, actually continues those themes in ways I didn't expect, ways that I even think might even be new and challenging for kids.

Overall, "Ralph Breaks the Internet" was a much more worthy successor to the original film than I anticipated. If you're looking for a fun, humorous, imaginative movie that you can turn your brain off for, it provides all the necessary thrills. But it rarely loses sight of the characters and the heart that make these particular thrills so special.