Chicken Run : La Menace nuggets

This sequel to 'Chicken Run' arrives after 23 years, but don't worry, being animated the returning cast haven't aged a bit! Although the story picks up where the original left off, this is an entirely new adventure and you don't really have to see the first film to follow the story, although it is highly recommended. The opening to 'Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget' recaps the events of the first film in a nutshell.

The chickens are living happily on an island away from humans, and Ginger and Rocky starts a family. Their daughter is Molly. No sooner has she become a teenager than she becomes curious about the world and what lies on the other side of the lake. When trucks arrive and start clearing the forest, the chickens devise a plan to shelter themselves from human vision, but Molly wants to explore...and so she does.

She befriends a chicken named Frizzle, and together the head to Fun-Land Farms where they believe chickens to live happy lives, according to an advert they saw. Off course the farms are not what it seems, and they soon get into trouble.

It's up to Ginger, Rocky and some of their friends to save them. Last time they broke out of a chicken farm; this time they're breaking in. A familiar antagonist from the first film returns, as well, but I won't spoil it for you.

I enjoyed the stop-motion animation, the characters, their adventures, and the humour. This is a delightful film young and old can enjoy. The film also illustrates how the younger generation are not always appreciative of what their parents went through to ensure their survival, and I don't think youngsters watching this will fully understand. These are lessons a mature audience will relate to.

As much as I enjoyed 'Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget', I enjoyed 'Chicken Run' more, because it was simpler and funnier.

Looks like the creators didn't learn anything from the failure of Early Man (2018). A successful family animation needs to engage folks of any and all ages - the first Chicken Run did to a good extent. This one didn't. Ditto Early Man.

Audiences want to see relatable settings, characters with soul, plots that are realistically challenging (not pointlessly ridiculous). So we end up with a colourful bland bright happy island commune ... overdone, unrelatable and boring. Then we get a silly super high tech robots and gadgets filled chicken farm/factory - huh? And football matches in prehistoric Early Man? Huh?

From the short documentary on 'the making of' its immediately clear the creators and team spent a massive 99% effort on the puppeting, the sets, the lighting, the movements, the look of things - which is fine, except, where's the effort on the story, the characters, the soul of the whole thing??

The director even laughed at how fun it was to give Ms Tweedy a glam look - but hello mister - did you ask yourself what the viewers want out of a once iconic scary evil character like her? A glam up look? Really?

It does seem all the people involved in this - many very competent in their area of specialty - was more focused on putting out their best on producing their area of specialty than making an animated movie that truly relates to the audience.

For instance so much technical deal and effort was made of Tweedy walking down glass steps - if the story and plotting was better it wouldn't have mattered if she was walking down milk carton cutouts with average lighting and a less smooth gait.

Do please spend more thought and effort on plotting and characters and audience impact, and less on the visual razzle dazzle.

For me, this sequel was a decent continuation of the original. It was based on the same concept as the original with some minor additions.

The story was simple and light hearted just like the original, the screenplay was decent, the direction was decent, the animation was unique like the original and the voice actors did a good job. The thrill elements were embedded nicely in the story which makes this normal story little bit enjoyable.

But to be honest, I think this sequel was unnecessary as it was underwhelming if we compare it to the original. Overall, this movie was a decent entertainer.

Not as good as the first one as the setting is a lot more fantastical and silly, but it still has the Aardman charm and style with goofy looking characters and inventive contraptions. The plot clearly shows its inspiration from classic films and whilst being a bit too long, it has lots of humour, jokes and wacky adventures to keep it entertaining. The different voice actors aren't as good and the modern pop song at the start felt out of place, but the animation is great (if less hand-made) and full of vibrant colours and it has those little touches which make it something special.

Overall score = 7/10.

Aardman Animations, personally, is a hit or miss for me as in the past, they have created some great works like Wallace & Gromit, Shaun the Sheep and so forth. But at the same time, they have made some pretty mediocre or pretty bad works too. "Chicken Run" is one of my favorite stop-motion movies as I really like the characters, the animation, and the narrative. With this sequel coming out after many years, it was entertaining but it was a bit underwhelming.

Throughout, the stop-motion animation, character models, and colors are amazing as Aardman continues to provide great clay animation. Aardman always provides some great animation and the models, colors, sound designs, and the movements are all excellent. We get to see the same characters from the previous movie and it was fun to see them communicate, move around and observe their actions throughout. The voice performances from the cast members were solid as they provided some good voice works, although a few voice performances weren't great. The soundtrack is pretty good and there are some decent humor moments that I chuckled at.

With the narrative continuing from the previous movie, the narrative explores some new concepts and territories within the setting and characters and there are some aspects that were interesting but some not so much. Certain new concepts that were explored I felt weren't strong enough and at times, it really feels like a rehash of the first movie. On the characters, there are new characters that are introduced but unfortunately, none of the new characters weren't really interesting since they felt a bit dull and kind of annoying at times. Because this is a new cast, I personally felt while the original characters are still fun, the chemistry and energy of what made them fun from the first movie felt a bit lacking. The soundtrack is okay and there are some solid dialogue moments while being a bit clunky.

Despite my gripes, I still was interested to see where the movie goes and for what it is, it's a decent sequel. Overall, it is entertaining and it's nice to see the characters again, but I wish it could have been better.