I really enjoyed the first "Wreck-It Ralph" movie, and was looking forward to this sequel. While it's amusing enough and inoffensive, it's certainly a bit underwhelming compared to the original. It's great to see John C. Reilly and Sarah Silverman's undeniable voice talent back on the big screen, and the film admittedly does have a good concept: a plot structured around Ralph and Vanellope heading to the internet to find a missing part for the latter's "Sugar Rush" game. The animation is generally pretty good, and there's a fair amount of reasonably fun humor. While some of the jokes don't really work (Ralph asking if goggles are sold at "Google,") many do.
The main problems with the movie are two-fold: its attempt at messaging satire over the potential dangers of the internet comes off as too heavy-handed and surface-level, and the film can sometimes feel repetitive. The film attempts to show excessive fame on the internet as a (rightly) dangerous force, but it borders on being preachy while trying to do so. Additionally, many of the film's attempts at satire of internet and pop culture do come off as too undeveloped. Just like "Ready Player One" (a film I did not like,) the filmmakers here attempt to go for quantity rather than quality when dissecting pop culture references. Just having blue birds that make tweeting noises to take a jab at Twitter isn't particularly original or funny. The pop culture jokes are better than "Ready Player One," but certainly not as profound as the first "Wreck-It Ralph," where they were more developed (such as the Q-Bert scene.) I also thought the new characters weren't all that interesting. The Slaughter Race game and Gal Gadot's character felt fairly meh, and simply don't compare to "Hero's Duty" and Jane Lynch's character in the first film.
It's certainly not bad, but ultimately "Ralph Breaks the Internet" is a slight miss. If you have kids that are clamoring to go, it could make a OK family matinee, but all others (including fans of the first movie) can wait to rent this. 6/10
The main problems with the movie are two-fold: its attempt at messaging satire over the potential dangers of the internet comes off as too heavy-handed and surface-level, and the film can sometimes feel repetitive. The film attempts to show excessive fame on the internet as a (rightly) dangerous force, but it borders on being preachy while trying to do so. Additionally, many of the film's attempts at satire of internet and pop culture do come off as too undeveloped. Just like "Ready Player One" (a film I did not like,) the filmmakers here attempt to go for quantity rather than quality when dissecting pop culture references. Just having blue birds that make tweeting noises to take a jab at Twitter isn't particularly original or funny. The pop culture jokes are better than "Ready Player One," but certainly not as profound as the first "Wreck-It Ralph," where they were more developed (such as the Q-Bert scene.) I also thought the new characters weren't all that interesting. The Slaughter Race game and Gal Gadot's character felt fairly meh, and simply don't compare to "Hero's Duty" and Jane Lynch's character in the first film.
It's certainly not bad, but ultimately "Ralph Breaks the Internet" is a slight miss. If you have kids that are clamoring to go, it could make a OK family matinee, but all others (including fans of the first movie) can wait to rent this. 6/10