The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part 2019

It’s been an interesting year so far for me, and while it’s only February, I’ve actually been doing quite well at keeping up with the new releases that I cover here on the site. And while LEGO Movie may have been a bit of a stretch to consider as a superhero movie at all, the sequel is even slightly moreso. But it still has LEGO Batman as a main character and the heroic characters are busy saving their world, so I’m rolling with it. As far as how it stacks up to the previous two movies, the humor is still the same but this one builds on the live action reveal of the first movie in a way that’s predictable but still enjoyable. And as I tend to mention with any new release reviews, I discuss the movie in full so if you’re worried about spoilers, here’s your warning.

In the first movie the real conflict was between the strict and structured father played by Will Ferrell who wanted to build the LEGO sets according to their instructions and keep them that way verses his son who wanted to be more creative and make his own unique creations and re-make them according to his mood. In this sequel, the family dynamics have changed. The father has completely removed himself from the LEGOs (and the movie takes a couple moments to joke aboutit) and given the space to his son Finn who turned Bricksburg into a tweenage boy dystopia Apocolypseburg, and his younger sister has been introduced to LEGOs on her own terms with more imagination and cuteness. While the boy started out with the traditional LEGO sets, the girl started out with Duplo and moved onto a mix of the traditional LEGO sets as well as the girl-themed LEGO Friends style. As a concept, it worked quite well and was pretty clear how they were going right from the start, at least from someone familiar with the different types of sets.

The level of detail in the first movie is continued just as well here, though there are more cuts into the live action segments. Especially noticeable are the numerous fingerprints all over the larger flat blocks that make up Queen Watevra Wa’Nabi along with the extra wear and tear on the decal that makes up Emmett’s vest. There are also plenty of meta moments throughout, like the aforementioned hanging a lantern on the very limited involvement of Will Farrell’s father slash President Business. But there’s also a commentary on Chris Pratt’s career with the inclusion of raptors as well as a couple other jokes. They even comment on the exclusion of Marvel characters despite the fact that LEGO does make Marvel sets and games. The one big miss was how the movie leaned way too hard into the idea of stepping on LEGOs with bare feet.

Where the real heart of this movie is also lends to its predictability with the conflict between brother and sister. The attacks of the ultra cute hearts and stars for the matrimonial ceremony feel very little sister-ish things to do. The song that Lucy feels is overly evil passing as being friendly mimics how an older brother would feel about his younger sister wanting to play with him. He generally would think that it’s not something that he would enjoy despite the sister’s insistence otherwise. The concept of who the bad guy of this movie really is in this movie is also an interesting concept that really comes into play towards the end of the film. While we’re initially focused on the characters we’ve known from the first movie, we think that the sister’s toys are the villains. It’s ultimately revealed that it’s Finn’s toys and unwillingness to play with his sister that brings about the Our-mom-mageddon while the sisters toys really just wanted them all to come together.

There are a few other moments throughout the film that takes a few extra fun elements that incorporate the real world a bit more than what they did in the first movie. There are moments when the characters transition from the basement to the sister Bianca’s room that are done more in the style of a young kid playing with toys rather than a fully realized CGI character like how the spaceships are held up with string and look much more like actual LEGO toys rather than CGI recreations. There are also more live action segments spread throughout the film rather than just one or two moments towards the end. The one thing that doesn’t necessarily work quite as well is how they integrate how Emmett has the power to actually move in the real world which is used one more time here. But it’s not used in the same way and it’s even taken down a notch because there’s mention of time travel early on with Finn talking about a storyline he has going on and there’s no actual interaction with any live action people when they are in the “real” world.

But what’s the most important with this film is the overall humor and that falls right in line with what has been seen before as well as what has been seen through most of the LEGO multimedia through their other DC home video movies and video games. There’s also quite a few more songs in this one than there were in the first one and those are hit and miss. The best ones were the most meta like the credits song and Catchy Song. The others were ok, but nothing too special. Even the reprise of Everything is Awesome was a bit of a letdown, though it was intended to be a downer at that point in the story. Overall, it was a decent sequel but it didn’t quite live up to the original. Until next time, this has been Bubbawheat for Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights.