Tales From The Ipe!

Sequel to popular children’s animated film comes out, and you think we adults/parents can escape? I try my best to avoid the Pokemon madness, but you have to pick your battles. That’s why I’d rather watch Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 instead of The Smurfs 2. You have to pick your battles.

After wrapping up our anniversary weekend relaxation celebration Saturday (I’m making that up), we picked up the kids from the in-laws and brought ’em home. No sooner were we home before the kids were invited on a movie play date (is that really considered a “play date” though?) to see 2nd Meatballs film. Namita had a lot of food prep and cooking for a potluck lunch with friends Sunday afternoon, so I accompanied the kids to our local theater. It was fairly empty on a Saturday night, and that was fine with me

Although the sequel comes out four years after the first film, it apparently takes place only eight minutes after that film’s conclusion. No sooner have the residents of Swallow Falls survived the events of the first film when helicopters from “Live Corp” arrive to help clean up the island. All fine and good, but it will require a complete transplantation of the entire population to SanFran Jose for what is supposed to be a period of time. However, six months pass, with no end in sight. In the meantime, Flint Lockwood gets a job at Live Corp itself, a sort of Apple or Google firm.

It’s a kid movie so don’t expect a lot of depth about being transplanted, being a people without a home, etc etc. Flint Lockwood and his friends get sent back to the island. The head of Live Corp reveals that the original device that was the center of the food-related disaster was not destroyed. In fact, it is apparently creating all new sorts of food animals, which leads to all sorts of puns like “Shrimpanzee” and “Cheese Spider”. So there is that.

Almost all of the voice actors return for the film — Bill Hader, Anna Faris, James Caan, Will Forte. Andy Samberg, except now Terry Crews replaces Mr. T as that burly police officer. The animation is of the same quality, and the writing is about the same as before, although it is a different writing team. It’s not a bad film at all, but I thought the first film was more enjoyable. That may be because I was not expecting a film with intelligent jokes. This was a serviceable film to entertain the kids, but the plot is fairly transparent, as are the themes and the villain himself. The film also leans heavily on repeating the same types of jokes from the last film. If you’re a kid, you are not going to care. If you’re an adult, I hope you liked the first film.

We also saw it in 3-D, because that was the only option. I’ve been avoiding 3-D films for a few years, but man, the 3-D was hurting my eyes after a while. It adds depth, but I could have lived without it.