The Lego Movie 2 builds a new layer on the foundation of the first movie

Spoiler Warning: This review reveals important end details compared to the original of 2014 Lego movie.

The most innovative and daringly different projects have two major drawbacks: the funders will want suites, and the more distinctive a project is, the higher the difficulty level of this suite. Phil Lord and the success of Chris Miller in 2014 The Lego movie is an excellent example. The very idea of ​​a Lego-based movie resembled the most bare-bones and most commercial setup for a movie that product placement gurus could imagine. But Lord and Miller meditated on the creativity and joys of childhood, with a secondary eye on great tropes of faded fantasy, like the "chosen" hero prophesied. And they wrapped everything up in an incredibly fast joke delivery system, built around a surprisingly elaborate animation, and anchored in a catchy song.

So, how do you follow a film that created a world, then upset it by revealing to its fullest extent that it was not what the public thought? There is a suite of standard tools: "Bigger, stronger and simpler". There is the complete pivot strategy of Lego movie spin off The movie of Lego Batman and The movie Ninjago Lego took, focusing on different characters in the same frame. And then there is the Harry Potter / Toy Story playbook, where the creators try to let their franchise grow a little alongside their audience, using the same characters, but darkening the tone and reaching more mature themes. As writers and producers (although Shrek foreverMike Mitchell has taken on the role of director), Lord and Miller are nudging this last option – sort of. With The movie Lego 2: The second part, they let the story grow. But in the process, they make fun of stories of "growing up," just as they mocked the stories of "the elect" from the first round.

The Lego movie presents Emmet Brickowski (Chris Pratt), an ordinary little Lego guy who is totally average, aside from his obscene shredder behavior and his inexplicable role as "Special", a savior prophesied for his threatened Lego world. When a mysterious force threatens his city of Bricksburg, he saves the day by revealing that his world and his story is a game played in the human world by a boy named Finn, who is creative with his father's extensive Lego sets. At the end of the film, her little sister Bianca, who also wants to play, joins Finn. Suddenly, Finn's Lego's world is threatened by the toys of Bianca, a series of raw baby voice creatures made from Lego's Duplo Toddler Line.

Lego Movie 2 briefly resumes at the exact moment when the first film stopped, while the "extraterrestrials" of "planet Duplon" make their way through Bricksburg. So the action begins five years earlier, as Wyldstyle, aka Lucy (Elizabeth Banks), explains, since everything that is bright or shiny attracts the attention of the invaders, Bricksburg is has become a dark and grainy post-apocalyptic post-apocalyptic dystopia as a defense. . Various characters in the first film, including Unikitty (Alison Brie) and the pirate Metalbeard (Nick Offerman), have played butcher characters, but crazy spaceship astronaut Benny (Charlie Day) does not seem to have changed much. (Will Arnett's Lego Batman was always ready for the apocalypse, although he must take a stressful moment to explain why Robin and Batgirl The movie of Lego Batman missing, supposedly to please fans who prefer batman lonely gloomy.)

Photo: Warner Bros.

Emmet is similarly unchanged and accepts the apocalypse with his habitual and optimistic forgetfulness. This offends Lucy, who wants him to grow and darken with the rest of the world. Then a mysterious invader removes Lucy and the rest of the crew. Emmet must then seek the help of a reckless fool named Rex Dangervest to become tough enough and serious to save the situation.

The Lego movie had his notable flaws, especially the way he presented Wyldstyle as a tough guy in the world, only so that Emmet could surpbad, save and win her. But Lord and Miller spent the film so quickly and so happily from one world to another, emphasizing creativity, color and good humor, that it was impossible to focus on a scenario or a character for a long time. The visual and verbal jokes occurred at a bewildering rate though, as if you were trying to keep the viewers submerged and hypnotized. The following slows down the story a bit, with a lower rate of jokes per second and a little more time for contemplation. But instead of making the new movie smaller or duller, it gives way to a little more sophistication. The best gag in the sequel is not a single film or an isolated film, it is part of the story in a subtle and fundamental way.

Where the first film caught the great meta reveals for the end, Lego Movie 2 puts it in the foreground without spelling it out. The whole film is a back and forth between Finn and Bianca, between the imagination of a villainous teenager and an energetic girl. Finn's tastes push Bricksburg back to his crumbling apocalypse, where locals sank around the rubble caused by Bianca's hyperactivity and excitement. But they also accept it, with a kind of fierce pride in their own ferocity. Meanwhile, Bianca's more chaotic, emotion-filled form of play fills the city with explosive hearts and stars that speak with a childish voice. His contributions to the imaginary world break the order and introduce a random chaotic element.

Photo: Warner Bros.

And Bianca presents a new character, Queen Watevra Wa'Nabi, who continually changes the shape of the skin, expressed by Tiffany Haddish. The name of the queen, pronounced "No matter what I want to be", openly announces that Bianca plays without limits, embracing the fantasies that are missing and changes shape to adapt to the present moment. This lack of structure seems erratic and unpredictable for the characters taken in the story, but for the viewers, it's great.

The most impressive thing about The movie Lego 2 it does not explain any of that. The action recurs periodically to show what is happening in the real world, to explain why certain things happen in the reality of Emmet's Lego. (It's a bit like the gap between a child's playtime and the imaginary world that toys live in Toy Story movies except that all Toy Story The characters are aware of and love their human owner, while most Lego characters ignore the human forces that shape their lives.) But there is never any explicit narrative or exposure explaining how the Finn-Bianca rivalry is shaking the world of Lego. It's a meta-joke that gives the whole story an extra level.

But the gag that the whole story is only a game for two children is also played at a third level and that it is a bit poignant. Again, without explicitly expressing her feelings, Bianca seems to blame Finn for growing old and focusing on "mature" games – that is, dark, sinister, humorless stories that have been a source of conflict in comics and movies since guardians and The return of the black knight. And this is reflected in their so-called common story, while Emmett tries to "grow up" to please Lucy and discovers some major clichés that prevent it. The film ends up making fun of the sinister movement and the very idea of ​​maturity, which it presents as much less fun than the innocence of childhood and the unconscious game.

Photo: Warner Bros.

So many Lego Movie 2 works at the same level. Viewers are constantly in the meta-humor lacking in the characters, many jokey cameos (including Jason Momoa taking over his role of Aquaman) to the conscious calculation of a musical dance song called "Catchy Song", which constantly repeats the line "This song will get stuck in your head!" When Queen Watevra Wa Nabi sings a very ironic song entitled "Not Evil", where she unconvincingly promises that she's not a villain, the movie reaches the point of plays where he It is gloriously impossible to say who is really sincere.

And this level of play ends up doing Lego Movie 2 an impressive experience, even when she can not stand the surprises and innovations of her predecessor. The new film strikes several times in the same way, from the inflatable electro-score of Mark Mothersbaugh to the gags of the same character. (Batman: still very attached to his own hype Benny: still extremely immersed in spaceships Lucy: still boring and uncertain about whether others consider her as a tough guy.) The dazzling work on the queen Watevra Wa Nabi, much of the novelty has disappeared at this stage. The ending credits song starring Robyn and The Lonely Island is hilarious, but is little more than an addition after the end of the movie's meat. On the surface, Lego Movie 2 is smaller and less ambitious than the series launch movie, and it's less frantic and fun. There are fewer fantastic worlds and less to discover in them.

But considered a narrative that operates constantly both at the level of adventure and meta-level, both as a functional thriller and a satire of its kind, it is a surprisingly clever and twisted project. It is normal for a movie about construction toys to be entirely devoted to the deconstruction of familiar stories of heroes and villains, and that a film about children would play so much time with the genre. Like the first Lego movie, the goofing suite with ever-changing forms, and the themes of creativity and creation. In the end, it's more than just mandatory money: it creates a new layer over the Lego movie foundations.

The movie Lego 2: The second part The theatrical release will take place from February 8, 2019.