Kung Fu Panda 2 Review

CGI-film sequels have a recent history of turning out far better than expected and, in some cases, better than the original. Toy Story 2 and Shrek 2 are a notable duo, both of which far exceeded expectations and treated audiences to something sequels rarely succeed in doing: keeping characters, locales, and in many cases, a plot formula already presented to the movie-watching world fresh enough to warrant another visit to the film’s universe. Films like these don’t come around every day, and unfortunately Kung Fu Panda 2 is not one of these special films. It’s not terrible on any front, but Panda 2 fails to deliver in several key areas, and the potential Kung Fu Panda franchise may suffer because of it.

The sequel picks up right around where the first film left off. Po the big, lovable spotted panda is now accepted by his peers as the Dragon Warrior and treated as such. He’s the leader of the Furious Five, who are tasked by their Master Shifu to avenge the murder of another respected kung fu master by an old enemy of China, Shen the evil peacock (yep, the bad guy really is a peacock). Shen aims to abolish Kung Fu and take over China with the use of cannons. Along the way, Po becomes conflicted with ghosts of his pasts and has to take on some family problems that have been lying dormant for quite some time. For the majority of the film, however, this subplot takes a back seat to the more action-oriented quest to defeat Shen, which is actually a shame considering that Po’s backstory is definitely more interesting than the fairly standard threat of world domination by an evil guy. However, this Panda’s biggest problem isn’t the potential destruction of the world he knows, or the haunting prospects of his origins. It’s the fact that he doesn’t really know what he’s doing half the time, both literally and figuratively. During some scenes, Po appears to be an unstoppable Kung Fu master, and during others he’s the sloppy, unfit panda we were introduced to in the first film. One minute he’s beating the heck out of a huge gang of angry wolves, and the next he’s struggling to take on a single opponent. 

Quality sequels usually find success in a fleshed out narrative that’s mostly independent from the first film’s. Although Kung Fu Panda 2’s story isn’t directly associated with the events of the first film, it too often ends up feeling far too dependent on points already established in its predecessor. There’s really no clear, crisp beginning or end to the movie. It’s never introduced or opened up. It basically assumes that the audience has already seen the first movie. And this is where it makes its overarching error. This is a sequel, and it sorely feels like one. Never during my viewing did I cease thinking about the superior first film. Panda 2 doesn’t feel like a stand-alone story told through the eyes of an established group of characters. It feels like a painfully obvious middle act in a trilogy that doesn’t yet exist. The action was visually striking, and the animation was smooth and impressive. All of the returning characters were still very likable, and it sure was fun watching the Furious Five do what they do best, but after every flashy fight sequence I was left wanting something more. Although the writers were surely making an attempt to create depth by giving Po an origin story, the whole thing ended up feeling cliched and almost desperate.

Another of the film’s struggling points was a far more fundamental problem. Where the first movie was a consistently funny film that kept audiences at least chuckling most of the way through, its sequel feels more like an action pic than a family-oriented action/comedy. There were a few funny lines of dialogue, and Jack Black’s brilliantly cast voice work as Po was better than ever, but laughs were few and far between, to the point where when something minimally amusing was uttered by a character I almost felt inclined to laugh for lack of something funnier to laugh at.

Kung Fu Panda 2 makes a few successful attempts to be another stellar animated sequel, but most of these grabs are buried underneath a slew of disappointing problems that gave the film a disjointed feel. The voice actors were all there, the animation was superb, but the narrative felt strangely lacking and the entire film felt like one long action sequence instead of a stand alone sequel built to revisit loved characters. At this point, I can only hope that if a third Kung Fu Panda comes around, it takes queues from this dismaying sequel's many mistakes, because no one wants to say good by to their favorite martial-artist panda on this disappointing note.

Final Score:

5.5/10
"Average"