When I watch sequels, I’m deathly afraid that they will never measure up to the first movie, and very often, they don’t. Many sequels don’t live up to expectations, because writers don’t know how else to develop character. Yes, the character has grown since the first movie, so where else can they grow from there? In Wreck It Ralph 2, henceforth known as WIRII, I’ll tell you why this is a good movie.
Warning! Spoilers ahead! Blah blah blah. You know the drill.
The movie starts off with Ralph and Vanellope going about their daily lives. Since the events that happened six years ago, everything’s been going great. They do their “jobs” in their respective games, and then go off to have a drink at Tapper’s and hang out together. After hearing Vanellope’s plea for something a little different, Ralph makes a different racetrack with his fists and causes everything in the game to go awry — fascinated with this new route, Vanellope forgets that she has to mimic the player’s movements, causing the player to yank a little too hard on the steering wheel and for the game to be shut down. No steering wheel = no game, right?
To get another controller the two buddies plug themselves to the internet while Felix and Calhoun from the previous movie adopt the other racers — who are effectively children — in Sugar Rush, the game that Vanellope is from. But since Ralph doesn’t know how the internet works, he bids $20 000 for a controller and has to find a way to get some money.
Cue the gratuitous Disney Princess cameo, and basically every property that Disney owns, not to mention all the money spent on licensing all the logos needed. There are also loads of references, like how the game Vanellope is attracted to being in, Slaughter Race, is a GTA reference and how Spamly is, well, the personification of all those sleazy spam sites. References and cheap jokes aside, the movie does well as a sequel because the characters grow.
While the whole quest in the movie seems to be about the controller, it really isn’t. It’s about how Vanellope wants to pursue different interests that somehow sometimes don’t involve Ralph. While we think that Ralph has grown since the first movie, and he has, in a way, he has to tackle his self-esteem issues because he bases his entire self-worth on his relationship with Vanellope. Without her, Ralph feels like he’s nothing and this is seen in the clever depicting of how the virus in the movie sees Ralph’s insecurities and exploits them. The virus magnifies Ralph’s insecurities and creates copies of him, with it threatening to swallow the internet unless Ralph can get a grip. Although Ralph is a video game character, his issues plague so many people struggling with their self-worth. Although, like the Knowsmore avatar says, these issues should be remedied using therapy, Disney only has so much time in the movie so they opted for giving Ralph self-awareness and addressing the issue head on, letting him reconcile with Vanellope.
Similarly, Vanellope has her own issues — the trauma of being bullied hasn’t escaped her, and every time she experiences something triggering, like her thinking about not having her own game anymore, she glitches, which is all too similar to someone who dissociates as glitching is her phasing in and out of reality. Anything that affects her emotionally (i.e. upset or angry) results in a glitch, and although the glitch was written into her code in the first movie, it can be used as a metaphor to show how she copes with conflict. Vanellope learning how to tell her friend that she has another interest that may not involve him is tricky, and shows her emotional growth as well.
Although I wanted to see more development between Felix and Calhoun, this sequel may not be the best place for it and sometimes, a B story is what it is and shouldn’t have to try and be anything else. But that is the way with sequels — some minor characters don’t get character development because the plot only requires the main ones to.
WIRII is such a fun movie and I would watch it again–all right, I even liked the gratuitous Disney Princess scene. I’m so glad that this sequel was done well.