Almost a decade since the original movie came to theaters, Inside Out 2 continues to explore Riley’s (voiced by Kensington Tallman) state of mind as she enters puberty, seeks the approval of her peer Valentina (Lilimar), and struggles to redefine her identity. These new challenges come with more complicated emotions.

The new emotional avatars (Anxiety, Envy, Ennui, and Embarrassment) aren’t as memorable as the core five. Adding to the bad news, Bill Hader and Mindy Kaling unfortunately didn’t return for this installment; however, Liza Lapria does a better job in the role of Disgust than Tony Hale as Fear. Anxiety is a welcome addition with Maya Hawke’s manic energy bringing the character to life, but I hated the design. Anxiety looks more like a leftover draft of Jim Henson’s Pepe the King Prawn. Ennui (Adele Exarchopoulos) has a great introduction, but doesn’t get much more to do, which is more than can be said of Ayo Edebiri’s Envy or Paul Walter Hauser’s Embarrassment.

The limited interaction between Joy (Amy Poehler) and Anxiety was a lot of fun, so I was shocked when the format of the story recycled the first movie’s plot with Joy and Sadness (Phyllis Smith) except with the entire team in exile from headquarters rather than being something of a “toxic workplace environment” kind of story. It’s fun to see the landscape of Riley’s mind, but at times the story felt more like an adventure to deliver the next gag.

I found myself responding to this one more than the original movie. Namely how the animators gave form to abstract concepts such as the islands of personality, the belief pool, the vault of secrets, brainstorm, or my personal favorite the Sar-Chasm (a literal chasm that distorts any echo with a sarcastic inflection.)

Composer, Andrea Datzman’s moving score adds to the emotional climax as Joy calms both Anxiety’s fears as Riley wrestles with her identity. A healthy reminder that our emotions color our memories and perceptions, but we aren’t and shouldn’t be ruled by our emotions. It’s a shame the movie doesn’t start here because I would argue the journey isn’t as interesting as the destination.

Rating: 3.5/5.

Inside Out 2 is available on digital now and will be released on 4K ULTRA HD, Blu-Ray and DVD on September 10.

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The writer of this piece is: Laurence Almalvez
Laurence tweets from @IL1511

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