There's enough ingenuity with its central metaphor to keep this entertaining and funny, but ultimately it just doesn't carry the same emotional punch as _Inside Out_. The story is fine if a little forgettable and predictable, for me it's lacking some of those profound, memorable moments that made me connect with the first one. I also think it has some trouble with sticking the landing. [spoiler] Making peace with your anxiety and not letting it define you as a person [/spoiler] isn't a particularly interesting note to end this on, nor do the writing or presentation make it feel very impactful. There's also something about the set-up that doesn't quite make sense to me. Why does this movie consider envy and shame to be among the more complex emotions? Most kids have experiences with that, right? Why are we not including love or lust? Is it because Pixar made a coming-of-age film about that topic just 2 years ago? Why didn't we see any of these new emotions with the parents during the first one? Is it because none of this was planned ahead and they're just making stuff up as they go along? Of course, but like a lot of Disney mandated Pixar sequels, it should be stressed that this is still a decent and fun watch. Visually it's an improvement, the score is once again great, ennui and anxiety are great new characters, loved the creativity shown during the 'brainstorm', secret vault and nostalgia bits. Much like _Finding Dory_ and _The Incredibles 2_, this is another adequate Pixar sequel, but also another one where it's abundantly clear they didn't have much story left to tell. 6/10

It’s fine. It’s Pixar. You can’t deny the craftmanship. It’s pretty, there’s some fun animation gags. I couldn’t help but think about the recent comments from Pixar about ‘less specificity more universality’ and Turning Red while watching this. Turning Red you could feel the director’s experiences in. This was such a distance from Riley, a resistance to anything that could define her as more than a white blonde typical American girl. She’s really smart AND creative? But she gets too passionate sometimes and has anxiety and makes mistakes and is hard on herself? Wow! A bunch of positive flaws that mean nothing but kids and adults alike to go ‘that is or was me but in a good way’. And that’s fine! If it helps a kid it’s fine. But you can feel the anxiety, the crowd pleasing, in how much initial play Riley’s admiration and fixation on her fellow hockey player gets and then Mount Crushmore is all guys, including her video game crush. Can’t risk alienating or upsetting a certain crowd, or even just anyone relating to the wide brush that is Riley. And the emotions are not nearly as fresh a concept this time. In this one they split up Sadness from the group and Joy spends most of the journey with Anger, Disgust, and Fear. A natural instinct: you don’t want to repeat the first movie. But it reveals the efficacy of the first in that they clearly planned three dynamics: the whole group, Joy and Sadness, and Disgust, Joy and Anger. The last three are mostly comic relief while the first two get the emotions and depth, and for a one and done movie that’s fine. But then for this they try to introduce dimensionality to what was meant to be caricatures and it strains the metaphor for what they are in a ‘that doesn’t feel like the feeling of anger’ way. Because it’s easy to go ‘what are positive ways to feel sadness, and the benefits of sadness’. To go into ‘what are positive ways or reasons to feel anger, disgust, or fear,’ well, that could be upsetting, or worse, subjective. So their collective arc is just ‘stop complaining and support Joy more’. It’s not helped by Disgust and Fear just being impressions. Tony Hale’s Fear lacks Hader’s inhabitance of the character, the extra mile he went to elevate the material. Hale is less a being and more one note. Even in how hollow the about face of support Anger and Disgut go through- not Black’s fault who is clearly trying to make the emotional moments but just can’t get the script to congeal- Hale’s Fear doesn’t even really get a moment. Phoeler and Smith play the hits well enough, and Hawke does a pretty job of playing a desperate, sympathetic antagonist. Unsurprisingly Edebiri is the standout, elevating what she’s given to make even so so bits of comedy charming and laugh worthy through her delivery alone. It all just hits the same message- ‘all emotions have their place in moderation, any can be bad in excess’ as the first in a way that feels more parent’s well intentioned lecture and less like Turning Red’s ‘god I’ve been there.’ Even the attempt to replicate Puss in Boot’s ‘realistic depiction of a panic attack’ felt less earned and lived in, and almost cloying. A lot of the word play- much as I love a good pun- started to get there too, sounding like the tired creak of a car spinning its wheels. I was gonna give this three stars because animation wise Pixar knows how to make a pretty movie, but is that the standard? Is that it? It can be more- even in modern Pixar we have Turning Red. But with the reception and money this has made, it seems like this will be what we’ll get more of. As is it’s a fine movie to take my mom out to.

Inside Out 2 takes pretty much the exact same formula as the original and applies to a tween year, specifically focusing on the impact of anxiety. The novelty of the idea isn't as fresh in this movie, reflected in a lot fewer clever psychology puns and metaphors. In general, the humor doesn't seem to land much, and part of that is that this movie is about anxiety, teenage years, and to some extent, puberty, yet the market for the movie is far more oriented towards younger kids. While I think it could have handled some more emotions, specifically around puberty and being a teenager, I think it manages to capture anxiety pretty well. Even if the innovativeness and humor are not as sharp this time around, the emotional pathos is still fantastic, hitting the right notes and leading into a cathartic message that feels wholesome (albeit a bit too easy). I found this to resonate really well with my own experiences, and it was a compelling movie because of this central theme that is able to iterate so well on the original concept while still exploring another complex emotion. Inside Out might be my favorite Pixar movie, and this doesn't hit all the same highs as that one; however, it's definitely a lot better than a Disney sequel had any right to be.

This movie left a huge impression on me. I was very pleased to discover that this movie was more enjoyable to watch than the first one, and I loved the first one! Inside Out 2 is what I feel to be a rare case in animation where everything was improved for the sequel: Cast, Story, Soundtrack, even the animation, which was definitely a highlight of this film in that it creatively intertwined multiple different styles similar to that of Spider-verse. 10/10, absolutely fantastic movie. I hope Pixar can keep this momentum up.

Psychologically interesting, entertaining and funny sequel. With the start of puberty come new challenges, new emotions and new developments. Somehow it‘s ironical that Pixar still makes better movies than Disney after Disney bought Pixar. Pixar is still Pixar. Thank you, Disney. I highly recommend this sequel to students and classes of psychology. For kids funny and entertaining, for parents and adults perhaps more insightful and deep, this movie is one of the better U.S. animation movies in recent years.