Unnecessary (after so long!) and under-whelming sequel

Rating: 4/10 (28 August 2018)

STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning
Over a decade after their last big screen adventure, the Parr family, headed by dad Bob (Craig T. Nelson) and mom Helen (Holly Hunter) are performing their heroic deeds as their super-hero alter-egos Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl, along with their kids Violet (Sarah Vowell) and Dashiell (Huck Milner), as well as baby Jack-Jack (Eli Fucile.) But their activities are still illegal, and their exploits have caused yet another public calamity. All seems lost, until millionaire Winston Deavor (Bob Odenkirk), launches a campaign to make superheroes legal again, along with his sister Evelyn (Catherine Keener.) But a mysterious villain called The Screen-slaver plunges The Incredibles, and their cohort Frozone (Samuel L Jackson) into a battle where no one is who they appear to be...
We seem to be under attack from a barrage of sequels lately, some to fairly recent films and others to films from a while back that never got their follow up when they were flavour of the month, such as this sequel to the animated 2004 superhero satire The Incredibles. That said, they will only ever make sequels to films that were in any way a success, and so the comparatively lukewarm fanfare this sequel received was telling in itself. I certainly took my time going to see it, even after being very impressed with the first one, not least because I didn't relish sitting in an auditorium on my own packed with noisy, screaming kids. So, of course, I went to see it yesterday on a Bank Holiday Monday, thinking it wouldn't be so bad because it had been out a while and the showtimes were less frequent (bad luck!!!) Sadly, I wish I hadn't bothered...
The animation, special effects and action sequences are, of course, as amazing and impressive as ever, and will certainly bring spark and joy to the average young person (no gender stereotyping!), who will be dazzled by all of that without thinking of anything else. But whilst older, more demanding viewers will still enjoy the in-jokes and references to modern pop culture and social issues, they will be less impressed with a far less engaging or coherent plot than the original, as well as a really obvious villain you can see from a mile off. As many others have noted, there seems to be some really obvious interference from the female empowerment lobby in the proceedings, with Mr Incredible as the 'stay at home dad', while Mrs Incredible is off saving the world like a superhero should throughout, in a reversal of how it's been throughout the years.
I'm not sure why this got made, other than as a cheap and easy way to make some cash. Original director Brad Bird has doodooed all over his original masterpiece with this pointless and flat offering, that came out of nowhere like a thief in the night, with no Incredibles to stop it. **