No replay value. Flat, Predictable, and Charmless

Rating: 4/10 (23 June 2011)

Some characters voiced by famous people were barely used (especially the snake, monkey, and bird). I didn't see the first movie, but they just seemed like baggage that couldn't be cut. I feel bad for David Cross getting about 3 lines and none of them being comedic. This was an all star voice cast, and it was mostly wasted.
There was no emotional build up in the plot or development of the characters. It just stumbled through a series of henchmen fight scenes. You knew how the movie was going to turn out in the end. In fact this was one of the most predictable movies I have ever seen. Let alone the plot, scenes, and character types we've seen 100 times before, I found myself predicting the ends of the characters lines way too many times. There was no charm to this movie. Compare to a Pixar movie, they both use clichés, but Pixar films are actually remembered. Nobody in this film really had a developed personality besides Jack Black's character.
Visually, the entire film seemed to be colored an ominous red and gray. It made for a very uncomfortable movie as the whole thing looked like it was over a fire. Compare to Mulan, where there were scenes in the white snow or woods. That was visually memorable. Who cares about the good CG animation, its like buying a 3 year old expensive crayons. In addition I was confused by the purpose of a lot of the non-kung fu action scenes. I felt like I was watching a video game someone else was playing. They went on for forever. I was later told this would normally be in 3D, makes sense. These scenes are time filling garbage.
Review was harsh, but honestly they created this for the quick cash so I don't think they care. This has almost no replay value and won't stay in your memory for long. It won't bore you to death or anything, I didn't have a bad time watching it, but something irks me when they pull movies like these out of a can and I come here to find it has a rating of about 8. That's on par with Aladdin/Fantasia and above Cinderella/Dumbo. Lets be honest, its about a 4.