Even better than Monsters, Inc

Rating: 8/10 (21 June 2013)

When I first heard about this movie, I really thought it would be an interesting idea to see how Mike and Sulley's lives were before the events of Monsters, Inc. Although I didn't expect anything great from this movie. I'd give the first film a 7/10. It was good, but I don't see it as great. I started seeing trailers for the movie, and it really got me interested then, and gave me a lot of questions going into this film. At the beginning of Inc, Mike is coaching Sulley up. During this film, he's going to college to become a scarer. How would this be developed and transition from him trying to scare kids to become Sulley's coach? I was also interested in seeing how Randall Boggs went from a friend of Mike's to one of the first film's villains. I came out of the film, and my questions were completely answered. In my opinion, this movie not only transitions into Monsters, Inc in a great way, but I feel that this movie was even better than the first film. This really exceed my expectations.
You probably know the plot of the movie, so I'll go into why I think this film works, and how my questions were answered. Mike and Sulley are kicked out of a scare class because they didn't do very good on the final, and are forced to join a group of "losers" in the Scare Games in order to get back into the program. They end up winning, but Sulley cheats on the final task to help Mike out. Mike isn't happy about this, so he ends up sneaking into a door to the human world to try and scare a kid. The kid isn't afraid of him, as she thinks he actually looks cute. He later realizes that he's just not scary, and nearly gives up on his dream to work at Monsters, Inc. But Sulley tells him that he may not be scary, but he sure is fearless and really knows good strategies to scare kids. In a way, his dream comes true, but obviously not what he originally had in mind. This is a great way to transition into Monsters, Inc coach if you ask me.
Randall was another thing that was on my mind. Would something bad happen to him or something to make him a future villainous character? Here's what happens. Randall becomes Mike's roommate, but one of the teams in the Scare Games really likes him, and Randall thinks of them as "the cool kids." He had been trying to get into a group like that for years, and now he's got his chance. The group is a bunch of jerks, and that really changes Randall's character. Plus, at the end of the final round, he says "This is the last time I'll lose to you, Sullivan." He actually wasn't a good guy for very long in the movie, and I like that. I didn't expect that, honestly.
There are plenty of funny moments in this as well. I would say that this is probably Pixar at their funniest. One good example of it would be this one scene where Mike and the gang go to Monsters, Inc to see the variety of monsters. Before they leave, Squishy's mom says "Have fun, kids. I'll just be here listening to my tunes." She rolls up the window, and we hear very loud heavy metal music. I think that was probably the best joke in the movie, but there are plenty of other great ones too. There's also this other joke during the tour when they go into the cafeteria. "The MU cafeteria has some of the best chefs in the world." They think dump a thing of garbage onto the serving area. (Note: Both of these jokes are in trailers.) I really enjoyed watching this movie, and I look forward to seeing it again.