Moana, the last disney princess movie—no Raya is not a Disney princess I don’t care what Wikimedia says. While Moana herself is not a princess, she has certainly earned herself the title of being one of Disney’s last good movies before modern day Disney. Now, Disney releases countless live action movies (no shade to the new Mufasa movie that no one asked for and that looks emotionless and creepy and hurt me to watch during the ads of Moana 2). Moana has been a fan favorite movie and I have personally rewatched it many times. It is strange to see a sequel after almost 9 years. Of course it takes a long time to make a movie, but it was still kind of unexpected. Still, Moana 2 garnered a lot of attention and excitement when Disney announced its release.
One thing that makes Disney princess movies are its iconic songs. The first moana movie understood that assignment. Almost all songs in the first movie are iconic masterpieces like “You’re Welcome” or “How Far I’ll Go”. Fans criticize many of the songs in the new movie. They are good, but none of them are particularly memorable compared to the original songs. Unlike the first movie where I can name at least three songs from it, during the second movie I had to look up every song.
Many fans call this the Lin Miranda effect as he co-wrote songs for the first movie and was nominated at the Oscars for them. It was a surprise for many fans to find out he would be dropping out of writing songs for the second movie. It really showed in Moana 2 how Miranda’s departure affected the quality of the songs. This disappointed many fans that were looking forward to the songs hoping they were like the first movie.
A song that really stood out to me was “Beyond”, my favorite song in the soundtrack. It has this really intense feeling that fits the situation. In my opinion, Auli’i Cravalho, Moana’s voice actor, did a really good job on the track. Most songs were ok, nothing special, nothing unique. If the first Moana didn’t set such high expectations for songs then I feel like no one would have complained about this movie.
The relationship between Moana and Maui is one of the things I enjoyed most about the movie. Moana seems mature and grown compared to the first movie showing how she had grown from her experiences in the first movie and just growing up in general. Maui seems more caring and compassionate to Moana. In the first movie he seemed indifferent to what would happen to Moana and acted selfishly for most of the movie. The reunion was sweet as Maui showed concern for Moana’s safety. Their friendship has grown a lot, creating very bittersweet moments in the movie.
While Maui and Moana’s relationship was strong during the movie, others weren’t. Most of the side cast didn’t really play any significant role in the story. Yes, they did do things, but it never felt significant enough. The side characters were definitely filler characters. I didn’t feel any connection to any of the side characters except the bat lady, but that’s because she looked cool.
I found Moana and her little sister’s relationship really lackluster. I couldn’t feel anything for the little sister, and, quite honestly, I couldn’t care less about her. I understand how Moana’s little sister is a big part of Moana’s growth, but the movie just puts their relationship out there which makes it really hard to connect with the little sister. I think Disney put the little sister in the movie for young girls to project themselves onto her.
While Moana 2 definitely did not live up to the original Moana movie’s name, it was still enjoyable and fun to watch. The ending genuinely baffled me, left my jaw dropped and left me holding my breath. I recommend it to anyone that loved the first movie. You can watch Moana 2 in theaters now.
