Someone Unplug This Animated Karaoke Machine

2021 has been a year full of movies, from the highly anticipated No Way Home and House of Gucci to the forgettable at best Cinderella and Last Night in Soho. In what was meant to be the beginning of the end of this pandemic, people found their way back to the theaters with family and friends to once again savor the silver screen. 

Sing 2, the second in the Sing franchise, follows the old gang as they take on Redshore City (which very much resembles Zootopia) and try to prove to the world that they are more than a local theater troupe. The talent show from the first movie launched them into a profitable established theater company, but it seems that in the time between the movies the ever emulous Buster Moon decided this was not enough for him and his friends.

A basic recap of Sing for those of you who haven’t watched the movie in a year or five: Buster Moon, owner of a failing theater, decides to shoot for the moon (haha) and hold a talent show, hoping to win back his community and revitalize the theater he fell in love with. Throughout the course of this goofy musical, he finds a talented group of animals who need the theater almost as much as he does, and together they put on the show of a lifetime. Fun, nostalgic, simple.

***Spoiler Warning for those who haven’t seen the movie and still want to beyond this point***

This movie is another story. Literally. The ensemble cast of the first movie, and the special attention the film paid to each of its characters, is what made it so charming. It is the overindulgence of this trope where the second film falls short, though. The characters’ individual storylines were the very thing that made Sing so special- pulling the viewer into the story and appealing to specific people. A viewer could watch Meena battle her stage fright, or Johnny deal with an unsupportive family, and feel themselves represented on screen. In Sing 2, though, this is taken to the extreme, and the effect is a crowded plot with every character’s storyline being shallowly touched upon in a way that leaves the viewer suffering whiplash. 

It is unclear to a casual movie goer who the main character of this new installment to the franchise is. One might immediately think of Buster Moon, voiced by Matthew McConaughey, as the film’s protagonist, but this isn’t necessarily the case. He takes a backseat throughout the movie, becoming a caricature of himself through his overdone need to please, as well as his drive- to the point of crossing ethical and moral boundaries. Was the main character Ash, with her solo and her confusing wisdom around death and dealing with loss? Was it Rosita, with her character arc of stepping into the spotlight and coming into her own body? And wasn’t that the plot of the last movie? The lack of understanding around the main character means that as a viewer, there is no connection between yourself and the movie. 

As for the actual plot of the movie, the days of a simple koala trying to save his theater are far behind us. One confused moviegoer proclaimed, “the plot of the movie was almost as bad as the plot of the play in the movie.” If you think Sing 2 had too much going on, just wait until you see the space musical Gunther wrote throughout the film. Sense is thrown to the wind as explorer Rosita tries to find Clay Calloway…in space. After we spent the movie watching Rosita grapple with being the lead of the movie- and finally cheering as she got the role- we watched her have less lines than the supposed side characters. Johnny is mentally, not to mention physically, abused by a dancing instructor; Meena talks to an icecream boy while still on stage; Buster is narrowly avoiding murder in the back; Johnny’s fresh-out-of-jail father and brothers provide security outside; all while Nana sits calmly in the opera box. It’s an understatement to say that the audience, both in the movie and outside of it, are unsure of what to be paying attention to.