Inside Out 2 (now streaming on VOD services like Amazon Prime Video) is THE runaway movie success story of 2024 thus far. So after a half-decade of creative and commercial floundering, does that mean Pixar is Officially Back, Baby? Maybe. On the commercial end, it bulldozed $1.6 billion of international box office cash into Disneyâs coffers, making it Pixarâs biggest financial success ever, even accounting for inflation, something of a surprise for prognosticators, but emblematic of a greater desire for more theatrically released family-friendly movies. And considering Pixarâs recent struggles are at least partly due to five of its previous six movies being original standalone ideas, that financial success reflects a greater desire for more FAMILIAR theatrically released family-friendly movies â there’s even an Inside Out spinoff series, Dream Productions, due on Disney+ in 2025 — which prompts one to wonder whether or not the sequel builds upon the ingenuity of its 2015 predecessor (notably the last hands-down Pixar classic), or simply drafts on its success. Which is a question Iâm gonna wrestle with right here today.
INSIDE OUT 2: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
The Gist: You donât remember Riley (Kensington Tallman) as vividly as you recall the characters inside her head, but they wouldnât exist without her, you know. She was 11 in the first Inside Out, and now sheâs 13, on the brink of high school with her mouth full of braces and a head full of new, complicated emotions. The old ones are still there, though: Joy (Amy Poehler) kinda leads the way, with the support of Anger (Lewis Black), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Tony Hale) and Disgust (Liza Lapira). Joy has been curating memories into Rileyâs Sense Of Self, which manifests as a precious object that resembles a hand-blown glass flower that glows blue and grows out of Rileyâs Belief System. She only uses the good memories, and memory-holes the bad ones to the Back Of The Mind â an actual location here in Rileyâs gray matter, of course â via a spring-loaded ejection tube. And we pause for a sec to ponder if this is a good thing. I mean, didnât we learn in the last movie that she, the anthropomorphic representation of Joy, had to learn to coexist alongside the anthropomorphic representation of Sadness in order for Riley to be a functional young human? Shouldnât the same be true of good and bad memories? Hmm.
The conflict anthropomorphically manifests via a new emotion, Anxiety (Maya Hawke). Yes, ulp. Sheâs bright orange with bugged-out eyes and jaggedy lightning-bolt hair. She and her supporting group of new, complicated emotions â Embarrassment (Paul Walter Hauser), Envy (Ayo Edebiri) and Ennui (Adele Exarchopoulos) â arrive during Rileyâs puberty-inspired brain remodel. Their emergence coincides with Rileyâs trip to hockey camp; sheâs a budding star whoâs long played aside her besties Grace (Grace Lu) and Bree (Sumayyah Nuridden-Green), but now has an opportunity to step up to varsity level and play alongside a star player she admires, Val Ortiz (Lilimar).
Inside her skull, the emotions find themselves at war ideologically. The adultish Anxiety banishes Rileyâs Sense Of Self to the Back Of The Mind, so Joy and co. take an arduous journey to retrieve it. With Anxiety at the control desk, Riley worries. About fitting in with new people. About being cool around the older girls. About leaving behind Grace and Bree, whoâll attend a different high school in the fall. About proving herself in all situations, whether itâs on the ice or in social settings. (In hockey parlance, sheâs gripping her stick too tight.) Anxiety stirs paranoia; meanwhile, Joy and her pals quest to retain Rileyâs core self. Is Riley doomed to be crazy like the rest of us, or what? NO SPOILERS.Â
What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: This filmâs release means, of course, itâs time to rank Pixarâs Anthropomorphic Manifestations of Abstract Concepts (AMAC):
4. Elemental â This exploration of earth, air, fire and water beings never addressed the pragmatism of what happens when a fire person and a water person have a romantic relationship.
3. Soul â In this high-minded bit of overconceptualized spiritualish complication, souls are little bloblike beings traversing an animated afterlife and contemplating the notional ephemeralness of the universe. You know, for kids!
2. Inside Out 2 â Anxiety as a character who gets your brain in a spiraling tizzy? Inspired!
1. Inside Out â This one kicked off the AMAC trend with this exquisitely conceptualized, profound and moving film, which is a true original that holds up nicely nine years later, and holds strong as top-5 Pixar.
Honorable mention: Orion and the Dark, which isnât Pixar, but really wants to be, thanks to its animated characterizations of the Dark, Quiet, Sleep and other otherworldly abstractions.
Performance Worth Watching and Hearing: The ingenuity of Inside Out 2 hinges on its nigh-perfect visualization of Anxiety, paired with Hawkeâs comically frazzled vocal take on the character (who, notably, guzzles caffeine, five energy drinks at a time). Pixar hasnât been this inspired since Forky blew our minds with the existential despair he wrestles with in Toy Story 4.
Memorable Dialogue: Joy breaks our hearts with this all-too-true self-realization: âI donât know how to stop anxiety. Maybe we canât. Maybe this is what happens when you grow up â you feel less joy.â
Sex and Skin: None.
Our Take: Pixar, as you are no doubt aware, offers smarter, more perceptive insights than other films of its ilk. Thatâs why this isnât a spoiler: Anxiety is not the villain here. There is no villain here! The film depicts Anxiety not just as an undeniable reality, but as a key component of a healthy mind. A lesser movie would draw that line and set up a predictable conflict where Joy and Anxiety kung-fu each other over control of Rileyâs brain-console. So without getting into too much detail, Iâll say that Inside Out 2 wisely asserts that achieving harmony is more valuable than exacting control or dominance, and symbolically depicts the value â nay, the necessity â of loving yourself despite your faults. Both Inside Outs chime in the same key, with all their heavily conceptualizations landing on the notion that well-rounded personhood is healthier than someone who either forces themselves to be positive all the time or dwells too much on the negative.
Sure, the sequelâs profound aims seem a little calculated to parrot the weight psychological overtures of its predecessor â Anxiety essentially takes over the role Sadness played in Inside Out â but it still plays out truthfully, meaningfully. You could poke holes in the conceptual fabric of the world building, if youâre a cynic who believes Pixar merely cranked out a sequel for the sake of topping off Disneyâs coffers, and not because it has something new to say. OK, maybe itâs about 49 percent profit-driven, 51 percent adding to the conversation started by the first film, but it successfully plants a new array of blooms to the Inside Out garden of big ideas.
And much like the first movie, Inside Out 2 is wildly funny (the sequence in The Vault, where Riley keeps her deepest, darkest secrets, is a riot), tender and sweet (in its depiction of friendship inside and outside Rileyâs head), and a little bit tearjerky (thereâs no devastating Bing Bong-like moment here, but itâs hard to come to grips with Joyâs diminished role in Rileyâs life without sniffling). Thatâs Pixar doing its Pixar thing, sticking to its core philosophy by skillfully cutting across the demographic spectrum. Is it the result of conservative thinking? Sure. But thatâs the successful Pixar formula, more for better than for worse.
Our Call: STREAM IT. This is the best Pixar outing since Toy Story 4 (and I liked Turning Red and Onward quite a bit).
John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
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