Request: Kung Fu Panda 2

Kung Fu Panda 2

Kung Fu Panda became a pretty big hit for DreamWorks back in 2008. It was a fun little movie with some really nice martial arts and a likable main character voiced by Jack Black. It was one of the few times that I've seen a panda used as a main characters in a movie and it works. People love pandas... maybe a little bit too much since we are always worried about their sex life. But I digress, Po is a character that people initially liked because he was always out of his element and still managed to do whatever he sets out to do. Whether it is becoming one of the Furious Five as the legendary Dragon Warrior or being able to live up to his master Sifu's expectations. He is basically the perennial normal good guy that ends up saving everyone. I felt that this sequel lost some of the charm that made the first one so much fun.

I have a big gripe with this one more than the last one, but it applies to both movies. Po is supposed to be part of a team. We hardly get anything from his team other than Tigress (Angelina Jolie). Jackie Chan, Seth Rogen, Lucy Lui, David Cross and even Dustin Hoffman (my favorite character in the first movie) are hardly in this damn thing. Shen (Gary Oldman) is, to me, a weak antagonist. Sure, he has done some terrible things and all of that jazz, but Tai Lung was a better bad ass. A peacock is not very scary. By the way, talking about misuse of characters... Master Ox and Master Croc are the biggest pussies I've ever seen. Criminally misused.

"I might look cool, but my kung fu is weak."

Now, I have to give props where props are due. The first fight scene at the music place was one of the most entertaining and creative martial arts scenes I have seen in a long time. The music playing hand on hand with the fight. Every time a blow hit, it would become part of the music. It is really something to see. The last "fight" scene with Po and the fireworks is also really good. The visuals throughout this movie were fantastic.

I thought the plot was mostly good. The idea of the old versus the new, industry versus the classical way of doing things, technology versus culture was very well done. The fear for the old ways and the ways of kung fu are really felt by the watcher as you see the carnage that Shen's weapon unleashes. The biggest problem I had with it though is that a cannon is not very useful when you are fighting against one agile martial artist. For a battle against a bunch of people, then fine. This sort of reminded me of the final battle in The Last Samurai where the samurai that are left ride against the mini-gun.

My biggest gripe with the film was the whole Po back story angle. In the first movie it was funny that a goose had a panda as a son. The fact that he was adopted and all of that wasn't touched on that I remember. This time they attach this lame and cliched 'your parents were killed by the bad guy because of a prophecy' crap that we have seen in a million other movies and discover when they first have the nightmare. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to put it together, but they drag this on forever. They could have done something more creative and not wasted so much time on this. What happened was that the main story was sort of lost in the shuffle and characters never develop. Might as well call his team Furious Five Member #3 and so forth. Tigress is the only one that gets some development but only for like 5 seconds.

At the end of the day, this is a fun although darker (why is it that everything has to be darker all the time??) sequel which has some of the charm but never fully realizes its potential. The martial arts are awesome and there are some really cool scenes, but the lack of any character development (even for Shen) except for Po really hurts this film. Is it a bad movie? Not by any means. It's just not that great.

6 out of 10