Will's Watches Vol. 63: Inside Out 2
Inside Out 2 (2024), HOTD S2 Ep. 2, The Boys S4 Ep. 4, The Acolyte Ep. 4, Titanic, and more
We’re back with another edition of Will’s Watches, where I don’t sell wrist watches, but I do sell movie and TV reviews, for FREE! Please subscribe below if you aren’t already and share with your friends and I’ll give you a crisp high-five! Also feel free to give my Instagram a follow HERE.
Time to take a trip back to childhood. It feels like Pixar has been on a downward trend lately, does Inside Out 2 get us back on track?
Spoiler Free Section:
Inside Out 2 (2024):
The first Inside Out (2015) was awesome. I was a big fan. Some ideas on screen you see and just think “dang that’s creative,” and that movie was one of them. Was very interested to see if the sequel would take the Cars 2 route (bad) or the Toy Story 2 route (incredible).
This one is pretty dang good. It’s doing numbers at the Box Office, already passing Dune 2 as the highest grossing movie of the year. In my opinion, I don’t think it is as good as the first one, but it still has a lot of merit. The best part about this one, the last one, and Pixar movies in general, is they are also enjoyable for adults. It even feels like with some of this you can’t fully appreciate the message it is trying to convey unless you’re a little older, which is why they do so well with the whole family.
Throughout the sequel, Riley is a growing teen about to enter high school, so new emotions start to appear with Envy, Embarrassment, Ennui (kind of vague, it is basically the boredom/chill/sarcasm emotion) and the main addition to the movie, Anxiety. Maya Hawke does a great job as Anxiety and really steals the show.
The main conflict this time around stems from the Belief System: a little lake below the Emotion HQ filled with important memories that create Riley’s Sense of Self. When the “Puberty Alarm” goes off and the new emotions come in, the OG emotions have to go on a journey to help Riley retrieve her old Sense of Self and run into a bunch of metaphorical parts of the mind just like the previous movie.
I really did enjoy this. Helps that Studio Movie Grill accidentally gave us a full bottle of wine to watch (although they didn’t accept my free ticket pass I got from them trying to give me a seizure during Challengers, not cool). Had a few moments where I was genuinely moved and liked where they were going. Decided I had to leave it below 4 stars because it’s not a film I would rush to watch again.
I do wish we got a little bit more of the emotions in other character’s heads, that was one of the funniest parts of the first. Honestly think there is a primo opportunity here to make a PG-13 or R-Rated movie/show with the same emotion characters but for adults. I’m picturing Joy, Anxiety, and Sadness in a three way battle for the controls on a night out at the bars, that type of thing.
TL;DR: Very good and wholesome, what you would expect from this type of movie. Not as good as the first one for me and doesn’t crack the top tier of Pixar, but leaves you feeling good as it should.
Ranking: 3.5 stars (79 raw score)
Inside Trivia 2: An early draft of the screenplay introduced the following new color-coded emotions: Freedom (white), Love (magenta), Passion (cyan), and Strength (black). Later drafts replaced these with Anxiety (orange), Embarrassment (pink), Ennui (indigo), and Envy (turquoise).
Word Around the Kitchen:
I don’t know what this is for. But it can’t be for nothing. Or it could.
Missed opportunity to name this movie 2MILE. I thought the first one was kind of garbage despite the incredibly effective marketing strategy of having people sit behind cameras at sporting events and creepily smile.
I hope this is good. Colin Farrell in a fat suit for a whole season, how could it not be? Rumors of Robat Battinbat (official Robert Pattinson Batman nickname, don’t get it twisted) showing up would be ideal and would be majority of the reason that I watch.
RIP Donald Sutherland, I know him best from The Hunger Games but I know he was in so much more.
I don’t care about this movie or even know anything about it at all. I just need to know how Netflix is making money on movies with a budget of this size. More ammo for my theory that a lot of movie budgets are ballooned for some sort of money laundering scheme. Usually a movie’s actual reported budget is only half at MINIMUM of what it needs to break even given marketing costs. Someone explain it to me.
Extra Bites:
See below for the other content I’ve been watching lately. As always, all my movie reviews go up first on my Letterboxd account. To keep it simple, the four categories here are: Absolute Cinema (incredible content), Would Watch Again (good stuff, recommend), Meh (it’s fine), Madame Web (it’s terrible)
The Acolyte Ep. 3 (2024)
Better! Still not great, but better! I don’t know how much I liked it as a whole but the last minute of the episode was awesome. But the pacing in this is dreadful, shouldn’t have to wait until the very end to finally get something exciting and then just cut it off. I don’t like how we got a Wookie Jedi for only two seconds, and a lot of people are bringing up canon issues with Ki Adi Mundi (big weird phallic shaped head man). I just feel like we’re moving towards an ending where this big bad guy is actually just some random dude (or just the only cast member who wasn’t in that scene), not a sith, and everything will be conveniently resolved as if nothing happened by the end. I hope that is not where we’re going, but that’s how it feels.
Verdict: Meh
MINOR SPOILERS: House of the Dragon Season 2 Episode 2 (2024)
Just an FYI that I am really debating just going full spoilers here going forward, so if you don’t want that tell me and if not I’m going to assume it’s okay. Great episode, definitely a step down from Episode 1, but that’s not a bad thing. Totally thought we were getting a coffin flop this episode. Credit A-Riddles, this is the first episode I’ve ever liked Otto Hightower. That slow side-eye was iconic. Aegon I understand you’re mad but you really didn’t have to destroy Viserys’ cool stone city he built. If I died and my son destroyed my lego batmobile I’d freak out. Also, I genuinely don’t know how Criston Cole can get worse as a character, dude dropped the ball and then just tried to blame Arryk? You’re the worst. Allicent Hightower too. The worst. But I am happy with the development that happened to Criston at the end of the episode, because it’s such a dumb idea. That guy is a moron and is a subtraction by addition, Team Black members rejoice! The twins deserved better.
Verdict: Would Watch Again
The Boys Season 4 Episode 4 (2024)
Has to be Antony Starr’s best performance as Homelander yet, and that’s saying something. Just absolutely INSANE acting from the man doing some diabolical stuff. It’s hard to convey how consistently great he has been in this role. There was so much in this episode, Firecracker and Sister Sage’s additions have been so impactful to the plot. In other news, got some good theories going around in THIS LEAGUE (trademarked group text name) about what’s going on with Butcher, HML if you’re interested. And shout out to The Deep, just killing the dumb comic relief role like no other.
Verdict: Absolute Cinema
This week’s edition of “What? You haven’t seen that before???”:
Titanic (1997)
So off the top I want to be clear I have seen most of this before. Definitely seen the back half with the ship sinking probably 20 times. But I had never watched this all the way through from the beginning to end and I don’t think I realized that until Noah put it on and then walked upstairs so I just sat there and watched. I never realized how much the “My Heart Will Go On” theme sounds like the score from Avatar. I have to admit, I was actually got hit with the emotional sledgehammer with Jack and Rose at the end which I was not expecting. Billy Zane is just really Billy Zane’ing it up in this, maybe the most Billy Zane any character has even Billy Zane’d. It baffles me the efforts they went through to recreate the ship, the attention to detail, just some really great stuff. Bonus note: I stuck my hand in the water they said was as cold as the Titanic water at the Ripley’s Believe It Or Not museum in San Antonio when I was a child, so I have firsthand experience that the water was in fact very cold.
Verdict: Absolute Cinema
Coming Soon:
I don’t know, but I did make a purchase for a new movie pass and am taking my allegiance to AMC. If they go out of business after my first movie, we will know that I am in fact the problem. I will not be getting a Cookie Shake. RIP Alamo (until you come back my sweet prince).
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SPOILER SECTION
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Inside Out 2 (2024):
Despite being a sequel, they still brought some fresh creative stuff
not sure if the literal Stream of Consciousness was in the first film, but I enjoyed that
the vault that holds all of Riley’s secrets had some fun moments
loved the “Sarchasm” that opened when Riley was sarcastic for the first time
we also get the “Brainstorm” a literal storm producing various lightbulbs representing ideas that Riley is getting
mainly, there is the “Belief System” which creates Riley’s sense of self through different memories the emotions throw down there
starts off with “I’m a good person” until anxiety gets so focused on making the team and everyone liking Riley until it changes to “I’m not good enough”
in the end, Joy takes it out entirely and her belief system continually changes, showing she’s evolving as a growing kid to be more complex, not everything is sunshine and rainbows, and she has a lot of beliefs that make up who she is
I like the concept that not only is Riley growing up, but the emotions are growing up too. They evolve, maintaining their original purpose and intent but learn that not everything is black and white the older you get