Moana 2 is a watered down rehash of the first film. Are you welcome?

On the fictional island of Motunui in the South Pacific, a variety of tween girls known as “Moanabe” (pronounced “Mo-wannabe”) now exist. These eager, sometimes awkward young ladies stand for a queen who is also well known to the rest of the world: the faithful seafarer Moana, teenage heroine of the magnificent 2016 film of that title. After saving her people from famine by reversing an ancient curse on the goddess of nature, Moana (again voiced by Auli’i Cravalho) has gone from being the eldest daughter of the island tribe’s leader to essentially being her father’s – Chief. Children look up to her, village elders seek her advice, and her return from a three-day solo voyage to a nearby island is celebrated as if it were a major national holiday.

Moana 2 is something of a Moanabe himself, eight years younger than his wildly popular predecessor (Moana achieved universal acclaim and more than $600 million worldwide, and remains a fan favorite on streaming) and set out to recreate, if not its unique charm, then at least its most recognizable gestures and stylistic choices. Scene by scene, there’s nothing to miss in this lushly animated ode to exploration, teamwork and foraging, especially if you’re a parent of young children looking for a fun family outing. But for all its humility and polish, Moana 2 seems more like a consumer product, in a subtle but unmistakable way, than the first film did. (Given that both were hyper-promoted Disney releases, it might be more accurate to say that the sequel carries its inevitable status as a mass-produced consumer good less lightly than the original). Moana have been sanded down or worse recycled as nostalgic callbacks.

Part of the problem is that, like every other film in such a large franchise, the title character can’t help but start from the position of top dog. When we first meet her, the slightly older Moana – about three years have passed in the world of the films since the previous chapter – has none of the self-doubt and insecurity that plagued her during her first adventure. She’s a confident, idealistic, powerful young woman—a state of being that, while certainly optimal for her, isn’t the most conducive to a satisfying character arc for the audience. Instead of watching as our heroine acquires the competence and knowledge she needs to carry out an extremely difficult task, this time we are presented with an almost superheroic protagonist, a kind of Moses who already knows that she can part the waters and walk between them (although in her case she mainly does it to entertain her little sister).

True, Moana will later encounter obstacles that call for her to tap into even deeper reserves of that quintessential Disney heroine fuel: self-belief. But now that she’s BFFs with a demigod, the shape-shifting trickster god Maui (voiced, as in the original, by Dwayne Johnson), Moana has a get-out-of-jail-free card of sorts. It is not difficult to subtract from one deus ex machina rescue when you are an actual deus who regularly exchange high-fives with the sea.

Once again, the sea voyage at the center of the film is set in motion by a battle between the natural and supernatural worlds. This time, an angry god has placed a curse on a distant island that must be lifted so that the world’s scattered people can find each other. Moana is summoned to undertake this dangerous task by her wayfinding ancestors, including her late grandmother Tala (Rachel House). At her parents’ insistence, Moana brings along a team this time, an unlikely trio of misfits: Moni (Huālalai Chung), a teenage boy who idolizes Maui; Loto (Rose Matafeo), a quirky (and possibly slightly queer-coded) teenage girl who is a goblin with a tool kit; and Kele (David Fane), a grumpy old farmer who hates the sea and can’t even swim. They’re accompanied by not one, but two cute animal sidekicks who also return from the first film: Moana’s intellectually challenged chicken Hei Hei (Alan Tudyk) and her pet pig Pua.

Wild things begin to happen as the travelers’ raft approaches the cursed island of Motufetu. A kind of floating mountain turns out to be the shell of a colossal clam, inside which travelers are trapped for a while, Pinocchio-style. There’s an extended encounter with the Kakamora, a species Moana also encountered last time – basically they’re sentient coconuts, animated in a minion-like fashion, whose specialty is piracy on the high seas. Later, the crew will meet the mysterious underworld goddess Matangi (Awhimai Fraser).

This middle section is too action-packed to be completely coherent; every other scene contains a near capsize or other brush with maritime disaster, and the antagonists keep piling up. But the ship’s banter is often hilarious, and the frame always pops with bold, warm colors and witty visual ideas. For example, Maui’s many tattoos (still) have the ability to move around his body like animated characters, their movements and interactions sometimes providing commentary on the main story. When new characters are introduced, like a grim-looking neon-green blobfish that secretes a powerful but not deadly nerve agent, the designs are reliably clever – but no creature stays with you like the bling-hoarding crab voiced by Jemaine Clement in Moana (who returns this time only for a brief non-musical cameo).

Moana 2 is directed by the team of David Derrick Jr., Jason Hand and Dana Ledoux Miller, all of whom make their debut from a script by Miller and original Moana screenwriter Jared Bush. The project was intended to be made as a TV series, a lineage that can remain visible in the crowded middle section.

Although it shows some symptoms of secondary inflammation, Moana 2 appears to have been made with enthusiasm, love and impressive attention to detail by a group of talented artists, many of whom have cultural roots in the South Pacific. The score is once again composed by Mark Mancina in collaboration with Samoan-born, New Zealand-raised songwriter Opetaia Foa’i, but this time without the assistance of Lin-Manuel Miranda, who wrote or co-wrote the most memorable songs in the 2016 film. The Grammy-winning composing team of Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear (The Unofficial Bridgerton Musical) contribute songs that fit nicely into their dramatic slots without ever leaving as deep an impression as the original’s “How Far I’ll Go,” “Shiny,” “You’re Welcome” or “We Know the Way” ( an uplifting seafaring anthem most sung in Samoan and Tokelauan). The new film’s big numbers are virtuosically belted by the golden-throated Cravalho and pleasantly sung by Rock, whose incarnation of the conceited but needy Maui may be the best work of his wrestling-turned-acting-turned-wrestling-again career. But I would have been hard pressed to hum a single tune on the soundtrack half an hour after stepping out of the theater.

A midcredits teaser subtly hints that there may be another ancient myth-related crisis in the future for Moana and her crew to take on. And true to Disney’s newly established tradition of repurposing its animated classics as live-action … less than classics, a remake of the first film is already underway, also starring Johnson and set for release in the summer of 2026. young Polynesian adventurer (be please don’t, as she insists in the new film with a fierce look, call her a princess) may still be dreaming of how far she’ll go, but audiences will have to make their own choice if they are ready for another ride.