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The Incredibles 2, directed by Brad Bird, does the impossible: the film is the perfect sequel to an already incredible starting point.
A sequel outing featuring the titular super-family, the Parr’s, is led by family man Bob and stay-at-home mom Helen, appearing as the typical American family. The parents have three kids, Dash, Violet, and Jack-Jack, to keep up with. The day-to-day of family life is only complicated by the family’s superhero outings.
Incredibles 2 picks up immediately where the first film leaves off: the Incredibles springing into action to fight their latest nemesis, the Underminer. After a catastrophic attempt at defending their home city, the Incredibles are forced underground once again, and are sought out by tech developer Winston Deavor and his sister Evelyn for a campaign to bring supers back into the light.
Whereas the first film centered mainly on the action driven by Mr. Incredible, this film is absolutely Elastigirl’s film. Due to Bob Parr’s destructive track record, the Deavor’s elect to go with the safer Helen for several action-filled missions to improve the super image. The action in this movie is visually stunning, even more so than the first Incredibles. Elastigirl has such a creative powerset that the filmmakers could frame shots for her doing things that Mr. Incredible simply couldn’t do. At one point, she has to slow a bullet train completely by herself and the ingenuity she employs is quite spectacular.
Ironically, one of the hallmarks of Incredibles 2 is its treatment of pedestrian life as a backdrop for superhero action. Because Helen Parr has to work as a covert operative, Bob has to become a stay-at-home dad to take care of the family in her absence. His struggle in transitioning to the caretaker life is truly compelling. His restlessness combined with his forced optimism for his wife paints a very human tale, despite all his super-strength. The audience also observes his struggles of being a parent, which play out in a very relatable way, even with the family’s superpowered conditions.
Bob starts off overly confident that his wife’s homely endeavors over the past 16 years are just an easy day job, though soon learns that Helen has been the more super of the two parents all along. These “Mr. Mom” antics are only escalated by the emergence of superpowers in their infant child, Jack-Jack. The baby provides much comic relief for the film with the spontaneous manifestation of his powers. His major scene in the film involves his spat with a trash-digging raccoon. Jack-Jack’s powers develop with complete randomness, quickly cycling through teleportation, self-replication, laser eyes, and many more to take out the ring-tailed caper.
Incredibles 2 is a foray of superhero action through the aesthetic of the Golden Age of comics, also the writing is spectacular; the film carries the worldbuilding done by the previous film even further. The score by Michael Giacchino perfectly sets the scene for an incredible movie for the whole family. The Incredibles 2 receives a 95% rating.