JUMANJI : THE NEXT LEVEL (2019)

JUMANJI : THE NEXT LEVEL (2019)

In this one the gang is split up for the most part but decides to get together, only Spencer (played by Alex Wolf) never shows up. That leaves Martha (played by Morgan Turner), Bethany (Madison Iseman from Goosebumps 2), and Anthony (played by Ser’Darius Blain) to try and find out what happened. Upon going to Spencer’s house, they surmise that he’s gone back into the video game Jumanji. Yeah, the one that they all swore to not go back into unless the profits from the first movie called for a new script to be written.

In this adventure the game is completely different and rather than just having jungle animals to contend with, this one actually features a villain named Jurgen The Brutal (The Hound from Game Of Thrones) with a supporting viking army. There are snow scenes, desert scenes, of course jungle scenes and a few other surprises thrown in. The mix really works and I feel like this adventure does forward the series to a new level, however adding some characters did feel a bit unnecessary and didn’t bring all that much to the table. I did like Danny DeVito and Danny Glover’s introduction but the writing in the first half of this thing really struggles to get out of the gate, relying on cliche gimmicks and over-saturation of old people forgetfulness to feed the humor. This was a bit off putting for me because the movie already has a whacky premise to begin with introducing different real life video game characters to the main characters persona’s. Example - Jack Black (who plays Professor Sheldon Oberon) being himself with the mind and words of a teenage girl is already funny enough.

Fortunately the 2^nd half of the movie is quite well written after gaining it’s footing and even takes time to pull at our heartstrings a bit. Using the subjects of reconciliation and thinking about what each person in the situation is going through it almost feels like you could rate this movie in halves rather than as a whole.

Special effects wise and pacing wise, this thing is pretty strong and might be about as good as the first installment. This movie also had me questioning if Karen Gillan’s character Ruby Roundhouse could beat Nebula (from Guardians Of The Galaxy) in a fight. Then I remembered that Nebula is a robot and could put herself back together, while Ruby only had 3 lives.

Overall this series is very enjoyable and there is no taking away from that, but I didn’t feel this installment was as good as the 2^nd one. I give Jumanji : The Next Level a 5 out of 7.

 GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF HARTBEAT PRODUCTIONS AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY.  

Please check out the link below by clicking on the picture. Because no one should die buttonless. Until next time.