computer-animated comedy film based on Rovio Entertainment's Angry Birds video game series, produced by Columbia Pictures, Rovio Animation, and Sony Pictures Animation,[N 1] and distributed by Sony Pictures Releasing. The sequel to The Angry Birds Movie (2016), the film was directed by Thurop Van Orman and co-directed by John Rice (in their directorial debuts) from a screenplay by Peter Ackerman, Eyal Podell, and Jonathon E. Stewart. Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad, Danny McBride, Maya Rudolph, Tony Hale, Bill Hader, and Peter Dinklage reprise their roles from the first film, with newcomers Leslie Jones, Rachel Bloom, Awkwafina, Sterling K. Brown, Eugenio Derbez, JoJo Siwa, and Brooklynn Prince joining the ensemble cast. In the film, the birds are forced to team up with the pigs when an advanced weapon threatens both Bird and Piggy Islands.
Production on a sequel to The Angry Birds Movie began in August 2016 with the goal being that the sequel improves upon the first film. New ideas for the film were conceived with the premise being that the birds and pigs work together to save themselves, which typically does not happen in most Angry Birds games. New characters for the film were announced in March 2019 along with new cast members. Heitor Pereira returned to compose the film's score with artists such as Kesha and Luke Combs contributing tracks for the film.[5][6][7]
The film was theatrically released on August 2, 2019 in the United Kingdom and Ireland, and in the United States on August 13. It has grossed $154 million worldwide and received mixed reviews,[8] although many critics considered it an improvement over its predecessor. It is also the best reviewed animated film based on a video game on Rotten Tomatoes, as of 2020.[9]
Plot
Three years[N 2] after the Birds destroyed Pig City as retribution for the Pigs' theft of their eggs,[N 3] Red now protects Bird Island from pigs with Chuck and Bomb. The pigs, led by King Leonard Mudbeard, are in a prank war against the birds after Piggy Island is rebuilt. Eventually, a giant ice ball from a nearby island called Eagle Island hits the sea near Piggy Island, forcing the pigs to seek a truce with the birds. Zeta, the leader of Eagle Island, is fed up with her frozen surroundings and wants to occupy the two islands by shooting ice balls from a super-weapon to force their inhabitants to evacuate. Meanwhile, three hatchlings, one of whom is Terence and Matilda's daughter Zoe, plan to reenact a battle using Zoe's three egg siblings, but the eggs drift out to sea by accident. They set sail to retrieve them, but a whale blows them into a cloud. They manage to get them down after inflating Zoe into the air only to misplace them again.
Chuck and Bomb force Red to join them in a speed dating activity, where Red meets Chuck's sister Silver, an engineering student who deems Red incompatible.[N 4] Mudbeard visits Red and convinces him to ally with the pigs. They recruit Chuck, Bomb, Silver and Bird Island's retired hero, Mighty Eagle. Silver was demonstrating a new invention, Super String, a very strong string, when she was recruited. A meeting in Mighty Eagle's cave is disrupted when an ice ball from Zeta's super-weapon hits Eagle Mountain, which alarms the other birds living on Bird Island.
As the team travels to Eagle Island by submarine, Red assures the other birds that they do not need to evacuate. Once there, Mighty Eagle confesses that Zeta was once his fiancée but he abandoned her due to cowardice before he flies away. Red insists on fighting alone but Silver decides to follow him instead. They intrude the base from the mouth of the weapon only to be captured. The other team members disguise themselves as an eagle and grab a key card to get into the base.
Elsewhere, the three hatchlings finally find the eggs on a small island, guarded by a snake. They defeat it and plan to drift back to Bird Island, but arrive at Piggy Island by mistake and are greeted by three piglets.
As Red and Silver are frozen to inflatables, Zeta tells them her plan to fire ice balls filled with lava at both islands, then demonstrates her newly upgraded cannon. Red, regretting not telling the birds to evacuate, admits his selfish desire to be liked by everyone to Silver, who comforts him and frees them both. The duo reunite with the rest of the team and Red gives up leadership to Silver, who establishes a plan to destroy the weapon.
Red and Silver put themselves inside an ice ball and roll it down the spiraling ammunition track of Zeta's super weapon, with their allies working to sever the track by reaching and pulling a switch so that the ball would fly off and crush the cannon, but the plan fails and the whole team are confronted by Zeta and her guards, giving her a chance to fire the weapon.
Mighty Eagle (whose real name is revealed as Ethan) arrives and makes a desperate attempt to stop Zeta by apologizing to her. Zeta brushes him off, revealing that her servant Debbie is their daughter. While Zeta is distracted, Chuck ties up the weapon using Silver's super-string, which catches and decelerates the lava balls after Zeta fires them. As the string breaks, the hatchlings and the piglets passing by Eagle Island help grasp it. The lava balls slide back into the weapon, destroying it and the whole base. Everyone escapes, and Mighty Eagle protects Debbie from being crushed by a metal plate, redeeming himself to her and Zeta.
Mighty Eagle and Zeta get married on Bird Island, with Red as the chief witness. Afterwards, Red credits Silver and the entire team for saving the islands, and finds himself being even more beloved for his honesty and selflessness. Meanwhile, Silver and Red start a relationship.
The hatchlings put the eggs back home, but three snakelets hatch instead. The injured mother snake comes and exchanges the babies with them, only for the three new babies to drift out to sea again, much to the hatchlings’ dismay.
Cast
- Jason Sudeikis as Red
- Josh Gad as Chuck
- Leslie Jones as Zeta
- Bill Hader as King Leonard Mudbeard
- Rachel Bloom as Silver
- Awkwafina as Courtney
- Sterling K. Brown as Garry
- Eugenio Derbez as Glenn
- Tiffany Haddish as Debbie
- Danny McBride as Bomb
- Peter Dinklage as Ethan "Mighty" Eagle
- Pete Davidson as Jerry
- Zach Woods as Carl
- Maya Rudolph as Matilda
- Tony Hale as Mime
- Dove Cameron as Ella
- JoJo Siwa as:
- Jay
- Kira
- Brooklynn Prince as Zoe
- Genesis Tennon as ViVi
- Alma Varsano as Sam-Sam
- Faith Margaret Kidman-Urban as Beatrice/Sophie
- Sunday Rose Kidman-Urban as Lily/Isla
- Gaten Matarazzo as Bubba
- Lil Rel Howery as Alex
- Nicki Minaj as Pinky
- Beck Bennett as Hank/Brad
- Anthony Padilla as Hal
- Colleen Ballinger as Roxanne
- David Dobrik as Axel
- Mason Ramsey as Oliver
- Alex Hirsch as Steve
Production
Development
A sequel to The Angry Birds Movie was announced in August 2016.[10] It was directed by The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack and Home: Adventures with Tip & Oh creator Thurop Van Orman, co-directed by John Rice, and written by Peter Ackerman. John Cohen returned from The Angry Birds Movie to serve as producer, with animation again handled by Sony Pictures Imageworks.[11] Imageworks' sister studio Sony Pictures Animation released the film under their banner, despite having dropped out of co-producing the project beforehand and had not co-produced the first film either.[12]
In the summer of 2017, production designer Pete Oswald stated that the sequel would be more of an adventure movie that introduces new characters and locations into the world first established in The Angry Birds Movie. While he was not in a position to offer further details about the plot and characters, which remained unknown until the months before the film's release, he expressed hope that it would be a better film than the first installment.[5]
The creative decision to break from the games' source material and have the Birds and Pigs end their conflict and form an alliance to face a greater threat was one that was made out of a desire to surprise audiences with a new experience with the same characters, as well as attempt to outdo what was accomplished in the first film with an unprecedented level of creative freedom available.[13] Josh Gad stated that the production team went forward with such idea because it was not only an "ingenious" one, but also because they felt it would feel most appropriate in light of the increasingly polarized political climate at the time, as people who disagree on significant issues struggle to find common ground.[6]
Casting and character reveals
In April 2018, the majority of the voice cast was announced. Sudeikis, Gad, McBride, Rudolph, Hader, and Dinklage will reprise their roles from the first film. Jones will voice a new female villain,[14][15] revealed to be Zeta in the teaser trailer.[16] In December 2018, Nicki Minaj joined the cast of the film.[17] Upon its release, the teaser trailer briefly revealed that Hal, a green boomerang bird from the first film, will return in the sequel.[18] Anthony Padilla would return to voice Hal.[19] The following day, producer John Cohen announced in a tweet that Awkwafina will voice Courtney, the first named female pig in the Angry Birds franchise that briefly appeared in the teaser.[20]
When the film's first full trailer was released on March 27, 2019, more details about the sequel's characters and their voice roles were revealed. Among several new characters confirmed to appear in the movie was Silver, a bird first introduced in the Angry Birds 2 game.[21] In June, People revealed the identity of the white bird living with Zeta in the teaser trailer as Debbie, voiced by Tiffany Haddish who was one of several voice actors not listed in the initial casting.[22] Later that month, the film's final trailer revealed that Terence, a large red bird from the first film, will appear without Sean Penn reprising his voice role, and Nolan North replacing Penn.[23]
Animation
Unlike the previous film, the sequel was co-produced with Rovio Animation and Sony Pictures Animation. While it was possible to reuse assets from the first film instead of starting from scratch, significant work was needed to make them compatible with new technological systems that were adopted in the past few years. The animators faced great challenges attempting to create more realistic feather systems for the Birds' plumage, even with the help of Sony Pictures Imageworks' existing feather system that was first used in Stuart Little, especially when it came to designing the villain Zeta, the hardest character to animate in the film with over 1,000 controls, a very complex face structure and a tall, flexible torso. The team also faced a demanding task in designing visual effects for snow, ice, water and lava for the film and production was also affected by the unavailability of certain animators who were being used to complete Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse months prior, as well as the amount of time lost due to Sony moving the film's release date ahead by more than half a month.[24]
Music
Heitor Pereira, who previously composed the first film, returned to compose the score of The Angry Birds Movie 2. On July 25, 2019, American singer-songwriter Kesha released her song "Best Day" for the film as a single.[25] Days later, Luke Combs released a song, "Let's Just Be Friends" for the film as a single as well.[7] Both singles were played in the film's end credits.
Also included on the film was Giacomo Puccini’s aria “Un bel di vedremo” from his opera Madama Butterfly.[26] However this was credited as “Opera”, by Heitor Pereira in the soundtrack.
Release
Marketing
Sony released a teaser trailer and poster for the film on February 21, 2019.[18] A month later, the film's first full trailer was released.[27] followed by the final trailer in late June.[28]
As with the first film, Sony also attempted to connect the film to certain social causes while marketing it, leveraging the premise of the threat of worlds being frozen to call attention to urgent action on climate change[29] and using Silver, who is depicted as a technical expert, as a model to inspire more young women to pursue STEM disciplines.[30]
During the releases of two of its previous summer blockbuster films, Men in Black: International and Spider-Man: Far From Home, Sony further promoted The Angry Birds Movie 2 by releasing Angry Birds-themed parody posters of them.[31][32]
The film was theatrically released in the United States on August 13, 2019, coinciding with the 10th anniversary of the debut of the original Angry Birds game. The film was originally scheduled to be released on September 20, 2019,[33] but was moved two weeks from its original release date to September 6, 2019,[34] then three weeks to August 16, 2019,[35] then two days earlier to August 14, 2019.[36] and finally to one day earlier to August 13, 2019. It was released two weeks earlier on August 2 in the United Kingdom and Ireland.[37]
The film's North American theatrical release was preceded by Hair Love, a Kickstarter campaign short created by Matthew A. Cherry and Bruce W. Smith.[38]
Video game
A cooperative tie-in video game, The Angry Birds Movie 4 VR: Under Pressure, was released exclusively for the PlayStation 4's PlayStation VR system[39] on August 6, 2019.[40] The game takes place aboard the Piggy Gadget Lab that the main characters use to get to Eagle Island for the film's climatic confrontation.
Home media
The Angry Birds Movie 2 was released on digital and Movies Anywhere by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment on October 29, 2019, with Blu-ray, Ultra HD Blu-ray, and DVD releases following on November 12. All releases included an animated short film entitled Live Stream. The Ultra HD Blu-ray version was the first release of its kind to be IMAX enhanced.[41]
Reception
Box office
The Angry Birds Movie 2 has grossed $41.7 million in the United States and Canada, and $112.9 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $154.6 million.[3][4]
In the United States and Canada, the film was projected to gross $16–18 million from 3,800 theaters over its first six days of release.[42] It made $2.6 million on its first day, ranking fifth and $1.7 million on its second.[43] It ended up making $16.2 million over the six-day span (including an opening weekend of $10.6 million), finishing in fifth. It was less than a third of the first film's $38.1 million debut, and was blamed on the marketing making the sequel look the same as the first, as well as the crowded marketplace.[44]
Critical response
On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 73% based on 106 reviews, with an average rating of 5.7/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "Like its non-aerodynamic title characters, The Angry Birds Movie 2 takes improbable yet delightfully entertaining flight, landing humorous hits along the way."[45] According to Rotten Tomatoes, it is the best-reviewed film adaptation of a video game on their website and the highest score for an animated video game movie and is rated higher than the first film.[N 5][46][47] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 60 out of 100, based on 23 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[8] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale, the same score earned by its predecessor. It received an average 4 out of 5 stars and 72% "definite recommend" from parents and kids under 12 on PostTrak.[43]
Guy Lodge of Variety summarized his review with: "Perked up by some ingenious slapstick and Leslie Jones' inspired voice work, this gumball-bright sequel to 2016's game-based spinoff is another unexpected pleasure."[48] Sandie Chen of Common Sense Media gave the film a 3/5 stating, "Silly pranks, an ace voice cast, and a super-team mission storyline make this fast-paced sequel more fun than the original. It's a predictably well-intentioned second installment, in which the birds and pigs are forced to work together against an even more formidable foe. It also shows how Red's insecurity lingers, since he was only recently accepted and respected. Although some of the movie's jokes and sight gags are recycled (because, frankly, it's unlikely that little kids will ever get tired of naked piggy-butt jokes), the addition of the third mystery island is interesting enough to keep younger audiences guessing."[49] Bob Hoose of Plugged In praised the humor, stating, "Surprisingly, the whole frenetic animated escapade ends up being pretty entertaining and funny. Even adults will, at some point, snort out an unexpected chortle."[50] Simon Thompson of IGN gave the film a 6/10 stating, "The Angry Birds Movie 2 does what you’d expect it to do, some nice touches move the franchise forward, but it could have dug deeper as some other franchises have. The whole is less than the sum of its parts, but those parts just about make the grade. Kids or a certain age will love it, and ultimately that’s all that really matters here."[51]
Accolades
| Award | Date | Category | Recipient(s) | Result | Ref. | People's Choice Awards | November 10, 2019 | Favorite Animated Star | Awkwafina | Nominated | [52] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Favorite Family Movie | Nominated | ||||||||||
| Nickelodeon's Kids' Choice Awards | May 2, 2020 | Favorite Animated Movie | Nominated | [53] | |||||||
| Favorite Male Voice for an Animated Movie | Josh Gad (sharing his award with Frozen II) | Won |
Soundtrack
The film's soundtrack, titled The Angry Birds Movie 4: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack was released on August 9, 2019 only in digital format and is available to download through payment platforms.
It includes two songs previously unreleased and original from the movie: Luke Combs' "Let's Just Be Friends" and Kesha's "Best Day (Angry Birds 2 Remix)". The rest of the album consists of a compilation of eighteen classical pop music hits from the 1960s to 2000s decades, in different genres and various artists.
- "Best Day (Angry Birds 2 Remix)" - Kesha - 2:59
- "Holding Out for a Hero" - Bonnie Tyler - 4:21
- "All by Myself" (Single Edit) - Eric Carmen - 4:22
- "Margaritaville" - Jimmy Buffett - 3:20
- "Get Ready (Orchestral Mix)" - 2 Unlimited
- "Angel" - Sarah McLachlan - 4:00
- "Lovin' You" - Minnie Riperton - 3:20
- "Space Oddity" - David Bowie
- "Turn Down for What" - DJ Snake & Lil Jon - 3:33
- "I Don't Want to Wait" - Paula Cole - 4:07
- "Eye of the Tiger" - Survivor
- "Fireball" (feat. John Ryan) - Pitbull - 3:56
- "Axel F" - Harold Faltermeyer - 3:01
- "Hello" - Lionel Richie - 4:14
- "Baby Shark" - Pinkfong
- "I'm Too Sexy" - Right Said Fred - 4:14
- "The Final Countdown" - Europe - 4:03
- "Happy Together" - The Turtles - 2:50
- "Let's Just Be Friends" - Luke Combs - 3:21
- "We Run This" - Missy Elliott - 3:24
Possible sequel
On April 30, 2020, Geeks WorldWide exclusively reported that a third film is in development at Sony, with production planned for 2021.[54][better source needed]
Notes
- ^ Sony Pictures Animation was not involved with the first Angry Birds Movie.
- ^ A newspaper clipping in Red's house indicates that the events of The Angry Birds Movie occurred on its release date, implying that the films are set in the present day.
- ^ As depicted in The Angry Birds Movie.
- ^ Chuck and Bomb also encounter Dahlia and Willow, two birds who first appeared in the 2014 spin-off game Angry Birds Stella.
- ^ In their Video Game Movies Ranked Worst to Best list, Rotten Tomatoes only included theatrically-released films with scores based on more than 20 reviews.
References
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- ^ http://www.cinelinx.com/movie-news/blu-crew/the-angry-birds-movie-2-flies-onto-4k-ultra-hd-this-november/
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- ^ https://www.imdb.com/event/ev0000530/2019/1?ref_=ttawd_ev_2
- ^ https://deadline.com/2020/02/avengers-end-game-leads-nickelodeons-kids-choice-awards-nominations-billie-eilish-taylor-swift-chance-the-rapper-full-list-1202859259/
- ^
External links
| Wikimedia Commons has media related to The Angry Birds Movie 4 |
| Wikiquote has quotations related to: The Angry Birds Movie 4 |
- Official website at Sony Pictures
- The Angry Birds Movie 4 on IMDb