The Secret Life of Pets 2

RATING: C

The first Secret Life of Pets movie was a fun enough movie, even if it was heavily derivative of other computer animated movies. Still, it had a likable enough premise centering around what our pets do when we're not around. Regardless of what you thought of the movie, it made a lot of money... so therefore a sequel was inevitable.

This movie basically takes three subplots and eventually awkwardly strings them together for the climactic act. For one, Max and Duke's owner Katie gets married and has a kid, thus introducing another new element into their lives; and then they take a trip to a farm, where Max meets a new dog named Rooster (Harrison Ford), and Max will have to learn to stop being so fearful... because apparently he is. Maybe I've forgotten it from the last movie, but I don't remember him being almost like Marlin from Finding Nemo in terms of being scared of the real world; instead, he more resembled Woody from Toy Story in that he only feared being replaced. (Man, these folks just can't stop ripping off Pixar, can they?) 

Elsewhere, Gidget the tiny dog has to rescue Max's favorite chew toy from a house chock-full of cats... and this is where those scenes of "learning how to become a cat" from the trailers come in. And in our third subplot, Snowball the bunny fancies himself as some kind of superhero now. Yup, that's a thing. And as previously stated, all three of these subplots will be driven together somehow in the final act. It's an odd case of attempting too much, but at the same time not really doing anything remarkable.

The bottom line is this sequel is not as good as its predecessor, which is unlikely to be a surprise. Neither of the two movies are overly remarkable, but this one is more oddly written because of the way the "plot" is structured. And while Gidget's subplot is generally fun and amusing (as is Jenny Slate's voice acting for her), both Max and Snowball take a step back in this one. As previously stated, Max's character seems to be a little different in this one. And while it was to be expected that Snowball would be different in this one, the direction it goes is just the wrong kind of silly. Save for when he fights an evil circus monkey near the end, though--that part's fun. Harrison Ford's Rooster is decent enough as a mentor, but feels oddly underused--he's not there for the final act, anyway.

Still, for all the faults this movie has, there is a little fun to be had. There are still a handful of hilarious moments surrounding the pets, such as when Chloe the cat tries to wake up her owner. These guys seem to have a grip on the way animals behave that is realistic enough for the setting they're trying to create, but still with a little embellishment for a cartoon. In both movies, we do see the kind of behavior that we'd expect from some dogs and cats--and what they might say if they could talk.

What you think about this movie will probably depend on what you thought of the first one. If you disliked the first one for being a silly cartoon being derivative of better cartoons, give this a wide berth. If you enjoyed the first for what it was, maybe give this a go but with tempered expectations. Animal lovers are really the audience that is likely to get the most out of this--so long as they're not cynical cinema viewers as well. Ultimately for this viewer it's a passable but also forgettable 90 minutes. Hopefully this will be the last we hear from this franchise, because Illumination in general has proven that they are not good at sequels.