The Addams Family 2

The Addams Family 2 is a 2021 computer-animated supernatural black comedy road film directed by Greg Tiernan and Conrad Vernon, co-directed by Laura Brousseau and Kevin Pavlovic, written by Dan Hernandez, Benji Samit, Ben Queen, and Susanna Fogel with a story by Hernandez and Samit, and based on the characters created by Charles Addams. Serving as a sequel to the 2019 film, the film features the voices of Oscar Isaac, Charlize Theron, Chloë Grace Moretz, Nick Kroll, Javon Walton (replacing Finn Wolfhard), Snoop Dogg, Bette Midler, and Bill Hader.

It was theatrically and digitally released in the United States by United Artists Releasing and internationally by Universal Pictures on October 1, 2021 in the United States and Canada, due to the COVID-19 pandemic and rising cases of the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant.

Plot
Morticia and Gomez are distraught that their children are growing up, skipping family dinners, and overly consumed with "scream time". To reclaim their bond, they decide to cram Wednesday, Pugsley, Uncle Fester, and the crew into their haunted camper and hit the road for one last miserable family vacation. Their adventure across the United States takes them out of their element and into run-ins with their cousin Itt and other kooky characters.

Why They're Unhappy to See You Again

 * 1) Hotel Transylvania 3 already had a concept about a macabre group going on vacation, making this film a pretty egregious rip-off. Also, the road trip plot that this movie follows has been used in many other movies that came before this.
 * 2) *However, not only it copied the premise of the third film, but also the fact that this sequel is done as an attempt to cash in on Hotel Transylvania’s fourth and final film, Transformania which is released on Amazon Prime video three months after this movie was released, being January 14, 2022.
 * 3) The film makes heavy use of very bright strobe effects, particularly near the end, making it seem like the filmmakers completely forgot about the Incredibles 2 incident three years back. However, unlike what happened with films such as The Rise of Skywalker, Cruella, and the aforementioned Incredibles 2, no warnings were placed outside theaters, which could've been bad for photosensitive viewers unaware of these scenes.
 * 4) The humor essentially makes the film feel like an r/fellowkids post, including a "Squad Goals" joke and direct shoutouts to Amazon Prime, Snapchat, and Billie Eilish.
 * 5) The main conflict that Wednesday may not be an Addams is insanely predictable where once the conflict arises, the viewer knows beat-for-beat how it'll play out, especially since during Fester's flashback where he juggles Wednesday with other babies, you can literally see Wednesday in the cot marked 'Addams' .
 * 6) While Javon 'Wanna' Walton gives a decent performance, the way they recast Pugsley is laughably noticeable, as both Walton and Finn Wolfhard's voices are highly different.
 * 7) Cyrus Strange is a generic twist villain and laughably predictable. While Bill Hader does a decent job voicing him, it gets boring at times, thus making Cyrus Strange not only predictable, but a rather less intimidating villain.
 * 8) Has absolutely zero faithfulness to the source material from Charles Addams.
 * 9) Uncle Fester turning into an octopus, while a good idea on paper, is not executed well, due to the fact that it did not build up suspense at all. The fact that the said idea didn't show up until the final act doesn't help either.
 * 10) The subplot with Fester trying to help Pugsley get a girlfriend adds little to nothing to the story.
 * 11) Unnecessary product placement for Progressive which also did a commercial to promote this film.
 * 12) Much like the first film, Cousin Itt doesn't serve any purpose to the story, making his role feel like a glorified cameo.
 * 13) At one point, it's implied that Wednesday murdered Mustela, which is extremely dark, even for an Addams Family movie.
 * 14) * Granted, one of the reasons why The Addams Family media in general were beloved is because of its use of dark themes in it such as torture (except in the 1973 and 1992 series in which, due to the restrictions on violence on TV at the time), but even then, they were meant to be for laughs and no one died such as when Wednesday electrified Pugsley on the electric chair in the original film, Pugsley survived. But in this case, it seems to take it way too far with murder since the aforementioned media didn't even have murder at all either.
 * 15) Still questionable casting choices, such as Snoop Dogg reprising his role as Cousin Itt. In which he is only used for a song only.
 * 16) There's a joke regarding social distancing which could be considered insulting towards everyone affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
 * 17) A lazy dance party ending that you can see in many modern movies, again.
 * 18) Almost all of the characters are still flanderized in this film and still unlikable. While Morticia Addams has noticeably improved in this film and that Uncle Fester and Grandmama aren't flanderized, the same cannot be said for the rest of the Addams Family, especially Pugsley, Wednesday, and Gomez
 * 19) The art style is still bland since it tries to mimic the old The Addams Family, but falls flat since it still did not give out anything interesting.
 * 20) While the animation is good and the character designs for The Addams Family are still good, the rest of the human characters still looks very unsettling and uncanny, just like the first film (Though they were improved a bit).
 * 21) Still poor references and jokes.
 * 22) A few of the family members are still flanderized.
 * 23) Both Pugsley and Wednesday still look like they're depressed and are on drugs, not to mention how their designs still translate weirdly into CGI, especially with Wednesday looking less like a human and more like an anthropomorphic thumb.
 * 24) This film can get easily boring depending on your view, mostly due to the slow pacing.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) The animation is still good, and the character designs for The Addams Family are faithfully translated from Charles Addams' 1938 art style (despite the fact that the said art style still didn't give off any interesting vibes), and the designs of the other human characters outside the Addams are thankfully improved a bit. This is because it is still done by Nitrogen Studios, who also did work for Sausage Party.
 * 2) The voice acting is still decent, like the first one (even if some of them, like Snoop Dogg as Cousin Itt, are questionable).
 * 3) Mustela is a very entertaining character thanks to Wallace Shawn's performance.
 * 4) The final battle scene is alright.
 * 5) There are some funny moments here and there, such as Gomez revealing his hairbeing a toupee near the ending.
 * 6) There are some faithful moments to the source material.
 * 7) The concept of the Addams family going on vacation is interesting despite being poorly-executed.
 * 8) Similar to the first film, Uncle Fester and Grandmama still aren't heavily flanderized. Additionally, Morticia has noticeably improved in this film since, instead of not having Wednesday do anything with the outside world, she means well and cares about Wednesday.
 * 9) The soundtrack from the Danna brothers is good.

Reception
The Addams Family 2 received negative reviews from critics (even worse reviews than the first film from 2019) who criticized the humor and story. On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 20% based on 35 reviews, with an average rating of 4.7/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Altogether ooky, and not in a good way.". Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 39 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". On IMDb, it has a rating of 5.3/10.

Box office
As of December 5, 2021, The Addams Family 2 has grossed $56.5 million in the United States and Canada, and $53.8 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $110.2 million.

In the United States and Canada, The Addams Family 2 was released alongside Venom: Let There Be Carnage and The Many Saints of Newark, and was projected to gross $15–17 million from 4,207 theaters in its opening weekend. The film made $5.5 million on its first day, including $550,000 from Thursday night previews. It went on to debut to $17.3 million, finishing second, behind Let There Be Carnage. The film dropped 42% in its second weekend to $10 million, finishing third.

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