VGFlicks: Jumanji: The Next Level (Part 2)

Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3

The Search for Spencer

Finally, a sign of civilization. It's probably a trap packed
with goons, mooks, and cake-offering merchants.

The team ventures through the desert. On the way, Milo tries to get through to Eddie, who’s too angry at his friend to entertain a conversation. Milo tries to explain that he needed to retire from the business after working so long, but his efforts are in vain. They finally spot a town in the distance, The Oasis, as indicated by the map that only Prof. Oberon can read.

...Does this mean Jumanji: The Next Level counts as a
Christmas movie?

They must have walked all day, because it's the evening when we return to Bethany in the real world. She goes to get Alex Vreeke (Colin Hanks), who knows a lot more about Jumanji. He did remain stuck in the game for 21 years, after all. He’s reticent at first since he now has a family and a daughter, but she manages to convince him to help save the rest of the team.

She's not real, Eddie! Also, I know what you have in mind,
and I doubt Jumanji will let you use Bravestone's, uh,
“equipment” for that, if you see what I mean.

In The Oasis, the players notice Jurgen's army. They enter a bar, the Smoke Stack, where Smolder Bravestone is accosted by a gorgeous woman in a red dress. The archaeologist’s ex says she has a clue for him, but she cannot say it in the bar. She slaps Bravestone to act like she isn’t interested and flees, but in an obvious “follow me” way. Grandpa Eddie, of course, doesn’t make the connection with the “Follow the flame” clue given by Nigel.

The group progresses, encountering Jurgen. The safe containing the Falcon Jewel is there. Jurgen makes a speech while casually tossing pieces of meat to hyenas. A speech about those hyenas’ trainer, whom Jurgen considered a friend. The guy tried to get too close to the Jewel… and now he’s hyena food. Geez, that’s dark. Then, the lights go out, and when they’re back on the key to the safe has disappeared.

What hits the worst about this scene is, after Jurgen throws
the axe and kills Ming (well, Spencer), the avatar's head
literally flies off her shoulders before disappearing.

The warlord yells for the thief, and Eddie, thinking he’s playing right, stops the robber: An Asian woman (Awkwafina), who recognizes Bravestone. But it’s too late, Jurgen’s men pull her aside and shake the key off of her. She tries to explain herself, but sounds more and more like a shy Jewish nerd with breathing issues and no self-esteem. Before the players can rescue the thief, whom they’ve recognized as Spencer, Jurgen throws an axe that disintegrates the player character.

I mean... he did get that far playing the Thief class.
Not bad, he should try Dungeons and Dragons.

Spencer respawns outside of the bar, with two lives left. Hey, he got that far without losing anything, that’s impressive! The rest of the team rejoins him and calls him out on retrieving the game and going back into it – which, in complete fairness to Spencer, he might not have had a choice, that thing messes with people’s minds. But also, he was hoping to be back into the body of Bravestone, where he’d feel strong and courageous – but instead, the game put him in Ming Fleetfoot, a crafty cat burglar and safecraker with a weakness to pollen. A little too close to his normal self. Well, aside from losing his handle.

Fluent in… Animal?? And Glitches, Too?

After Jurgen’s crew has left, the “ex” reunites with Eddie/Bravestone and explains that Jurgen will bring back the Jewel to his stronghold, in the mountains. He will trade it to the Brothers Kababik to create an alliance. For what? Who knows, Jumanji hasn’t thought that far. To get there, the team will need camels. They’ll also need the “desert fruit”. The woman leaves, saying she must return to Switchblade – who shares his name with Bravestone’s new weakness… Martha and Fridge will follow the woman (the “old flame”) to look for the fruit, while Spencer and Milo infiltrate the camel stable. Grandpa Eddie will stand guard. That’s gonna go wrong, I can feel it.

What a conspicuously large fruit.
That's nothing, wait till you learn about its weight.

Martha and Fridge’s quest takes them to a spooky area with a large tree in a pool of glowing liquid. On one branch rests a Jumanji Berry, which they’ll have to pick up. Ruby Roundhouse is the only one with physical skills; so, thinking the water is dangerous, Martha figures out an aerial path using lanterns on the walls, and makes it to the Berry, which she plucks… and then she falls into the water, because this thing is heavy.

Switching back imminent. Too bad I couldn't get any
satisfactory screenshots out of Fridge's very short tenure
as Ruby Roundhouse.

Fridge puts a foot in the water and grabs her hand to help her out, but the water causes them to get blasted away from each other. They realize that they switched avatars – Fridge is now playing Ruby Roundhouse, Martha is in Prof. Oberon. She takes it even worse than the others! Fridge decides to test this athletic body, and goes overboard trying to jump above the pool, causing him to hit the wall and fall in the water. Helped up by Martha, they end up switching back. Hey, maybe that’s why Fridge keeps ending up in the worst avatars; Jumanji knows he’d be careless (or dangerous) otherwise. With the heavy fruit in their possession, they head back.

I don’t think the water is a glitch. Also, for a brief moment, Jack Black was playing Martha, and Karen Gillan was playing Fridge – the only time she gets to act a whole other character, kind of a missed opportunity all things considered when the other three (and, later, Awkwafina) get a lot more to do.

"How's the desert weather? Spat on anyone lately?"

Using Ming’s skills, Spencer picks the lock to enter the stable, with Milo following behind. Turns out that Franklin “Mouse” Finbar’s new skill, Linguistics, allows Milo to speak to animals, and he manages to convince five camels to be their mounts towards Jurgen’s fortress.

"Bravestone! I told you to stay away from my wife!"
"Uh.... My name's not Bravestone, I'm Eddie Gilpin!"
"Yeah, right! Don't you try that with me!"

Unfortunately for them, Eddie attracted the attention of an NPC by going “nothing to see here”. And because the old man has no wisdom and doesn’t know his current strength, it escalated into an all-out brawl where he knocked out fifty guys, so everyone’s in trouble. Worse even, Switchblade, a common gangster archetype dude, has showed up. Eddie runs into the stable, where they climb on their new mounts and flee.

Bazooka Shoots, Everyone Dies.

They catch up with Martha and Fridge outside of town, and Eddie is convinced he must go fight Switchblade. However, while he’s arguing his point (and the others try to talk him out of it), a bazooka blast comes from town and kills the entire group in a massive fireball. Total party kill! The best Eddie can say after they’ve all respawned is a defensive “What?”

Yeah, Eddie is way too hotheaded to be a good Bravestone.

The Mandrils Attack

"The mount I'm on doesn't need to have an opinion!"

During the camel trip, Eddie and Milo finally get to chat. Milo says he needed to retire and spend time with his wife, Eddie snaps back that he’s still mad to have lost the restaurant because he’s a workaholic and would have kept working forever. The camels’ comments only pour oil on that fire, which devolves into a physical fight between Eddie-as-Bravestone and Milo-as-Mouse. This ends as predictably as it could, with Milo getting punched into a rock, crushed, and losing a life. Getting flashbacks to Welcome to the Jungle here.

Everybody hates when the puzzle/RPG/open sandbox
suddenly has a platformer stage.

The journey continues, but the camels stop before Jurgen’s territory. To get there, the players will have to cross a giant chasm with swinging, disconnected rope bridges hanging from… from… what the Hell are they even hanging from, there’s nothing but sky up there! It looks hopeless until Fridge starts to talk like he knows what he’s doing, and realizes that this level is where Prof. Oberon’s Geometry skill comes into play. Fridge will indicate which bridges can be used to cross safely. Finally, he’s getting it! Oberon is the puzzle-solver! Geez, it’s like the game had to re-teach him to use his smarts, like he hasn’t already learned that last time.

Seriously, who let the monkeys loose?

Or, that’s how it should happen, but it won’t be that easy. The bridges begin to move on their own, and to top it off, an army of mandrils attacks. And, of course, Milo the zoology expert talks at a snail’s pace, so he’s way too late to say what has to be done about them. The party ends up split among the bridges, with Martha losing her second life when she gets tossed to the abyss below. Eddie rescues his grandson from more of those damn primates, but his destructive methods end up tossing Spencer off a bridge. Thankfully he lands by Martha, and the two help each other, with Ruby Roundhouse tossing Ming Fleetfoot to safety before making it across herself.

It’s the last stretch. Fridge makes a bad fall and sprains his ankle. Milo crashes through the last bridge and gets stuck. Eddie uses Bravestone’s strength to save his old friend, and the last three make it through. However, the mandrils aren’t done, and they, too, cross the chasm. They surround the team, only to get scared away by a guy who arrives on a black horse.

Pictured: Two player characters, for some reason.
Or because Jumanji decided it could do whatever it wanted.

On the horse is Alex, under the traits of Jefferson “Seaplane” McDonough (Nick Jonas). Just like when the gang met him the first time they went through Jumanji. As for the horse? That’s another player character. Yep! That’s Bethany. It’s confirmed when Milo, using Mouse’s Linguistics, translates the horse’s neighings to teen valley girl lingo. …I swear, the sentences I write when recapping movies sometimes…

WThey're (mostly) ready for the mountain cold.

They’re right at the border of Mount Zhatmire, the island’s snowy mountains. Hey, it’s a video game, I’m used to climates being next to each other without any logic. With his 20 years of experience in this universe, Alex about the mountain area, and where to shop for winter clothes, so he arrived with equipment for everybody.

Jumanji is NOT broken

Milo's illness is never specified. But I think this scene could
have called back to when Milo started talking about "Morris",
their past dishwasher at the restaurant. Maybe with Eddie
going, "You've got the same thing as Morris? Is that why
you mentioned him?"

With this, Eddie and Milo finally have a heart-to-heart. Eddie realizes how much he missed Milo’s friendship, and that they should have repaired that bridge a long time ago. Milo still can’t bring himself to say why he came for a visit, so Eddie guesses; Milo is sick and dying, and he’s trying to depart with his life all sorted out before it’s too late. To think that, had it not been for this crazy adventure, Eddie would have been too proud to listen, and Milo might have just never said it. We can joke all we want about Kevin Hart and Dwayne Johnson portraying these two old men with a lot of comedy, but this scene shows they can still do emotion even within those roles.

The team regroups to plan for the final level. That’s when Fridge pipes up: They’re screwed. Eddie is too impulsive  and likely to fuck up as Bravestone, Milo is way too slow, Spencer is too stressed out to be a good thief, and Fridge hates being the map guy (plus, he’s still healing from that sprained ankle). Thanfully, Fridge falls over backwards and is lucky enough to land near river with a faint green glow. Just like the pond under the tree. He calls everyone else over; all these issues can be resolved by switching around the players and the avatars!

Badass walk out of the water. Followed by a non-badass
"Dammit, that water was friggin' cold!!"

Everybody (minus Martha and Alex) takes a dive into the waters and comes back out in more suited roles. Spencer is back in Bravestone, Fridge is back in Mouse Finbar, Bethany is back in Prof. Oberon (and is happy to be back as the bearded, overweight man, at that!). As for Eddie and Milo, they’re now playing as Ming and Cyclone the horse, respectively. Figures that Milo will be best in a role that doesn’t require talking. (I’m a bit skeeved at Hollywood ONCE AGAIN doing the whole “transforming a black person into an animal”, because that’s waaaaaayyy overdone and if I, as a white guy, feel it’s insulting, I can’t even start to think how much it pisses off actual Black people that this keeps happening in fiction, no matter the medium.)

With everybody back in appropriate bodies, and the new players in ones better suited to them, the assault on Jurgen’s Stronghold can begin. But I feel like they would have never gotten there if everyone could have picked their avatars from the start…

Jumanji is basically an omniscient, reality-warping... thing,
that teaches lessons to people. It transformed into a video game
so it could be more alluring to new generations. It most
definitely CAN make itself appear broken.

See, after watching this film several times, I have my theory: Juamnji is NOT broken, it’s only pretending to be. It’s magical, so technological damage should not do much to it. But the console (and the board game before it) has always ended up teaching lessons to those who played it and survived. It wouldn’t have been able to do so, had everyone picked their favorite in the first place – the tricks it pulled the first time (like making Fridge think Mouse was a bigger guy with the nickname “Moose”, or making Bethany choose “Curvy Professor Shelly”, AKA Sheldon) wouldn’t have worked twice anyway. It just had to include some way to have players go back in the right bodies in time for the grand finale.

Also, I'm convinced that Jumanji has a personal vendetta
against Fridge specifically, due to the athlete dropping a
bowling ball on the console at the end of the previous film.

The way Alex talks about it, the “new” environments have always been there, we just didn’t see them before. It’s only the green water that’s new to him. If Jumanji had been truly broken, it would have displayed real glitches that would have been extra dangerous to the people trapped in it – but that doesn’t happen. In fact, I was kinda disappointed that the movie didn’t go all the way with the concept of a broken Jumanji – but this theory of mine ties it all into a nice little package that also takes into account the game’s status as some sort of trickster mentor.

The gang starts plotting. Eddie, now as Ming Fleetfoot (it’s hilarious seeing Awkwafina playing the part of an old man, hunched and grumpy), goes back to Milo/Cyclone, and that’s when the two get captured by Jurgen’s men. Welp, guess the others will have to save them.

Be back for Part 3!