Movie Review: Jumanji: The Next Level

Spencer, Fridge, Martha and Bethany are back in a whole new adventure as Bravestone, Oberon, Roundhouse and Finbar - and this time, they have special guests.

Of all movies to get a sequel, I wouldn't have expected Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, a film I reviewed this year, to have a sequel, yet here we are. And I'll be honest, I enjoyed it about as much! Not quite "as much", but really close.

Basic story: We open a year after the previous film; everyone's life has taken a new turn. Spencer's own life isn't doing so well, as he has broken up with Martha since the events of the previous film. The holidays are coming; this movie opened in theaters on December 13th, 2019, and the story also begins on December 13th, 2019. That is an awesome idea. The team has plans to meet and celebrate, but Spencer is missing. They go to his home and are greeted by Spencer's grandfather Eddie, played by Danny DeVito, healing from a recent operation at his daughter and grandson's home. See, he was in a video game movie this year, even if it wasn't Detective Pikachu! The Spencer household also welcomes another guest - Milo (played by Danny Glover), Eddie's business partner in a restaurant they owned 15 years prior before Milo retired, souring the two older men's relationship.

Turns out, Spencer kept the pieces of the old Jumanji game console, and feeling like it was the only thing that had given him purpose in life, he has willingly repaired and gone back into it, to feel like Doctor Smolder Bravestone again. His friends decide to go in and rescue him, but the two elderly men also get sucked in. And if they were hoping to work with the knowledge they gained in the previous adventure, well, tough cookies - save for one, they're not in the same avatars as before...

I'm gonna stop there before spoiling too much. To me, the strength of a good sequel is that it builds on what was set up previously and explores new ideas with the concept, without taking away the feel and noteworthy details of the original. The element of surprise is gone with Jumanji: The Next Level, as it's the same base idea as in Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle. They more than make up for it, though, with the introduction of new characters.

Eddie and Milo bring their own baggage to the plot, and the film fills in the blanks about their relationship pretty fast. A lot of the comedy, this time around, is the young adults having to explain the outlandish situation to these two old men, who have no basis of what video games are, much less "avatars" and "powers" and "abilities" and "levels" and "whathaveyous", and who thus start with an even greater disadvantage than the group in the previous film. If you've ever tried to explain video games to a grandparent, you can definitely relate!

I was sold this movie on a somewhat fake premise; the fact that Jumanji was rebuilt as a faulty version of its former self was never a secret in promotional material. I guess I had false hopes that the film would play around more with the concept of glitches and things "not being quite right" inside the game's world, but I didn't feel cheated in the end either. To compensate, the new avatars added to the game fill up the cast nicely, while all returning avatars have new strengths and weaknesses as well, leading to new possibilities for both action scenes and moments of comedy. Special mention to Awkwafina, playing expert burglar Ming Fleetfoot in Jumanji.

The island itself is also more diverse and populated; whereas the island of the first film had nothing but jungle and mountains with one village, here we see deserts and snowy peaks as well, with implications of tribes living on the island along with more towns. And yes, the movie has a couple twists up its sleeve, and I'm doing my damndest not to spoil any of them - though some of them are easy to guess ahead.

Overall, still a great viewing experience, and one that complements its predecessor well. I definitely recommend it. Time (and box-office results) will tell if the people behind these films will go for a Round 3, but I certainly hope so if they can make a sequel as good as this one turned out to be.