40% or more of this movie is choreographed group movement (I won't say dancing because sometimes it doesn't have music) or terrible musical numbers that spoof popular songs but change the lyrics in an amateurish way to pertain to the characters in the movie. The main character even gets a freestyle rap in... Ohh, did I accidentally change the channel? Is this a live-action 2021 movie or a bad 90s cartoon?
It's pathetic that while this musical mess is going on the characters watching it are snapping or swaying along like it's so good. You're trying too hard. Just stop.
30% of the movie is woke virtue signalling. They repeatedly, crassly, and directly continuously state how it's messed up women don't have as many opportunites as men, how sexism is bad, how there's systematic racism, how it's wrong to grope women... Was the script written by a ultra-liberal children or an out-of-touch high school teacher or what?
Then they imply that society has changed and now people consider all that stuff bad. Is it implying that the first movie was miogynistic and culturally backwards? Uhh... I didn't see Eddie Murphy groping women or denying women their rights in the first movie. How is this relevant or necessary? It's not on both counts.
Now we can talk about the shrimp larva of a plot. Basically Eddy Murphy's character has a son and we meet the son.
That's the whole plot. It's not about anything in particular because there are many storylines, none developed beyond the outlines, none of them logical, and all regressing at some point:
1. Fish out of water trope? The son and his family are from the hood and they go live in this African king's palace. Except the son's not really very hood, knows how to behave himself appropriately when going into an interview, and quickly settles into the princely life. He doesn't play the role like a poor boy but like a middle class person.
The mom is a little bit more exaggerated and urban but she disappears for most of the movie. He also has an uncle of the same persuasion but he only comes out near the end. All of these characters drive the royals up the wall but are reconciled with them at the end and become close friends with no explanation.
2. Poor guy suddenly becomes rich trope? He's (supposedly) poor, but not really. He wants to get a job for the sake of his dignity. His king father comes to get him. At first he doesn't want to go. Then he sees money and gold and wants to go. Once he's there he decides he doesn't care about money or luxury and wants to go back. Once he goes back he cares about money again and wants to return... Ad nausem.
3. Love story: Rehashes the same plot from the first movie. Except at first he wants to marry the shallow girl because she's hot. Then he talks to some other girl for a week and wants to marry her... If he could fall in love with a girl he barely knows in a week and he's 30 wouldn't he have done it by then?
4. Son is needed to ascend to the throne: They say a son is needed to ascend to the throne and never explain why. Kind of because some other guy wants to attack Wakanda or whatever their country is called if there's no male heir - for no reason. It's forgotten at the end.
If you're a huge, huge fan of the original, the only redeeming quality is the cameos. All of the main characters and even some minor characters who appeared in the first movie show up again.
I've seen a lot of movies, but this is truly shameful and pathetic and I don't hesitate to say it is one of the worst movies I have ever seen. It's barely a movie. More like a series of tik tok shorts badly sewn together.
Ohh, and no, it's not funny.
Honourable Mentions: Yes, I hate Chariots of Fire (1981) with a passion, but I much prefer it to this movie. At least it had ONE good scene.
