Madagascar 2

It's hard to say if is an improvement or not on the original, but it's certainly a good continuation of the story this time more focused on Alex's origin and life. The animation looks great, the humor is on point of course, and the characters with so much more development. With some great moments is a fun sequel to all ages!

Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, David Schwimmer and Jada Pinkett Smith are back in their animated animal roles which 3 years ago saw their zoo animals being transported to Madagascar in a typical fish out of water tale, where they had to rely on their street smarts and friendship to survive in an environment they do not fully understand. While it's the usual pop-culture jokes and witty one liners that plague recent animated films, there were some gems in that movie, the ones which stuck suck as the crowd favourite penguins stealing the whole show, as well as the madcap rave party tune Move It!

Beginning directly where we last saw Alex the Lion (Stiller), Marty the Zebra (Rock), Melman the Giraffe (Schwimmer) and Gloria the Hippo (Smith), the penguins have finally built a plane that ought to bring our merry crew back to New York, together with Julien the lemur (Sacha Baron Cohen) and his sidekick (Cedric the Entertainer), but of course should that happen, there'll be no sequel to begin with. So we have the crew crash land into the continent Africa, thereby guaranteeing yet another tale of being from the outside, but now having a habitat that's much closer to their natural environment, one which sees the animal types in question grouped together into one reserve for storytelling convenience.

Directed by Eric Darnell and Tom McGrath, who also provided the voice of Skipper the head penguin, the storyline might seem like a poor man's cousin to Disney's The Lion King, what with exiles and alpha-lions battling it out to be king of the habitat. The filmmakers had taken the opportunity to craft the backstory for Alex a little more, so that the main plot of his return to his home could be dwelled upon, with sub plots for the others to fall into place. You have Alex's return and reunion with his parents, with adversary coming from an earlier generation, there's Marty who discovers that he's no longer unique but the same as every other hundredth zebra out there, Glora looking for love with other hippos now that there's no lack of suitors, and Melman fighting his own cowardice to reveal his feelings for Gloria, as well as being appointed the witch doctor for the land.

And if you think that the primary voice cast is already A-list, the film piles on to that list with the likes of the late Bernie Mac voicing Zuba the alpha-lion, Alec Baldwin again in a villainous role as his rival Makunga, and Will.i.am of Black Eyed Peas in a hilarious role of hippo-Casanova Moto Moto (the name's so good you have to say it twice!) The songs department falls up a bit short this time round, though thankfully "Move It!" wasn't conveniently and lazily played ad-nauseam. Given the army of illustrators working on the project, you can't expect quality to drop from its predecessor, though there's nothing new to be injected into a mature presentation.

Despite the plundering of the same old family values / theme / storyline and the importance of establishing strong friendships, this new Madagascar managed to deliver on multiple fronts, joining the ranks of the few whose sequels are superior than the original. The comedy which got piled up here managed to work through the punchlines, leading to a number of characters like the monkeys and even the tough-cookie granny to steal some limelight from the lovable penguins. If you liked the original, then you'e likely to fall in love with this one.

I thought that the first Madagascar had promising characters and a decent premise, but it was very poorly put together. My son, who was 8 or 9 at the time loved the movie, however. We saw the sequel this morning and we both agreed - it was much better than the original. And, since part II begins with a brief summary of part I, there is no need to see the first one to understand what's happening in the new movie. All the main characters are back and there are many new ones as well. Going in, the big question on my mind was "do the penguins play a bigger role in the sequel?"... answer is "Yes, but not much bigger". All in all an enjoyable movie that outshines it's predecessor!

The first Madagascar was a colourful and above average animated movie. I saw its sequel last night for the first time, not sure not to expect, and I was surprised. It actually lives up to the first pretty much (and almost surpasses it), it isn't as zany in terms of humour to its original despite some very clever references, but it has more heart than the first film did. Of course the plot is very predictable and I did notice one or two similarities with the Lion King, and probably slower than pace. But it is well the watch, for a number of reasons. The animation was beautiful and very colourful, even more so than the original. The characters are still great, the penguins were great fun, but Julien was absolutely hilarious here. The voice actors bring a lot of vigour into the film, Jada Pinkett Smith has more to do here, Ben Stiller and Chris Rock provide great comedy and heart and Sacha Baron Cohen is a hoot as Julien. Plus there is a sweet romantic interlude between Melman and Gloria. All in all, a fun sequel that lives up to the first. 7/10 Bethany Cox

The original Madagascar was a break from the typical mold in family animated entertainment; it was fearless, didn't slow down to teach a lesson, and was not afraid of entertaining solely on physical humor. The content was light, but it was so satisfying that it wound up being Dreamwork's second best animated movie of them all—behind Shrek. The zany cast of characters easily exceeds the number of memorable characters in Shrek, and contained more humor and creativity than all of the other Dreamworks animated flicks before and ever since.

In the second installment, you see the writers trying to give the franchise a dosage of heart and sentimentality, which is what made Shrek the instant classic it became. A bit of heart can definitely propel an animated movie into masterpiece status (see Toy Story and Finding Nemo) however this is not the franchise to do it. Madagascar is about the cast and how they interact with each other and the conflict that is presented onto them. While the laughs are definitely here, the attempt for emotion constantly makes this film slows down and keeps it from being a superior installment when placed against the original. That being said, it's still a fun, entertaining, and unpredictable movie that continues the zaniness that made the original a personal guilty pleasure of mine.

In Escape 2 Africa, we follow the New York zoo animals, the psychotic penguins, the monkeys, and the lemur leaders as they unexpectedly are stranded in the middle of Africa. While at first the main four (Marty, Alex, Melman, Gloria) are rather happy at their new environment, they quickly realize that it's not all that it seems, and that their new temporary home is splitting the four apart. In the meantime, the penguins attempt to repair the plane that they accidentally destroyed. The writers did a good job in presenting all sorts of new gags and yet again refrain from referencing pop culture too much (although the Twilight Zone nod was hilarious). But, they couldn't deliver the emotional impact because of one main reason: this franchise wasn't meant to ever slow down in terms of pacing. Like a roller coaster, this movie moves sometimes extremely fast, and then can grind into a halt in the next scene. Lastly the main four don't interact much with each other, but more with the environment. There literally are at least 8 plots happening at once—some of them are good, some of them aren't.

The voice acting remains decent, but there are fewer lines by the original cast, and more from supporting characters and new characters. Bernie Mac, rest in peace, but his performance was rather bland and could have been done by anyone else. Alec Baldwin didn't have much of a chance to lend his comedic skills either. Yet again, the penguins and Sacha Baron Cohen steal every scene they are in, no matter how mediocre the previous scene was. Cohen (as Julien) has an obvious knack for comedy, and delivers every line perfectly for two movies in a row; not bad at all. Ben Stiller had fewer chances at being funny, as they had to handle all the major slower moments. Chris Rock's role was surprisingly limited, especially for someone who did so well in the original.

The one major improvement from the original was the animation, which was crisp, fluid, and flowed better. Surely it's undeniably no Wall-E (Or even 2007's Ratatouille), but it's still respectably an improvement over previous work. The jokes themselves are hit-and-miss like the original; the only difference is this one has more misses. Plus it's the recurring jokes that are missing; the hula girl, feisty tourist, repetitive herd, and lion-dancing bits all didn't elicit much laughter from the audience, nor from me. We just needed much more Julien, and much more penguin-action. Maybe in the future the focus will shift; in the meantime they are just grabbing all the spotlight and attention.

Bottom Line: Exactly what Scrat did to Ice Age: The Meltdown years ago, we have minor/supporting characters becoming the main hit and running the show. While the original four characters take a backseat and add emotion to a franchise that's too fast-paced for this sort of stuff, we have the penguins and Julien taking over the movie and keeping it from being another totally disappointing animated sequel like every straight-to-video Disney sequel, the ugly Shrek sequels, or Ice Age 2. The entertainment level is still magnificent the second time around, but it won't age as well as the first Madagascar did. Leave the heart to Pixar, because those folks have nailed it perfectly for years. Dreamworks can serve as the escapist cinema in terms of animation, but if they continue imitating and try to outdo Pixar, it will just dampen the quality of all their movies. Madagascar 2 is the prime example of this: purely fun and entertaining until it tries to distribute family values. Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa is also proof that those hilarious penguins need their own movie, pretty much immediately.

Yes, right now.