Critique: Kung Fu Panda 2 (Film) 1/2

Po, both Dragon Warrior and panda, leads the Furious Five to save Gongmeng City for leucitic peacock Shen. Shen had been kicked out decades ago because he and his wolves committed genocide against the pandas, preventing the prophesised ‘warrior of black and white’ from defeating him.

 

*****SPOILERS*****

 

Clever Details

 

Many smart details were included in this film. Lord Shen and Tigress are developed as characters, the film really makes the audience emotionally invested, and the idea of inner peace is played with in a relaxing way (the idea isn’t shoved down our throats).

 

Many of these details relate to Lord Shen.

Lord Shen’s genocide on the pandas is interesting. Their decimated numbers would reflect panda’s endangered status in real life.

Lord Shen, the peacock prince that uses fireworks as weapons. Peacock fans are explosions of colour that are thrown into the air: both these traits are easily attributed to fireworks. ‘What had brought colour and joy could bring darkness and destruction.’ Darkness is the absence of colour, as is white; Shen took the original purpose away from fireworks.

The symbol the wolves wear on their sleeves is very similar to the symbol on the palace’s ceiling. Their design is simplified, more jagged, and follows a different colour scheme. It matches the eyes on Shen’s peacock fan. The similarity gives Shen legitimacy to rule there whilst the differences marks his stamp on Gongmeng City.

 

This film worked hard to make the audience emotionally invested in the characters.

As such, there were fewer funny moments to accommodate this. This change was handled well: this film definitely makes the audience emotionally invested and laugh.

The ending makes the audience happy for Po on two counts. Po returns to Mr Ping and says, “I found my past. I found who I am. I’m your son.” So touching. As the films end, we see a whole bunch of pandas farming. Po isn’t alone!

Tigress tells Ping that Po will be back, “before you can say noodles.” Ping waits for ages as the shot slowly zooms out before sadly whispering, “Noodles.” Heartbreaking.

 

Shifu performs a movement, allowing him to control a falling water droplet.

Po does the inner peace raindrop technique to access his memories. They have a golden hue to them, just like Ping’s memories. It’s a nice shared detail. The fact the technique worked this time felt like an achievement because Po’s attempt to do the inner peace technique on the boat failed miserably.

Po this same technique to control the direction of cannon balls. When Shifu did it, the water ended up exactly where it would have done if not for Shifu’s interference; when Po does it, the cannon balls are redirected. This shows inner peace looks different for everyone, enables different people to achieve different things, that inner peace allows people to respond to different situations in the best possible way.

 

In the first film, Tigress depicted as disciplined, emotionally distant (aside from the odd spark of anger) and focused on kung fu, not fun. But in this film, she comes out her shell.

Po and the Furious Five are having fun. Even Tigress joins in! Having Tigress enjoy life was great to see.

Tigress punched ironwood trees for twenty years so she feels nothing (physically). Po makes a joke about her feeling anything emotionally, either. This made Tigress look sad.

Po says, “The hardcore don’t understand.” Then Tigress hugs Po, saying, “The hardcore does understand.” The feels!

 

Three miscellaneous details must be mentioned.

Grand Master Oogway, who died in the previous film, isn’t forgotten. Master Shifu now holds the staff of, and wears green like, Grand Master Oogway did. Oogway is used as the Dreamworks fisher. A lovely way to bring him back.

The Soothsayer says to Po, “You know so little. Mind, you were little.” Using ‘little’ in both sentences but with them meaning different things is always great work.

Po says, “Skadoosh” when he does the final attack that stopped Shen’s armada in their tracks. He said this when he did his final attack on Tai Lung in the first film. A small callback to let the audience know that the good guys have won, that their struggles have been worth it.

 

 

Animation

 

The way movement was animated was top-notch.

In regards to Shen, there are two points. The first is that Shen, whilst fighting, sweeps his train to trip people and spreads it out as a fan to shock people: both are great, creative details. The second is the animation of Shen’s history is moved by cogs, seen underneath their gauze-patterned objects.

Viper’s fighting animation was awesome. It was good in the previous film but this film elevated it to another level. Considering she’s the forgotten member of the Furious Five, seeing her receive this attention was great.

At the musician village, the movements of the fight were timed with the rhythm of the music. Usually background music is made to work around the noises of the fight, but this music was enhanced by the fight which in turn enhanced the fight.

 

There are also purely visual details to appreciate.

            Some are subtle, like how Shen’s blades are engraved so that they look like feathers. Some are beautiful, like how Thundering Rhino’s horn and sledgehammer are carved with the same beautiful pattern.

When Tigress growls, her nose wrinkles in the same way a real tiger’s would. So that’s an excellent detail on the animators’ part.

When Tigress goes to life Po out the water, we can see all the individual hairs on his body. Plus the hair was clearly wet. To achieve either of these things in incredible in animation.

Both films start with a legend animated in a different style from the rest of the film. Also, the intro styles are different in both films. It gives each film a unique flavour. In the first film, it is a dream of a fictitious legendary event; in the second, it is recounting a historical atrocity that would go down in legend. So even how these intros are classified as legends in different.

 

 

Humour

 

Master Shifu, whilst being largely absent from this film, has many funny moments. Like when Master Shifu’s busy looking for inner peace, a quest shattered when Po comes crashing in. Shifu slumping in utter defeat was hilarious.

When Shifu says some seek inner peace by not tasting food, Po worriedly begs, “OR?!” Yes, it’s funny because Po loves his food, but it’s more than that. Po learnt kung fu via food so for him to learn an advanced kung fu principle (inner peace) without food would be difficult.

Shifu says some people learn inner peace through great pain, going into great length about how terrible his pain was when Po was chosen as Dragon Warrior. This rant is funny. He goes as far as to say Po’s chosen day was the worse day of Shifu’s life.

 

There’s plenty of word play.

Shen tells the kung fu masters guarding Gongmeng City that “It’s your parting gift. It will part you. Part of you here, part of you there.”

Po says, “Thundering Rhino… the Valey of Woes.” Shifu butts on, “He’s dead.” Po whispers, “Woah.” The use of homonyms for comedic affect is always appreciated.

 

Po and the Furious Five his inside a dragon costume provided much humour.

Po pulls in wolves via the mouth, they get a beating all the way through, and then they roll out the tail-end: it looks like they’re eaten, digested then passed.

When Po and co are in the dragon costume, the shot takes an arial view. The dragon moving around the streets, gobbling some things but avoiding others, looks like Pacman.

 

Prison many funnies.

If the wolves entered the prison, Monkey was meant to make a bird call. The wolves come in and Monkey doesn’t warn them; when Po chastises him, Monkey quietly does the bird call.

Po always gives dramatic metaphors, like ‘prison of fear behind bars of hopelessness’. Clever. But in this case it was hilarious because he was talking to people behind bars in an actual prison.

Po trying to get Master Croc and Ox out of jail with the shoving and spinning door was a fun scene. The fast pace, combined with the constant shifting of viewpoint character positions, added an adrenaline to make the scene more intense.

 

Other examples of humour outside of a broader theme also exist.

Mantis says, “I never had problems with my dad. That’s probably because Mum ate his head.” Mantis says, “I didn’t think I’d die like this. I thought a nice girl would eat my head.”

The Soothsayer is my favourite character in this film. She predicts Shen will get hurt before plucking a feather; she predicts Shen will get angry, then bites his expensive clothing. Pointing to the one-eyed wolf, she says, “Even with his poor eyesight he can see the truth.”

Some detail came from tiny details. Mr Ping turns Po being the Dragon Warrior into promotional material for the noodle shop. The big bad wolves made sounds like little dogs when they were hit (going against expectation). Baby Po ate all the bamboo furniture.