{"id":1046443,"date":"2026-01-17T20:26:44","date_gmt":"2026-01-17T20:26:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.polygon.com\/?p=485444"},"modified":"2026-01-17T20:26:44","modified_gmt":"2026-01-17T20:26:44","slug":"moana-2-adds-one-good-song-to-the-disney-canon-but-not-much-else","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/moana-2-adds-one-good-song-to-the-disney-canon-but-not-much-else\/","title":{"rendered":"Moana 2 adds one good song to the Disney canon, but not much else"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Moana
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Moana<\/em> grew on me. I can\u2019t say I loved Disney\u2019s Pacific Islander musical<\/a> at first blush \u2014 when it originally came out in 2016, it felt vibrant, yet overstuffed. But as the film\u2019s songs permeated the zeitgeist, I returned to the movie with an ear for Lin-Manuel Miranda\u2019s rousing, rat-a-tat lyrics and the deep history vibrating through Opetaia Foa\u2018i\u2019s drum-backed Samoan- and Tokelauan-language tunes. And then, it all cohered. As with any great musical, the film was <\/em>the soundtrack.<\/p>\n

Moana 2<\/em><\/a> may grow on me as well \u2014 frankly, my feelings for it could only go up from where they started. It\u2019s been less than a day since I saw the long-awaited sequel (Disney screened the film for press just 17 hours ago), but unlike with the overwhelming let-me-hear-that-again rush of experiencing Moana<\/em> for the first time, I don\u2019t have the lingering gut feeling that I’ve missed something. In the end, Moana 2<\/em> is a vehicle for one banger, a feel-good throwback, and a few songs we\u2019ll never talk about again, which doesn\u2019t feel like enough for a brand-new Moana<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Most musicals don\u2019t get sequels. Why would they, when they can be restaged<\/a>, rewatched, or replayed? The ones that do get the sequel treatment generally either lean on jukebox bona fides, to some success (Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again<\/em><\/a>, now with more ABBA!) or immediately flop into nonexistence. (RIP Annie 2: Miss Hannigan\u2019s Revenge<\/em><\/a>.) But Moana 2<\/em> averts disaster, thanks to a new songwriting duo that throws everything at the wall.<\/p>\n

\"Moana<\/p>\n

Abigail Barlow, a pop singer-songwriter who has hit big on TikTok<\/a>, and Emily Bear, a Grammy- and Emmy-winning piano prodigy<\/a> and prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of Quincy Jones, succeed Miranda with youthful energy and a reverence for the previous film. (Which makes sense: Both women would have been in their teens when Moana<\/em> hit theaters.) But whereas Miranda\u2019s songs drove the original\u2019s emotional arc, Barlow and Bear\u2019s tracks race to keep up with a disjointed script that takes literal shortcuts to get Moana from her South Pacific home island, Motunui, to a mystical underwater mountain ravaged by a god\u2019s curse. <\/p>\n

Conceived as a series for Disney Plus<\/a>, then eventually reworked into a feature film, the sequel has more in common with the direct-to-video output of the now defunct Disneytoon Studios<\/a> than it has with the unwieldy sequel ambition of Frozen 2<\/em><\/a>. (Sidebar: \u201cInto the Unknown\u201d good!<\/a>) I don\u2019t hold the pivot from TV to film against Walt Disney Animation \u2014 after all, David Lynch turned a scrapped show into Mulholland Drive<\/em>. But in relation to a damn near musical masterpiece, Moana 2<\/em> comes off like Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas<\/em>, a sidequel with more of the same and a few minor new additions. (Although with somehow less character work than Disney\u2019s Aladdin and the King of Thieves<\/em>?) <\/p>\n

Like those DTV sequels, Moana 2<\/em> adds tons of new characters, all of whom are introduced in \u201cWe\u2019re Back,\u201d<\/a> a jaunty substitute for Moana<\/em>\u2019s opening number, \u201cWhere You Are.\u201d<\/a> When we pick back up with teenage chieftain Moana (Auli\u2018i Cravalho), she\u2019s the star of Motunui, and everyone in the village is fawning over her, complete with cosplay from a group of Moana-lookalike kids Maui (Dwayne Johnson) casually dubs \u201cMoanabees.\u201d But Hamilton<\/em> star Christopher Jackson is decidedly not back to lend his vocals to Moana\u2019s dad, Tui (voiced by Temuera Morrison in dialogue scenes), and with him goes a narrative point of view for the new movie. \u201cWhere You Are\u201d set the stakes for Moana\u2019s adventure beyond the reef in Moana<\/em>. \u201cWe\u2019re Back\u201d is a victory lap for Disney Plus\u2019 most-streamed movie of all time<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Three<\/p>\n

Barlow and Bear nail one thing: the foregrounding of Moana and Cravalho in the music. Moana anchors the ensemble-driven \u201cWe\u2019re Back,\u201d and later takes over lead vocals from Miranda on a redux of \u201cWe Know the Way\u201d<\/a> from the first movie. She\u2019s the Wayfinder now, Oceania\u2019s true leader, and she has the lung capacity to prove it. Her big song, \u201cBeyond,\u201d<\/a> feels like a totally serviceable pop hit for Cravalho, who belts hard enough to ensure the track\u2019s place on Disney Radio for all eternity.<\/p>\n

The movie\u2019s odd pacing dampens the effect of Cravalho\u2019s powerhouse vocals. Screenwriters Jared Bush and Dana Ledoux Miller spend so much time with Moana talking about how she needs to set sail (again) before she finally sets sail (again) that \u201cBeyond\u201d feels like a bit of a chore. And the story rarely supports Moana\u2019s empowerment the way the music does. She\u2019s a mortal pitted against godly activity, and she can\u2019t actually make waves (ahem<\/em>) against her supernatural enemies. So she\u2019s constantly screwing up, begging the ocean for help, or learning new lessons from characters whose power she can\u2019t touch. But she\u2019s very good at singing about being powerful.<\/p>\n

The big surprise of Moana 2<\/em> is a song that feels completely detached from pretty much everything else around it in terms of style or story. Partway through her expedition, Moana meets magical bat-lady Matangi (Awhimai Fraser, the voice of Elsa in the M\u0101ori edition of Frozen<\/em>), who has all the makings of a classic Disney villain. Matangi\u2019s number, \u201cGet Lost,\u201d<\/a> is a fiery pop tune with a Motown spine, which Fraser wails like there\u2019s no tomorrow. <\/p>\n

\n
\n