Trolls World Tour – A Passable Animated Sequel

The first Trolls film came out of nowhere to become a hit, not necessarily a box office one, rather one that has spawned plenty of merchandise and a Netflix kid’s television series. With that, it was only inevitable that the film would get a sequel. Whether or not one is actually necessary is debatable but nevertheless, here’s Trolls World Tour. The film is unfortunately a pure cash grab though whether or it will be successful remains to be seen/ With the majority of movie theatres closed around the world due to the coronavirus saga, Universal Pictures took a chance by taking an unprecedented step by releasing the film on digital and VOD simultaneously with its theatrical release (the latter did not happen). The only big question remaining is if the film is worth the money. If providing a distraction for kids is the goal, this may do the trick. For anyone else, they will be treated to a dull experience that not even bright colors and flashy performances can save.

Trolls World Tour sees Poppy (Kendrick), Branch (Timberlake) and the rest of our band of lovable trolls find out that they are not alone. They are part of one of six different Troll tribes scattered over six different lands devoted to six different kinds of music: Funk, Country, Techno, Classical, Pop and Rock. Queen Barb (Bloom) of the Rock trolls had a different idea, wanting to destroy all the other types of music and leaving rock to rule the land. It would be up to the comically optimistic Poppy, Branch, and the rest of the gang to unite the trolls against Barb before it was too late. To do so, they would embark on an adventure throughout the land, encountering other trolls that were much different than them but this was just an opportunity to parade their various quirks in a gimmicky way (while also creating merchandise and/or new intellectual property off of them).

Just like any children’s film, Trolls World Tour also has a message, a pretty obvious one that the film goes out of its way to beat us over the head with. As a result, the story suffered as it only existed to reinforce that message. Over time, the film gets dull and it’ll be easy to lose interest in a story that didn’t seem to know where it wanted to go. The film pretty much forgot about the character of Queen Barb who was surprisingly thin. While the film did have its moments, be it some cute moments and entertaining musical numbers, it will mostly all feel like a waste of time. In terms of animation, the level is impressive. Dreamworks has consistently proven themselves in the field of animation, again delivering a crisp and highly-colorful world (though the colors may be too much for some) full of detailed characters and environments.

The writing may be mediocre at best but the Trolls World Tour all-star voice cast do their best to breathe some life into the proceedings while most of it not all of them can actually sing (though this was already common knowledge). Kendrick and Timberlake were the best part of the film as they again bring their all in delivering energetic performances as Poppy and Branch though World Tour was more of a Poppy film. Meanwhile, the rest of the cast were all solid while the new cast followed suit though no one truly stood out, not even Bloom as Barb (which was more due to the writing than anything else).

In the end, the release strategy for Trolls World Tour is definitely an interesting one but the film itself unfortunately misses the mark but will still provide a passable distraction in a pinch.

*still courtesy of Dreamworks*

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.