Inside Out 2

Story

Thirteen-year-old Riley (voice of Kensington Tallman) is smart, kind and an excellent hockey player. Her parents and her main emotions – Joy (voice of Amy Poehler), Disgust (voice of Liza Lapira), Anger (voice of Lewis Black), Fear (voice of Tony Hale) and Sadness (voice of Phyllis Smith) – have done a great job looking out for her and helping to shape the person she is becoming.

The high school hockey coach watches Riley and her best friends Grace (voice of Grace Lu) and Bree (voice of Sumayyah Nuriddin-Green) do some fancy goal scoring to win a championship game. The coach personally invites them to attend a hockey camp with the high school team she coaches. Riley is thrilled because she’ll finally meet her hero, Valentina (voice of Lilimar), a hockey player she has admired for ages. But as luck would have it, puberty hits Riley the night before the hockey camp. She awakens feeling emotional and distressed.

Puberty brings new emotions – Anxiety (voice of Maya Hawke), Ennui (voice of Adele Exarchopoulos), Embarrassment (voice Paul Walter Hauser) and Envy (voice of Ayo Edebiri). Joy and the others must try to work out the roles these new emotions will play in the command centre. Anxiety is sure that she’s best to guide Riley through the hockey camp. She’s equally sure that if Joy is in charge, Riley will have no friends left in high school. As Anxiety and Joy try to help Riley navigate the camp introductions, it becomes clear that Anxiety knows what she’s doing. She and the new emotions take control of the console, locking Joy and the others in a bottle and sending them off to a vault.

While Anxiety staffs the controls with help from Ennui and Envy, Joy and the others must escape from the vault, travel to the farthest reaches of Riley’s brain to retrieve her original sense of self and re-establish it before Anxiety can change her into someone she’s not. With Anxiety out of control and Riley making some serious mistakes, the emotions must find a way to work together before it’s too late.

Themes

Peer pressure; anxiety; puberty; emotional instability; fears of failing, being inadequate, being lonely and not fitting in

Violence

Inside Out 2 has some violence. For example:

Anger punches Fear.
Envy smashes Anger on the head with a baseball bat.
A wrecking ball blasts through a window and nearly hits Joy.
The emotional headquarters is torn apart by explosions and a demolition crew.
A sofa is destroyed by a chainsaw, and a cup of tea is knocked out of a character’s hand.
Joy and Anxiety fight over Riley’s previous beliefs.
Anger begs others, ‘Please kill me’.
A character breaks open a jar that Joy and the others are trapped in by smashing through the top.
Anger uses dynamite to blast their way out of a vault they’re trapped in.
A mop handle hits several police officers.
A police officer is hit by a door, an officer’s legs are accidentally handcuffed together, another officer slips in coffee, some are dragged, and then all the officers are locked in another vault.
Anger visualises punching Anxiety so hard that she flies through a window and down into a chasm.
Sadness gets pummelled with memory balls as she’s trying to make her way up a tube. The balls continue to bang into her until there’s too much pressure and they all burst through the tunnel (along with Sadness) into the control room.
A stream suddenly drops off and a huge chasm opens, transforming the stream into a raging waterfall. Joy and the other emotions struggle to get off the vegetable they’re floating on before they plummet over the edge.
Disgust slaps Fear in the face.
Sadness is imprisoned in a jar.
Characters shatter a large screen by throwing a chair at it.
Lightbulb ideas fall from the sky during a brainstorm. Joy uses a bat to smash as many ideas as she can, while other characters try to hold onto the balloon they’re riding.
Anger is hit in the face by ideas.
Joy and the others are caught up in an intense swirling storm. They fall but Fear saves them all with his emergency parachute.
Anxiety destroys the tunnel Joy and the others are hoping to use to get back to headquarters. Large tubes crash down around them.
Anger grabs a character and aggressively pulls random items out of its mouth.
Joy and the other emotions blow up a mountain of bad memories and travel through Riley’s brain back to headquarters on this tsunami of unfortunate moments.

Sexual references

Inside Out 2 has some sexual references. For example:

Riley’s puberty is announced with a glowing red alarm. Joy catapults to the farthest reaches of Riley’s brain in the hope of turning it off. This doesn’t work.
Riley’s mother tries to mention how Riley’s body is changing but she’s quickly shut down by Riley’s uncharacteristically emotional response.
On ‘Mount Crushmore’, presidential carvings have been replaced by the faces of boys.

Alcohol, drugs and other substances

Inside Out 2 shows some use of substances. For example, Anxiety consumes a lot of energy drinks.

Nudity and sexual activity

Inside Out 2 has some nudity and sexual activity. For example, there’s a video game character that Riley secretly thinks is gorgeous. He has a well-toned physique, and his costume reveals the lower part of his torso. Disgust is infatuated with him.

Product placement

No products are specifically mentioned in Inside Out 2, but there are some references to preschooler shows that look a lot like Bluey and Dora the Explorer.

Coarse language

Inside Out 2 has some mild coarse language like ‘jerks’, and Joy uses the expression ‘Jiminy-mother-loving-toaster-strudel’ as an expletive. There’s also some name-calling like ‘morons’. Joy gives Ennui the nickname ‘Wee Wee’. A character is called ‘delusional’.

Ideas to discuss with your children

Inside Out 2 is the sequel to Pixar’s hugely popular Inside Out (2015).

Filled with humour and excellent visual effects, the movie boasts the original cast of characters in addition to some fabulous new ones. It shines a light on teenage struggles like finding your place and fitting in and managing the emotions that govern your choices. This is a great family movie suitable for all but the youngest of viewers.

The main messages from Inside Out 2 are that we can’t let emotions control us or determine who we are, and we aren’t defined by single memories but rather by a deep sense of who we know ourselves to be. Sometimes fears and anxieties mean we lose sight of our sense of self, but strong foundations and friendships allow us to learn from our mistakes. This means that mistakes don’t become defining moments that lead to dark places. Instead, they become part of the complex tapestry of our lives and help us to grow into better human beings.

Values in Inside Out 2 that you could reinforce with your children include empathy, compassion, forgiveness, courage, friendship and teamwork.

Inside Out 2 could also give you the chance to talk with your children about the real-life consequences of things like:

denying who you really are to become what you think other people want you to be
turning your back on old friends in the hope of winning new ones
trying to do everything yourself instead of remembering that you’re part of a team
suppressing emotions and forgetting that all experiences, even unpleasant ones, are important for growth and learning.