While preparing for their wedding, Shang and Mulan are suddenly sent off on a secret mission. Mushu starts to meddle, and a surprise attack by Mongolians doesn't help either. Fa Mulan gets the surprise of her young life when her love, Captain (now General) Li Shang asks for her hand in marriage. Before the two can have their happily ever after, the Emperor assigns them a secret mission, to escort three princesses to Qui Gong, China. Mushu is determined to drive a wedge between the couple after he learns that he will lose his guardian job if Mulan marries into the Li family. After the princesses unexpectedly fall in love with the Gang of Three, Mulan decides to help them escape the fate of marrying men they do not love. This contradicts the Emperor's orders and forces him to put Mulan's relationship with Shang into question. They are attacked by Mongolians, and the fate of China hangs in the balance. Mulan 2 was a decent sequel. Of course it isn't as good as the wonderful original, which is one of the better Disney movies of the 90s. As far as this sequel goes it isn't as good as Aladdin and the King of Thieves, Simbas's Pride and Beauty and the Beast:The Enchanted Christmas, but I do think it is an improvement over Cinderella 2 and Jungle Book 2. The animation wasn't so bad, it was nice and colourful, but nothing too fancy. The avalanche scene in the original made my jaw drop by the way. The songs and music are fairly decent and memorable on the most part, my favourite is "I want to be like other girls" but Jerry Goldsmith, who is my favourite film composer, is missed. The music he did for the original is beautiful, and I don't think is appreciated as much as it should be. I liked the three princess characters as well. And the voice acting on the whole was very good; Ming Na is a spirited Mulan and Pat Morita has little to do, but is fine as the emperor. However, I did miss Eddie Murphy, Mark Moseley did his very best, but Mushu isn't as funny as he was in the first movie, in fact he is annoying and unlikeable often. The story was clumsily handled at times as it seemed to focus on Mulan and Shang's petty arguments than upholding the country honour. And the film was devoid of humour, with the exception of Ling's very lame jokes. And I don't know why Shang is such a jerk in this movie, he isn't really the handsome and brave Shang I came to admire. On the whole, decent, but don't expect the original. 6/10 Bethany Cox Mulan was one of Disney's greatest films ever made with beautiful animation, excellent voice acting, intense action, and an entertaining story. So, when some of the Disney sequels came out at the time (Return of Jafar, Cinderella II, and Hunchback of Notre Dame II), I waited so desperately to see a sequel that would capture the magic of the original.<br/><br/>Sadly, my expectations were quite low when after the first 10-15 minutes of this film since it failed to be the same positive levels that made the original such a masterpiece and the characteristic was one of the few main problems of this sequel. I'll show you by contrasting the characteristic of the original and this sequel.<br/><br/>In the original, Mulan was a conflicted woman who was doing what is right for his family by protecting his father from getting himself killed. In this sequel, Mulan's personality is to now be a staunch feminist as she and Shang try to love each other. In the original, Mushu was a well-intentioned but slightly misguided sidekick who gave me some laughs with his comedic moments throughout the film. In this sequel, he's a selfish villain who attempts to break up the relationship between Mulan and Shang. In the original, Mulan's army buddies were hilarious and were quite enjoyable characters. In this sequel, they are now being one-dimensional characters repeating the same characteristic over and over again.<br/><br/>With the characteristic out of the way, there are a few good things about this movie. The voice acting is very terrific and did their best with the material they've been given and the animation, while below the original's standards, is obviously quite good and is the best animation I've seen in a Disney direct-to-video sequel this far.<br/><br/>Sadly, those two positive aspects got suffered by it's predictable story (with some overused clichés from other new direct-to-video sequels) and it's uninspiring message about "Following your heart" which makes it a little less entertaining for children and their adults.<br/><br/>Although, not a horrible sequel (unlike Cinderella 2, which was by far the worst direct-to-video sequel I have ever seen), Mulan II lacks the heart of the original and has a uninspiring message that just doesn't measure up. I'm sure the kids will enjoy it, but in terms of direct-to-video sequels, the adults might have a hard time remembering this.<br/><br/>Rating: 5.6/10
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292 weeks ago