The first High School Musical continues to be a family favorite in our house. The songs are catchy and the characters are all likeable. It was with much anticipation that we waited for the second movie. The whole cast was returning from the original. My daughter talked about almost nothing else with her friends. Even the mighty POKEMON took a back seat if for just one night. From what I hear, my household was not alone in this phenomenon.
We had stopped by Blue Coast Burrito on the way home and got inside just as the movie was starting. The "We're all in this together" theme kept creeping to the surface which is fine because it was a song in the first movie and it connects the two. Summer was starting and all the characters needed money for various things. Enter the summer job.
The success of the first movie was in the characters and how the songs were relevant to being a teenager or at some points a teenager in love. Songs like "Stick to the Status Quo" were great songs that truly captured the high school experience. I walked away from the first movie with some of the songs rattling around in my brain.
High School Musical 2 fails. The plot is contrived (the whole cast from the first movie get summer jobs at a resort together). The songs are forgettable. The story centers around characters that you don't end up liking much. Gabriel, the lead from the first movie and most likeable character, takes a back seat to Sharpay. So you get a movie were the focus is on characters you don't like or characters that you do like but are acting in a way that you don't like. The musical scenes themselves where over choreographed and looked forced. Not to mention that the transition to studio produced songs was always an obvious cut (the volume and pitch would be different). I didn't notice this in the first one.
I really didn't want the sequel to be just a capitalization off of the success of the fantastic first movie. I wanted it to continue the tradition. Unfortunately it faltered and I can't say that I am looking forward to High School Musical 3 and I probably won't get the soundtrack to High School Musical 2. My daughter liked it okay. She said it was really good, but we had to get onto her for getting up and running around several times (not a problem with HSM1). I don't know any teeny boppers that watched it so I don't know what the demographic's response was to it.
3 comments:
The response from my house (girl- 14, boy-11, boy- 8) was that it "sucked". I didn't like the 2nd one at all. I agree with everything you've said.
Two thumbs down!
Good to know that I am not crazy. I was reading some stuff of google hailing it as the second coming.
Probably a plant from the folks associated with HSM.
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