No matter what age you are, there’s never a bad time to pick up a new skill to help you engage with your emotions or guide someone else’s. By learning to regulate, each of us is more capable of dealing with life’s stressors, large and small. With a film like Pete Doctor’s Inside Out (2015), emotions were brought front and center via a tale that explores the turbulent adjustment preteen Riley (voiced by Kaitlyn Dias) experiences moving from Minnesota to San Francisco, California, told in part through her five dominant emotions: Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust (voiced by Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Lewis Black, Bill Hader, and Mindy Kaling, respectively). That film asked audiences to consider that we don’t experience our emotions as merely one thing at one time, but sometimes a collection of them concurrently. Pushing this idea further, director Kelsey Mann’s (Party Central) Inside Out 2, written by Meg LeFauve (Inside Out; My Father’s Dragon) and first-time feature screenwriter Dave Holstein, utilizes Riley’s journey into puberty with the introduction of four new emotions that don’t blend so neatly at first. After a solid run at the theater, Inside Out 2 is coming home, bringing with it two featurettes and five deleted scenes to help invested audience members learn more about the making of the film and maybe get a different perspective on their own emotions in the process.
Riley (voice of Kensington Tallman) in INSIDE OUT 2, directed by Kelsey Mann and produced by Mark Nielsen. © 2024 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
The last time we saw Riley, she was still acclimating to the move to San Francisco, but things were looking up between joining a hockey team and chatting with a boy. Now, Riley (voiced by Kensington Tallman) is fully-engaged with the team the Foghorns, having formed a strong bond on the ice and off with Grace (voiced by Grace Lu) and Bree (voiced by Sumayyah Nuriddin-Green). When the three are invited by Coach Roberts (voiced by Yvette Nicole Brown) of the varsity team for a weekend training session that could mean joining the remarkable varsity-level Firehawks, the pressure is on. With this potential change externally comes a simultaneous change inside as emotions Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust (voiced by Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Lewis Black, Tony Hale, and Liza Lapira, respectively) are joined by Anxiety, Envy, Embarrassment, and Ennui (voiced by Maya Hawke, Ayo Edebiri, Paul Walter Hauser, and Adèle Exarchopoulos, respectively), requiring that all the emotions find their place within Riley. But as new information and new opportunities come to light, new and old emotions come to conflict as they try to help Riley navigate current challenges while paving the way for the future.
Though this is an initial review for Inside Out 2, there will be specific discussion of the narrative details in the exploration of the film. As such, if you just want to know about the bonus features, just scroll down to the image of Riley celebrating with her Foghorn teammates where they are discussed without mentioning plot-related details.
L-R: Sadness (voice of Phyllis Smith), Joy (voice of Amy Poehler), Disgust (voice of Liza Lapira), Fear (voice of Tony Hale), and Anger (voice of Lewis Black) in INSIDE OUT 2, directed by Kelsey Mann and produced by Mark Nielsen. © 2024 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
In the featurette “New Emotions,” Mann expresses something about the new emotions, specifically Anxiety, that puts the film into a very different perspective, as well as the film before it. As an antagonist, Anxiety isn’t working to hurt Riley (though Joy would say otherwise initially) but trying to help her. This is much in the same that Joy wasn’t trying to prevent Riley from feeling pain via the absence of Sadness. From a certain perspective, it might appear that Joy didn’t learn anything from her prior adventure, but, considering that the two films take place within one to two years of each other, it’s just that Joy hadn’t processed it fully. This enables Mann to tell a story wherein Joy must combat more than an opposing emotion, but one which also believes its purpose is to help Riley get to where she needs to go, even if it means the suppression of other emotions. This makes Inside Out 2 a tale in which Joy faces off against another version of herself, someone lovingly trying to help Riley be her best, but doing it in a manner in which it only causes pain. This, of course, reveals a few things, most of which is that balance of emotions is what’s most important, both in the story and in the real world. Riley was her best version as a preteen when Sadness was allowed to mingle with Joy or Anger or Fear or Disgust without any worry of what it might mean for the smooth development of Riley’s sense of self (new to the narrative universe for this film). With the introduction of new emotions that rival the old, there’s turbulence because neither Joy nor Anxiety, as the de facto leaders of their emotional groups, can see how the other truly helps Riley and seeing them as opposition because neither can see how the other compliments them functionally.
L-R: Embarrassment (voice of Paul Walter Hauser), Anxiety (voice of Maya Hawke), Envy (voice of Ayo Edebiri) and Ennui (voice of Adèle Exarchopoulos) in INSIDE OUT 2, directed by Kelsey Mann and produced by Mark Nielsen. © 2024 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
Despite its similarity to the narrative of the first film, what’s remarkable about the plot of 2 is how it prompts the audience to reexamine the perception of anxiety. When someone says “I have anxiety,” it’s perceived as something overwhelming, as an inhibitor upon the person’s choices in life. We all have anxiety, it’s a biological necessity for survival. Those who have more of it, however, can find it debilitating and that’s beautifully represented in the climax of the tale as Anxiety, having gone too far, has created a panic attack for Riley that also has Anxiety simultaneously unable to stop moving and frozen solid. So great is the terror with Anxiety that she can’t see how slowing down, taking a moment, could help turn things around and help reframe Riley’s sense of self that Anxiety’s plan to redevelop destroyed (metaphorically as a new one took the old one’s place). Other than Anxiety jettisoning the older emotions, there’s nothing that Anxiety does that’s *intentionally* harmful, though her choices, much like Joy’s before her a year or so ago, absolutely do cause a great deal. This is what makes the confrontation and resolution so powerful because it’s all of the emotions encircling Riley’s sense of self, newly formed from all of her returned memories from the back of her consciousness, helping Riley to calm down. Of course, on the outside, Mann smartly shows Riley attempting to use regulation techniques like touch, sight, sound, and breathing to break free from the spiral she’s caught in. Anxiety has her place, just like Fear, Disgust, Embarrassment, and the others. But it’s about regulation and emotional management. It’s about recognizing the things that we can control and the ways in which our concerns can spiral when we focus on what we can’t. What a wonderful message wrapped in a frequently clever animated road trip package. With luck, the adults will recognize it within themselves as much as the preteen/young adults should.
L-R: Bree (voice of Sumayyah Nuriddin-Green), Riley (voice of Kensington Tallman), and Grace (voice of Grace Lu) in INSIDE OUT 2, directed by Kelsey Mann and produced by Mark Nielsen. © 2024 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
Strangely, compared to other recent Pixar home releases like Elemental (2023), Lightyear (2022), Turning Red (2022), and Luca (2021), the included features are comparatively bare-bones. There’s no feature-length commentary track, no behind-the-scenes look at the recording or creation of the characters, a gag reel, or any focused exploration of the psychology that forms the basis of emotions old and new. Instead, there are two featurettes — “New Emotions” and “Unlocking the Vault” — which are deeply informative, but serve as a collection of the things that received deep-dives elsewhere. In “New Emotions,” we hear from the various psychological consultants, while also listening to cast (mostly Poehler) and crew talk about the creation of the film. This translates to looking at the evolution of character designs, learning about emotions that didn’t make the cut, and basic overview explanations of the animation process for each of the new emotions. In the second, Mann leads a brief discussion from his team in one of the screening rooms as they dig into the things that amused them stylistically and narratively about the entire “Vault” sequence from joke callbacks, Pixar easter eggs, and the thought processes of four of the five new emotions that are featured here. There’s a great deal of information and it’s easy to follow and get absorbed into, which is why it’s surprising, especially when looking at other Pixar home releases, that some of this wasn’t provided as its own deep dive.
For those who enjoy looking at what didn’t make the cut, there are five deleted scenes with pre-screening filmmaker commentary, each one made up of scratch voices (placeholder voicework during storyboarding and early animation steps before the final vocal recordings) and incomplete animation. Compared to the final film, one can see why these sequences were removed (mostly for pacing and character clarity), but there’re still interesting to see in terms of what might have been.
L-R: Sadness (voice of Phyllis Smith) and Joy (voice of Amy Poehler) in INSIDE OUT 2, directed by Kelsey Mann and produced by Mark Nielsen. © 2024 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
Be advised that there’s a note that included features may vary from retailer and edition, but, thus far, it’s difficult to parse which, if any, edition will not include the mentioned features. Do note that, if physical is your preference, there is a 4K UHD steebook edition from select retailers. Otherwise, it seems to be the usual Blu-ray/DVD Combo with digital and DVD.
INSIDE OUT 2 steelbook design.
At the time of this writing, Inside Out 2 is the highest grossing animated film of all time having made over $1 billion globally, suggesting that it very much connected with audiences. Personally, I enjoy this film far more than the initial outing. The emotion characters are more balanced and there’s a solid arc for Riley herself. Though there are no young adults in my purview just yet, more than 1, 2 contains an important message that transcends the target viewing audience, the Riley-aged viewers, expanding its influence to those who’ve yet to learn that anxiety itself isn’t bad, but just another facet of ourselves to understand. The better we understand ourselves, the stronger our sense of self becomes — and there’s no age limit on that.
Inside Out 2 Special Features*:
- “New Emotions” — With Riley’s imminent puberty, the story of Inside Out 2 always suggested that there would be a party of new emotions complicating Riley’s world and throwing a wrench into Joy’s hard-won stability. But exactly what those new emotions could be was a big question mark. Casting the new emotions in Riley’s mind was a fun exploration into the shifting mindset of a teenager, and was also informed by some of the discarded scenes and characters from the original film. In this documentary, we’ll discuss that process of creating Anxiety, Embarrassment, Ennui, and Envy from narrowing them down from a long list of possible emotions, to the design, animation, and voicing of these new, hilarious, and strangely recognizable characters. (11:44)
- “Unlocking the Vault” — In a kind of visual commentary, a group of central creatives watch and discuss the scene “The Vault.” As they stop and start and refer to various IP versions of the scene, we’ll hear about the inspiration for Riley’s repressed memories like Bloofy and Lance Slashblade, the development of the scene in story, and the technical challenges of creating 2D characters that exist in the CG world of Riley’s mind. (8:59)
- Five (5) Deleted Scenes (23:56)
Available on digital August 20th, 2024.
Available on 4K UHD, Blu-ray, and DVD September 10th, 2024.
For more information, head to the official Walt Disney Studios Inside Out 2 webpage.
Final Score: 4 out of 5.
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Categories: Films To Watch, Home Release, Home Video, Recommendation, Reviews, streaming
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