The heroine of China returns for another mission in Disney's 2005 direct-to-video release, "Mulan 2". This time, Mulan's excitement over her new engagement to General Shang is interrupted when the pair is summoned by the emperor to escort his three daughters across the country for an arranged triple marriage that will secure an alliance to discourage future Hun attacks. This weighs a bit on Mulan, as she believes people should marry for love rather than duty. It also weighs on the princesses, especially after they fall in love with the three soldiers brought along to guard them, China's other unlikely heroes, Yao, Ling, and Chien Po.

However, the driving force of this second narrative is everyone's favorite dragon guardian, Mushu, who stows away on the mission with sidekick Cri-Kee the cricket, this time with a not so noble mission of his own. Rather than trying to help Mulan accomplish her goal, Mushu is concerned that he is soon to lose his position as the family hero of the spirit world and his pedestal among the ancestors once Mulan is married off. Therefore, he convinces himself that the yin and yang of Mulan and Shang's relationship really makes them incompatible and sets forth to prove it to them in a series of devious acts to make Mulan and Shang stop getting along so well with each other. Cri-Kee declares that he his coming along to protect Mulan from Mushu's misguided trickery.

Now, being that this is a direct-to-video Disney feature, there is no shortage of harsh reviews out there for it. Reading over them on a variety of websites, I find many of them to be overly harsh. To bring up one example, some folks will call the animation here sub-par. This is outrageously incorrect. The animation is nearly as good as the original film, which is saying quite a lot! So, where such derogatory statements about this film's animation come from is anyone's guess. On top of that, you may find if you read some other reviews yourself that some folks sound as though they haven't even really watched the movie and are just posting an unspecific, negative review that could be (fallibly) stamped on any Disney direct-to-video sequel without watching it first.

The fact is, "Mulan 2" is a very good film. Not perfect, not as excellent as the original, but very good, and I find that a lot of the negative reviews for it out there not only exaggerate, but sometimes even contradict themselves, and often also come from folks who didn't even like the first film (and never have anything nice to say about direct to video sequels).

One of the best things about Mulan 2 is that the story is not a retread of the first by any means. This, along with the very good quality of the animation and overall visuals, is generally praised even by most folks who are hard on it. Though, some of those people will still complain that it doesn't have the cross-dressing warrior aspect and that we see too much of Mulan's feminine side in what is more of a romance story than a war-epic like the first film. So, there's one of those glaring contradictions. Folks are praising Mulan 2 for being original but complaining that it is not similar enough. Oy. Well, I LOVED the first film, but I also loved Mulan 2 (hence the full amount of stars, even though I credit the first as superior in many ways) and its boldness of showing how Mulan's strong character maintains even in a story that is the almost a polar opposite of the first. Some folks seem to want a caricature of Mulan now rather than Mulan as she really was (Mulan went to war because she felt she had no choice, not because she was a Xena wanna be). Maybe they need to rewatch the first film. Anyway, this new Mulan story is not as epic as the first, which is probably wise considering the budget was probably far less. But, with almost the entire original voice cast back for this one and with such high quality visuals and a still very enjoyable yet smaller scale story, it's not a big issue that we don't get war epic scenes here with grand mountain scopes. They're not needed for this story, and just because it's a Mulan story doesn't mean it has to be a war epic (very mild spoilers ahead). Mulan 2 is our chance to see Mulan being her post-war self, the woman warrior (yes, she does have a battle scene when the caravan is attacked by bandits) rather than the woman pretending to be a warrior (or warrior woman, as some folks seem to want her to be). And some have said that he character is too easily pushed to the side by focus on Mushu. Well, when I watched the film a second time, I found this to be untrue. Another great thing about the film is how no one really takes center stage. This film focuses equally on all the characters. It seems like it focuses on Mushu probably because his story kicks things off and rounds things out, he sort of saves the day in the end, and he's got that loudmouth personality. But I loved how this film was about not only Mushu's story and Mulan and Shang's story, but also Yao, Ling, and Chien-Po and their princesses. Su, the little one who ends up with Chien-Po, was too cute. And, incidentally, Mulan was looking more gorgeous than ever in this film too, I guess because you didn't have the whole cross-dressing thing to work with, allowing the artists to stick with and accentuate her more feminine design.

Now, I'm not here to give nothing but praise to Mulan 2. Yes, as some may mention now and then, it is rather predictable once it gets going. You know who is going to end up with whom. Well, a lot of films are that way, even great ones. And who doesn't know how Cinderella or Snow White are going to turn out when they sit down to watch them? So, that's never the best complaint in the world. My biggest complaint (practically my only one) was with what felt like a loose end, and that's the whole thing about forming an alliance to discourage an impending Hun attack. I sort of felt the resolution of that issue was left too much to the viewer's imagination. Perhaps this is because, back when Mulan 2 was being made, word was that Mulan 3 was to go into production soon also. Since then, Disney direct-to-video sequels have been scrapped by the company and a lot of planned films were canceled, Mulan 3 as well I guess. Whether that third film would have tied up that loose end of this film is unknown, but it seems very plausible. If that's the case, and if the animation quality, writing strength, and cast could have been maintained one more time, it's a shame Mulan 3 was never made. Now, to play devil's advocate against my one complaint, I haven't read too many other reviews complaining about that alliance/Hun issue as a "loose end". Maybe I missed something, didn't take something the right way, or other folks just didn't see it as all that important. Regardless, this is not enough to ruin an otherwise wonderful direct-to-video feature that, in my opinion, does an excellent job of maintaining the characters of the first film and introducing fun and likable new ones. Which brings me to the songs. There are two new ones here, and "A Girl Worth Fighting For" is brought back. Frankly, I loved "A Girl Worth Fighting For" in the first film, though it is often the most dissed song from Mulan. It was brought back well here though, and some folks seem to like it more this time. "Lesson Number One" is a delightful musical sequence early in the film as Mulan teaches some warrior skills to a group of village children who want to be just like her. I only was disappointed in "Like Other Girls", because here was a fine opportunity that was cutely animated, but like many direct-to-video songs, the lack of almost any rhyming at all just made it displeasing to me as a song. Seems that most songs written for direct-to-video have that trouble of not rhyming or not having catchy tunes or something like that, making them overall unmemorable. So, okay, if I have two complaints about this film, that is the second, the first being what I felt was a loose end. Some may have an issue with Eddie Murphy not returning as Mushu (the only main character who doesn't return), but Mark Moseley does such a great job at voicing him that it is inconsequential. Incidentally, for Michelle Kwan fans, she has about two lines in the film as a marketplace shopkeeper who practically skates into the scene.

So, I think and hope that's everything I wanted to say about "Mulan 2", a wonderful little direct-to-video sequel to an excellent feature film. I'm sorry for the folks who didn't like it, but I can't help but think they went into viewing it with the intention of not liking it to begin with or hoping to see the same kind of film as the original (or with the same kind of budget; though this film, as I've said, looks nearly as good aside from the epic scope). It's not perfect or as amazing as the original, but I enjoyed Mulan 2 more than Atlantis, which was a theatrical release and an original, and possibly even more than a few others. The currently dead phenomenon of Disney direct-to-video sequels was not always a bad thing, as this film exemplifies in my opinion, and while a lot of the films they made were poorly done and all-out mistakes, I would have been quite happy if they continued to make them at this quality level and hadn't made some of those really bad ones. For more GOOD Disney direct-to-video sequels, check out Bambi 2, Lilo and Stitch 2: Stitch has a Glitch, the Lion King 1 1/2, An Extremely Goofy Movie, and even Tarzan 2 and Cinderella 3. Though, with Cinderella 3 you have to be willing to ignore it as continuity and just take it as a fun film, or else the ending will mess with your head. Mickey, Donald, and Goofy: Three Musketeers and Mickey's Once and Twice Upon a Christmas are also highly recommended, as is The Tinker Bell Movie, which thankfully will have some sequels of its own in the near future.

As for the DVD of Mulan 2, I thought it had an adequate selection of bonus features compared to what I would have expected from a Disney release at the time. Included are 4 deleted scenes in animatic form, a music video for "Like Other Girls" as performed by Atomic Kitten (though the video is just clips from the film), a briefly diverting silhouette game, an educational experience called "The World of Mulan" that ends with a chart of Chinese year animals as a prize, and finally, a behind the scenes featurette on the voices of the film (not mentioning Mushu, of course) is also included. And, yes, this DVD is equipped with Disney's Fast Play. If you loved the first film but can handle Mulan in a very different kind of story, then I highly recommend picking up your own copy of "Mulan 2".

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Revisado en Alemania el 24 de febrero de 2024

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