I took in both Inside Out 2 and Despicable Me 4 at the Bagdad this summer. Both times, I attended a matinee with plenty of kids and their parents in the audience. Although having food and drink with the movie is encouraged, I didn't indulge in either (I have plenty in the past) and so didn't need a countertop in front of me. I sat fairly close, probably in the same seat both times.
Inside Out 2 is about diving into the psyche of one child in particular, Riley, a female entering puberty and intensely anxious about her future popularity and acceptance levels while adapting to the high school scene. The fact that her best friends from middle school are headed to a different high school raises the spectre of loneliness and abandonment. She will end up sacrificing these old friendships at the risk of flubbing the more critical new ones.
The story focuses on Riley's constituent personalities: joy, sadness, anger, fear, and disgust. With the onset of puberty, anxiety, embarrassment, envy and ennui (boredom) enter the picture. The newer emotions, anxiety especially, seize control of the "bridge" leaving the original team to recover and resurrect Riley's old self, a journey that eventually leads to a better-integrated, more adult, newer self, a more inclusive amalgam of internal empaths.
Illumination: Despicable Me 4 is more about family and sociopolitical dynamics and exploring the concepts of truth-telling, deception, blackmail, secrecy and villainy. One of Gru's arch enemies, Maxime Le Mal, is on the loose and out for vengeance with a plan to kidnap Gru's baby. So Gru and his whole family are put into the Anti-Villain League's protection program, which necessitates assuming phony identities, which for the adults means roleplaying in new professions. Felonius Gru becomes a solar panel salesman and his wife Lucy Wilde, a beautician. Neither has much of a clue what to do.
However, Poppy Prescott, about the same age as Riley, is a budding villain like Gru and uses blackmail, the threat of revealing Gru's identity, to get the latter's assistance on her risky prank: the theft of a school mascot, a crazed otter, from Gru's old alma mater. Chaos ensues, abetted by the famous Minions for which this franchise is best known. Yes, I caught the allusion to Ian Flemming.
