Verdict:
Overall, good movie, but I find two issues with it:
1. There does not seem to be sufficient introduction to the main plot device that is Jumanji, which means that you need to have watched the first movie or at least the 1995 movie to understand what’s going on. Many of the themes explored in the sequel also require you to remember what happened in the first movie. I feel like, in the modern age, there is an unwritten law between movie makers and movie goers that this unacceptable. Every movie should be a standalone thing.
2. The last 30 to 40 minutes of the film go downhill in every aspect. It’s like a different team took over the movie and wasn’t sure what the first team wanted and didn’t have the vision that the first team had, so they just drove the movie off a cliff. It all just sort of ends abruptly, and the interesting themes that were introduced in the first half, don’t get a satisfactory resolution.
Having said that, this movie is still great. Compare it to Red Notice, another Dwayne Johnson vehicle from around the same time, and the first 5 minutes of The Next Level have more acting talent and interesting material, than the entirety of Red Notice.
One of the main interesting things about the first film is that the 4 main actors were playing against type, with Jack Black playing a girl and Dwayne Johnson playing a scrawny shy teenager. In the 2nd film, the story makes them do that twice. They play one set of characters and then switch bodies again, halfway through the movie. The Hollywood fad of “if something worked in the first movie, do it twice as much in the sequel, without understanding why it even worked” is getting very annoying, but in this particular case, the body switching was entertaining to watch.
The film explores a few interesting emotional dimensions of the main characters, though the main character arc relies heavily on familiarity with the first movie to be fully appreciated. It was also great to see Danny Glover and Danny DeVito. They are not just phoning in their performance for a paycheck.
In short, a lacklustre ending, but a fun ride, nonetheless.