Why Moana’s difficult second voyage is easy for audiences

Moana returns, three years later, as a lauded ‘wayfinder’ with a far more challenging task than the first time round. It doesn’t float my canoe – but I’m not the target audience. What does my co-viewer have to say?

Stephen Romei

In this sequel, Moana is charged with reuniting the people of all the seas.

2 min read

4:00AMNovember 27, 2024.

Updated 7:41AMNovember 28, 2024

The Disney animated musical Moana 2, with its strong links to Polynesian folklore and traditions, is a conventional sequel to the 2016 original, which made close to $US700m at the box office.

Most of the cast return, including Auli‘i Cravalho as Moana and Dwayne Johnson as the shapeshifting demigod Maui. They continue to be allies though Moana, now 19 rather than 16, has more of an upper hand.

In the first film, Moana dared sail her canoe beyond the reef of her home island. It was about a young woman breaking free of girlhood and her chieftain father (Temuera Morrison, who returns in the sequel).

Now, three years later, she is a lauded “wayfinder” and has a far more challenging task: to find a hidden island and reunite the people of all the seas. If she fails, as she says, “Our story ends.”

Moana (centre) has a crew of unlikely seafarers.

Standing in her way is the storm god Nalo and his underlings. She needs to find the island and lift Nalo’s curse. On her side is Maui, who warns “You’re all going to die”, and her canoe mates.

The animation is impressive. This is an easy film to watch. As an adult viewer, I think it lacks dramatic tension. Contrary to Maui’s warning, everything seems a bit too easy.

My eight-year-old co-viewer, who is more in the target audience, thinks the mysterious (adult translation: nebulous) gods do lift the stakes. He’d rate the movie 3.64 out of five, a precision that would appeal to the punctilious canoe maker and crew mate Loto (Rose Matafeo).

The other crew mates are the grumpy farmer Kele (David Kane), the Maui-wannabe Moni (Hualailai Chung), the chicken HeiHei, who is a fan favourite, and the pot belly pig Pua, who has a plumper role this time around.

The directing team is new – David Derrick Jnr, Jason Hand and Dana Ledoux Miller – but the script remains in the hands of Jared Bush, with Miller as co-writer. The most significant change is that the songs are not written by the multi-award-winning Lin-Manuel Miranda but by Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear. I’ve noted that some critics think the songs are not as good, but I quite liked them.

Awhimai Fraser as the “mad bat lady”, to use Maui’s description, singing Get Lost – as an advice anthem to Moana – is a highlight. “Get lost, cut loose, and lose your way/ There ain’t no fun in holdin’ back babe.”

That’s a form of tough love for Moana, who wonders, “Will I lose myself between my home and what’s unknown?”

Moana 2 doesn’t float my canoe, but with school holidays around the corner it’s the right movie at the right time. Disney knows its market. Its next film, Musafa: The Lion King, hits screens in mid December. Will there be a Moana 3? I’d bet all my coconuts (yes, the piratical coconuts also return) on it.