Inside Out 1 VS. Inside Out 2, How do they Compare?

 

Inside Out VS. Inside Out 2

    Inside Out 2, already a global box office hit at over 1 billion and 90% on rotten tomatoes in less than a month, is a runaway hit and one of Pixar’s strongest showings these past few years. The movie is a charming continuation of the first’s fantastic cast (and incredible new additions), the exploration of young Riley’s inner world, and the resulting conflict of both, but how does this movie compare to the first?
    Generally, sequels perform slightly worse than the originals, both financially and critically, but how does Inside Out 2 compare and contrast with the original Inside Out? Does it buck the trend of sequels being poor successors to the originals? Or does it follow the trend of sequel movies' inability to surpass the original?

 

Animation and Setting

    The original Inside Out featured impressive animation and a unique setting, and Pixar put a remarkable amount of thought and care into the movie's art direction and design, which made for an iconic look to this day. 

    The striking designs of the emotions and the stunning locations like Long Term Memory, Animation Land, and Headquarters make for some dense scenery that is a feast for the senses. The most spectacular displays for the senses are the opening sequence, when Joy awoke in the just-born Riley’s mind, and Abstract Thought, where Joy, Sadness, and Bing-Bong “abstract” into simpler and simpler designs in an impressive sequence. That is to name a few of this beautiful film’s incredible animation and design sense, but what about the sequel?

 

We all have a rich Internal world

 

    The second film features a much more polished aesthetic, as expected from the decade difference in animation techniques and technology. It builds on the original strong foundation, using familiar locations, like Long Term Memory, and new ones, like the Belief System and Vault of Secrets. Even a decade between the old core five emotions, the new emotions fit like a glove with their colorful and unique body types that one would hesitate not to believe they were not among the first emotions. The movie falls a bit short in striking animated sequences, as seen in the first, with the main standouts of note being Riley’s panic attack and Brainstorm Joy, Anger, Fear, and Disgust have to traverse. 

    While the first movie is comparably less polished than the second, it features more ambitious animated sequences. The second is about equal to the first in terms of setting. 

 

Characters

The little voices in our heads...

 

    Inside Out’s main cast, Joy, Sadness, Disgust, Fear, and Anger, alongside the imaginary Bing-Bong, their host Riley, and her parents, make for a tight core cast of characters.

    Joy and Sadness, as played by Amy Poehler and Phyllis Smith, are the obvious standouts of this group, with their journey through the depths of Riley’s mind as their surrounding conflict, as later accompanied by Bing-Bong (Richard Kind), make up the lion's share of the movie’s runtime and thus get explored more. Bing-Bong, while a later addition to this trio, is used just the perfect amount, being both the comedic relief and emotional center to the group whose (SPOILERS) sacrifice hit just the right note to leave watchers thinking about well after the movie is over. How does the rest of the cast fair? 

    The other three emotions, Anger, Fear, and Disgust (Lewis Black, Bill Hader, Mindy Kaling, respectively), are given comparatively much less to do, their struggles to keep Riley functioning without Joy being both humorous and scary in equal measures, but given not as much room to explore their emotional depths as the Joy or Sadness as a result. 

    The human world has even less going on than that. Riley’s parents strike a good balance between the upheavals of moving and the parental tribulations it invites, with some good comedic moments from their core emotional counterparts. At the center of the movie, Riley (Kaitlyn Dias) is more of a vehicle in which the five emotions steer than a character into herself, which is the point, but makes her struggles feel a bit harder to sympathize with. Still, as the second movie will show, this balance of “vehicle for the emotions” and “a person into herself” could and later would be done much better. 

...Just got a little more crowded.

 

    The second movie makes a bold leap by introducing four new emotions: Anxiety, Envy, Ennui, and Embarrassment (with some cameos from Nostalgia) to shake the status quo. It also features a whole new cast of human characters, such as her friends Bree and Grace, the subject of her admiration, Val, and many others. Riley herself, who, in contrast to the first, feels just as much as the host to a gaggle of emotions in conflict as she does a character herself, a noticeable step up from the first.

    Riley, a few years older and now played by Kensington Tallman, has a much more central focus on how she acts and reacts, with the emotions input into her feelings far more personalized and driven by the person Riley is becoming. The other human characters, who, while not as striking as the emotions, come off as a combination of pleasant and believable preteens and hockey stars that make you believe they are the type of people Riley would both want to associate with and socially pine over. In short, the movie about Riley’s emotions feels like it is just as much about Riley herself for the first time, which is a significant step up. That is not to sell the movie's stars, the emotions, short.

    The five original emotions return in the second movie, with some slight recasts for Fear and Disgust, played by Tony Hale and Liza Lapira. They all, like Riley, feel more mature and given much more to do as a group. Joy and Sadness are at peace and have a strong bond. Anger, Disgust, and Fear are along for the ride this time, and while not given as much focus as those above two in the first movie, they all get some time to shine and work great as an ensemble. Overall, the original gives even more room to warm our hearts, but what about the new ones?

    The new emotions play the role of the antagonists in this movie, with Anxiety, played by Maya Hawke, running the show as a dark mirror to Joy in the first movie. Energetic, controlling, trying everything she can to make Riley’s life better, with Envy, Ennui, and Embarrassment (Ayo Edebiri, Adele Exarchopolous, and Paul Walter Hauser, respectively) egging her on the entire way through. They all make for a solid group of antagonists, perfectly contrasting the original emotions in their similar, but more focused, functionality and fitting in as both natural emotional states and drivers of conflict in the movie!

    Overall, while the first film had a smaller, more focused cast that was allowed to explore some of its cast more deeply, the second had a more extensive, exciting cast that made the human side just as engaging as the emotions side, and the emotions, both new and old, got more time to shine as a collective.

Story and Stakes

The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Get Lost in

    The story for Inside Out 1, and then later Inside Out 2, follow similar storytelling patterns and themes but possess a collection of subtle differences that make them unique by their own merits.

    The first movie follows Riley’s disastrous move to San Fransisco, where little goes right and continues to go wrong. Internally, to keep the young girl happy, Joy isolates Sadness, trying to keep the slew of positive core memories, the basis of their host's personality, positive and away from the latter so as not to change them into sad core memories. Riley’s disastrous first day at school spawns a Sad Core Memory. Joy and Sadness, alongside all the core memories, are ejected from their headquarters to the farthest reaches of the mind with no easy way back. The duo of Joy and Sadness, opposites but committed to returning to headquarters so Riley can be happy, travel the depths of Riley’s mind, meeting all sorts of mental constructs, such as the forgotten imaginary friend Bing-Bong, all the while Riley’s islands of personality, the representations of their hosts being, shut down one by one in their absence. The journey back to headquarters, tiresome and riff with loss, ultimately leads to Joy accepting Sadness and letting go of her controlling ways, the two of them returning to headquarters and, at a pivotal moment, prevent Riley from running away and allowing the young girl to have a needed heart to heart with her parents.

    Overall, the first movie is about a young girl put in a terrible but relatable situation, with her attempts to suppress her sadness to put a brave face for her struggling parents, ultimately leading to a near-disastrous choice but also a positive breakdown that enabled her to heal and accept Sadness, and the diversity of emotions, as a core part of the human experience. It is a strong basis for a movie, so strong in the fact the sequel took a very similar approach to its story.

She Controls Your Every Decision

    The second movie now follows Riley, now a few years older, going to a hockey training camp for a weekend with her friends. At the same time, she begins going through puberty, with the original five emotions inputs through her intensifying and four new emotions manifesting in headquarters: Anxiety, Embarrassment, Envy, and Ennui. At the camp, Riley is confronted with the dilemma of spending time with her friends, who will not be going to the same high school as her, or the Fire Hawks, a high school hockey team she admires, to set herself up for success in high school. This conflict manifests in Anxiety discarding Riley’s “Sense of self,” a collective presentation of her core beliefs, and banishing the original five emotions, leaving her and the other new emotions at the helm to steer Riley toward the Fire Hawks. 

    Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust, all trapped in the depths of Riley’s mind, race to retrieve the Sense of self and get back to Headquarters, all the while Anxiety and her crew to do what they think is best for Riley’s future, lead their host in an anxiety spiral with escalating self-hatred and misbehavior as they grow a new Sense of self-made exclusively from core anxiety memories. The movie hits its climax where, after Riley’s utter anxiety-fueled Sense of self results in her injuring her friend in a hockey game, she and Anxiety have an intense panic attack. The massive breakdown only calms down when Joy coaxes Anxiety down and, seeing their hosts suffering, all the Emotions come together to heal her new toxic sense of self to create a new, multilayered one. The movie ends with Riley apologizing to her friends, rediscovering the joys of hockey, and still growing and learning, while internally, all her emotions are in harmony and united to do right by her.

    Overall, this movie is a natural progression of the first one. It is about coming to terms with all emotions and memories, good and bad, as a necessary step to self-acceptance and worth, the tribulations of puberty, and the rampant anxieties and difficulties it brings out in our decision-making.

When you compare the two, the story structure is nearly identical. Both focus on a core part of Riley’s internal world (core memories, the Sense of Self) lost in the back of the mind, with two or more of the original emotions going about getting those parts back to headquarters to return to the stable status quo, only to realize the necessities for change for Riley to grow as a person. 

The key differences story-wise for these two come down to the execution and, of course, the age at which Riley goes through these stories. The first movie relies more heavily on the emotional side of the narrative, exploring the inner works of the mind and living emotions, their struggles, and their direct effects on Riley as, essentially, her “pilots.” A kid at Riley’s age, who has yet to find herself and, as seen with her “Islands of Personality,” is still discovering her interests and values, is naturally more predisposed to be controlled by the literal emotions personified within her. The core five Emotions control over Riley in the first movie is a fact that is made more evident when contrasted with the second movie’s use of emotions.

    Inside Out 2, seen primarily through the new “Sense of Self,” shows an older Riley with a firmer sense of identity and interests. Her Islands of Personality are no longer under threat and are firmly in place, with her love of hockey in full display; even when Anxiety shakes her enjoyment of the sport, her interest in Hockey never weavers. The core 5 Emotions and even the new ones are less in direct control of Riley and more nudge her along, with puberty, understandably, intensifying their feedback but ultimately not piloting her like in the first. Riley’s “Sense of Self,” the fledgling core of her being, literally needs to be uprooted by Anxiety to push her towards the goals the rogue emotion set, and even then, requiring constant manipulation and the growth of a new Sense of Self to keep that way. The even split between the Emotions and Riley's struggle at hockey camp strengthens both as we watch the anxiety-filled descent and see Riley’s struggles to do what’s best for her future and what's right by her friends. It makes us care about Riley because now she is becoming her own person, as all teens begin to do. 

We all grow and change, and rarely do our emotions stay the same

    The critical difference between both movies and their stories is the time frame in which such similar stories occur. The personal struggles of a child in a bad moving situation and a teen who just hit puberty in a social situation that could have lasting consequences will naturally have dramatically different ways in which they play out (even with the same conclusion) and hit better for various audiences. The first movie resonates more with children, who share a similar mindset as the younger Riley, and the second with both teens dealing with their puberty-fueled woes and adults who remember their struggles all too well. 

    In short, the first movie’s story and stakes are more relatable to younger audiences, while the second’s is better for older audiences. Both largely follow the same story with a handful of unique differences that keep them distinct.

Conclusion

    Inside Out, the original blockbuster hit showed a young audience the necessity of more negative emotions. Inside Out 2 is the even bigger sequel that again made the case for its premise with just as strong results. 

    Both possess different strengths, the first having stronger world-building and ambitious animation, and the second having a more diverse, exciting cast and a stronger focus on the human side of its story. Both teach the same lesson but at different stages in life, conveying strikingly different meanings of the necessity of emotionality that stands strong together as part of a bigger narrative. 

    Overall, both Inside Out movies are tremendous but work best as a unit, giving the viewers a better scope of Riley and the Emotions' journey growing up and the layers of struggle and self-acceptance that come with it.