A decade after the campy rom-com primarily based on the Broadway musical Mamma Mia! hit the massive display screen, the band is again collectively, minus one essential participant. The lack of magnetic performer Meryl Streep is obvious within the sequel, which scrambles to fill the void with pointless storylines, over-complicated digital camera work, foolish slapstick, younger hunks, and extra. Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again is like cotton sweet. It’s fantastic for just a few bites till it turns into sickeningly candy and also you’re dying for one thing of substance…and even simply an ABBA tune you really acknowledge.

Outside of ABBA’s biggest hits, such because the titular “Mamma Mia” and “Dancing Queen,” many of the sequel’s music consists of the B-sides that solely superfans will acknowledge or the songs so weird that the writers of half one couldn’t work out methods to shoehorn them into the plot. Sadly, the film solely manages to cross that fantastic line from cringeworthy into campy enjoyable only a few occasions, with the spotlight being the absurd, unlikely incorporation of the music “Waterloo.” The quantity is about in a French cafe and encompasses a comically massive Napoleon hat, a baguette sword combat, and probably the most charming of younger Donna’s suitors, Harry, performed by Hugh Skinner. The quantity can also be notable for its inclusion of a dance ensemble member in a wheelchair, a shiny spot of range within the forged.

Besides “Waterloo,” the sequel’s different musical victory is in its restraint. Pierce Brosnan‘s singing, a tragedy to even probably the most ardent followers of the primary movie, was stored to a naked minimal.

Unfortunately, with so many plotlines previous and current to get via, scene stealers Christine Baranski, Julie Walters, and Colin Firth are underutilized or given subpar songs. While most of them have develop into extra cartoonish variations of their authentic characters, Amanda Seyfried largely seems unhappy and wide-eyed and lamely states exposition. Oscar nominee Andy Garcia is just there in order that Cher has a motive to sing throughout her transient look, which is complicated, out-of-place, and dispassionate, and but by some means works as a result of it’s Cher.

Underlying the movie is an admirable message about making your individual household and never being beholden to the desires and failures of your dad and mom, however the romantic classes are a bit out of whack. Every romantic plotline includes individuals reuniting with a misplaced love—the one one who was proper for them however obtained away. While this appeared romantic for Donna (Streep) and Sam (Brosnan) within the first film, it loses its punch when repeated repeatedly, and distracts from the far more particular relationship that needs to be on the film’s heart: Sophie and her three dads.

Despite the dizzying quantity of weak, unsatisfying storylines and musical numbers, the movie does sometimes pause to let the viewers recognize the attractive surroundings. And the film’s costume and set designers labored splendidly in concord to weave a saturated coloration story of turquoise, orange, and extra turquoise for good measure.

Overall, Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again seems to be a half-baked mixture prequel and epilogue that zips so shortly from scene to scene and music to music that any real emotion is swept apart, leaving audiences solely fluff and a killer credit sequence after virtually two hours of their time. But for moviegoers in search of one thing escapist and “sweet as sugar cane” this summer time, it’d simply hit the spot.