Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil
By Sandie Angulo Chen,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Fairy tale sequel has tired jokes, tedious references.
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Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil
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Based on 11 parent reviews
AHOY!!!!
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A Very crappy movie.
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What's the Story?
Now a full agent at the Happily Ever After (HEA) agency, Red (voiced by Hayden Panettiere) is studying with mysterious female warriors the Sisters of the Hood when she's unexpectedly called back into action to aid Wolf (Patrick Warburton) in freeing her Granny (Glenn Close) from the clutches of an evil witch (Joan Cusack). The witch is supposedly keeping young siblings Hansel (Bill Hader) and Gretel (Amy Poehler) hostage, but as it turns out, the candy-loving brother and sister aren't what they seem. While Wolf and Red try to put their differences aside to work together, a secret Sisters of the Hood recipe for a magic truffle falls into the wrong hands and bestows almost unlimited power on the story's greedy villains, who want to sell the truffles to their fellow criminals.
Is It Any Good?
There's no doubt that the voice cast assembled for this rather unnecessary sequel is talented. There's Oscar winner Close, Saturday Night Live alums Hader and Poehler, and ubiquitous animated-film veterans Cusack and Warburton. But all of the movie's inside jokes and references to sequels and Hollywood and Shrek and The Sopranos (to name just a few) don't feel sophisticated or well-written like they did when the first Shrek and Pixar films were released. The heavy-handedness of the humor isn't funny; it's alternatingly derivative and at times cringe-inducing (the "talk to the hand" ogre, the Mafioso giant, etc.).
Sure, there are a few laughs (there's a banjo-playing billy goat who keeps popping up and narrating songs before getting injured in sillier and sillier ways), but they're far fewer than you expect from of a family comedy. A lot of the jokes are lazily written -- even if it takes animated movies longer than live-action ones to produce, there's no excuse for punchlines that would've seemed dated when the original came out in 2006 -- and you're more likely to think "Really?" than respond with a laugh. With far better kid-friendly movies out there, this definitely isn't a must-see movie.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about why fairy tale adaptations are so popular. Why do filmmakers want to remake these stories again and again? What do the different versions of the tales have in common?
Did any of the characters seem stereotyped to you? Is that OK? Why or why not?
Do you think this sequel will appeal to viewers if they aren't familiar with the first one?
Movie Details
- In theaters: April 29, 2011
- On DVD or streaming: August 16, 2011
- Cast: Bill Hader, Glenn Close, Hayden Panettiere, Joan Cusack
- Director: Mike Disa
- Studio: Weinstein Co.
- Genre: Family and Kids
- Topics: Fairy Tales
- Run time: 80 minutes
- MPAA rating: PG
- MPAA explanation: some mild rude humor, language and action
- Last updated: January 6, 2023
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