Popcorn Lobotomy

Cars 2 (2D) by Rodders 1 Star

It’s been a long time since I’ve been here – I apologise.
My absence was spent in rehab recovering from a combination of excessive drinking of paint thinner mixed with just about every pharmaceutical out there. I was on a Nicolas-Cage-Leaving-Las-Vegas-type binge heading directly for the grave when I had an epiphany.

“Wait a minute.. I just saw ‘Cars 2’ and there’s that crappy blog I used to write for. I should review this movie and put it up on that! I DO have a purpose after all!”
So here I am and to quote Chuck D of Public Enemy, “Back once again is the incredible..”

The Plot

If you remember the first movie (which I’m assuming you won’t really. I’m sure you remember purchasing that ‘Lightning McQueen’ race car toy for your little nephew or niece 4 years ago though..) the story was pretty simple. Up and coming rookie race car with eyes where the windscreen should be gets side-tracked (pun intended) on the way to the big race in a small town where he learns to value community and relationships over corporate sponsorship and the big city lights.
This is pretty far removed from that.

There’s quite a bit going in this movie and its set up like a Bond film – less the human actors and sex scenes. There are quite a few additional characters which you don’t get much of an introduction to. Michael Caine does an adequate job of voicing Finn McMissile (Bond-type character) and is a step up from that lame-ass corpse Paul Newman who is briefly acknowledged when we’re basking in the glory of Lightning McQueen’s past victories in the Piston Cup which they rename the Hudson Hornet Cup in his honour. Thankfully, they got rid of the “He did what in his cup!?” joke from the first movie and didn’t replace it with anything else as pissing in things and getting drunk are jokes kids really aren’t going to (or rather, shouldn’t) be entertained by. Their alcoholic and valium munching parents on the other hand, might.

Look, to make this more succinct, this movie fails on so many levels as a kid’s movie. The little blighters were climbing over the seats and banging the back of my seat after 5 minutes. It’s like they’ve lifted the story from one of the least popular Bond movies and cut-pasted that into a weak story about a seemingly socially conscious car-actor Sir Axelrod (see what I did there?) who develops a clean energy fuel source that can replace oil-based petrol called “Allinol”. He then invites the world’s best racers to compete in a global event to promote the fuel – dubbing it the World Grand Prix. I tend to think this was to promote globalised ownership of an energy source – you know to get the idea popular among young families and the kids, especially. As if to say, “Look kids! Big companies are gonna take care of you in the future. We’re making clean gas (petrol as we call it) now that won’t harm the environment!”

Just stop right there. There is no mention of what the fuel is or how it is produced – we’re just supposed to accept this as fact. The fanciful concept is yanked quickly from our reality and we’re distracted by the main story which is Mater (Tow truck from the first one) looking forward to be re-united with his best friend Lightning McQueen who has returned to Radiator Springs to spend the summer following his recent success with him and his girl-car-friend Sally. Most of this film revolves around Mater played by Larry the Cable Guy. Yep, that’s the actor’s name. Don’t know who he is? I saw the first one so I remember him from that, but I don’t know any of his work as a comedian or anything. He does the simple-redneck-from-a-small-town act okay I guess but the dimly-lit padded cell that is his brain vocalising words just gets excruciatingly annoying throughout.

Mater ends up being the focus of this one and I have to say that was a bad, bad move John Lasseter. I thought Owen Wilson was frustrating to listen to but this dill-pickle country hick of a character was way more annoying than aforementioned, deformed nose-having jizz guzzler Wilson. Fucking hell what are we to expect from Hollywood these days? The stupid mother trucker is the town fucktard that unwittingly becomes a secret agent alongside McMissile and Holly Shiftwell, the Bond um.. car-girl(?) that crusty old McMissile doesn’t get to fire into. Even for an animated family flick this was difficult to digest as the impostor characters proceed to drive the crazy bus to the Hollywood asylum.

One bit did make me cringe severely injuring a cheek muscle. The Japanese talking toilet scene. What are we to make of this.

I'll have a crack.

Simple folk, like our friend Mater, are scared of technology. They wont even be able to use a public toilet in the future. This is the agenda being pushed onto the kids. Mater is shown confused to a dribbling mess when faced with the computer squeaking instructions in Japanese and lights blinking rapidly all over the place. After which he cops a burst of water directly up the clacker amid his disorientation. Punishment is the only explanation for this, as Mater clearly has no place being in such a pristine piss palace. Are we to believe that dear old Mater is part.. Lemon? What the blazers is going on here?

The story jumps around like a severely scratched piece of vinyl spinning on the turntable in Pixar’s imaginarium. It’s boring, filling the air with the stench of product placement and corporatocracy and I want to vomit in rage in telling you that seeing this felt like a huge waster of my precious time. We don’t care about any of the characters here – they’re bland filler material masking an even blander attempt at prolonging this useless attempt at providing over merchandising of pointless crap for the kids with silver spoons dangling from their pie-holes.

I’ve got my paint thinner concoction to mix up dammit! Oh wait, I quit that didn’t I? The purpose of the making of Cars 2 is pretty clear now. The “Brotherhood” or the “Network” or whatever they’re calling themselves these days is aiming blatantly inane movies specifically at me to turn me back on to my life-shortening addictions and silence what is to be considered the one truth, the only truth and nothing but the truth. We’re all being mind-fucked beyond comprehension by these productions that aim only to condition our brains to make decisions we wouldn’t otherwise make had we not endured them. Slavery is alive and well I can tell you, my friends. No-one is paying me to tell you this; I’m telling you this as a favour to YOU. Wake UP BROTHERS AND SISTERS!

2D or not 2D?

At the cinema I went to, they didn’t have the 3D version of Cars 2. I didn’t care because sitting there drinking my wake-up shake of acai berry and magnesium I thought to myself, “It’s just gonna cost more and these kids running around hopped up on fruit loops and Ritalin are gonna distract me enough in addition to some blurred 3D effects..” Am I right or am I right? I’ve yet to see a good 3D movie and I’m damn sure you shouldn’t fish in your pocket for your hard-earned to see Cars 2 in 3D. You can if you want but don’t say I didn’t warn you.

The first Cars movie wasn’t 3D, so I decided it’d be better, for continuity’s sake, to see the sequel in the 2D format also. This should give you an idea of my train of thought before sitting down to view Cars 2. Walking from the theatre, I could have scooped some rubbish from the gutter and eaten it to feel better about myself. Who am I? What is my purpose of being? It’s certainly not hanging out with a bunch of writhing, sugar juiced-up mongrels and their lazy, humdrum parents who attempt to further their child’s development by plonking them in a dark cinema on Saturday morning for 2 hours of weird looking car people with eyes where the windshield should be. The drive behind the eye concept is to make the cars able to show more emotion apparently. This is acknowledged in Paris where Mater meets a street vendor selling yep, you guessed it, car headlights. Her eyes are in place of her headlights and this totally wigs Mater out. The insipid characters in Cars 2 creep me out as much as the cars in the first one and I dislike intensely all of them with the exception of Fillmore (voiced by Lloyd Sherr – George Carlin unfortunately passed away) Luigi and Guido – who doesn’t speak English except for the words “Pit” and “stop” – and yet is more engaging than the main cars. Ramone (Cheech Marin is still hittin’ them corners in a Lo-lo girls) is pretty good too but you see them mostly in the first one. I’m just gonna call them cars now. Less letters than characters.

John Turturro is alright as the F1 car I suppose. He’s the Alpha guy, but even for this type of movie he’s pretty lame and the rivalry between him and Lightning juxtaposed to the Bond rip-off part of the story is merely a dirty, miniscule fly buzzing around the pile of manure your brain has become to this point.

The “Lemons” are painted as the baddies in Cars 2. You know what a lemon is when we’re talking about cars right? They’re cars that are discontinued due to them being superseded and rendered obsolete. Cars that if they break down, they’re essentially fucked as replacement parts are not readily available for them should they need repair.

So, let me get this straight. The “Lemons” are the bad guys in a world consisting of cars? Cars that are essentially outcast from mainstream society are the bad ones are they? If we’re to believe that the shiny modern cars are mainstream and the Lemons are not, how do we assume Pixar studios view human beings in society? Well, I’ll tell you. If you can’t compete in today’s societal system, you have nothing but a life outside the law to look forward to. That’s what the established companies are conditioning the kids to think as they have been doing for the last 60 years. Launch yourself at and support conglomerate mass-producers, update your parts and get into the race or you’re on the highway to hell baby.


In Conclusion

Even though Disney is inherently evil, I like watching animated movies from Pixar in general because you’re sitting there thinking, “Anything is possible in this movie. It’s all CGI so they can literally do ANYTHING.” When I sat in the theatre watching Cars 2 even with the pounding on the back of my seat I noticed they’d managed to improve the reflective capability of the car’s chassis in its environment, something the original pioneered effects-wise. So visually, I’d give the movie a star because the fire, water, explosions and overall visual aspects of the movie are quite stunning in places in regard to their realism.

But jeez that tow truck Mater needs to be confined to the impound lot, because Larry the Shit Shovel is clearly NOT able to carry a movie. His twangy accent and pure ignorance during this ordeal is astounding to say the least. Cars 2 possesses the same problem as Cars 1 and that is simply that no emotional connection is able to be made with any of the cars even in the slightest. There’s way too many and the kids rathered going to sleep, throwing ice and generally fidgeting over watching the movie only to hear a slight chuckle on behalf of the adults. [Spoiler alert] There’s one bit near the end where Fillmore makes a joke to Sarge regarding the fact that he endorsed the “Allinol” as safe earlier in the movie before the final race.. I won’t write what the punch is but it’s a good one. Captures what George Carlin would have liked to have delivered had he been available to voice in Cars 2.

I’m really hoping there will be no Cars 3. Give it the boot, Pixar! The humour is rank and sparse, characters are convoluted yet distant and in no way engaging apart from a couple of exceptions. They seem to multiply from the beginning too so it’s like the movie bombards you with all these different cars hoping that you’ll be dazzled at the amount of recognisable actors (not many really) and shiny things on the screen. Note to Pixar: Quantity does NOT equal quality you ratfinks.

They got rid of the tyre track clouds in the sky and some of the other intricacies of the original and made anything that has a windscreen in this have eyes so I was in torment most of the time doing my utmost to not rip my eyeballs from their sockets, turn around and make that kid’s birthday REALLY memorable. Allinol (wow, I’m on fire!) this is visually tolerable mainly because it’s from Pixar and if you don’t mind the eye thing however it seems to me that movies like this are definitely perpetuating the agenda of the Elitists contributing to the dumbing down of human beings and in particular, the kiddies. I can’t sit here and be silent about it. Movies like this are aberrant and should be boycotted – DO NOT SUBJECT YOURSELF OR YOUR CHILDREN TO IT. Not even those ones in the crawlspace and basement – they’ll only become more evil and eat your face.

Fuck you, Pisstar and Dogsney. Right here, buddy.

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