In a sequel to the surprise hit Trolls the glitter explosion of Trolls World Tour arrived as the first of the straight to streaming rental in the pandemic that proved that the future market of movie consumption had arrived and was here to stay.
Poppy and Branch discover that there are six different troll tribes scattered over six different lands. Each tribe is also devoted to six different kinds of music — funk, country, techno, classical, pop and rock. When rockers Queen Barb and King Thrash set out to destroy the other music, Poppy and Branch embark on a daring mission to unite the trolls and save the diverse melodies from becoming extinct.
Within 5 minutes of Trolls World Tour actually getting to the opening credits, the entire see-through, wafer thin plot is laid bare and apart from those too young enough to get that, it’s literally 100 minutes of waiting for Trolls World Tour to get to the point.
However, that said, Trolls World Tour is a vast improvement on the original, with some interesting concepts as Poppy and Branch venture through the different Troll lands to save the Trolls from the Hard Rock impending doom. The bounty hunters are nice addition and Sam Rockwell’s rebel Country Troll Hickory is a standout.
The voice cast is pretty amazing when you look at the lineup; the returning Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake, James Corden and then the additional Rachel Bloom, Jamie Dornan, Kelly Clarkson, Sam Rockwell, Chance The Rapper, Ozzy Osbourne, Zooey Deschanel, Tiffany Haddish, Christopher Mintz-Plass, Mary J. Blige,Kirsten Wiig and George Clinton to name but a few. So it’s such a shame, that they couldn’t have some up with something at least mildly entertaining. It plods along to the inevitable climax, which by the time you get there, you’ve long given up caring.
It’s other weakness is declaring Hard Rock the bad guys. Because you are ultimately there’s going to be a portion of the crowd who won’t buy into it. Especially as Pop is supposedly the way of love and hugs. Could have done with a third party enemy that would have sent them on a mission to unite all of the musical trolls. However the repeated line of ‘pop ruins everything’ does raise a smile.
Trolls World Tour is a glitter and colour explosion that violently assaults the senses, the musical numbers sonically challenges your sanity too. However, Trolls World Tour target audience will no doubts terrorise their parents into getting the soundtrack as soon as the credits roll so they can re-live the syrupy poundshop karaoke ad infinitum. But at least it will finally remove Frozen… So every cloud has a glittery lining.
Trolls World Tour is streaming on NOWTV
