Incredibles 2 Review: 6 Ups & 3 Downs

2. It's Surprisingly Low On Superhero Satire

Given that The Incredibles was released back in 2004, before both Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy reinvented the superhero genre forever and the Marvel Cinematic Universe was even a twinkle in Kevin Feige's eye, it was pretty reasonable to expect Incredibles 2 to address how the whole landscape has changed.

It's pretty surprising, therefore, that virtually no effort is made to send-up the genre's moldy tropes or explore how superhero cinema has evolved over the last 15 years.

Sure, Incredibles 2 kicks off where the previous film ended, but that shouldn't have prevented Brad Bird from ribbing the last decade-and-a-half of superhero fare.

Instead, this film mostly feels like it was created in a time capsule: the plot is clearly somewhat influenced by contemporary comic book films, but the satire many expected is mostly absent. Bird pulls off a fairly straight-faced treatment extremely well, but not even trying to send-up the genre just feels like a hugely wasted opportunity.