Rise of the guardians 2
Just watched this movie and oh boy, Jack Frost is good looking.
However, what attracts me most is his personality and his brains.
He's very sarcastic and he won't pass a single chance to tease the Easter Bunny.
Dreamswork did a fantastic job with the movie. It's beautiful.
The frost, the colour, the motion of the snow and sand are just astonishing.
I wouldn't mind spending another 11 bucks in the cinema for this.
As for the storyline, it seems a bit weaker compared to How to train your dragon in term of flow but nonetheless, it's still good. It just seems slightly rushed for some parts. At least, they did develop Jack's story enough to explain his anti-social behavior and the reason he was chosen.
Summary:
The story started with Jack Frost waking up in the water of a frozen lake and pushed through the ice to see the moon. (This part is just gorgeous.) He learns that he is The Jack Frost from the Man in the Moon and his power to manipulate the weather, snow and frost as the winter spirit. He also quickly learn that no one sees or hears him. That stay true for the next 300 years.
Next we see Santa/North building a toy train and tracks out of ice and playing it when a Yeti charged in to tell him that something's wrong with the globe displaying all the children in the world that still believes in the Guardians. It was when Pitch made his prologue. Santa knew it's bad and had the other guardians assembled at this workshop to discuss it. The Man in the Moon then 'tell' them that he's choosing a new guardian and it's Jack Frost (to Bunny's dismay).
Jack Frost is making his rounds to freezing things over in towns and he had his fun with Jamie and other children but in the end, no one 'believes' in him as 'Jack Frost' is just an expression. While he was watching Sandman's dream sand doing its work, Pitch appeared to turn dreams into Fearlings (nightmares). One raced off past Jack and Jack chased it down to a alley where Bunny was waiting for him. He was kidnapped and thrown into North's workshop where all 4 guardians were. Jack was not happy that they want him to be the guardian because the Man in the moon told them he is when MIM never talked to him and ignored him for the past 300 years. Tooth tried to explain to Jack what is their real job as the guardian of children in the world while Bunny just says Jack is not fit to be one. North, however, tells Jack that Jack has to figure out his inner heart before he realize the reason of his existence.
Sadly, Jack doesn't have the luxury of time as Pitch stole all the teeth and captured all the tooth fairies at the Tooth's palace. The tooth fairies, all locked up, can't do their job and children waking up to see their tooth under their pillow and not a penny, they stopped believing the Tooth fairy and weakens Tooth. It was where Jack learned that he was a human and that he can learn his memories from his teeth. If he knew who he was, he might realize what he is standing here for. He decided he will help the guardians to get his teeth back. To turn the table around, they did the collecting themselves and it quickly turned into a race. Tooth and Jack were both in Jamie's room collecting the tooth that 'dropped' (caused by Jack) and Tooth knows it. One by one, the other guardians appeared and they started comparing who collected the most teeth, waking up Jamie. Jack went on to make Jamie's dog chase Bunny. It ended with everyone knocked out by Sandy's sand except Jack and Sandy himself. They had to leave the sleeping group to stop Pitch. The fight looks like it was going well with Sandy winning until Pitch shoot at Sandy with a arrow and Sandy was devoured by the nightmares and disappeared.
The group was devastated by Sandy's death. They are losing the fight with the loss of Sandy. However, Bunny reminded that they still have one more trump card and that is Easter Sunday. They left for Bunny's warren to prepare for Easter Sunday to stumble upon Sophie (Jamie's sister), who found Santa's traveling globe. Jack helped the guardians learn the way of interacting with children as they were all too busy with preparing and protecting the children that they have no time for the children. All seems fine as the eggs were all painted and ready to set off for the big day. Jack volunteered to send Sophie home but the guardians want him to stay in the Warren and with the departing eggs as Jack is their strongest fighting force now. Jack assured them that he will be back soon. While he makes his way back from Sophie's house, he heard a voice calling his name and he followed the voice to PItch's hideout where all the tooth fairies are locked out. He was distracted from setting them free by a voice calling his name again from the pile of cylinder containing teeth of all the children. He tried to look for his and later stalled by the Pitch with his teeth to find out that all the eggs were trampled over. There were no eggs on Easter Sunday and children stopped believing in the Easter Bunny, thus weakening Bunny too. Bunny took his disappointment and anger out on Jack as he could have stopped it. Even though Jack tried to explain, the disappointment in Santa and Tooth's eyes made Jack took off.
Alone on a snow covered cliff, Jack tried to throw his teeth away when Pitch visited him. Pitch wants Jack to join him by convincing that he knows how it feels to be ignored with no recognition by anyone. He tells Jack that they can make the world a cold, miserable and dark place but Jack refused as what he wants is to be believed in, not feared of. If he can't have Jack, then might as well destroyed it. He threatened Jack with the baby tooth fairy that he previously saved. He gave Pitch his staff and was thrown into a clevis and his staff broken. The tooth fairy showed Jack his memories as a human child. He was a child that played a lot and can be rather reckless like hanging upside down from a branch. It was revealed that he drowned in a frozen lake after saving his sister, who was skating on it and the ice was cracking. (which explained why he woke up under the ice in a frozen lake) After remembering all these, he restored his staff and he rushed off to rescue all the other tooth fairies but they have were all badly weaken that none can fly now as there are only 6 children in the world that believe in the guardians anymore. The last few lights disappeared, leaving only one and that is Jamie.
Jack arrived at Jamie's room to see him losing his beliefs as well. Jack frosted up his window and draw pictures of an Easter egg and bunny to convince Jamie that the Easter Bunny does exist. He has the bunny jumped out and hops around in the room before bursting into snow flakes. Seeing the snow, Jamie realize that it is Jack Frost and he believed that Jack exists, causing him to see Jack standing in his room. Jack was so happy that Jamie sees him and believed in him now. Jack persuaded Jamie that the 4 guardians still exist. The other guardians arrived to see Jamie and were badly weakened that they could hardly stand or Bunny can't even maintain is previous form. Pitch arrived shortly to put out the last light. Jack was unable to hold Pitch off as Pitch has gained a relatively amount of power. They were cornered and when Jamie said that he was scared, Jack remembered how he had saved his sister by convincing her that he will just have a little of fun and make her move away from the thin and cracking ice and used a staff to push her onto thicker areas of ice. He realized that he resembles Fun and having Jamie's friends come out to play will help improve the situation. Pitch's fearlings scared the children but Jamie stood out to say that he will not fear Pitch so he can protect the Guardians. The children's beliefs and dreams helped changed the dark sand back into the dream sand, resurrecting Sandy and removing Pitch's control. With no power, Pitch ran off in fear of the guardians. His own fear had his own fearlings chasing him and dragging him back into his hideout. With Pitch gone, the guardians celebrate their win and making Jack an official guardian.
In the credits, it was shown how the children were brought home after being knocked out by the dreamsand.
Thoughts:
The art is just simply beautiful.
I like pretty men and Jack is one handsome chap.
On top of it, he has the brains and very sarcastic.
I personally must say I am impressed by how gentle he is at heart.
Even though he's ignored for 300 years, he didn't resent anyone (or enough) to hurt anyone.
Despite his reluctance to be a guardian and even though they took their disappointment out on him, he never stopped to think again to help save the tooth fairies first on or to convince Jamie to believe in them.
If it was me, I will cause a blizzard every year and make people cold and miserable for ignoring me.
I only find it weird that Jack remembered the part when he drowned from his teeth when the teeth should only contained memories up to the point when they dropped. I personally think the memory of his death is not from the teeth but probably MIM's doing.
I also have a theory that MIM didn't give Jack his memories as a human when he resurrected Jack so he won't be saddened that his death might have caused his sister trauma and had to watch his death by her own doing. he is a guardian of fun so his sister grieving for his death would not have developed his coming as one.