Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle

"In the end, Jumanji has got to be the surprise of the year, or at least the past few months."

- Jeremy Jahns

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle is a 2017 American fantasy adventure comedy film directed by Jake Kasdan, co-written by Chris McKenna, Erik Sommers, Scott Rosenberg, and Jeff Pinkner, and starring Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black, Kevin Hart, Karen Gillan, Nick Jonas, and Bobby Cannavale. It serves as a soft reboot to Jamanji, which in itself, is based off the book by the same name.

A sequel, Jamanji: The Next Level, released in December 2019.

Plot
Four high school kids discover an old video game console and are drawn into the game's jungle setting, literally becoming the adult avatars they chose. What they discover is that you don't just play Jumanji - you must survive it. To beat the game and return to the real world, they'll have to go on the most dangerous adventure of their lives, discover what Alan Parrish left 20 years ago, and change the way they think about themselves - or they'll be stuck in the game forever.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) Despite how different the premise is compared to the original film, it still manages to stay faithful to the source material. The protagonists are still trying to beat the game while avoiding the dangers from the jungle, all while having to deal with Van Pelt antagonizing them (who's now called Russel Van Pelt).
 * 2) Good soundtrack that's up-beat and exciting sounding to help emphasize the action scenes. The main theme is a standout, having a large-scale classical feel to it.
 * 3) Great performances from the four stars of the film. What makes their performances even better is that most of them are playing characters whose personalities are different from the characters they usually play, especially Jack Black and Dayne Johnson.
 * 4) *Jack Black goes from being a wise-cracking, action-loving guy to being an self-obsessed social media addict.
 * 5) *Dwayne Johnson goes from being a serious, yet badass leader to a hilariously cowardly nerd. While we have seen comedic moments from The Rock before this film, his comedic style really shines here.
 * 6) Amazing and action-packed action sequences. The stunt work is handled very well and relied on very little CGI, especially considering how characters are getting flung quite often (something that's proven difficult to look convincing). And although there is a lot of CGI being used outside of the actors performing stunt work, it's convincing for the most part.
 * 7) Funny humor, especially from The Rock and Jack Black because of how different their characters are, as well as Kevin Hart being himself like usual.
 * 8) Good character development. For example, Bethany starts out as a complete jerk but ends up becoming selfless to the point she gives up one of her lives to save Alex, becoming a better person in the process, and even retains this development in the sequel.
 * 9) A reference to Alan Parrish, the protagonist of the original film, which in turn is a nice Easter egg towards the late Robin Williams.
 * 10) The film's portrayal of the Jumanji video game is pretty accurate to video games in real life. The protagonists have health meters, lives, statistics, character classes (with certain strengths and weaknesses included), and inventory systems.
 * 11) In addition to doing a good job at simulating a video game, the film tends to reference and make fun of certain problems present in many video games.
 * 12) *The NPCs have an illogically limited role. They usually just guide the protagonist to where they need to go and then never appear again.
 * 13) *The NPCs in the game also repeat their dialogue over and over again, even if the protagonists try asking different questions.
 * 14) *The protagonists are forced to do nothing during cutscenes. Most of the lore is shown in the cutscenes as well.
 * 15) *Russel Van Pelt solely exists to oppose the protagonists, and he only appears in the cutscenes until the end to deliberately pad out the game.
 * 16) *The protagonists are able to store tons of items in a small backpack.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) There are a few plot holes present:
 * 2) *When Alex is revealed to now have a family after escaping form Jumanji, he recognizes Spencer and his friends and vice versa. However, in the original film, while Alan and Sarah recognized Judy and Peter, they didn't recognize them.
 * 3) *There are times when the game acts like a real world and not like a video game, such as how the entire world is fully rendered instead of just one area.
 * 4) *When the protagonists collect an item during a certain objective, the game rewrites itself to make collecting said item mandatory. This doesn't make sense since video game obviously can't reprogram themselves (unless the developers update the game). It's never explained why this happened.
 * 5) Despite the other stars playing against the usual characters they play as, Kevin Hart still remains his comedic self with no changes to his character. His performance is still comedic and entertaining despite this though.
 * 6) Although his character does a good job at making fun of poorly-written video game villains, this ultimately makes Russel Van Pelt a forgettable villain.
 * 7) The action scenes tend to rely on CGI too much, with the CGI appearing obvious during a few of them. The biggest example is the scenes with the animals, especially when Kevin Hart had to run from a bunch of rhinos chasing after him.

Critical Reception
Before Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle released, expectations for the film were low upon the trailer's release. Many believed the film felt nothing the original Jumanji, viewed the protagonists as too stereotypical, and overall thought the film was going to be a slap in the face to the original film's legacy.

Upon release however. Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle received generally positive reviews from critics and audiences alike, who found it to be surprisingly good, and praised the cast. On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 76% based on 229 reviews, and an average rating of 6.2/10. Meanwhile, the audience approval rating is an 87% with an average rating of 4.3/5. The website's critical consensus reads, "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle uses a charming cast and a humorous twist to offer an undemanding yet solidly entertaining update on its source material". The scores on Metacritic were lower, with a Metascore of 58/100, and a user score of 6.7/10.

Chris Stuckmann gave the film a B-. Angry Joe and his two friends Alex and Other Joe all gave the film an 8/10.

Box Office
Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle was a box office hit, grossing around $962.07 million against a budget of about $90-150 million. The film would end up topping the box office for four weeks in a row, even beating out the highly anticipated mh:awfulmovies:Star Wars: The Last Jedi for the top spot a few weeks after the latter released. It was overall the fifth highest-grossing film of 2017.

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