MOANA 2 Makes Waves on Disney+
By Movieguide® Contributor
MOANA 2 keeps making waves. So far, the sequel has brought in 27.3 million views over its first five days of streaming on Disney+.
This isn’t a surprise considering that the movie, which stars Auli’i Cravalho and Dwayne Johnson, surpassed $1 billion at the box office following its November release. It also had the “best 5-day Thanksgiving opening of all time” and the largest opening day for any Disney film in history.
Movieguide® celebrated its “strong moral premise”:
MOANA 2 opens with Moana returning home with an artifact, a cracked pot with the image of an island under a constellation of stars with people surrounding it. During a ceremony celebrating Moana, she gets a vision where she’s visited by one of her community’s ancestral heroes, the first wayfarer. He says the island was a meeting place for all the people of the ocean. Nalo, the god of storms, got jealous of the people. He cursed the island and destroyed the ocean currents directing the people there. Moana must find the island. She hopes her friend, the demigod Maui, can remove the curse and help restore the connection among the Polynesian people.
MOANA 2 is an animated comical fantasy with funny, thrilling and touching moments. There are some scary looking creatures and situations, but they aren’t super intense. MOANA 2 has a strong morally uplifting, conservative premise of bringing disparate people together into one kingdom, a version of E Pluribus Unum, Out of Many One. However, this is mixed with some polytheistic content and scenes where the heroine interacts with her people’s ancestors.
READ MORE: MOANA 2 REVIEW
Disney originally planned for the story to be a Disney+ show, but its success reveals the company’s decision to make it a film was the right one.
MOANA 2’s success follows the footsteps of the first MOANA movie. The 2016 hit currently holds the record for the most streamed movie across all platforms ever, garnering over 1 billion views. The family-friendly franchise proves that wholesome and clean content always prevails.
Johnson, who portrays Maui in the movie, took to his Instagram recently to thank fans for the film’s success.
In the post, he said, “Can I get CHEE HOO!! 🙌🏾 🌊 THANK YOU with all our hearts 💞 as MOANA 2 achieves over $1Billion in box office earnings. A global embrace of our Polynesian culture and A LOT of happy and hyped movie goers around the world. In the history of Hollywood, only 57 films have earned over $1B at the box office, so this is truly a real honor. Teamwork makes the dreamwork, and we’re pumped (and proud) to build out our MOANA Universe. Fa’afetai tele lava (thank you so much) ~ Maui 🪝🤎”
READ MORE: MOANA WINS BIG AT THE BOX OFFICE SECOND WEEKEND RUNNING
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