Cars 2 (2011)

Cars is unpopular with Pixar fans for a number of reasons, but for me, its biggest flaw was the way its characters moved. Nearly all of Pixar's films are a master class in animation choreography. Just the tiniest things, like the way characters walk,  leaves me enraptured. Cars don't have the range of motion that toys, monsters, or humans controlled by rats do, which made the first Cars pretty visually dull (for a Pixar film).

The second movie lacks the sweetness of the first film, but the choreography issue has been fixed wonderfully. The opening chase scene was perfectly executed, and I was on the edge of my seat the entire time. It could've been great if it'd only focused on the spy plot. It seemed like no one had any idea what to do with Lightning McQueen, and his scenes felt like an interruption. There's too much Mater, but I genuinely smiled at some of the moments between him and Finn McMissile. Considering how much I loathe him, that's saying something. I blame Michael Caine.

2.5 surprisingly bloodthirsty automobiles out of 5.