Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		1.5
Overall		2.5

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil Blu-ray Movie Review

Empty calories.

Reviewed by Martin Liebman August 10, 2011

It's not just a fairy tale, it's an adventure.

If originality is the spice of life, then Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil is the wrong ingredient. Director Mike Disa's bland, uneventful, slow-paced, tries-too-hard animated film is the woefully inadequate followup to the halfway charming Hoodwinked. It falls completely flat, certainly not adding anything to the series or the animated genre at-large, instead leaving audiences with a sour taste in their mouths. And the movie is all about recovering a secret, almighty powerful recipe to boot. Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil is so off that it needs to be scrapped, the recipe thrown away, and the entire thing reworked or maybe given up on entirely. It's not even close to being figuratively edible; it's not just shy a pinch of this or a dab of that. No, Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil is so bad that even gallons of chocolate syrup, mounds of sugar, piles of frosting, or a heaping helping of sprinkles couldn't even begin to cover up the foul taste this one leaves in the mouth. From its horrid pacing to its uninspired animation, there's almost nothing here of value. The fairy tale characters-meet-the-21st century is at least somewhat novel, but this is a paper tiger recipe, one that looks good on the cover of the cookbook but that tastes far worse than even those cardboard-textured "healthy" frozen pizzas that merely replicate the basic look of the real thing.

Even we think this movie is pretty slow.

Four heroes -- Little Red Riding Hood (voiced by Hayden Panettiere), Granny Puckett (voiced by Glenn Close), The Big Bad Wolf (voiced by Patrick Warburton), and little overly-caffeinated Twitchy the Squirrel (voiced by Cory Edwards) -- have defeated Boingo the Evil Bunny. All is well with the world...or is it? Red has excused herself from the team to train with the venerable Sisters of the Hood where she learns that the most powerful secret recipe on the planet, the one that absolutely could not fall into the wrong hands under any circumstances -- the recipe for a special formulation of truffle -- has been stolen. Meanwhile, the rest of the group, working for the secret organization known as HEA -- the Happily Ever After Agency -- has undertaken a dangerous mission to rescue Hansel (voiced by Bill Hader) and Gretel (voiced by Amy Poehler) from the gingerbread house occupied by an evil witch (voiced by Joan Cusack). Without Red, the mission goes terribly wrong. The witch escapes with Hansel, Gretel, and a new prisoner, Granny Puckett. It's up to Red to find her missing teammate, rescue the children, and discover the connection between the kidnappings and the missing recipe before it's too late.

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil plays in the same zip code as Shrek as an animated movie that dares turn traditional fairy tales inside out. It takes things a step further, though, placing much-cherished storybook characters in the modern-day world where they've formed an alliance of sort and make use of S.W.A.T. team tactics, embark on Mission: Impossible-style raids, and employ cutting-edge technology to save the day. It's an idea clever enough to make even the most ardent James Bond fan drool with the possibilities, but there's just one problem: the execution is terrible. Whether the completely uninspired digital animation that's not even quite on-par with the decade-old first Shrek movie or the lazily-written and halfhearted cliché-riddled plot line, there's just nothing to like about Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil outside of the most fundamentally basic idea behind the movie.

The heart of the problem comes down to the movie just trying too hard to be ultra-hip, up with the times, and incredibly generic. Yes, there seems to be a concentrated effort to make this movie as unimaginatively cliché as possible. When asked to cook up a recipe, a character says in a low voice in a darkened room, "I'll need a titanium mixing bowl." The line is followed by an ominous crack of thunder. Really? It's more eye-rolling than smile-inducing, and even all of the little inside jokes and winks and nods to other films fall completely flat because the movie is so contextually, thematically, and emotionally vacant. Once the novelty of little animals running around with laser-sighting devices wears off, the movie does nothing to hold audience interest. Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil is so routine that its every move is completely predictable, and the characters do and say everything expected of an animated adventure pulled straight from a plot that's better suited for a Saturday morning cartoon than a feature-length picture. Even the voice actors seem completely disinterested; gone from the series are veteran Actors Anne Hathaway and Jim Belushi, and the end result is a passable roster that provides just enough faux- emotion to get the job done; just don't expect the quality work found in Shrek, Ice Age, and the better movies of this style.

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil's 1080p transfer is unspectacular, but then again so is the movie's visual style. The animation is nowhere near today's intricately and realistically-detailed images as seen in films like Wall●e and Rango. Anchor Bay's transfer does a good job of replicating the film's limited visuals, but the quality of the source is itself enough to keep this disc on the shelf when demo time rolls around. Fine detail is lacking; sure there are some elements that appear quite good -- a well-textured plank of wood, the leather-bound book seen at film's open -- but hair, fur, skin, and the like are, for the most part, flat and lifeless. On the other hand, color reproduction is fair; the palette never quite pops, but most shades are accurate rather than pale or overcooked. Black levels are stable, appearing inky and lifelike and never really crushing out fine details. There's some readily-evident banding going on throughout the movie, but that's almost to be expected of a midlevel animated picture. Clarity is quite good and the image remains relatively sharp, though not exhibiting much depth. This is a good transfer in that it replicates the film's natural look and feel, but it's a far cry from the best reference-standard material.

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil features a frustrating DTS-HD MA 5.1 lossless soundtrack. While clarity leaves little to be desired, the track is completely lacking in volume and energy at reference levels. It plays almost timidly, like it's afraid to really stand up and do what's required of it. Even heavier sound effects -- an explosion, the roar of a jet engine, the zipping of a motorcycle -- seem underpowered, but the basic delivery in terms of directionality, spacing, and the like is fine. Likewise, surround use is sporadic at best, and the track never really does much to draw the audience into the film. On the other hand, dialogue is crisp and accurate as it flows from the center channel while music enjoys a full front-half delivery, but again, though, both sound a little tinny and underpowered. Make sure to crank this one up a bit past normal levels.

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil arrives on Blu-ray with a handful of mostly inconsequential standard definition extras. Interviews with the voice cast and storyboard comparisons represent the highlights.

• Music Videos (480p): I Can Do It Alone by Hayden Panettiere (3:34), You Know It by Lavay Cole (3:02), and Perfect Two by CeeJ (3:13).
• The Voices (480p, 19:13): Individual voice cast members discuss their work on the film. Included are Hayden Panettiere as Red, Patrick Warburton as Wolf, Heidi Klum as Heidi, Wayne Newton as Jimmy 10-Strings, and David Ogden as Nicky Flippers.
• Storyboard Sequences (480p, 4:29): Bridge and HEA Invasion.
• Production Artwork (1080p).
• Hoodwinked Too! Video Game Teasers (480p, 0:41): Red's Escape Mobile Game Teaser and Decoder Game Teaser.
• DVD Copy.

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Yikes, is this movie ever bad. Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil is a real drag, a movie with a good idea but terrible execution to show for it. Once the novelty of storybook characters engaged in super-secret 21st century spy work wears off, audiences are left with a cliché-riddled plot, equally unimaginative dialogue, decade-old-in-appearance animation, and lazy voice work. There's nothing to like about this one except its relatively compact runtime, but the movie is so miserable that it feels twice as long as it is. Anchor Bay's Blu-ray release of Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil features a 1080p transfer that's only as good as the material it has to work with, an underpowered lossless soundtrack, and only a few throwaway extras. Skip it.