Alice Through the Looking Glass Review: Better Than the Original, But Still a CGI Mess

Film critic Sean Patrick reviews Alice Through the Looking Glass. It’s better than Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland, but still overwhelmed by CGI and odd performances.

By Sean Patrick, Regional Media Film Critic

Released in 2016, Alice Through the Looking Glass arrives as the sequel to Tim Burton’s 2010 Alice in Wonderland—a film I genuinely despised. I still do, six years later. That original outing was an irritating display of cloying whimsy, ugly CGI, and grating performances—particularly from Johnny Depp.

Fortunately, Alice Through the Looking Glass, directed by James Bobin, manages to rise above its predecessor—though only barely.

Plot Summary

This time around, the story hinges on the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp), who is falling into a deep melancholy. He believes his long-lost family, presumed dead, might still be alive. When no one believes him, he begins to fade away both emotionally and physically. Alice (Mia Wasikowska) must travel back in time to uncover the truth.

To do this, she seeks help from Time himself, played by Sacha Baron Cohen. In one surprisingly moving scene, Cohen and Wasikowska manage a rare emotional connection—one of the only genuinely effective moments in the film.

Performance & Visuals

But one scene isn’t enough to save a movie so weighed down by excessive CGI. Nothing in this film feels tangible. Even basic set pieces—like handrails—are rendered digitally. The result is a visually exhausting film that offers little in the way of immersion or wonder.

Johnny Depp’s portrayal of the Mad Hatter continues to be aggressively grating. His performance, like much of the film, is loud, chaotic, and difficult to endure.

Final Verdict

Alice Through the Looking Glass is not a good movie. It is, however, a less bad movie than its predecessor. That’s the best I can say. While it has a moment or two of clarity, they’re quickly swallowed by the same garish spectacle that plagued the first film.

Rating: ⭐⭐☆☆☆ (2/5)

I’m Sean Patrick. Thanks for reading.

Alice Through the Looking Glass, Movie Review, Johnny Depp, Mia Wasikowska, Sacha Baron Cohen, Disney Movies, Tim Burton, Film Critic, CGI, Fantasy Films, Sequel Review

Movie Review: The Ring 2

The Ring 2 (2005) 

Directed by Hideo Nakata

Written by Ehren Kruger 

Starring Naomi Watts, Simon Baker, David Dorfman, Elizabeth Perkins, Gary Cole and Sissy Spacek 

Release Date March 18th 2005 

Published March 17th, 2005 

When The Ring was released in 2002 and became a nationwide sensation with 129 million in box office sales and there was no doubt that there would be a sequel.  Hell, the Japanese version of the film spawned multiple sequels so there was even material from which to borrow for a new movie if necessary.  The real question was whether the story they told in the sequel would matter to viewers, not that it mattered much to marketers who had the poster mocked and approved on The Ring's second weekend atop the box office. Unfortunately there is no more story worth telling, or if there is the producers of Ring Two failed to locate it.

A quick recap of the original concept: The Ring was founded on the idea of a crazy looking videotape that, when viewed, left the viewer with seven days to live. A girl trapped in a well used the supernatural powers of the videotape to escape and claim anyone who watched the tape. Naomi Watts starred in The Ring as a journalist named Rachel who saw the tape while searching out a story about the urban legend surrounding it, a legend that may have claimed the life of her young niece.

Rachel is back in Ring Two with her preternaturally creepy son Aiden (David Dorfman). The two have escaped the tape's supernatural curse by running off to a small town somewhere in Oregon where Rachel has taken a job as a reporter for a small town paper run by Max (Simon Baker). How location could prevent a supernatural being from finding victims is a logical question that the film fails to address, among many other failures in logic and works of luck and chance that would be forgivable were they not so numerous.

Unfortunately for Rachel and Aiden, the tape has been traveling with a new legend attached to it. Teens are passing it around under the pretense that if you can get someone else to watch after you the curse is transferred from you to them. This theory fails a teenager who tries to pass it off on an unsuspecting girl. This is in the opening ten minutes and for some reason is the last time in the film we will hear about the killer video.

From there the film changes the supernatural elements, losing the videotape and randomly deciding that Samara, the killer chick in the video, can attack by possessing Aiden, Exorcist style. This leads Rachel back to that well in the basement of Samara's house and to Samara's real mother, an institutionalized woman played by Sissy Spacek. None of this leads to any satisfying conclusion though to the film's credit there is no overt set up for another sequel.

Ring 2 is shockingly bad. Truly shocking considering the talent of director Hideo Tanaka whose original Ringu is terrifically stylish and suspenseful. Ring director Gore Verbinski skated by in the original by being visually inventive and taking advantage of the films unique premise. Ring 2 abandons the original premise and even much of the strong visual aspects, replacing them with what amounts to a series of rip-offs of other horror movies.

Ring 2 is the perfect example of what I have called 'sequelitis.' It's a film that exists solely as a concept, a poster, a series of demographic marketing numbers and never anything resembling a real film.