Ralph Breaks the Internet

Ralph Breaks the Internet
File:Ralph Breaks the Internet poster.jpg Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Rich Moore Phil Johnston
Screenplay by	Phil Johnston Pamela Ribon
Story by	Rich Moore Phil Johnston Jim Reardon Pamela Ribon Josie Trinidad
Produced by	Clark Spencer
Starring	John C. Reilly Sarah Silverman Jack McBrayer Jane Lynch Gal Gadot Taraji P. Henson Alfred Molina Alan Tudyk Ed O'Neill
Cinematography	Nathan Detroit Warner (layout) Brian Leach (lighting)
Edited by	Jeremy Milton
Music by	Henry Jackman
Distributed by	Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Release dates	November 5, 2018 (2018-11-05) (El Capitan Theatre) November 21, 2018 (2018-11-21) (United States)
Running time	112 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

Ralph Breaks the Internet is a 2018 American 3D computer-animated comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Pictures as well as the studio's 57th feature-length film. It is the second installment of the Wreck-It Ralph film series and the sequel to the 2012 film Wreck-It Ralph. It is directed by Rich Moore and Phil Johnston, written by Johnston and Pamela Ribon, and executive-produced by John Lasseter, Chris Williams, and Jennifer Lee. It features John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jack McBrayer, Jane Lynch, and Ed O'Neill reprising their roles from the first film, with Alan Tudyk returning to voice a new character, alongside new additions to the cast including as Gal Gadot, Taraji P. Henson, and Alfred Molina.

Talks for a Wreck-It Ralph sequel began in October 2012, and went through three different scripts before settling on the final plot. The film was officially announced in June 2016, with much of the original cast confirming they had signed on, with new members being added in 2018. It marks the first feature-length theatrical sequel from Walt Disney Animation Studios since Winnie the Pooh (2011), which was a sequel to The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977). It is also the studio's first animated sequel to be created by the original film's writing/directing team.

Ralph Breaks the Internet had its world premiere at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles on November 5, 2018, and is scheduled to be released in the United States on November 21, 2018. The film received positive reviews from critics, who called it a "worthy successor" and praised the animation, humor, characters and storyline.

Plot

Six years after the events of the first film, the steering wheel controller on the Sugar Rush arcade game console breaks, forcing Mr. Litwak to unplug the machine. Wreck-It Ralph and Vanellope von Schweetz evacuate all of the Sugar Rush residents to other games before it is shut down, placing the racers in the care of Fix-It Felix Jr. and Sergeant Tamora Jean Calhoun. Ralph and Vanellope then use the arcade's new connection to the Internet to go looking for a replacement steering wheel. While they find a source for a replacement wheel, they need money, leading them to join a free-to-play violent racing game, Slaughter Race, where they meet Shank, one of the game's drivers. Vanellope is taken in by what Slaughter Race has to offer over Sugar Rush and Shank becomes a big sister figure for Vanellope, making Ralph concerned that Vanellope no longer looks up to him nor will return to her game. Along the way, the two encounter new customs, worlds, and characters, such as trendy algorithms and the Disney Princess lineup with The Muppets, Star Wars, Disney Animation, Marvel Comics, and Pixar characters.

Voice cast

• John C. Reilly as Wreck-It Ralph, a gigantic but soft-hearted man who is the antagonist of the arcade game Fix-It Felix Jr.
• Sarah Silverman as Vanellope von Schweetz, a racer/glitch in Sugar Rush who turned out to be its lost princess-turned-president.
• Jack McBrayer as Fix-It Felix Jr., a repairman who is the protagonist and playable character of Fix-It Felix Jr., as well as the husband of Sergeant Calhoun.
• Jane Lynch as Sergeant Tamora Jean Calhoun, the lead character of Hero's Duty and Fix-It Felix Jr.'s wife.
• Gal Gadot as Shank, a racer in Slaughter Race.
• Taraji P. Henson as Yesss, an algorithm that determines the trending videos on BuzzTube. Her character is modeled after Cruella de Vil, as both characters are seen as fashionable.
• Alfred Molina as Double Dan, the creature of the Dark Web.
• Alan Tudyk as KnowsMore, a search engine. Tudyk previously voiced King Candy in Wreck-It Ralph.
• Ed O'Neill as Mr. Stan Litwak, owner of Litwak's Family Fun Center & Arcade.
• Flula Borg as Maybe, Yesss' assistant.
• Hamish Blake as Pyro, a character in Slaughter Race.
• Ali Wong as Felony, a character in Slaughter Race.
• GloZell Green as Little Debbie, a character in Slaughter Race.
• Timothy Simons as Butcher Boy, a character in Slaughter Race.
• Ana Ortiz as Ballet Mom

All of the Disney Princesses appear, including: Jennifer Hale as Cinderella, Kate Higgins as Aurora, Jodi Benson as Ariel, Paige O'Hara as Belle, Linda Larkin as Jasmine, Irene Bedard as Pocahontas, Ming-Na Wen as Mulan, Anika Noni Rose as Tiana, Mandy Moore as Rapunzel, and Kelly Macdonald as Merida, all of whom reprise their roles from previous films and other media. Also returning from other films are Kristen Bell as Anna, Idina Menzel as Elsa, and Auliʻi Cravalho as Moana, while screenwriter Pamela Ribon will voice Snow White.

Additionally, Roger Craig Smith reprises his role as Sonic the Hedgehog, while Brian Curless voices himself, an auctioneer, and the film's directors Rich Moore and Phil Johnston voice auction bidders. Colleen Ballinger, Dani Fernandez, and Tiffany Herrera voice cameo as themselves. Tim Allen, Anthony Daniels, Vin Diesel, Michael Giacchino, Brad Garrett, and Corey Burton will reprise their roles as Buzz Lightyear, C-3PO, Baby Groot, FN-3181, Eeyore, and Grumpy, respectively. Moore also reprises his roles from the first film as Sour Bill and Zangief. Moore, Kevin Deters, Jeremy Milton and Jesse Averna will voice First Order Stormtroopers. Katie Lowes and Jamie Elman will reprise their roles as Sugar Rush racers Candlehead and Rancis Fluggerbutter, respectively, while SNL cast member and impressionist Melissa Villaseñor replaces Mindy Kaling as Sugar Rush racer Taffyta Muttonfudge. Stan Lee, Marvel Comics's former writer, editor and publisher, and Groot's creator, makes a posthumous cameo appearance in the film.

Popular culture cameos and references

Similar to the first film, which included a number of cameos and references to video games, Ralph Breaks the Internet has additional features to Internet culture and to various Disney properties, including their own films, Pixar films, the Star Wars, Marvel Comics, and The Muppets franchises. Mickey Mouse, Grumpy, Dumbo, Eeyore, Tinker Bell, Nick Wilde, Judy Hopps, Heihei, Buzz Lightyear, Baymax, C-3PO, R2-D2, Yoda, First Order Stormtroopers, Iron Man, and Rocket Raccoon will appear in the film as well, along with the video game characters like Q*Bert, Pac-Man, Clyde, Inky, Taizo Hori, Ken Masters, Chun-Li, Ryu, Zangief, M. Bison, Peter Pepper, Frogger, Tapper, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Dr. Eggman from the original film. The band Imagine Dragons will also have a cameo for the film, as shown on its TV spot, with the members voicing themselves.

The filmmakers revealed that the film originally featured a joke about Kylo Ren being a "spoiled child", which was later cut from the film. Like the first film, it will not have a Mario cameo despite the promise they would include him.

Production

Development

In October 2012, director Rich Moore said that he and Disney had ideas about a sequel that would bring the characters up to date and explore online gaming and console gaming. Moore stated that many of the crew and voice cast were open to the sequel, believing that they have "barely scratched the surface" of the video game world they envisioned. He also stated that he planned to include Mario and Tron in the sequel. In 2014, the first film's composer Henry Jackman said that a story for the sequel was being written. In July 2015, John C. Reilly said he had signed on to reprise his role of Ralph in a projected sequel.

On March 24, 2016, Moore stated that a sequel was still being planned. Moore specifically stated that a sequel would include an appearance from Mario, citing a "good relationship with Nintendo". On June 30, 2016, Walt Disney Animation Studios announced that the sequel would be released on March 9, 2018, with Reilly, Moore and writer Phil Johnston attached, and that it would focus on "Ralph leaving the arcade and wrecking the Internet".

In March 2017, the sequel's title was officially announced as Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2, with Moore returning as director joined by the first film's co-writer, Phil Johnston, in his directing debut in an animated film and Clark Spencer also returning as producer. In July 2018, Disney removed Wreck-it Ralph 2 from the film's title.

Writing

Two working versions of the script had been scrapped before settling on the one used for the film, according to head writer Josie Trinidad. In one version, Vanellope had become self-absorbed by the Internet, gaining popularity and celebrity among the users. Ralph had been thrown in jail where he met the search engine Knowsmore, and they had partnered together to escape prison and help bring Vanellope back to her normal self. A second version had Ralph becoming an Internet-famous celebrity, and would have been challenged by an anti-virus program named Bev that served as a super cop and would have been the story's villain. Trinidad said neither of these versions captured what they felt was the centerpiece of the sequel, being how Ralph and Vanellope reacted to the new world of the Internet and realizing they have separate paths going forward.

Producer Clark Spencer said that "the film is about change. Two best friends are about to realize that the world won’t always be the same. The internet is the perfect setting, really, because it’s all about change—things change by the second". Director of story Jim Reardon said that it was intimidating to set the film on the Internet, stating that "[They] looked at how [they] could make the internet relatable on a human level—like how Game Central Station aka the power strip mirrored a train station in the first movie. In ‘Ralph Breaks the Internet,’ any person who uses the internet has a little avatar version of themselves that does their business for them". Reardon, however, said that Disney "didn’t want to make the movie about the internet", wanting to instead focusing on Ralph and Vanellope's friendship, wanting to instead treat the Internet as "the place where the movie takes place". Josie Trinidad claimed that the filmmakers "didn’t want to just give the audience more of that friendship — [people had] to see that relationship grow."

The design of the scenes within the Internet was based on tours made of One Wilshire in Los Angeles, as it is one of the world's largest telecommunications centers, serving most traffic around the Pacific Ocean. The filmmakers did not approach any of the companies (outside of Disney) that are represented in the Internet, and strived to include net branding from all across the world. They also had to explore various Internet memes, making sure to avoid those that lacked long-term presence on the Internet. While the first addresses many positive elements of the Internet, the filmmakers did not want to shy away from covering some of the more unpleasant aspects about it, in part fueled by the success of tackling racism indirectly within Zootopia. Such elements include Ralph reading through comment sections on videos to find users leaving disparaging messages about him, and having the pair travel to the dark web with its activities of questionable legal and ethical status. They wanted to follow the same approach as they had with Judy Hopps in Zootopia, where she experienced, learned, and overcame the racism aspects, and have Ralph similarly learn and become a better person without having to actually solve the issue of hostility on the Internet.

The scene where Vanellope is introduced to the Disney Princess came from screenwriter Pamela Ribon. In 2014, Ribon was still working on Moana when Disney began internally pitching ideas for the sequel to Wreck-It Ralph, Ribon recognized that like the title character of Moana, Vanellope fit the definition of a Disney Princess. When work formally began on the sequel after the completion of Zootopia, Ribon pitched the idea of Disney poking fun at itself by having Vanellope meet the other Disney Princesses in the green room of OhMyDisney.com, the Disney fan-driven website. Further inspiration came from a Buzzfeed online quiz that asked which Disney Princess the user was; Moore thought it would be interesting if Ralph had encountered that quiz and ended up in an argument with Vanellope over the result. Ribon's initial script for the scene, playing off the various tropes of the Princesses such as several being kidnapped or enslaved, remains mostly intact through production. Animators had to work out various techniques to take the different styles of animation into a single approach, and figure out the proportions of the characters to themselves using official figurines.

Casting

Reilly, Jane Lynch, Jack McBrayer, and Sarah Silverman are set to reprise their roles. In December 2016, Alan Tudyk confirmed his return in the sequel as a different character, named KnowsMore. In August 2018, actress Gal Gadot joined the film. The team was able to secure all the Disney Princesses' original voice actresses, save for Adriana Caselotti for Snow White, Ilene Woods for Cinderella, and Mary Costa for Aurora, as Caselotti and Woods passed away in 1997 and 2010 respectively while Costa retired from acting in 2000; Jennifer Hale and Kate Higgins, the current voice actresses for Cinderella and Aurora were hired for the film while Pamela Ribon, the film's co-screenwriter, performed Snow White's voice for temporary tracks, but the team considered it a good substitute, allowing Ribon to voice her in the final film.

Animation

The picture contains over 150 unique sets and 5,726 assets. It also included the highest number of characters in any Disney Animation film, with 434 individual characters with 6,752 variants.

Following the initial trailer for the film, which included the first shots of the Disney Princesses, Tiana, the lead character from the 2009 film The Princess and the Frog and of African-American heritage, appeared to have a lighter skin tone, a narrower nose, and European features in Ralph Breaks the Internet than in the 2009 film. This led to some backlashes on social media as these drew her appearance away from that expected of African-Americans. As a result, Tiana's voice actress Anika Noni Rose and the advocacy group Color of Change contacted Disney to redesign Tiana for Ralph Breaks the Internet to make her look closer to her 2009 appearance, which was reintroduced in the second trailer. The same treatment was made given to Pocahontas, the titular character of the 1995 film, who had been pointed out by many viewers that she was given a much lighter skin tone.

Music

Main article: Ralph Breaks the Internet (soundtrack)

On September 19, 2018, Imagine Dragons released the lead single from the soundtrack titled "Zero", which will play during the end credits of the movie. On October 23, 2018, the music video of "Zero" was posted on Imagine Dragons' YouTube channel. The film will feature an original song called "A Place Called Slaughter Race", performed by Sarah Silverman and Gal Gadot, written by Tom MacDougall and the film's co-director Phil Johntson, and the music was composed by Alan Menken, while the song's pop version, "In This Place", was performed by Julia Michaels. The soundtrack, composed by Henry Jackman, who also composed the score from the previous film. It will be released digitally on November 16, 2018, and will release on CD on November 30, 2018.

Release

On June 30, 2016, Walt Disney Animation Studios initially announced that the sequel, titled Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2, would be released on March 9, 2018. However, in April 2017, A Wrinkle in Time took over its date, and the film was pushed back to November 21, 2018. In July 2018, Disney shortened the film's title to Ralph Breaks the Internet. The film will be released in 3D, 2D, Dolby Cinema and IMAX 3D.

The film will be released in the United Kingdom on November 30, as shown on its international trailer. The first official clip named "KnowsMore" was released on World Internet Day last October 29, 2018. Another entitled "Hearts" was introduced on November 5, the same date where they start selling tickets before its release. On that same day, the film made its world premiere at Los Angeles’ El Capitan Theatre along with the song "Zero" played by Imagine Dragons at the event. A clip about "There is no Track" was released on November 8 which is all about the new character Shank.

Marketing

A new poster for the film was released on February 26, 2018. Two days later, a teaser trailer for the film was released on February 28, 2018, and it quickly became viral, getting more than 4.5 million views in 24 hours. A second trailer was released on June 4, 2018 with the Daft Punk song "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger". A sneak peek of the film was released on August 10, 2018 that included the will.i.am song "Geekin'". Its final trailer was released on September 20, 2018 which included the song "Never Gonna Give You Up".

Carvana and Disney collaborated to promote the film's release throughout a multi-channel campaign.

Reception

Box office projections

In the United States and Canada, Ralph Breaks the Internet will be released alongside Creed II and Robin Hood, as well as the wide expansion of Green Book, and is projected to gross around $65 million in its five-day opening weekend.

Critical response

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 92% based on 59 reviews, with an average rating of 7.2/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Ralph Breaks the Internet levels up on its predecessor with a funny, heartwarming sequel that expands its colorful universe while focusing on core characters and relationships." On Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating to reviews, calculated a weighted average score of 71 out of 100, based on 21 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

Further reading

• Julius, Jessica (2018). The Art of Ralph Breaks the Internet (1st ed.). Chronicle Books. ISBN 978-1452163680. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

External links

• Official website
• Ralph Breaks the Internet at IMDb