The Descendants franchise is one that was a surprisingly big franchise for Disney as on paper the story of the kids about Disney's biggest human villains going to school with the kids of there biggest human heroes shouldn't work and yet it somehow did. With the franchise so far consisting of four films , several books a TV series and two TV specials and as such it wasn't all that surprising when a fourth films was announced and well then that very film has now been released and you all just knew that I had to check this film out the very first chance that I got and so then join me as I give you my SPOILER FILLED review of the film that is pretty much Star Trek: The Next Generation but for Disney characters with the film in question being called simply just "Descendants: The Rise Of Red" enjoy.
The plot of this film is Princess Red daughter of the Queen Of Hearts find her and the Chloe the daughter of King Charming and Cinderella going back in time in order to prevent something that happened to Red's mother when she first attended Auradon Prep. Now then interms of what I personally thought felt about the actual plot that's actually featu4ed / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty not that bad but that's also the problem as the plot of this film wasn't all that good either and while yes it could be argued that the plot of all three of the previous weren't that good either they were at the very least plots where you couldn't see what the next big plot point was going to be where as with this film it's painfully obvious what all of the big plot points are going and because of that is the fact that this films plot looses any and all of surprises that it could have had this is despite the fact that the plot of this film is still a fairly decent plot in it's own right with the plot of this film also being really rather entertaining and as well as being really rather engaging as well in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.
Starring in this film is Kylie Cantrall as Red , Malia Baker as Chloe Charming and China Anne McClain as Uma. Also starring in this film is Dara Reneé as Uliana , Rita Ora as The Queen Of Hearts , Ruby Rose Turner as Bridget , Morgan Dudley as Ella , Joshua Colley as Hook , Peder Lindell as Morgie , Melanie Paxson as Fairy Godmother , Grace Narducci as Fay , Levin Valayil as Aladdin , Kabir Bery as Teen Aladdin , Shazia Pascal as Jasmine , Aiza Azaar as Young Jasmine , Jeremy Swift as Merlin , Leonardo Nam as Maddox Hatter , Alex Boniello as Jack Of Diamonds , Sam Morelos as Meadow , Mars as Young Maleficent , Anthony Pyatt as Young Hades , Julee Cerda as Evil Stepmother , Paolo Montalban as King Charming and Brandy as Cinderella.
Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty not that bad. Which is pretty par the course for these films and to this films credit the acting that's in this film was alot better then what it really had any right to be this is mainly due to the fact that the film really does have some actors from the previous films reprising their roles in this film and it really does have two actors reprising their roles from other films as well all of whom really would know best on how to portray there character in any given situation but at the same time this films acting really is also fairly held back by alot of the films newer cast members as actors like Rita Ora , Kylie Cantrall and Grace Narducci while they really are passable in this film just can't hold a candle to the rest of this films cast members in anyway whatsoever as there just really not that good from an acting point of view with the acting in this film not really being helped by the fact that the script for this film really is just so bad as it gives none of this films cast absolutely nothing to work with interms of what it is there respective characters personalities is even meant to be in this first place which is something that really does hold back the overall quality of the acting that's in this film as that's just how bad the script for this film really is.
Doing the CGI for this film is the legends and the really greats that are currently over at Ingenuity Studios. Now the interms of what I personally thought /felt about the actual CGI that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual CGI that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty really bad which is something that does make sense as this film most likely didn't have that big of a budget in the first place and it's effects budget would have been even smaller then the films production budget and while yes all of the CGI in all of the previous films was never all that good in the first place the effects on those films at least looked like they were there on set where as here alot of the CGI looks fake at best and just down right cartoonish at worst and while having bad CGI in this film means that the effects in this film keep in line with the effects in the previous films bad effects are still bad effects.
SPOILERS START HERE!!!!!!!!!!!
What was surprising was the fact that this film including a touching little tribute to actor Cameron Boyce. With the Uma character mentioning that her sending an invitation for the Princess of Wonderland to join Auradon Prep is something that he would have wanted which is both touching as it's a nod to the actor who of course passed away just before the airing of Descendants 3 but it's also dark as it kind of hints that his character died as he's only mentioned in the past tense where as alot of the other characters from the original trilogy of films are all referred to in the present tense which means that it's canon that a key character in this franchise died which is most likely the only thing that they could have done with his character as there was always going to be the elephant in the room of them doing another film in this franchise and he wasn't going to be in it and so the makers of this film did kind of have to address why not only he but also the rest of the original characters weren't going to be in this film and to the films credit they do it in a way that makes sense but for the rest of the original characters also leaves it open for them to return should they decide to do a fifth movie.
This film is basically the franchises version of Star Trek: The Next Generation in it certain characters from the original do appear but it mostly features and focuses on new characters and tells an original story. However tho that's not something that works well for this film as the last two films already introduced characters that could have taken over as the new lead characters should they have chosen to bring them back which would have worked really well as we the audience would have already have known those characters and so that connection would already have been there and yet the makers of this film instead chose to a whole cast of characters and just straight up ignore the fact that the previous two films already introduced characters that could have filled in the roles of the new leads characters which wouldn't be a bad thing if the new characters were interesting or even fun characters and yet there not all that interesting as all they are are just cardboard cut out replacements of the characters that there meant to be replacing where as with both Descendants 2 and 3 they had unique characters that all could have stood up on there own and feel different from the characters that there meant to replacing in the first place.
As with all of the previous films this film is a musical and while it would be great to name who wrote the songs for this film or even what the name of the songs are sadly none of that is available online. With the songs in this film being perfectly in line with the songs from the previous film in that there nothing more then safe cookie cutter songs that would most likely get alot of air time on Radio Disney with the best song in the whole entire film being the sing that introduces the past versions of classic Disney heroes and villain which is a fun and unique number that is really well sung by actress Ruby Rose Turner but let's not only that song down but all of the songs in all of the films this one included is the fact that it's over produced and very busy and in the case of this film alot of the songs also have alot of auto tune which makes it feel like that your just listening to a machine and not listening to a character sing as they normally would do and while yes this film does have some decent songs in it sadly none of them are memorable songs that are going to stick in your head long after the film has finished.
Now then this film has / had an exact grand total running tie of exactly one hour and thirty one min uets and forty four seconds. Which is pretty on brand not only for this franchise but also for Disney Channel Original Movies as a whole as well but where as all of the other Descendants films have more then enough there interms of plot to really cover that large amount of running time this film doesn't as this film instead feels alot like a thirty minuet special that was instead stretched out to feature length with alot of the scenes in this film not really adding to the main plot of the film are instead just to pad out the films running time this is made worse when you take into account that this film has a time travel which then doesn't make sense as Red was only allowed into Auradon Prep due to the fact that years after Red's mother became a dictator and took over Wonderland and raised an entire army to help her do it that entire part of the country was then locked of and the entrance to it was closed for good and yet due to the time travel her mother is now good and yet for some reason Wonderland was still locked off even tho it wouldn't as she wouldn't have taken it over and raised an army as she'd now be a hero type of character this is something that could have been fixed if the film used some of it's running time to explain what's happened in this time line but it doesn't but I will admit that this film really does have some really good pacing to it tho.
So now then as this is an action film that means that I gave to actually talk about the actual action that's actually featured / presented to us un this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual action that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty not that bad. Which is to be expected as these films never really had that much great action in them with alot of them looking like action scenes that you'd find in a small budget TV show and to this films credit it does try to do something new with the action by having them incorporate alot more elements of CGI which yes does take away some of realism away from the action in this film but at the same time tho it is something that does make the action in this film feel unique and different from the action in the other films which mostly took part in obviously fake sets where as here they could at least make the effort to make the action look visually different from those in the rest of the films but that doesn't make the action in this film any good as all it does is make the action look passable which to be fair is also true for the rest of the films in this franchise as well in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.
SPOILERS END HERE!!!!!!!!!!!
Overall as a spin off film this film does fair really good but as a sequel film this film doesn't fair all that well as it finds a way to write out all of the main characters from the original films and essentially act as a way for new fans to join the franchise but at the same time tho there's nothing in this film to warrant it's existence in the first place in my freaking opinions anyways / at least. Now then i've talked about all of the good and as well as all of the bad things that are in this very film in this very review and as such that really does mean that this very film really does earn itself a grand old score of exactly a 6 out of 10 from me.
Now then as for where I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review well then boys and girls and as well as ladies and gentlemen I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review from the official Descendants fandom wiki page , the official Disney fandom wiki page and Google Images. With my personally preferred website to use to get the images from this very film that I used in this very review being the really great the official Disney fandom wiki page really simply just due to the fact that really alot of if not really all of the images that are all really from this very film and are really of course really up and really on the official Disney fandom wiki page are also really all fairly high in quality and really as well as them all being really fairly freaking high in definition.