Musicians and singers alike commonly cameo in films and television series. They provide a familiar face, a musical note, or needed comedy for some darker plots. In the past, we rarely would see huge musicians of the time have big roles in movies. Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and Bruce Springsteen do not have great film careers for example, even if each of them has specials and album recording documentaries to their names. “Trolls World Tour” aims to change that.
In the last couple of years though, we’ve seen a resurgence for musicians and artists in film. Lady Gaga excelled in “A Star is Born” and more are looking to follow suit. Enter “Trolls World Tour,” the new animated sequel to 2016’s “Trolls.” The sequel features several large-name musical talents and TV personalities, including Kelly Clarkson (“American Idol” winner), Ozzy Osbourne (Black Sabbath frontman turned reality star), and even Gwen Stefani (3-time Grammy award winner). “Trolls World Tour” is pushing as many singers into one film, and hoping that star power does the rest.
Here’s the official synopsis:
Four years after the events of the first film, Poppy (Anna Kendrick) and Branch (Justin Timberlake) discover that they are but one of six different Troll tribes scattered over six different lands, each devoted to a different form of music: Pop, Funk, Classical, Techno, Country and Rock. Their world is about to get a lot bigger, and a whole lot louder, as member of hard-rock royalty, Queen Barb (Rachel Bloom), aided by her father King Thrash (Ozzy Osbourne), wants to destroy all other kinds of music to let rock reign supreme. With the fate of the world at stake, Poppy and Branch, along with their friends — Biggie (James Corden), Chenille, Satin (Icona Pop), DJ Suki (Gwen Stefani), Cooper (Ron Funches) and Guy Diamond (Kunal Nayyar) — set out to visit all the other lands to unify the Trolls in harmony against Barb, who’s looking to upstage them all.
The idea for a great film lies somewhere in that synopsis, but the sheer amount of name-dropping is never a good sign. The premise allows all of these different musicians a chance to play within their genre of music, always keeping them in their wheelhouse.
This sequel brings back the winning duo of Anna Kendrick (“Pitch Perfect,” “A Simple Favor”) and Justin Timberlake (“The Social Network,” “Friends With Benefits”), who brought home an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song as well as a monster box office hit. As the saying goes, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
Starring Timberlake, Corden, Clarkson, Kendrick, and Sam Rockwell (“Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri”), “Trolls World Tour” is scheduled to be released in the United States on April 17, 2020, by Universal Pictures.