Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2

Although it's a far cry from its inventive and fun predecessor, "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2" is neither particularly outstanding nor especially bad. It has a few moments of fun, but not much worth shouting about.

"Cloudy 2" picks up where the first left off, even giving a brief summation of the events of the first film to establish the island of Swallow Falls, overrun by four-story hamburgers, mountains of ice cream and lagoons of applesauce. Most of the residents have departed, and Flint Lockwood (voice of Bill Hader) has been given his dream job with an Apple-like company that pays people to come up with awesome inventions.

Meanwhile, the Flint Lockwood Diatonic Super Mutating Dynamic Food Replicator (FLDSMDFR), it turns out, was not destroyed at the end of the first movie. Instead, it has evolved, and the food it created in the first film has turned into animal/food hybrids, giving us creatures like the Tacodile Supreme, Mosquitoast and the like.

Much of the rest of the film plays like a parody of "Jurassic Park," down to Sam Sparks (Anna Faris) wearing an outfit eerily similar to that of Laura Dern from that film, with the added element of the villain trying to find the FLDSMDFR and use it for his own nefarious purposes.

Sequelitis may be a factor here; it just feels like a lot of the same jokes repeated. There are several of the "conversation in the foreground, comedy in the background" gags that work well, but most are at best chuckle-worthy. There are only so many cutesy food monster names and wide-eyed-wonder shots you can take before you realize the joke has been done.

There are a few odd and abrupt character moments, including one involving Flint and Baby Brent, a bully for most of the first film who came around to become a friend. That angle is played up halfway through the film, but it feels manufactured. It comes and goes quickly and seems forced.

The voice cast is relatively stable, though most notably Terry Crews ("The Expendables") has replaced Mr. T as the voice of police officer Earl Devereaux. The voice work is standard and solid, with no one's starpower overwhelming the characters in the way, say, Robin Williams frequently does.

The visuals are lush and colorful, almost too bright, but this is another unfortunate instance where 3D adds nothing to the proceedings. There's seriously not a single 3D shot; in an animated film, that's inexcusable.

"Cloudy 2" is passable entertainment for your children; they'll love it and laugh like crazy. Heck, maybe you will too. I personally had a decent enough time with these characters. They're mostly likable, but I can't help but feel like some of the magic is missing.