Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp's Adventure

(The Disneycember logo is shown, before showing clips from Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp's Adventure)

Doug (vo): Of all the Disney sequels I've reviewed so far, Lady and the Tramp II seems to be the closest in spirit to the original. Now that's not saying a ton, seeing how I thought the original was only okay, but to be fair, I think it was meant to be kind of a smaller movie anyway. As soon as its sequel starts, you'd swear you were in the exact same film. The animation is really top-notch and looks eerily similar to the original. I don't know why they throw all their effort into these Lady and the Tramp films. I mean, they're just dogs walking around. Why would you make them look this good? But they do, and it's beautiful to look at. The story itself ranges from generic to actually kind of okay. But again, for a Lady and the Tramp movie. It's not like I'm expecting anything spectacular.

Story
Doug (vo): The film takes place not even a year after the original. Lady and the Tramp still have puppies and they seem to be a happy family, but one of them seems to get into a lot of trouble. That being Scamp, voiced distractingly so by Scott Wolf. Yeah, look at this thing. You expect a cute little kid voice to come out of it, something high-pitch, but instead, what do we get?

Scamp: But I want to run wild and free like a real dog!

Doug (vo): God, does that not fit.

Scamp: I go wherever I want, do whatever I please.

Doug (vo): You know the only reason they went with this voice is so they can get a semi-celebrity in there, and it just doesn't work. But thankfully, the rest of the voice actors aren't that bad. As he wants to run away from home and join a bunch of Junkyard Dogs. One of them named Angel, played by Alyssa Milano, takes him under her wing and shows him the ways of the outdoors. But things get tricky when Scamp doesn't know where he belongs, in the home life or the outdoor life. It gets even trickier when it looks like Angel wants a home life and even had a home life, but has had her heart broken many times before, and even trickier when the leader of the Junkyard Dogs has it in for his father.

Review
Doug (vo): Yeah, sounds like a semi-reversal of the first film and not really too interesting, but actually, they do quite a bit with it. The pacing in this film is a lot slower than other Disney sequels, and it's very welcomed. Much like the original, there's this real elegance and color to it. The backgrounds are just glowing, and when a character goes through something, they don't just say a line and then run away, they actually kind of sit there and let the moment sink in.

(Several song sequences are shown)

Doug (vo): The songs are actually rather fitting, too. Okay, there's an occasional lame lyric here and there, but the style matches the time period perfectly. There's even a ragtime in it. And for these types of songs, they're actually done pretty well.

(Several clips, primarily focusing on the main characters, are shown)

Doug (vo): Does it all work? No. There's definitely the cliches you can see coming, and certainly a groaner line here or there, and I really didn't get what age everybody was supposed to be. I mean, okay, Scamp is supposed to be a puppy, but they get an adult voicing him. Well, okay. Maybe he's still a little kid. But Alyssa Milano voices the other maybe puppy. They don't really make it clear she's a puppy, maybe she's just a small dog. But there's clearly a romance blooming between them, so, okay. Maybe she is a puppy. But then she talks about how she spent in and out of five families. Five families?! You can't be that young and go through five families! But, okay. Give the benefit of doubt. Maybe she is, maybe she is still a puppy. The leader of the Junkyard Dogs, clearly an adult, has the hots for her, always calling her his girl! How does this work?! So, yeah, little scenes like that and kind of a phoned-in climax make it lame at some points.

Final thought
Doug (vo): But truth be told, I was actually kind of impressed with how much it felt like the original Lady and the Tramp. They do try to make you feel something, they do show the dilemmas the characters are going through, they do take the time for it. I can't really say it's great, because I don't think the first film or this one were meant to be really great. They're supposed to be small, elegant, pleasant little movies. And, okay, there's definitely problems that hold me back from liking it as much as the first one, I mean, the first one did have a little bit more of an edge to it. But I think if you're someone that actually wanted to see a sequel to Lady and the Tramp, this'll do you fine. If this is a story you, for some reason, really wanted to see continue, I say check it out. It might be an adequate spin-off to dig your paws into.

(The final scene of the movie is shown)