Star Wars: Visions Volume 2 (2023)

Score: B+ (8.5/10)

Coming off the series’ successful first outing, Star Wars: Visions Volume 2 offers more quality and variety from its selection of studios. The results are astounding from many and underwhelming from few, but it continues to establish itself as a bold creative endeavor worth experiencing for Star Wars fans, new and old.

---

In 2021, Star Wars: Visions Volume 1 released to a fanbase known for its nitpicky nature. As such, said fanbase wasn’t sure how to perceive Disney’s decision to enlist almost a dozen anime studios to create their non-canonical versions of the Star Wars universe. Fortunately for many, the successful first volume established creative and sometimes impressive stories with its anthology formatting. The first volume also exhibited the endlessness of Star Wars as an IP, offering a place for filmmakers to explore and mix different genres. However, Disney knew the anime studios were only the beginning. For the next volume, they knew the series needed to expand.

As a result, Star Wars: Visions Volume 2 enlists nine animation studios from across the globe. The global scale allows for more variance in art and animation styles, far outreaching the first volume's well-delivered but well-explored anime art style. Global outreach also allows more cultural representation, ultimately making the second volume more impressive than the first. For example, The Spy Dancer displays a moving narrative about an entertainer and the loss of her child through a brilliant art style. Another example is Aau’s Song, a heartwarming tale of a child with a world-changing voice beautifully filmed in stylistic stop-motion animation. Luckily, these two best represent the stellar quality of Star Wars: Visions’s second outing. On top of that, they also represent the duality of the volume when it comes to the studios behind them.

Volume 2 has two types of studios: the Davids and the Goliaths. The Davids often pull the same weight as the Goliaths, especially in an anthology format. A few examples include Sith, from Spain’s El Guiri, In the Stars, from Chile’s Punkrobot, and previously mentioned Aau’s Song, from South Africa’s Triggerfish, which all provide strong results from their small studios. Then there are the Goliaths. Ireland’s Cartoon Saloon is behind Screecher’s Reach, the studio behind Academy-nominated films like The Breadwinner and Wolfwalkers; I Am Your Mother is from England’s Aardman Animations, who produced Shaun the Sheep, Wallace and Gromit, Flushed Away, and Chicken Run; South Korea’s Studio Mir is behind Journey to the Dark Head, who also animated The Legend of Korra, Voltron: Legendary Defender, Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts, Dota: Dragon’s Blood, AND Harley Quinn; finally, there’s the previously mentioned The Spy Dancer, made by France’s Studio La Cachette, the same studio behind the critically-acclaimed Primal. The studios mentioned earlier deliver nearly the same level of quality despite their diverse backgrounds.

However, there are a few outliers from the rest of Volume 2’s cavalcade of stellar quality. India’s 88 Pictures animated The Bandits of Golak, somewhat emanating The Clone Wars art style. Despite this, it doesn’t do much different than what many Star Wars fans already know and love, making the episode stand out from the volume’s original and creative crowd. The Pit follows a similar issue despite having backing from two experienced members of Lucasfilm. These episodes are not bad by any stretch of the imagination, but they lack engagement and purpose when pitched against the rest of Volume 2’s studios.

Disney’s second crack at a Star Wars anthology series works like a worldwide search for animation studios and an expansion of Star Wars: Visions. Volume 1 was impressive, but the anime-centric episodes left many uninterested in its offerings. Luckily, by expanding animation studios to a global scale, more people are bound to be interested. It’s also without saying that Volume 2 feels more robust and everlasting than Volume 1. However, like Volume 1, Volume 2 also had a few low moments in its offerings. Regardless, Volume 2 does what it set out to do while offering a platform for future endeavors in the anthology series. I cannot wait for more from Star Wars: Visions, and I bet many others will say the same.