We continue our look at LEGO villains by skipping the spin-off movies and going straight to the sequel. The LEGO Movie 2 is okay but nowhere near as good as the first or even LEGO Batman. The problem is that it has too much to say yet too little to communicate if that makes sense.
It’s not a bad movie by any stretch of the imagination but compared to how the first is a commentary on there is no one way to play and LEGO Batman while I haven’t gotten to it yet seems to be a commentary on ego and id.
Before rewatching the sequel, I thought it was going to be a commentary on boy play versus girl play and that is kinda there with the toys traveling to the Systar system aka sister. It’s trying to go more for the sibling relationship much in how the first commentated on how Finn viewed his father through the lens of Lord Business.
Unfortunately, the human world story and the LEGO World story felt loosely connected. They shared similar threads and the big threat to the LEGO community that they view as an Armageddon is the childrens’ mom telling them to put their toys away.
I guess you could kinda argue Rex represents an older version of Finn and what teenagers think is cool but that is never directly stated and I am just spitballing here.
The other element to look at here is that with Rex Dangervest, The LEGO Movie 2 is basically doing what the first movie did with Bad Cop. If you remember Bad Cop was a parody of Liam Neeson, the sequel made Rex a parody of his voice actor Chris Pratt but was much more blatant about it.
First Appearance
We first see Rex after all of Emmet’s friends are taken by the mini-doll to the Systar System. He comes in and saves him. This of course sets Rex up as a heroic figure but as was all the rage around this time, he’s a twist villain. Anyone remember Danny Phantom and now the biggest bad Danny ever faced was a futuristic version of himself, Dan Phantom that was this movie was doing. This sequel has more of a sci fi bent to it. Heck, the opening is all but a Mad Max parody. Cuz spoilers but Rex is Emmet from the future.
I’m not exactly sure how this works but it does tie into the sci-fi element. Heck, the minifigures refer to the upstairs as the stair gate . And Rex’s ship is built out of pieces from the DeLorean Time Machine, the TARDIS, Bill and Ted’s phone booth and H.G. Wells’ Time Machine. Only two of those have official sets btw. Oh and the hot tub Time Machine.
They really lay on the sci fi theme hard. Heck, at one point we see Rex holding a flux capacitor piece from the original Back to The Future set. I’ll touch upon this when talking about his demise but Rex even says he’s Back to the Future-ing.
Personality
I haven’t hidden this, Rex was Emmet and that’s a big part of his character. Emmet if you remember was happy and carefree and loving to all his friends. Rex when he was still Emmet got stuck under the dryer or as he said landed in the Undar the Dryar system and was stuck there for a long time and he became jaded and cynical when his friends never came to rescue him.
His anger fueled him to shed his Emmet personality and picked out a new vest and hair piece and even changed the way he spoke. It seems to be he believed this was growing up as all the other minifigures keep asking Emmet why he won’t grow up at the beginning of the movie.
Rex is very much acting how teens think adults act being all tough and manly with a false bravado. Whereas Emmet is fueled by love and happiness, Rex is fueled by nothing but hatred and loathing. We see this taken to its extreme when he refers to his former friends as pieces of plastic.
There’s also something else I wanna touch upon and I think it ties into Rex’s hatred and anger. If you’ll recall in the first movie, Emmet learned how to be a master builder aka being someone who can build anything from their pure imagination. Rex teaches his past self how to be a master breaker, a person who can build anything break anything. Destruction is something else imo that ties into the idea of Rex being an idealized version of what teens think is cool as it is a stereotype that boys like seeing things blown up and destroyed.
Rex kinda reminds me of Edobard Thawne from season one of The Flash. Thawne was a fan of The Flash who became consumed by jealously and anger and wanted to ensure that Barry became The Flash. Rex lies and says he’s a fan of Emmet and how he saved Bricksburg. I’ll expand upon this in the next section.
Grand Desire
I already touched upon this in the previous section but Rex wants to make sure that Emmet gets stuck under the dryer. Remember Rex is a version of Emmet from the future and to ensure that Emmet gets stuck there so that Emmet feels the anger that fueled him to become Rex. Consider again if we look at his personality and how Rex actually stands for Radical Emmet Xtreme.
This may seem small but it speaks to how this version of who was once Emmet shed his good-denatured personality because his friends thought abandoned him. Rex tells the present day Emmet to tap into his anger and what truly angers him is not being there for his friends especially Lucy/Wyldstyle.
When looking at Rex, we see that this has been reversed to him feeling abandoned by his friends. We can assume that Emmet before he became Rex was stuck under the dryer for quite some time.
So Rex now having traveled to the past deliberately finds his past self to ensure that Emmet gets stuck where he was as he needs Emmet to become him as if Emmet never gets stuck there, there’s less of a chance that he’ll become Rex.
Most Evil Deed
Now, I haven’t touched upon much of the plot with the Systar system but for the entire movie, we are led to believe they are the villains. We even see this with the mini-doll, Sweet Mayhem who serves as the second in command to Queen Watevra Wa’Nabi as she wants to unite the systems. Sweet Mayhem even tells them that they were inspired by them and Queen Watevra Wa’Nabi is actually a heart that Emmet built to show love and peace when the Duplo aliens invaded which in reality is something Finn built for his little sister, Bianca.
Rex doesn’t want the reunification between the two systems and this goes back to the idea of being a master breaker and how as the wedding between Queen Watevra Wa’Nabi and Batman is about to take place, he tricks Emmet into destroying the cake as he has convinced Emmet that his friends had been brainwashed. Which fair as Lucy thinks the same. But by tricking Emmet into destroying the cake, he sets off the Armageddon that Emmet had a vision of prior to the events of the movie.
Demise
We see Emmet and Rex both under the dryer and fighting and Emmet has even been placed in a vest similar to what Rex is wearing. This further ensures that Emmet will become Rex. However this is where the paths diverge as Lucy comes and rescues Emmet. This small act ensures that Emmet will never become Rex and Rex and is erased from the timeline. Emmet tries to save him but Rex accepts his fate and too late realizes the errors of his way.
Is Rex Dangervest a Good Villain?
I like him well enough an he is one of the better parts of the sequel which again I don’t think is as good as the first movie. I have to wonder if this concept was a bit too hard for kids to grasp as it was a bit more complex than the theme of the first movie. Join me next time as I look at…
LEGO Joker
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