The second installment tackled mainly the story of Po, particularly about his origin and what happened to his parents. This is another journey in "getting to know oneself" story-line, and in this third installment, a similar story-line was told. Albeit similar, it was rather told in another level of perspective, a supposedly more profound perspective. More profound in a sense that the knowledge of oneself reaches a certain threshold such that the responsibility to share it with others comes in at a ripe time and becomes another level of journey in "getting to know oneself". Then, it becomes pedagogical, and the film's story shows us a compelling idea of the true meaning of teaching. Teaching in a sense that you transform others, not to become like the teacher, but to become like themselves with their own potentials realized.
Compelling as it may seem, the way of telling in this third installment is rather too simplistic given the weight of the perspective being tackled. It falls quite short of the depth that the first movie has given us despite the similarly comical approach that characterizes a Kung Fu Panda movie. Despite this little "disappointment", the movie was rather enjoyable, and the introduction of new characters and a new place was rather refreshing. The pitfall, however, is that the villain was kind of boring, wherein nothing is really different from the same greedy villain we saw in the second movie. And also, the movie feels a little bit short in a sense that the pacing was fast, and we had the eventual confrontation between the villain and the hero too soon before we get fully satisfied with the laughs, the action scenes, and the weighty story. In short, the movie kind of left us asking for more. Despite all of these, I still would like to say that the third installment is a decent and an enjoyable addition to the Kung Fu Panda series.
Compelling as it may seem, the way of telling in this third installment is rather too simplistic given the weight of the perspective being tackled. It falls quite short of the depth that the first movie has given us despite the similarly comical approach that characterizes a Kung Fu Panda movie. Despite this little "disappointment", the movie was rather enjoyable, and the introduction of new characters and a new place was rather refreshing. The pitfall, however, is that the villain was kind of boring, wherein nothing is really different from the same greedy villain we saw in the second movie. And also, the movie feels a little bit short in a sense that the pacing was fast, and we had the eventual confrontation between the villain and the hero too soon before we get fully satisfied with the laughs, the action scenes, and the weighty story. In short, the movie kind of left us asking for more. Despite all of these, I still would like to say that the third installment is a decent and an enjoyable addition to the Kung Fu Panda series.