Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure

Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure
Directed by	Mario Piluso
Screenplay by	Elana Lesser Cliff Ruby
Based on	Characters created by E. B. White
Produced by	James Wang
Starring	Julia Duffy David Berón Charlie Adler Amanda Bynes
Edited by	Christopher Hink
Music by	Michael Tavera
Production companies	Paramount Pictures Universal Cartoon Studios Nickelodeon Animation Studio
Distributed by	Paramount Home Entertainment (North America) Universal Studios Home Video (International)
Release date	March 18, 2003 (2003-03-18)
Running time	79 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure is a 2003 American direct-to-video animated movie. It is the sequel to the 1973 movie Charlotte's Web. The movie was released in the United States on March 18, 2003. It was produced by Nickelodeon and distributed by Universal Studios Home Entertainment.

The movie is about a pig named Wilbur, who lives on a farm and has to take care of three young spiders. They are the daughters of the older spider Charlotte who died in the first movie. He must also save his new friend, a friendly black lamb named Cardigan, from being eaten an evil fox named Farley. The sequel was not received very well. Robert Pardi of TV Guide stating that the movie does not capture the heart and spirit of the original. He also criticized the animation (which he called mediocre, or bad). Mike Long of DVD Talk also said that the animation was mediocre and was like a Saturday morning cartoon, and that the story was lame.

The story

The movie starts in spring, about a year after Charlotte has died. Charlotte's three daughters, Nellie, Aranea and Joy, are now teenagers. Wilbur takes care of them. During this time, Wilbur becomes friends with a newborn lamb named Cardigan. Cardigan is rejected by the other lambs and the younger sheep of his flock because he has black wool. Wilbur takes Cardigan under his wing and shows him the farm, the ways of animal life, and dangers to look out for. However, after only a few weeks, farmer Zuckerman suddenly sells Cardigan to another farmer. Wilbur, along with Charlotte's daughters and Templeton the Rat, set out to visit Cardigan and make sure he is okay.

Wilbur is hungry so he gets some grapes which make him look purple. Some bark from the trees comes and lands on his head. This makes him look like a wild pig. A near hit by a car then reveals that two other guys have now seen the wild pig. This makes it hard for Wilbur to visit Cardigan.

Meanwhile, an evil fox named Farley comes and steals a hen from the barn. Farley comes and steals Cardigan from the barn, and plans to eat him. Wilbur now must save his friend. He does this by trapping him in a "pig web". Charlotte's daughters spin the word "fox" in a spider web, and Fern arrives just in time to save Wilbur. The fox, while not shown, is probably disposed of. Aranea and Joy decide to stay with Cardigan, and the movie ends as Wilbur has to babysit Templeton's kids. He had promised to do this earlier when Templeton had to get Wilbur out of some brambles bushes, which also helped make him look like a wild pig.

Cast

• Julia Duffy as Charlotte
• David Berón as Wilbur
• Charlie Adler as Templeton, Lurvy
• Amanda Bynes as Nellie
• Anndi McAfee as Joy
• Maria Bamford as Aranea
• Harrison Chad as Cardigan the Lamb
• Rob Paulsen as Farley the Fox
• Debi Derryberry as Fern Arable
• Laraine Newman as Gwen
• Dawnn Lewis as Bessie
• Brenda Vaccaro as Mrs. Hirsch
• Jerry Houser as Mr. Zuckerman
• Valery Pappas as High Strung Chicken
• Nika Futterman as Baby Rats
• Bridget Sienna as Flo
• Bobby Block as Snotty Lamb
• Ashley Edner as Bully Lamb
• Pat Fraley as Donkey
• Frank Welker as Animals' vocal effects

Reception

Robert Pardi of TV Guide reviewed the movie saying "This 20-years-later follow-up fails to capture the zest (heart/spirt) of the original cartoon, turning E. B. White's beloved characters into cute sidekicks worthy of Barney." He also said the animation was poor. Mike long, of DVD Talk, reviewed the movie saying "The lame story isn't helped by the mediocre at best animation. The art has no real style and could have come from any Saturday morning cartoon. He continuously called the movie different and humorus names: "Charlotte's Web 2: The Quickening", "Charlotte's Web 2: Dead by Dawn", "Charlotte's Web 2: Island of Lost Dreams", "Charlotte's Web 2: The Nightmare Isn't Over", "Charlotte's Web 2: When Nature Calls", and "Charlotte's Web 2: The Wrath of Khan". He went on to say that "as "Charlotte's Web" is one of my all-time favorite stories, I had a great interest in "Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure". However, what I found was a bargain-basement sequel that does nothing to advance the original stories or characters. The DVD offers a very nice transfer, but the extras are pointless. There will be no spiders claiming that this is "Some DVD"." Out of five stars, he gave the content a one, the video a four, the audio a four, the extras a one, and the overall reply a one, with the advice to skip it. The one reviewer on Rotten Tomatoes that weighed in on the movie, Brian Webster of apolloguide.com, gave it rotten as well. Their summary of their review was "This is the sort of bland adventure that kids will have seen a hundred times before, with not-so-tense near-misses and not-so-exciting chases along the way."

Songs

1. "It's Not So Hard To Be A Pig"
2. "Watch Out Wilbur the Pig!"
3. "It's Good To Be Me"
4. "Charlotte's Kids"

Trivia

• The name of the lamb (Cardigan) is somewhat of a joke as certain characters in the movie want his wool to wear on themselves. This is said because words that mean the same thing as "coat" include jacket, sweater and cardigan.

Other websites

• Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure at AllMovie
• Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure at the Big Cartoon DataBase
• Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure on IMDb
• Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure at Rotten Tomatoes