Ok, we all know that sequels are usually not as strong as the original movie, especially with animated movies. However, the staff who pulled off The Lion King 2: Simba's Pride did a very good job of making a believable sequel with the use of good animators, the usual Disney touch of music, and of course the use of the same actors.

I have to start with the animation. The characters, especially the appearance of Simba and Nala were not butchered into completely differently looking characters, which was a massive relief for me. For example Nala's pale colors from the first movie remained pale in the second movie, which actually surprised me for a sequel because there's usually a common change of colors for characters. (For example, look at Balto. In all three movies he went from brown to tan to grey.) And as far as character design went, Kiara turned out great as did Vitani, Nuka and Kovu. The kids weren't clones of their parents, which was another score for Disney.

The music was not as magnificent as the first movie, but let's be honest, the budget wasn't cut out for commissioning Elton John and Hans Zimmer. I personally didn't mind the music, but after a while it got really corny. The music had all of Disney's fingerprints on it, and was meant for the enjoyment of little kids to sing along with. Obviously, it was not the shiniest part of the movie, but it was okay.

Here's another gold star for the sequel, the use of the same voice actors from the first movie. I really hate it when a sequel is made, and characters are given different voices. It drives me crazy, because the only way that characters from an animated movie can come alive is their voice. Disney did a great job keeping the voices the same for Simba and Nala (who were, after all the original two lion lovers). The casting of new characters was also well done especially when Neve Campbell voiced the adult Kiara. Kiara was basically a lion version of Juliet (without the tragedy of course), but Kiara didn't really have that desperate tone in her voice which I really appreciated. 

All in all, I really liked the sequel and I believed it was well done considering it was a follow-up to a timeless classic film. Bravo to the animators and voice actors.