Weekend Event Planner

Selena Gomez and Polyphonic Spree top best weekend events in Dallas

It's Halloween week, which means the slate for this weekend includes several holiday-themed events. But there is plenty of non-spooky stuff going on, including the opening of a new area in downtown Fort Worth, a big festival in Carrollton and the return of a hometown girl who's now one of the biggest stars on the planet.

Below are the best options for your precious free time Thursday through Sunday. Don't like what you see? Lucky for you, we have a much longer list of the city's best events.

Thursday, October 31

Alamo Drafthouse presents Alaween Halloween Carnival
The folks at Alamo Drafthouse love to play dress up on normal weeks, so you can only imagine what Halloween is like for them. They'll have all sorts of fun stuff going on, including trick-or-treating in the theaters, pumpkin carving, a costume contest with prizes and more. For those of age, you can also stay late for a special screening of Halloween.

Avenue Q Halloween Sing-along
Avenue Q has more-or-less become the permanent show in the Theatre Too space at Theatre Three, playing off-and-on there since September 2012. The latest incarnation with a couple of new cast members just started up again, and they'll celebrate Halloween by inviting the audience to dress up as their favorite characters and sing along to their favorite tunes.

Friday, November 1

Sundance Square Plaza grand opening
Sundance Square has been a huge draw for downtown Fort Worth for decades, and it's about to get another big boost with the opening of Sundance Square Plaza, a walkable open space smack dab in the middle of the square featuring fountains, giant umbrellas and entrances to multiple new buildings. They'll celebrate the opening with a variety of performances and other activities Friday through Sunday.

Dallas Black Dance Theatre presents Black on Black 2013
The 2013-2014 season for Dallas Black Dance Theatre continues with Black on Black, an opportunity for the audience to see DBDT's space in the Dallas Arts District, watch intimate and personal performances by the company's dancers and then possibly get on the action themselves at the after-party.

Saturday, November 2

2013 Travel & Adventure Show
The Travel & Adventure Show is kind of a catch-all title for an event that has a bit of everything. Taking place Saturday and Sunday at the Dallas Convention Center, it features everything from animals from SeaWorld to bubble rollers on a big pool to Bachelor host Chris Harrison. It also has loads of travel experts, a culinary theater and a melange of international music performances.

2013 Carrollton Festival at the Switchyard
If you missed your chance for a little '90s nostalgia when Smash Mouth and Sugar Ray came to Allen a few months ago, you can catch them headlining the entertainment at the Carrollton Festival at the Switchyard. The day-long fest in Historic Downtown Carrollton also has food, shopping, arts and crafts, games, rides and more.

2013 North Oak Cliff Music Festival
Anyone who frequents The Kessler for concerts will find more than a few familiar names at this second annual music festival, taking place at Lake Cliff Park. Artists like Jason Eady, The Relatives, Daphne Willis, Seryn, Ruthie Foster and Bob Schneider will all perform, with your usual array of food trucks and kid-friendly activities rounding out the event.

The Polyphonic Spree presents 1st Annual Halloween Hootenanny
The Polyphonic Spree has occasionally broken out a song or two from The Rocky Horror Picture Show at its concerts, but this will be a full-on Rocky Horror fest at Lakewood Theater, complete with costume contest and a post-concert screening of the film. The Spree will also perform some original songs to close out Halloween in style.

Sunday, November 3

2013 Festival of Church Music
Church-goers can get a full day of church music on Sunday by starting off going to their regular service and then ending the day at Meyerson Symphony Center for the Festival of Church Music. 450 singers from 19 churches, accompanied by a brass ensemble, will sing a variety of hymns and anthems, including several with the audience.

Selena Gomez in concert
Grand Prairie native Selena Gomez has accomplished a lot in her 21 years, including starring in her own Disney Channel series and dating Justin Bieber. Although she's been a hot commodity on the music scene for several years with her band The Scene, her 2013 album Stars Dance marks her first official solo effort. She'll bring all of her talent to the table for this concert at American Airlines Center.

The Polyphonic Spree will take on The Rocky Horror Picture Show with their inaugural Halloween Hootenanny at Lakewood Theater on November 2.

Photo by Jerry McClure

The Polyphonic Spree will take on The Rocky Horror Picture Show with their inaugural Halloween Hootenanny at Lakewood Theater on November 2.

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Movie Review

Zootopia 2 Disney is an OK sequel that keeps the fun of the original

Photo courtesy of Walt Disney Animation Studios

Nick (Jason Bateman) and Judy (Ginnifer Goodwin) in Zootopia 2.

When Zootopia came out in 2016, Walt Disney Animation Studios was in the midst of a great run of original films, including Wreck-It Ralph, Frozen, Big Hero 6, and finally Moana. Their output since then has not been as good, including three mediocre sequels, three so-so originals, and only one truly great film, Encanto.

All of which is to say that the odds for Zootopia 2 breaking that trend were low even before they started working on it. The odd couple pair of rabbit Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin) and fox Nick Wilde (Jason Bateman) are now officially detectives in the Zootopia Police Department, but they still have a penchant for not following the orders of Chief Bogo (Idris Elba). Such mischievous behavior doesn’t sit well with the other detective teams, which include pairs of zebras, hippos, hogs, and goats.

Still, their slightly insubordinate ways put them on the path toward discovering the infiltration of Gary De’Snake (Ke Huy Quan), the first reptile to be seen in Zootopia in a long time. He’s trying to steal a book that would prove that his relative was the rightful inventor of a weather technology that gives all animals in Zootopia an ideal climate. But the high-powered Lynxley family, including father Milton (David Straithairn) and son Pawbert (Andy Samberg), lay claim to the idea and won’t give it up easily.

Written and directed by Jared Bush, and co-directed by Byron Howard, the film retains the fun of the first film if not the consistently interesting story. Though Judy and Nick get along much better than they did previously, they still don’t see eye-to-eye on everything. It’s Judy who takes more risks this time around, with Nick’s rule-breaking ways seeming to have rubbed off on her, a nice twist that leads to some ironic situations.

The filmmakers struggle to make the story as easily coherent this time around, with the new characters a decidedly mixed bunch. The Lynxleys are supposed to be the bad guys of the film, but they’re not featured enough to drum up any enmity for them. The detective duos are fun comic relief, especially the two who refer to themselves as the Ze-bros, but none of them factor very much in the actual story.

Instead, the filmmakers fall back on things like cameos from small characters from the first film and a flurry of groan-worthy animal puns. While it’s fun to see the sloth Flash (Raymond S. Persi), sheep Bellwether (Jenny Slate), and Gazelle (Shakira), their appearances are too brief to carry the movie overall. The visuals are as fantastic as expected of Disney films, especially the myriad fur/hides/scales of the different creatures, but the film is not designed to necessarily wow in that respect.

Both Goodwin and Bateman prove again that they were cast perfectly for their respective roles, as Goodwin fully embodies Judy’s relentless enthusiasm and Bateman brings the wry tone to his street smart character. If you know them, it’s fun to have people like Samberg, Straithairn, Quinta Brunson, and Patrick Warburton in supporting roles, but no one but Warburton and his distinctive voice elevates the film.

Like most of Disney’s recent sequels, Zootopia 2 is a pleasant enough movie that lets fans revisit some favorite characters. But when a bar is set high with the first film as it was with Zootopia, it takes more outside-of-the-box thinking to have the second one measure up in any significant way.

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Zootopia 2 opens in theaters on November 26.

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