Dallas top 40 radio station 103.7 KVIL is getting into the concert festival business, putting on the first-ever Poptopia at South Side Ballroom on September 24, featuring such acts as Phillip Phillips, Magic!, A Great Big World and ZZ Ward.
The lineup is heavy on up-and-comers, as all four main acts have released their debut albums in the last three years.
Phillips is the most well-known of the four, having won American Idol in 2012 thanks in part to his memorable coronation song "Home," which proceeded to take over the charts and television soundtracks. After the huge success of his first album, Phillips released his sophomore effort, Behind the Light, earlier this year.
Magic!, which just released its debut album, Don't Kill the Magic, at the beginning of July, is currently competing for song of the summer with "Rude."
A Great Big World reached its current great big status thanks to the song "Say Something" off their debut album, Is There Anybody Out There? Following its usage on So You Think You Can Dance, Christina Aguilera gave it a big boost by asking the band to re-record it with her, whereupon it became a top 10 single.
The concert also features appearances from British pop singer Katy Tiz, Dallas socialite Courtney Kerr and lifestyle guru Steve Kemble, among others. Gates open at 6 pm, and the show starts at 7.
Tickets for Poptopia are $39.50 apiece and go on sale at 10 am on July 25 at www.kvil.com.
American Idol winner Phillip Phillips is the headliner at the first-ever Poptopia on September 24.
Phillip Phillips Facebook
American Idol winner Phillip Phillips is the headliner at the first-ever Poptopia on September 24.
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.
