User reviews

Positives are this movie is fun with good performances and lots of good musical moments.

It's costume designs and visuals are top tier for a straight to Disney+ movie, seriously the CGI was surprisingly good. (Like better than a lot of recent blockbusters I've seen) Rita Ora gives such a delicious performance as Queen of Hearts, she's the easy standout and has a real classic Disney villain vibe to her. The fun evil kind with a great evil laugh. Brandy as Cinderella is also amazing, she has a warmth and calmth that make her so motherly while also being so regal and her contrast with the Queen of Heart just works so well! The first Act of the movie sets up the plot well and was my favourite.

Negatives are well the writing and character actions are certainly off, particularly after Act 1. But what lets this movie down is the ending. Without spoiling, it's certainly not satisfying and makes you go wait it's over? While the cast are all teasing a sequel it makes me feel they rushed to the end and wasted lots of the build up throughout just for a potential to return to it later rather than properly fleshing out the story and developing it's new characters with the first movie. Every character feels underdeveloped and like they did very little because, in truth, very little actually happened.

Still though I'd recommend but I hope the sequel actually feels complete and doesn't opt for setting up a 3rd movie.

This movie feels like the producers had made a bunch of music videos and attempted to thread them all together with the thinest of plots. Great movies show don't tell.

I really loved the first 3. All the songs made sense to the plot and most of the story provided fairly believable character arcs. The actors are doing their best here with a subpar script. It was great to see Uma with her crew. That remix on her song was really fun. She barely has anything to do here. Cinderella and Pronce Charming we also wonderful to see together, even though it was extra lovey lovey. I also enjoyed their teenage counterparts.

Honestly, I could see a version of this story working with these same actors. They just needed a better script!

Says a lot about a film and its prospects when only 2 of the original cast are involved. Not only that it is flat from the get go that Kenny Ortega's directing/ choreography is not included in the film which just puts a dampener on the whole film. Overall the film isn't the most terrible thing to have ever watched and a good one for younger ones (watched with a 9 year old who loved it). Plot holes especially towards the end of the film and many things that just don't make sense. A highlight of the film was by far China Anne McClain's performance of Uma, very excited by the reprise of "What my name" from the second movie a great feature for older views who grew up watching the original film(s).

This movie was so bad and gave me a headache. It is obviously nothing like the first 3 which is what I expected but I did not think it would be this bad. The plot makes absolutely no sense and completely goes against what was true in the originals. The music, acting, and directing is bad. Also the costumes were terrible which was something I really liked in 1,2,and3. Only thing I liked was that the original Uma and Fairy Godmother were in it. This movie was veryveyvegryyryverrryyyy disappointing and boring. I didn't even finish it bc I needed to turn it off. Also the sets were bad. And the movie felt uncomplete. Making this movie was completely unnecessary.

As someone who grew up with the Descendants Trilogy I remember watching the first one air on TV for the first time in my grandparents living room. I was in love with everything about the movie. The story, the characters, and of course the songs. So when I heard a fourth film would be coming out, it made sense to me that I would be watching it, having fun, and loving the songs. However, I think I'd rather have my head cut off than watch this again. I will say, when I saw Brandy and Paulo come onto the screen, I began to shed a tear, for I also grew up watching the Cinderella movie. Their voices were both so powerful in that movie. When I heard Brandy start singing, the autotune made me cry. Full on ball. The autotune within everyone in the film was utterly rancid. Definitely the worst of the 4.

Exactly when the movie seemed to redeem itself, like it was finally heading on a better path- it abruptly ended. I understand the writers might want to leave an open window for a potential 2nd movie, but I think the plot could have been worked with in order to give us something else. There are thousands of ways they could have made this, and the result certainly wouldn't have been this quirky, edgy failed attempt to what could have been otherwise an interesting film. They somehow created sparkling details- the atmosphere, the confrontatione, even the characters were interesting enough, and I adore Red, I see pontential in her character development. But it totally lacked what the original series had: good songs, and the magic that overall glued all the other elements together.

The songs have absolutely nothing near the vibes of the original series. I would rather say all the songs sounded like badly timed pop songs. All the essence from the original series- gone.

This gets 1 higher mark purely for how beautiful they made Wonderland look, and even Merlin Academy.

Like everybody else, I had higher expectations. Like Red & Chloe, I wish I had a time-turning clock, so I could give this movie a higher time-ranged, and a not-so-rushed plot.

I loved the first 3 Descendants movies and was super excited to see what Rise of Red would do now that most of the original cast didn't wanna come back. Started out super strong with both Chole and Red's intros. I wish they stayed in the past a little more and extended the end giving it a bit more impact than what they did. Some of the songs I agree were a bit unnecessary for plot progression. Costumes were pretty good and felt like they would do nicely next to the OG Vks. I will say that we could have spent more time in Wonderland with Red seeing more of how life is there. I feel like seeing a young Maddox would also have been neat as well. There was definitely a missed opportunity to have the time machine break and have young Maddox fix it. As well as the Queens maybe remembering that they saw their daughters in the past. Just also making the ending longer would have been great.

The plot of this movie is completely horrid it has no relation to the first three movies; the only original characters that were in this movie that were from the first three movies are Uma and the fairy godmother. The music is absolutely horrendous: it gave me a headache, the writing is bad, and the acting is bad. There was absolutely no character development, no memorable scenes, not the mention that the ending of the movie was completely rushed. The outfits are not as detailed as well or as complementing as the outfits were in the first three movies. With this movie the characters outfits kind of lost their originality and that "descendants" sort of style. Overall boring and rushed.

Ny daughter was SO exited about this but unfortunately did not live up to the other films. The songs are below average (apart from one villain song) the acting is terrible and the whole story is boring. Rita Ora is the best singer and she doesn't have enough screen time. The character Red is sad and unlikable and not in the way I think they wanted her to be portrayed . A few cameos may have saved it but we don't get any. After an our 30 mins we knew this wa snot going to be good !

If you like the other films, don't bother watching this one, just rewatch the originals. Let's hope the new Zombies is better. Very disappointing.

I LOVE the Disney Descendants movies. I'm a Disney adult 100%. But this hurts my heart.

You can definitely tell King Kenny Ortega was not apart of this on any capacity. It lacks all the heart that the first 3 movies had. It's sad because it could have been great, a continuation of a new idea of Disney's stories..

And all the influencers are making it out to be the best in the franchise.. I'm so disappointed.

It's rushed, lacking in chemistry, I don't care for any of the songs, and the story isn't well put together. It's almost like they wanted it to be Disney Descendants and heavily Hamilton. Less movie and more stage production being filmed.

Disney, bring back King Kenny!

Not gonna lie, I was STUPID excited when I saw Brandy was going to be Cinderella. She's my favorite version of the character. I think I was more excited to see her than anything else. And I was happy they got Paolo Montalban to come back as Charming.

And I loved Jeremy Swift as Merlin. He was just like the one from Sword in the Stone. Made him a delight to watch.

For what it is, an adolescent fantasy movie, I really enjoyed it. Music had more of a rock feel then previous Descendants movies. Cast was fun to watch.

The writing could have used a little more work. Feels like they were trying a little bit too hard at times.

The movie had a great build up but the ending was super rush like wtf the music was horrible and wonderland set was so trash it's disappointing now as for the singing Ik for a fact uma mom can sing if u haven't seen high school musical the tv series so so red but Ella voice was unique. Over all the best part was uma singing and the scene for Cameron. As a descendants lover plz stop here I feel this was so disrespectful to the descendants franchise and to our fairy god mother and uma in this idk even know movie was just bogus asf and last thing WTF was maleficent wearing so much low budget on this movie.

My children and I have loved the last 3 Descendants; however, the 4th one just didn't have the same feel as the first 3.

The 4th just felt like the writers rushed through the storyline and made sure the OGs were only a memory. The start with Uma and Fairy godmother was the best scene out of the whole movie.

Including Cinderella and the Prince (and Rita) gave the movie some points, because even the music was a let down. If the last 3 weren't so good, I don't think I would be so critical, but the 4th was such a disappointment.

Please think of your fans when you are thinking of the next one! Also, please more scenes for the OG, especially if one or two of them weee to be in it again.

When I heard a new descendants movie was coming out I so excited because I grew up with these movies however this was utterly disappointing. This movie completely ruined the plot of the first three movies. Which Kenny Ortega directed clearly, there is a major jump from his original movies to this horrible film. I knew this movie wasn't going to be very good without his directing but I never knew how bad it could actually get. My hopes for this movie went down the drain the second the first song started playing. The costumes were disgraceful, the sets were awful, and don't even get me started on the editing. An apology needs to be sent out for anyone who has seen this film.