By Natalie Braga, Piper Gallivan, & Alivia Arredondo
The Barden Bellas are back in the third installment of the Pitch Perfect series. This movie was filled with jokes, music, and all of the fan favorite characters. After seeing it in theatres, we found ourselves simultaneously hating and loving it, and here is why. (Warning: this will contain spoilers.)
The plot strayed from the general predictable storylines of the first two movies. In those, the characters goals were laid out at the beginning, and you could easily tell they were going to achieve their goals. In this movie, the plot kept taking weird turns and it was hard to tell what was going on.
The overall plot was the Bellas, now in their early 30s and dissatisfied with their lives, are going on a reunion tour across Europe for the USO to be together one last time. On this tour, there was also a competition where DJ Khaled, a powerful and comedic character, was going to pick one of the acts to open for him on his upcoming tour.
As with most movies, there were sub-plots, but these didn’t really add to the movie, instead making it more confusing. Nothing seemed more out of place than Fat Amy and her dad’s storyline. He was a powerful, crime-bust, drug dealer who had been out of touch with her since she was a teenager. He recently found her and was trying to get the 180 million dollars that she had stored away from her mom. Through all of this, he ends up kidnapping the Bellas and holding them hostage on a boat with the threat of harming them.
Then came a scene that was more like a spy movie than anything else, with Fat Amy setting off a bomb and saving her team members. It was hard to understand why this was incorporated because it was a major distraction for a movie that already had a lot going on.
The ending was not what would be expected, with DJ Khaled only picking Becca instead of all of the Bellas. This led to a heartwarming and emotional scene, where they tell Becca they support her, and that they all love each other. Although the plot, at times was all over the place, the ending was still nice for a series so many people love.
The music and the acting overall in the movie wasn’t up to the standards set up by the other two movies. There seemed to be a lack of music, which was very unfortunate. However, the songs and remixes that did make it were quite good and the girls continue to be very talented singers. Music is such an important factor in movies, especially in the Pitch Perfect series, so to cut the amount of music in this movie was a bad idea by the writers and disappointing to the viewers.
The acting in this movie wasn’t bad, but overall there were some parts that seemed to be forced and unnecessary. For example, many of the scenes with Fat Amy and her father were not very well acted out and the whole thing seemed very forced. It is hard to tell why DJ Khaled got lines in this movie. Though some people disagree, he seemed to have lines that didn’t add much to the story and the acting was subpar. Aside from him, the Bellas and the other supporting actors did a good job with their parts. Most of them were able to bring their characters to life and seemed very believable, which was pleasing to watch and is appreciated.
In comparison to the other two Pitch Perfect movies, it seemed to be not as high quality and more forced than the others. Nearly all the characters came back, excluding Jesse, Bumper, and for the most part Stacy, if you don’t count her small and somewhat irrelevant appearances of her being pregnant. It was sad to see that Jesse was gone due to him being a very beloved character in the last two movies, and to cut his character entirely was a disappointing.
The girls still had crazy, hilarious personalities that were amusing for the most part, however, they seemed a little overdone after having the same jokes being made as the other two movies.
Though this plot continued to mostly follow Becca, this was the first movie where Fat Amy played a major role, which made sense due to her being a fan favorite. Unfortunately, we found her to be a bit too overpowering in comparison to her smaller, but still important, roles like before.
Besides these things, the bubbly personalities of the talented group still kept their charm, and were still satisfying enough to watch for anyone who had become invested in these girls over the years.
Overall, the movie was not the best quality, and we expected more from the creators, however, we don’t regret seeing how the beloved Barden Bellas’ trilogy came to an end. For those who have never seen the other movies, the jokes and plot may seem confusing, but for those who loved the first two, it is worth it to watch the Bellas go on one last crazy adventure together.
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