Incredibles 2's Biggest Unanswered Questions

Fourteen years is a long time to wait, but Pixar, along with writer/director Brad Bird, have finally brought audiences back to the comic book-inspired world of The Incredibles. Rather than follow the example of other decades-later sequels like Tron: Legacy or the new Star Wars trilogy, Incredibles 2 doesn't let any time pass for its heroes, choosing instead to reward the patience of longtime fans with answers to one big question: what happens next?

What happens next is another big, sprawling adventure in the lives of the Parr family and their outlawed fellow "supers." Like any good sequel, it raises just as many new questions as the old ones it answers, and it doesn't quite leave all of its plot threads tied up neatly at the end of its runtime. There's no telling for sure if or when we'll get a follow-up (more on that particular quandary later), so let's take a look at the most pressing of Incredibles 2's unanswered questions.

Incredibles 2 picks up exactly where the first movie left off 14 years prior, with the Parr family facing off against the Underminer (voiced by Pixar's "lucky charm" John Ratzenberger). The battle rages underground and spills into the streets of Municiberg as the heroes manage to just barely save City Hall. When the dust settles, however, the villain has escaped, and the Incredibles' failure to apprehend him kickstarts the rest of the plot.

So, where has this nemesis vanished to? The only reference the movie makes to his whereabouts comes at the very end of the end credits, when the silhouette of his drill vehicle can be seen driving off into the proverbial sunset. The Underminer has always served as a parallel to Mole Man, the first opponent of the Fantastic Four in classic Marvel comics. His significance in the lives of the Parrs, then, carries quite a bit of weight, and any future Incredibles stories, real or imagined, would potentially have room for him. 

The plot of Incredibles 2 initially seems to wrap up earlier than expected, with Elastigirl tracking the Screenslaver's hypnotic broadcast signal to a high-tech apartment lair and apprehending the masked man inside. As the police take him away, he protests, claiming he can't remember anything that's just happened. Of course, Elastigirl eventually discovers that he was telling the truth, and that the man in custody was a pizza delivery driver under the control of the real Screenslaver, Evelyn Deavor.

So, when the case wraps up for real and Evelyn herself is carted off to jail, what becomes of the poor pizza patsy? The movie gives a happy ending to just about every other character. As far as we know, he's still incarcerated. Perhaps he'll break free and seek vengeance as a pizza-themed supervillain that the Parr family will have to contend with in the future.

There are more questions surrounding this plot as well. How long had the pizza man been under Evelyn's control, and how did she manage to trick out that apartment without being noticed? But then, queries like these fall squarely within the realm of comic book logic. 

Evelyn Deavor reveals her motivation to Elastigirl in exactly the kind of supervillain monologue that the first Incredibles skewered so thoroughly. She blames superheroes for the death of her father, who relied on the powered vigilantes in the Golden Age and had no one to turn to after they were outlawed. Manipulating her brother's sense of nostalgia, she intends to frame supers for a terrible attack and ensure they remain illegal forever.

After hypnotizing an entire luxury yacht full of heroes and world leaders, Evelyn escapes by plane while the boat steers itself toward the bustling city of New Urbem. While the rest of the assembled supers seize control of the renegade vessel, Elastigirl narrowly thwarts Evelyn's flight. But if she hadn't, where what would the villain have done? Having left her brother presumably dead in the wreckage of a plan they engineered together, was she intending to go into hiding? Change her name? We may never know. 

Incredibles 2 introduces a large and likable cast of never-before-seen superheroes brought out of hiding by Winston Deavor as part of his PR campaign. Their scenes rank among the movie's highlights, whether they're interacting socially at the Deavors' mixer or teaming up to save the day during the climax. So, with the laws against their existence lifted in light of their deeds by the end of the story, we have to wonder: what will they do next?

Will Voyd get to spend more time with her idol, Elastigirl? Her bonding with Violet over their mind-controlled battle suggests that she might remain close to the Parr family. Will Krushauer ever truly un-crush anything? The question may have left him with something of an identity crisis. Does Reflux have any hope of becoming a respected protector, or will everyone he tries to save just be disgusted by his powers?

Whatever the future holds for each of them, their chemistry makes it nice to imagine that they might form a team and continue working together. Maybe they'll lay the foundations for some sort of avenging league of justice. 

Speaking of intriguing superpower combinations, it's impossible to discuss Incredibles 2 without bringing up Jack-Jack. The baby's unpredictable array of out-of-control abilities provides many of the movie's most memorable scenes, from his fight with a trash-thieving raccoon to his integral role in the final battle. When Bob Parr brings his infant son to Edna Mode in search of a solution to his overactive tendencies, E reminds him that many supers manifest multiple powers early in life before growing into their defining characteristics.

Jack-Jack, however, has many more powers than usual for his age, and shows no sign of settling into any one of them by the story's end. He remains blessed with laser vision, flammability, multiplicity, dimension-hopping, and a rage-triggered beast mode. His development will surely serve as one of the Parr family's greatest challenges going forward, and might even serve as fodder for potential future Incredibles sequels – writer/director Brad Bird has hinted that the "unexploded bomb" represented by Jack-Jack remains the greatest source of untapped potential for his super universe.

The attack of the Underminer isn't the only plot thread left dangling by The Incredibles that the sequel picks up, only to leave dangling again. The very first scene of Incredibles 2 revisits one of the last moments of its predecessor, in which Violet and her crush, Tony Rydinger, arrange for their first date. Unfortunately, Tony accidentally learns about the Parr family's secret identities, and his memory erasure at the hands of Agent Rick Dicker wipes Violet entirely from his mind.

This unique case of teen angst drives Violet's arc throughout the movie, but the question of her future with Tony remains unresolved once again. Just as their date is about to finally begin, Violet is entangled in another disaster requiring her family's services. It's a classic case of a superhero's duties getting in the way of their ability to commit to a love interest, and it just might plague Violet into adulthood. With seemingly every conversation getting interrupted, will their chemistry ever get a chance to develop?

The biggest missed opportunity in Incredibles 2 might be the choice to leave Honey Best, better known as the wife of Frozone, off screen once again. The character became an instant fan favorite in 2004 without even showing her face, as the scene in which Frozone searches for his super suit made for one of the most memorable moments in the original Incredibles. When asked why Honey remained unseen, Bird explained that a character design existed, but the filmmakers decided that "she's funnier as a voice."

The sequel spends more time with the personal life of the Parr family, and their friendship with "Uncle Lucius" gets more screentime as well. But Honey is once again relegated to a cameo in voice only, with actress Kimberly Adair Clark reprising the role as she once again shouts from across the Best apartment. Considering how satisfying it could have been to solve the 14-year enigma of Honey's identity, it's understandable if some fans feel like they've been left wanting. 

It's not very often that more than a decade passes between a movie and its sequel, especially when it comes to animated family films whose core audience may well age out of their interest in the characters during production. When Disney made The Rescuers Down Under 13 years after The Rescuers, they made it a standalone adventure that required no knowledge of the original. Incredibles 2, on the other hand, throws its audience right back into the final scene of a movie from nearly a decade and a half before. The gap is so remarkable that Pixar saw fit to prepare a special introduction to run in theaters with the cast and crew apologizing for the wait.

So, with all these lingering questions about the Incredibles universe still hanging in the air, we have to ask just two more: will a third Incredibles ever materialize, and when? Will Brad Bird make it a trilogy 30 years in the making? When GameSpot asked the writer/director, he dodged the issue, comparing himself to "a mom who's just delivered a child." Considering how long the second film's fate remained uncertain, the future of the franchise is as unclear as ever.