The Little Mermaid: Ariel's Beginning

Footloose with singing. I think from a technical standpoint, this is arguably one of the better Disney sequels? Animation is good, music is fine, the new characters aren't unbearable or anything, solid voice acting, and on account of literally pirating the script from a better movie, the script isn't terrible. But on principle this has no reason to exist and is horrifically uninspired. It also just loves to waste your time with long meandering scenes that go nowhere, plot beats that mean nothing, a story itself that we know is going to work out cause this is a prequel, OH AND SPEAKING OF, they really try and pull a fakeout death with the main character, despite, AGAIN, this being a PREQUEL! So boring, so apathetic to trying anything new, this is just bad in a boring way. The fact this was the last Disney DVD sequel produced is a blessing, cause it really shows there was no upward trajectory in sight.

Definitely more original than the second one, it had some fun moments and it was nice to see more of Ariel's... beginning. Not something I have to rewatch though. According to IMDb, the last animated direct-to-video film, since John Lasseter changed things, cancelling movies such as Pinocchio 2, Dumbo II, The Jungle Book 3, The Aristocats II, Aladdin 4, Hercules 2 and Mulan III. I know that's for the best and those movies would be (like most direct-to-video films) not very good, but it does make me wonder what does movies would be like.