December 21, 2023 – Twenty-three years after the first “Chicken Run” movie, Aardman Animations has spawned a sequel that is just as funny and engaging as the first one. We find the beloved escaped chickens have aged a lot less than the rest of us in this heist movie about a young chick rescued from an automated chicken processing plant.

We find some familiar stop-motion animated faces in this movie, such as Ginger and Rocky Rhodes, who have settled down on an island in a lake, where lots of chickens live an idyllic life free from the exploitation of humans, along with old friends, Fowler, Babs, Bunty and Mac, as well as the two friendly trader rats, Nick and Fletcher.

Ginger and Rocky welcome their first child, Molly, when she hatches. They try to protect Molly from the outside world, and their painful past at Mrs. Tweedy's chicken farm as well, but Molly is curious about the outside world and wants the freedom to explore it. She is a lot like her mother.

Molly escapes one night and meets another free ranging chicken, Frizzle, who is trying to find a chicken farm where all the chickens seem to be happy and well-treated. Molly and Frizzle hop a chicken truck and sneak into the farm, which seems to be a kind of paradise on the surface. Unfortunately, it is too good to be true.

When Molly gets stuck inside the plant with Frizzle, Ginger organizes a rescue operation. The plant security is ridiculously complex, so a team is needed to break in, including Fowler, Mac, Ginger, Rocky, Nick and Fletcher. This is basically a heist movie, with Molly sneaking around in the plant, trying to figure out what is going on, and the rescue team trying to get into the plant to find and rescue Molly.

To their horror, they find out that the plant is designed by mad scientist Doctor Fry to kill and process contented chickens in order to make better-tasting chicken nuggets. They also discover something even more terrible about this high tech place.

Fortunately, the main characters are pretty much indestructible, allowing them to survive all the traps and security devices. They are also smarter than the humans who run the plant. The chickens have to decide if they want to continue to hide from the humans, or if they want to take the chicken revolution to the wider world.

Aardman, founded over 50 years ago, is well known for its unique brand of good-natured British humor and expert stop-motion animation techniques. All of that is on display again in this fine sequel, streaming on Netflix. It is a funny, feel good movie about chickens with a lot of pluck. It rates a B.

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