Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again Parent Guide

It has been ten years since the last Mamma Mia movie. Although we are not sure how much time has passed for the characters, we do know one thing: A year has gone by since the death of Donna (Meryl Streep). During that time, her daughter Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) has devoted herself to fulfilling mom’s dream of turning their little piece of Greece into an upscale hotel.

To that end, Sophie’s boyfriend Sky (Dominic Cooper) heads off to New York to take a crash course on how to succeed in the hospitality industry. Then, just days before their Grand Opening event, Sky tells Sophie he wants to stay in the Big Apple to pursue his own career ambitions. Heartbroken, she turns to her mother’s lifelong friends, Tanya and Rosie (Christine Baranski and Julie Walters). She also finds some comfort from the three men she calls Dad: Sam (Pierce Brosnan), Harry (Colin Firth) and Bill (Stellan Skarsgård).

In a parallel storyline we meet the young Donna (played by Lily James), who is struggling with a similar feeling of rejection because her mother (Cher) didn’t come to her university graduation. Plucking up her flower power resolve, Donna bids farewell to her chums Tanya and Rosie (played by Jessica Keenan Wynn and Alexa Davies) and sets out to find herself while travelling through Europe.

We know, because of the previous film, that Donna will encounter and have a sexual fling with three young men who will all be potential candidates as Sophie’s father. And the fun of this sequel is supposed to be meeting the young Sam (Jeremy Irvine), Harry (Hugh Skinner) and Bill (Josh Dylan), and learning how these romances came to be.

The other entertainment, intentional or otherwise, is seeing how the writers of this musical work various ABBA classics into the script. The placement of “Waterloo” and “Fernando” were particularly funny.

While the editing between Donna’s past and Sophie’s present is creatively accomplished, the challenge still remains of excusing the characters’ promiscuous behavior – even though the one-night-stands are implied rather than shown. Some sexual comments, the glamorizing of single motherhood, a disregard for committed couple relationships and frequent drinking are also disappointing.

Yet what Mamma Mia 2 does do well is showing the importance of family ties. Despite the fairytale nature of the congenial Dads and their attitudes over paternity, this second visit to the sun-kissed island has fewer sexual moments and innuendo than the first and proves unexpectedly emotional in its portrayal of the bond between parents and children.

About author

Donna Gustafson

Donna Gustafson has been involved with her husband Rod's work since the beginning. Handling many of the behind-the-scenes tasks, she also creates preview pages for up-coming movies, acts as managing editor and occasionally writes reviews.