Just watched it last night! This might get a bit long.
So I really liked it, but prefer the first one by far. The action was great and the animation was absolutely gorgeous. Screenslaver was really cool - the whole apartment scene and trippy/flashy fight scene was a big highlight. The best part, like before, was the family and their interactions together, i.e. Violet hugging Bob after he's been trying so hard to be a good dad was really sweet.
But I don't know, this kind of felt like they made a sequel just because people have constantly been clamoring for one. The plot felt pretty similar to the first one, but the characters' arcs this time around didn't feel nearly as well-defined.
Incredibles 1's main plot was the effect of supers having to go into hiding. Particularly on Bob, who has a midlife crisis centered on wanting to relive the glory days, at the expense of not paying enough attention to his family. The first movie's focus on this was clear, and it tied in well with the other characters too (like Violet wanting to be normal and hating how she's different, Dash feeling like he can't be special because he has to hide his powers).
Incredibles 2 feels like it didn't really have a focus. We get Elastigirl starting in a similar position to Bob, as the superhero parent, but we don't seem to get much of an arc for her out of it. Bob kind of has a small arc where he has to adapt to being the stay-at-home parent and Helen being in the spotlight more, but he seems to accept the situation pretty early on and nothing else really comes from it.
In Incredibles 1, Violet learns to be cool with being different, but then here she kind of hates being a superhero all over again because of its repercussions on her personal life. Which could be an interesting plot to see, but it's not given much focus either.
And poor Dash had NOTHING to do in this movie. I liked how in the first one he loves having superspeed, but he feels like he's not allowed to be special because he has to hide who he is, tying into the movie's themes well. Him letting loose with his powers by running on water was one of my favorite scenes in Incredibles 1, but in this one he's just shouting jokes half the time and the most important thing he does is push a button.
I liked the villain's Lex Luthor kind of motivation where she thinks superheroes are a crutch that society shouldn't depend on. But the twist felt pretty obvious from the beginning (especially in their first conversation where she says the parents should have hid out in the safe room instead of calling supers), and her plan felt weird. After the Underminer incident, supers are shown to still be distrusted by the public. Why not just leave things here, if her goal is to maintain distrust towards supers? Why go to the trouble of building them up in the public's good graces to just tear them down again anyway?
Speaking of the Underminer, the opening for the movie felt weird too. I just rewatched Incredibles 1 the night before to get hyped for 2, and the ending gives the impression that supers are set to come out of hiding. They defeat Syndrome's robots even though there's a bunch of property damage in the city, but the crowd still applauds them and their lawyer thanks/congratulates them. So for things to turn right around so the public still hates supers at the beginning of this movie felt like whiplash.
The pacing for the movie was also really odd, like there was never time to breathe. I felt it a lot towards the end after they stop the cruise ship, and then Elastigirl launches right into a line about missing Jack Jack's first powers. It felt like the movie was afraid we'd get bored so it just kept going at a frantic pace.
I don't know, maybe it'll improve on a rewatch, which tends to happen for me for a lot of movies. I still think it was executed really well overall, but a lot of it was kind of a letdown for me, especially character-wise. I didn't expect it to be as good as the first one was, but beyond a few cool or touching moments, I don't think it even got close.
