It has been five years in the making, but the defenders of the LEGO universe are back to fend off alien invaders in The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part. If you liked the smartly zany goofiness of the original, there's much to recommend in the sequel, judging by this latest trailer.

(Spoilers for first The LEGO Movie below.)

In the first LEGO movie, we met Emmet Brickowski (voiced by Chris Pratt), a lowly worker in the town of Bricksburg who cheerfully fulfills his role as a cog in Lord Business' (Will Ferrell) corporate machine. That includes merrily singing the corporate theme song, "Everything is Awesome." (It's a bona fide ear worm. Just try to get that tune out of your head.) Lord Business has discovered a super-weapon, the "Kragle"—basically a giant tube of Krazy Glue—that will freeze the LEGO world permanently in its present form.

This is the antithesis of what the LEGO world is all about: fostering creativity by letting builders mix and match to build whatever they can imagine. So naturally a resistance emerges, along with a prophecy: there will be a master builder dubbed "the Special" who will find a "Piece of Resistance" to defeat the Kragle so that everyone will have creative freedom again. Emmett is mistaken as the Special by a resistance fighter called Wyldstyle (Elizabeth Banks), real name Lucy. They team up with Lucy's broody boyfriend, Batman (Will Arnett), to defeat Lord Business.

Warner Bros. Pictures



Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. Pictures

The LEGO Movie was a surprise smash hit that garnered numerous awards and an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song (the aforementioned "Everything is Awesome"). So naturally there would be a sequel, building on the film's final moments. That's when Emmet finds himself in the "real world" and discovers the people and events of Bricksburg are actually from the imagination of a boy named Finn playing with his father's pricey LEGO set in the family's basement. Finn's younger sister joins him with her LEGO DUPLO toys (designed for preschoolers), at which point aliens from the planet Duplon land in Bricksburg bent on destroying everything.

The LEGO Movie 2 opens five years later, with a dystopian Bricksburg ravaged by the alien invaders, who destroy things faster than the builders can restore them. Emmet is still his cheery self, but when the aliens kidnap Lucy, Batman, and Princess Unikitty (Alison Brie), he charges to the rescue by building a spaceship. He's joined by dashing adventurer Rex Dangervest (also voiced by Pratt) as they travel to a galaxy of glittery musicals, bubblegum pinks and pastels, and unrelenting cuteness.

The film reunites the stars from the original cast and also adds the delightful Tiffany Haddish voicing Queen Watevra Wa-Nabi, shape-shifting ruler of the DUPLO aliens. It has the same clever winks to the world of LEGO, tons of pop culture references, and the same surreal absurdity—perhaps even more so, given that Bojack Horseman creator Raphael Bob-Waksberg penned the script rewrites. And this being a LEGO movie, you can probably bet on a happy(ish) ending.

The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part hits theaters February 8, 2019.