Earl (Terry Crews), Flint (Bill Hader) and Sam (Anna Faris) in Sony Pictures Animation's CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 2. Courtesy of Sony Pictures Animat—© 2013 Sony Pictures Animation, Inc.

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 is a case in point. The original 2009 film was about a wacky young inventor, Flint Lockwood, who builds a machine that makes food fall from the sky onto the ...