Inside Out 2

Two years after her move to San Francisco, 13-year-old Riley Andersen is entering high school. Her personified emotions—Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, and Anger—now oversee a newly formed element of Riley's mind called her "Sense of Self", which houses memories and feelings that shape Riley's beliefs. Joy, aiming to fill the Sense of Self with only good memories, has created a spring-loaded mechanism that launches bad memories to the back of Riley's mind.

Riley and her best friends, Bree and Grace, are invited to a three-day ice hockey camp, where Riley hopes to qualify for her new school's team, the Fire Hawks. In Headquarters, the puberty alarm goes off the night before camp, and several mind workers abruptly upgrade the emotion console, whilst leaving Headquarters in disarray. The emotions find that Riley now overreacts to any inputs they make to the console. Four new emotions—Anxiety, Envy, Embarrassment, and Ennui—arrive and clash with the original emotions over their approaches. In particular, Joy wants Riley to have fun at camp, while Anxiety focuses on winning a spot on the team and making new friends, especially given that Bree and Grace will be attending a different high school. Under Joy's control, Riley inadvertently gets the campers in trouble by the strict camp director, Coach Roberts. Anxiety, deciding that Riley needs to change to fit in with the older players, launches the Sense of Self to the back of the mind and has the old emotions bottled up and thrown into a vault. The new emotions then plan to create a new anxiety-dominated Sense of Self and encourage Riley to befriend popular hockey player Valentina "Val" Ortiz, straining her friendship with Bree and Grace. After the original emotions escape the vault, Joy sends Sadness back to Headquarters with a two-way radio while she and the others retrieve the Sense of Self. Sadness is discovered by Embarrassment, who decides to help her remain hidden.

Under Anxiety's control, Riley sneaks into Coach Roberts' office and learns from her notebook that Riley is not considered ready yet to become a Fire Hawk. The four original emotions find the old Sense of Self on a mountain of bad memories deposited by Joy's mechanism. Anxiety, overhearing Joy's plan through the two-way radio, destroys the recall tube, stranding Joy and the other emotions in the back of Riley's mind. Joy breaks down as she cannot figure out how to save Riley. The emotions use dynamite to blow up the cliff supporting the bad memories, sending them careening into the belief pool and riding the flood to return to Headquarters. Anxiety realizes her plan to create a new Sense of Self has backfired, having generated one of self-doubt and inferiority, which causes Riley to perform poorly during her final tryout match, accidentally crash into Grace, and get sent to the penalty box. Horrified, Anxiety tries to help Riley but frantically swarms the console in a blinding whirlwind, causing Riley to have a panic attack.

Returning to Headquarters, Joy finds Anxiety still in control but paralyzed and heavily distressed; Joy convinces her that Riley doesn't need to change to have a better future. Anxiety relents and Joy reinstates Riley's original Sense of Self, but the panic attack persists. Anxiety apologizes to Joy, admitting that neither she, nor any of the emotions, gets to choose who Riley is. Joy, realizing that Anxiety is telling the truth, removes the first Sense of Self, allowing a new one to form from both Riley's good and bad memories. The emotions embrace this third self, calming Riley and helping her reconcile with Bree and Grace. The console calls for Joy, who reassumes command and helps Riley happily finish the hockey tryouts.

Riley befriends Val and the other Fire Hawks at high school, while maintaining her friendship with Bree and Grace. Living in peace, the nine emotions work together to protect Riley, as she happily checks her phone for the Fire Hawks' recruitment results.