Ted 2

The first Ted was a major surprise for me. I thought it looked stupid from the trailers, but when I saw it I couldn't stop laughing. Having been a fan of Family Guy for a long time, I was not sure what to make of Seth MacFarlane's feature film debut. It was a success, so a sequel was bound to happen at some point.

When I first walked into Ted 2, I wasn't sure what to expect. Would it be funnier than the original, or just a waste of time. Well it was actually neither. What it is, though, is a subtle commentary on civil rights.

In the film, Ted (voice by Seth MacFarlane) is seen by the US government as nothing more than a piece of property. With the help of his thunder buddy John (Mark Wahlberg) and a young lawyer named Sam (Amanda Seyfried), Ted goes to court to fight for his rights as a human being. This is the main plot point, but there are a few subplots thrown in, such as finding a sperm donor so Ted and his wife Tami can have a baby, and a return by creepy bear-o-phile Donny (Giovanni Rabisi).

I did not find myself laughing quite as much in this one as with the first. Some of the jokes were a bit predictable this time around, and some even seemed forced. Probably the highlight of the humor is a hysterical cameo which I will not divulge.

Bottom line, it has a good message to it if you like films with a moral, but if you're a fan of Seth MacFarlane who is hoping for nothing but non-stop laughs, then you may be a tad disappointed. Overall, I enjoyed it, but I'd say it's more worth a rental when the time comes. Not really anything to rush to the cinema for.

This film tells the story of a talking teddy bear who sues the government, so that he gets recognised as a human being and get human rights such as marriage and drivers license.

"Ted 2" is a hugely politically incorrect film, with a lot of swearing, sexual and crude humour. It is not usually a type of film I like, but "Ted 2" does have a way to get to my heart. It is sweet and emphasises a lot of love and friendship. Towards the end, the film gets very touching, and it made my eyes well up.

Having a touching plot, together with a funny script makes "Ted 2" very entertaining, way more entertaining than I expected.

Ted 2 does exactly what it set out to do. It delivers a bunch of laughs built primarily on crude, in-your-face humor and it doesn't take itself too seriously. Seth MacFarlane proves once again that he has his finger firmly on the pulse of his target demographic because the theater was in stitches throughout most of the film. That being said, a comedy doesn't have to sacrifice cinema in order to deliver laughs. I think the first movie was a prime example of that, as it was a genuinely good movie in addition to being hilarious. Instead, MacFarlane turns this movie into a live-action version of Family Guy. The plot is choppy and it essentially feels like a series of random skits, pieced together to form the semblance of some over-arcing plot. It was easily worth watching because it was hilarious but I expected a quality film closer to that of the first one.

His certainly not a cuddly teddy that's for all but after one seriously successful first outing in 2012 it was always a given that everyone's (the only one?) favourite foul mouthed yet somehow endearing talking bear was going to make it back to a big screen close by and with that we now have Ted 2.

After his biggest misfire yet in the potentially hilarious yet wrongly skewed A Million Ways to Die in the West (of which an alumni of makes a great cameo in this film), Seth MacFarlane finds himself back on familiar ground, which is in both a material sense, a comedic sense and also a still unfortunately self-indulgent directional sense that see's MacFarlane struggle to rid his 2 hour plus film of jokes that don't work and plot lines that feel like nothing more than time fillers. If there was ever a director in need of someone to cull his films of material that neither enhance or contribute to the tale at hand it's MacFarlane but to say the man doesn't deliver some comedic gold in this enjoyable romp would be a lie.

While you'll often find yourself ashamed at what brings forth fits of laughter here, MacFarlane as he is well known to do, mixes juvenile humour with far more wide reaching topical funnies, from everything from civil rights through to his usual pop culture insights, nothing is out of his reach. Within the films bloated runtime there are moments of pure gold that make Ted 2 succeed to the level it does, much like its predecessor and with the continued chemistry shared between Whalberg's well-meaning yet daft John and the MacFarlane voiced Ted Clubber-Lang (yes Ted now has a last name) at the same high levels the films many sins can be forgiven thanks to their often game saving banters. The addition of Amanda Seyfried is also a bonus to the film, her willingness to poke fun at herself a particular highlight.

The narrative of Ted 2 is anything but fantastic and the reappearance of Giovani Ribisi's teddy obsessed villain Donny is almost a movie breaker but Ted 2 has enough wit and chemistry to save itself from all the low denominator humour and awkwardly edited grove that surrounds it and in the end provides some very decent comedic entertainment. In saying this it may be time for all involved to move onto other things with MacFarlane in particular in need of something a little meatier than he has been dishing up over the last few years.

3 Tom Brady home invasions out of 5

If you're a fan of the first Ted movie you'll probably enjoy the second as well but I think everybody can pretty much agree the first one was a lot funnier. The performances are still decent with some laughs, the biggest problem is is the ho-hum story that isn't engaging. The freshness from the first movie is gone as well. All in all Ted 2 is a slightly fun little comedy if you enjoyed the first one just don't expect it to be as good.