cyrusramsey

I find most 1950s Westerns to be rather stuffy and dated by modern standards, but this one is actually a lot of fun. The dialog is witty, the characters are unique and well written, and the plot, while absurd in practical terms, makes for good comedy and has plenty of fun twists. While there are a few lines of dialog here and there that haven't aged well, there's a lot less of them than a typical movie from the era, and even the Native American characters are given a brief part to play in the story (although they unfortunately do serve as cannon fodder, in typical 1950s Western fashion, in some other scenes.) There's also lots of awesome train action, and even a strong female main protagonist in Kit Dodge Jr., a witty sharpshooting sheriff's deputy played by the legendary Ann Baxter. All in all, not perfect, but definitely one of the better movies to come out of that era of Colorado-based railroad Westerns.

First of all, let's be clear: by objective standards, this movie isn't very good. The plot is very thin and pretty generic, and is only there to somehow tie together all the driving scenes. The dialog and writing is hilariously bad, and the characters are shallower than an inflatable kiddie pool. Obviously, this is a movie based on a video game, but it's so badly written that it kind of gives the impression that it was written as a video game and adapted to film at the last minute.

That said, this is a very fun movie to watch. The cinematography is surprisingly good, especially in the racing scenes, and there is a fantastic sense of speed and realism that a lot of other similar movies lack. It's refreshing to watch car action scenes that don't have so much blinding shakey-cam and constant cuts that you can't even tell what's going on (looking at you, Bad Boys II). It's worth watching just for how well done the driving scenes are, assuming you can suspend disbelief for the action scenes and follow along with a protagonist who's a bit of a jerk to almost everyone in his life.

All of the street racers who are supposedly the heroes are immature, selfish and hugely irresponsible, although I guess that's par for the course in a street racing movie. Aaron Paul's character is supposed to be some kind of macho badass, but is a pretty big jerk to almost everyone, especially Imogen Poots' character, who has very little character development and is mostly only there as eye candy for male viewers, and could be written out completely with no major changes to the storyline. Not that the male characters are much better, mind you - there's one guy whose entire personality is that he has a toothpick in his mouth all the time. Characters are not this movie's strong suit.

It's not exactly a gearhead movie, either. The script pays little attention to the car enthusiast audience, and focuses more on making the cars look cool than making them plausible. The Mustang seems to have a manual transmission in some scenes and an automatic in others, there are numerous over-the-top crashes that get sillier the closer you look, and of course, there's the obligatory big jump scene that every car chase movie has, which the car inexplicably survives with no damage at all. It's hard to tell if this movie is paying homage to the cheesy chase movies of the past, or if the writers actually thought they were working on a Smokey & The Bandit reboot. Either way, it will be tons of fun for some viewers and tiresome (hehe) for others.

The plot is a pretty standard revenge story. It tries to wring out a moral of some sort at the end, and when I was a teenager, I thought it was a fantastic ending. From an adult perspective, it's painfully predictable, but I will give it points for being much better than the ending of the first Fast & Furious movie.

Bottom line: if you enjoy car chases and "so bad it's good" movies, you'll love this one. It's a decent addition to the canon of cheesy car chase movie. If you're looking for good characters and a meaningful story, keep looking.

First of all, if you're reading this, I assume you saw and enjoyed the first Ted movie. The good news is that Ted 2 has a lot - and I mean a lot - of the off-color humor that characterized Ted 1. Ted and Johnny smoke weed a lot, watch TV a lot and say "fuck" a lot. If you thought Ted 1 was funny, chances are you'll find this movie funny as well.

Now for the bad news: while it has lots of good moments, this movie does suffer from a mild case of "sequel-itis". It doesn't fit together as well as the first movie did, there are quite a few scenes that don't move the plot along at all and would work just as well as standalone comedy skits. The movie also falls short of Ted 1 in a few other ways. So let's figure out exactly what's wrong with this movie:

1. Mila Kunis isn't in it. Now, technically this flaw applies to all movies that don't have Mila Kunis in them, but in this case, it makes a noticeable difference. Mila's character was often the voice of reason in the first film, and while Amanda Seyfried's character in Ted 2 is hugely entertaining, she is as goofy, if not goofier, than Ted and Johnny. 2. In the first film, Ted and Johnny were obnoxious and vulgar, but essentially good-hearted. In Ted 2, our heroes and their friends seem to have lost their kind touch, and descended into simply being unhindered assholes. They harass strangers for fun, cause at least two vehicle accidents and make one or two mildly racist, sexist and homophobic jokes - hardly surprising, considering Mark Wahlberg's past, but still a letdown. 3. For some reason, this movie decided to try and be a legal drama as well as a screwball comedy. While it manages not to get too boring, there are still one or two courtroom scenes that feel out of place in this movie, to the point where it's a relief when the protagonists inevitably start shouting obscenities. 4. There quite a few running gags that feel very forced and unnatural. The celebrity cameos are also fun at first, but get a bit old after a while. 5. The ending seems a bit anticlimactic, especially after the brilliant ending of the first film. It mostly fits the characters, but it seems tacked on and pointless, and missed the obvious opportunity to be much cleverer than it was. 6. They don't sing the Thunder Buddy song.

Now, just for the sake of fairness, let me point out some of the utterly brilliant things in this movie that make me love it in spite of its flaws: 1. There are a couple of scenes that parody other films in utterly genius ways. I won't name any names, but if you're at all familiar with the biggest films of the '80s and '90s, you should have no trouble getting the references. 2. Ted really comes into his own as a character in this movie. The first film, despite its name, was really about Johnny, but in this one, Ted really is the one we're supposed to identify with, and Johnny feels almost like Ted's sidekick more than the other way around. 3. Amanda Seyfried is fantastic in this movie, and manages to fit in perfectly with Ted and Johnny's weird rapport. She has a few specific moments that really improve the film overall, and while I won't spoil anything, I will say that this movie would have mostly sucked without her. 4. They don't sing the Octopussy song.

In conclusion, if you enjoyed the first Ted, I think you'll enjoy this one. It doesn't really work as a standalone film, but few sequels do. As long as you don't expect it to be better than the first film, you'll be pleasantly surprised.