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Nov 25, 2014 · Read Matt's Horrible Bosses 2 review; Sean Anders' film stars Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, Jason Sudeikis, Chris Pine, Christoph Waltz, and Jamie Foxx.
- Who's the boss?
- Verdict
By Max Nicholson
Posted: Nov 25, 2014 1:01 am
I went into Horrible Bosses 2 with a good mindset. I had seen the first Horrible Bosses when it came out in 2011, and I remember enjoying it. It was by no means the funniest movie I'd seen that year and it definitely had its flaws, but it was a good way to kill an hour and a half. After that, I forgot all about it and never saw the movie again.
Fast-forward about three years, and I was ready for another misadventure with Nick (Jason Bateman), Kurt (Jason Sudeikis) and Dale (Charlie Day). What I got from Horrible Bosses 2 was more of the same, but that's about what I expected. It's just a shame that, instead of taking the best parts of the first movie and turning them on its head (à la 22 Jump Street), the sequel riffed on the exact same jokes using the exact same characters and mimicking the exact same structure (à la The Hangover Part II).
To be fair, this was probably the result of the movie losing its original creative team. Horrible Bosses director Seth Gordon didn't return for this one, leaving director Sean Anders and producer John Morris to pick up the sequel. In addition to working on questionable comedies like We're the Millers and Dumb and Dumber To, these guys also rewrote the original script (penned by John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein) shortly before production began. So it probably goes without saying that the cards were stacked against the sequel before it even began.
In Horrible Bosses 2, Nick, Kurt and Dale are fed up with answering to higher-ups and decide to become their own bosses by launching a startup business. However, things go sour when a bigwig investor played by Christoph Waltz pulls the rug out from under them, leaving the guys half a mil in debt. Outplayed and desperate -- and with no legal recourse -- the three would-be entrepreneurs put their heads together and hatch a misguided scheme to kidnap the investor's adult son, Rex (Chris Pine), and ransom him. But things take an unexpected turn when Rex wants to help the guys with their plan and swindle his dad out of a cool $5 million. From there, wackiness ensues -- and so on and so forth. Three's a crowd. Four's a kidnapping.Like I said, the setup here is pretty straightforward and borrows a lot of the same beats from the first movie. Honestly, the script is probably the weakest aspect of Horrible Bosses 2. In terms of sheer comedy, the gags range from pretty funny to downright offensive. The movie includes several mean-spirited racist and misogynist jokes that don't really play -- some of which brought my audience to a squeamish silence.
Horrible Bosses 2 is about what you'd expect from a Horrible Bosses sequel -- that is, it offers more of the same sort of comedy from the first movie. Stars Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis and Charlie Day are ever reliable as the not-murderers/not-kidnappers Nick, Kurt and Dale, and they each bring a good amount of laughs thanks to their quick improv...
- Max Nicholson
Nov 26, 2014 · Horrible Bosses 2 is a carbon-copy sequel of its highly successful predecessor. What made the original film so enjoyable from its charismatically funny characters to its hilarious plot have found themselves back with slight tweaks and new characters.
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- Sean Anders
- R
- Jason Bateman
Feb 21, 2024 · On the back of the original’s surprise success, Horrible Bosses 2 doubles down on both its all-star cast and on torturing its protagonists. And now the movie is streaming on Netflix for you to enjoy again and again.
Nov 24, 2014 · Horrible Bosses 2 does not fall quite into such depths, never mind this month’s truly abysmal Dumb and Dumber To. But that still doesn’t change the fact that Horrible Bosses 2 showed up two ...
Nov 25, 2014 · As the sequel opens, the victims of the horrible bosses have themselves become bosses, leading an entrepreneurial charge to get their Shower Buddy device (a shampoo dispenser/shower head combo) to ...
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Nov 26, 2014 · Horrible Bosses 2 may trigger a few belly laughs among big fans of the original, but all in all, it's a waste of a strong cast that fails to justify its own existence.
