Happy Gilmore 2 Review

 

So we got a new Adam Sandler comedy movie. Let's hope this is his better ones.

Happy Gilmore 2 is a sports comedy film and the sequel to 1996's Happy Gilmore. Happy Madison Productions did production with Netflix distributing. Adam Sandler not only stars but also wrote the story with Tim Herlihy, and Kyle Newacheck directs.

The story is, ever since winning his first golf tournament twenty-nine years ago, Happy Gilmore retired and now has a family. His daughter Vienna is going to ballet school but with that comes a big bill to pay. Seeing no other choice, Happy comes out of retirement and returns to golf in the hopes of helping his daughter with her dreams.

Initial Reaction

To keep it brief, the reason for wanting to review this is because I'm a fan of the original and I was curious if a sequel was gonna be any good.

Cons

I've got nothing.

Middle Ground

The biggest mix bag was the nostalgia. Now being a fan of the first all of these callbacks and cameos wasn't lost on me. I knew what everything was and who some of these people are. But if you're jumping into this and haven't watched the original, you're gonna be confused by a lot of things. But even if you're a fan a lot of the nostalgia is just gonna feel like a repetitive. Speaking of which, let's dive into the humor. Honestly I wouldn't say Happy Gilmore 2 has any bad jokes, at least in my opinion. But the slight issue stems from recycled gags. Remember that one moment where Happy strangles his caddy? Well an exact moment happens here too. And there's quite a few moments like that as well, but there was also a lot of new stuff too. There was a scene where golf carts crashed into each other and someone getting eaten by alligators that just made me laugh my ass off. Those were great.

Pros

First the pacing. Now there were some slow moments but I didn't find them too damaging to the runtime. So this is one of those few moments where I'm willing to forgive such a thing. Then we have Adam Sandler's performance. Sandler slips back into the role of Happy really well. He recaptured the character's crude charm but also gave him a more grizzled state as well. So it was a nice treat to see Sandler bring a balance of comedy as well as drama to one of his more classic characters. But there was also a surprisingly good performance from Bad Bunny as Happy's new caddie, Oscar. Now I do remember seeing him in Bullet Train but that was a much smaller role. So when I found out he was gonna play a bigger role in this I admit to being highly skeptical at first. So I was surprised he was really good in this, Hell some of the funnier moments came from his character. The last thing I'll give credit to is the tone. Now I understand some people not liking the more serious stuff, but for me I really liked it. I actually liked how the sequel wasn't afraid to be just a tad bit more serious. Mainly with Happy dealing with grief, alcoholism, helping his daughter with her dreams, and just trying to be a good father. It was surprisingly touching stuff, sure it won't be award winning but it's still good stuff.

Happy Gilmore 2 without a doubt has its fair share of problems. But thankfully it's not an outright terrible movie like I was dreading it to be.

My final rating is, Good.

Well that's all I got for now. Come back on Thursday, Jul 31st, for yet horror flick about a character who's in the public domain. I'm referring to my upcoming review of Bambi: The Reckoning. Until then, enjoy the rest of your day.