Merry Christmas, ladies and gentleman, and welcome to the "Reaction & Review Christmas Special". Yes, guys, after skipping this year's "Christmas in July Special", I'm gonna finally make up for it by actually covering a Christmas movie this year. And for this year's special, I have found the perfect movie that'll definitely fit that slot. It is a comedy from 2016. That movie is "Bad Santa 2".
Now, for those of you who may not happened to remember, about a couple of years ago, I reviewed the first "Bad Santa" movie during one of my Christmas specials, probably my second one, not totally sure. But needless to say, I loved it. I thought it was really funny, what with the humor and writing being very unapologetic and everything. I even dug the over-amount of cursing that the movie did, which, at the time anyway, I thought was overdone. But as I've watched it more often during my list of Christmas movies to watch, I really dug the movie's vulgarity even more. So, needless to say, I loved the first "Bad Santa" movie.
So, now that leads me into covering it's sequel. And I'm gonna tell you, guys, ever since I heard about it's sequel, I have so wanted to watch this movie that badly. And thankfully for me, I was able to find it. So, I'm genuinely exited to watch this thing. And as for what I know about it, well, the only thing I really know is that Billy Bob Thornton is back, reprising his role as Willie, along with his dwarven elf actor, and even the kid who played Thurman Merman is back in this movie, too. So, I'm curious to see what he can now that he's all grown up.
Guys, I really wish I could tell you more about the movie, but honestly, I have been avoiding spoilers and plot summaries about this thing. And yes, I could easily read what's on the back of the DVD case I bought for this thing, but really, I just want to find out for myself if this thing will be just as good as the first "Bad Santa" film was. And the only way I am gonna find out is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Bad Santa 2".
4 minutes later
Well...we're certainly starting off a bit dark here. Granted, this isn't the first time Willie has tried to commit suicide, but this time he's actually putting his head inside a fucking hot stove! Dude, I know your life has been kinda shit so far, but I didn't think he'd actually go to that lengths to kill yourself. That just seems a bit much. Oh wait...never mind, he's given up on that idea, and instead is trying to hang himself with a cord of a toaster. Not totally sure how practical that is, but I'm going to take a wild guess here and say that it probably won't work. Just call it a hunch.
6 minutes later
You know, guys, I never thought I'd get a lecture from Willie on how to fuck somebody from behind. Mind you, the words he's using to describe it to Merman are funny as shit, but I never thought I'd actually get to hear that from him here.
13 minutes later
Well, guys, I am able to say that this movie, at least so far, has retained the spirit of the first movie. I'm really liking the humor here, and it, so far, is just about as vulgar as the first movie was as well. Granted, I'm not totally sure if it's as good as the first movie was, but there's still well more than an hour to go here, so I'm hoping that the consistency stays this way.
19 minutes later
So, after telling off Willie that Diane doesn't want to have sex with him, minutes later, she comes back and tells him that she hasn't had sex with her husband within over a decade. And thus, Willie is fucking her in an alleyway. Methinks Diane either developed Stockholm Syndrome, or she just feels really frustrated inside. Honestly, I couldn't tell you which, but I will say she definitely changed her mind pretty quickly there.
20 minutes later
You know, guys, I'm still trying to figure out what Thurman's purpose is for being here. I'm not talking about being in Chicago, I know why he went there. But, like, his general purpose for being in this movie. I'm not saying that I hate the character or anything, I just don't really see much of a point for him being in this movie is all.
12 minutes later
OK, I was *not* expecting that kind of singing voice from Thurman. I thought it would sound a little more deeper than that, but honestly, he's not too bad at singing. Granted, it's not great, and it sounds a little bit on the tone deaf side, but honestly, I've heard much worse singing, so I guess that's something.
The Review
And so, the movie ends on a dick joke. Literally, I might add. Class act, I guess. But then again, classy is the last thing I would ever describe this movie. I'm gonna go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. So...what to say about "Bad Santa 2"? Well, I may as answer an obvious question. Is this as good, or even better than the first one? The answer to that is, well...no. It really isn't. Then again, the first movie was so fucking good that I kinda had a feeling that this one wasn't going to exactly live up to the first one. Now, I want to be clear on something. This movie is really funny, and I'll even go so far as to say that I'll definitely be watching it again next year as part of my list of Christmas movies. But, in comparison to the first one, it doesn't quite compare to it, but that's just more personal preference, really.
So, why don't we go ahead and start off this review proper by first talking about the writing. And, similar to my review of the first "Bad Santa" movie, I want to talk about the humor first. Because, I feel like it's gonna play a big factor on how I can recommend this film to you guys. Now, for the most part, the movie does retain the spirit of what made the first movie really funny. It's filled to the brim with raunchy humor, and we also have a ton of jokes involving sex, racial and toilet humor. All of that is there and it's guaranteed to make you laugh. Well, again, as long as you're able to tolerate this sort of humor. Myself, personally speaking, I love it, and I even got a couple of hysterical laughs out of it. It really is funny, especially when the jokes land. Now granted, not every joke here does land perfectly. There are a couple of times when characters will repeat the same shtick, such as when Thurman asks Willie if he can make him a sandwich. Which, to be fair, wasn't really all that funny in the first movie when Thurman's grandmother kept doing that, and they do thankfully cut that joke short here in this movie, but it sorta happens now and then. And then there's the other moment where Willie's mother keeps calling him a "shitstick". Which also kinda got old, but again, it was also sorta brief. So, I can at least grant the movie that it knows when to cut back on repeated jokes.
Oh yeah, did I mention? Willie's mother is apparently in this movie, and she plays a big part in this, as she enlists her son's help, along with Marcus, to steal money at a children's charity event in Chicago. And since the money's in a hard-to-crack safe, well, Willie's the only one who can really do it. Not only that, but it's also here where I have to talk about the characters here, because this movie goes in a similar route, where it's focused less on the story and more on the character relationships. And most of that is between Willie and his mother. Willie's mother's depth in this movie is rather decent, as she partly wants to go on one last heist with her only family member before she leaves for Mexico. Of course, Willie being Willie, doesn't really care about that part and is only in this for the job. But he still, in his own way, cares for his mother as she's seen coughing quite a bit in this movie, and. at one point, he actually goes inside a store to steal some cough medicine for her. So, the movie tries to show more of Willie's empathy in this movie, despite the fact that he's just a lowlife drunk, to put it lightly.
And I guess that brings me to the other side of the characters, which would be Thurman Merman. I asked earlier why he was even in this movie, since he really didn't have much of a purpose to begin with. Well, the movie kinda actually answers that question by saying that Thurman wanted to give Willie a gift in case he felt alone during Christmas. Which is very thoughtful of him, but I still feel like he already had his moment in the first movie, where it was much better handled about why Thurman, as a kid, was always around Willie, even though he wasn't the real Santa Claus. Here, I feel like they tried to do something again with him here, but it sorta gets in the way, because Willie's mother gets more of the depth rather than Thurman. And I felt like he was only in this movie just so that we can have another recurring character come back for the sequel. Which I get, to a degree, but you still gotta do something interesting with him. And unfortunately, I felt like the movie sorta dropped the ball a little bit here on that front.
But with that, guys, the writing here, while not as sharp as it was in the first movie, *is* still pretty good here. And the comedy is still really funny, too. So I can't really fault the movie too much here for somewhat mishandling some of the character depth. But what about the acting? Well, the acting here is great. Billy Bob Thornton is still fucking amazing as Willie, and so is Tony Cox as Marcus. And as for Brett Kelly as Thurman Merman, he actually does a rather good job, given the time from the first movie where he was a child to now where he's 21 in this movie. While his character in this movie is very underutilized, Kelly still did a good job with the material he was given. So I can say that he did sorta live up to my expectations. But the one who makes this movie that isn't Billy Bob Thornton, is his mother, played by Kathy Bates. She fucking nails it, as her personality is almost bit for bit the same personality as Willie's. So, I gotta hand it to her the most, since she was the big star of this movie. Everyone else is the same too. So, without further beating a dead horse here, the acting was definitely top notch.
Our sets here are great. The costuming here is also really good. There's actually something in the movie that I wanted to comment on, and it was something that I actually didn't know about. Apparently, according to this movie, there's something called SantaCon. And, at first, I thought this was just some made up event just for this movie. Well, it turns out that it's actually a real thing, and it's been going for just about 30 years now. Which, I gotta say, for hearing about this for the first time, that's actually really impressive. And I'm wondering if the filmmakers used this event to help film a certain scene in the movie, which I'm not going to spoil. But whatever the case may be, the event is basically just a bunch of people dressed up in Santa suits getting together and having fun. And that's where most of the costuming comes in, mainly. There is also a moment where Marcus is dressed up as an elf again, like in the first movie. But other than that, most of the other costumes are just Santa suits. So yeah, costuming here is great.
Camerawork here is also really good. The lighting is lit perfectly. The sound-mix here is mixed fine. The score and soundtrack here is just mainly Christmas songs. And again, I will say that Therman Merman, or his actor anyway, has a surprisingly decent singing voice to him that I never thought that was actually possible. But then again, you do learn something new everyday, don't ya? But anyway, the soundtrack is OK. Though, personally speaking, and this has nothing to with the movie's usage of Christmas music, but having to hear it so much often at my workplace this year, I'm personally sick and tired of it. So, setting aside that, the music that they got here is perfectly fine, and it's to be expectant from a movie involving Christmas and whatnot.
Overall, guys, when everything is said and done, can I recommend "Bad Santa 2"? Honestly, yes. While I will admit that this movie is nowhere near as good as the first one was, there is still something here that you'll guaranteed to get a laugh out of, and, like I said, I got quite a few laughs out of this thing. And, to me, is worth checking, if at least just once. I'm probably gonna be watching this again as part of my yearly tradition of Christmas movies to watch, because I still really enjoyed enough to hold onto. And now that I'm thinking about it, I'm probably just gonna go and rewatch the first "Bad Santa" movie again, just so I can continue watching Billy Bob Thornton being awesome in that movie. So yeah, guys, again, I can definitely recommend this movie to you guys, flaws and all.
And with that, guys, we come to the close of this year's "Reaction & Review Christmas Special". Until next time, ladies and gentleman, take care, and Merry Christmas to you all. Peace.
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