Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsModerately funny, but bloated sequel
Reviewed in the United States on June 17, 2014
While ANCHORMAN 2 does have its moments, it's largely disappointing and too long. The first Anchorman was a fun movie that was absurd and brilliant in the way it sent up gender stereotypes in the 1970's. There is some attempt to do something similar here, but it never seems like more than a random plot point or a chance to riff on a particular subject rather than being integral to the movie. The humor is almost dada-esque in its absurdity, but a lot of the jokes fell flat to me because they simply didn't have a punchline. Just pointing out how ridiculous you are doesn't count. The story was also very episodic, feeling like a bunch of sketches strung together. Sure, the first one was kind of like that, but it was also 30 minutes shorter. Still, there are a number of great lines and a couple of scenes which I laughed really hard at. One was a dinner with Ron and his new girlfriend's family, and the other was a news team melee that more than tops the brawl in the first film. It's also loaded with cameos. There was also a bunch of humor derived from what the 24-hour news cycle has done to broadcast news. Essentially, the movie has Ron Burgundy come up with Fox News' modus operandi off the top of his head. Those bits were pretty funny, although they never really commit to the idea. In fact, that's probably the biggest issue I have with the film, is that it doesn't really shoot for anything other than bigger jokes and more outlandish comedic set-pieces. Sequels are typically bigger than their predecessors, but this one just has a bloated run time when it could have gone with a full-on satire. Still, it was nice to see Ron and company back together again. Brick even gets a love interest(?) who's just as weird as he is, although that's one of the random things I would have trimmed. A lot of scenes between him and Kristen Wiig are just flat-out unfunny and go nowhere. I'd recommend this to fans of the original, but it would be hard for me to do the same for those uninitiated. They'd probably be better off checking out the original, which is far better than this one.