Just saw it. I thought it was great. Not really a touch on the first one -what is? - but there were plenty of laughs, a lot of satisfying callbacks and some great cameos.
Loved the little subversive nod to the type of news that gets ratings and the gradual progression to that... Wasn't expecting commentary. The only bit I didn't like was his relationship with his black female boss. It was unnecessary, made little sense, the gags were predictable and save for a few weren't funny, and the race aspect of it made me uncomfortable. He was an ignorant buffoon at the dinner table, but a minute later she was apologising to him in a cab.
Also Kanye.
I completely disagree with you on that Cobbler I laughed through the whole scene
I mean, sure it was uncomortable, but that was the point. These movies are both supposed to be existing in a time period and that time period included him being uncomfortable and trying to (idiotically) bridge the race gap he viewed present, when it wasn't. His inability to "read the room" was brought up more than once in the film.
Anyways, I was so damn happy. All I really wanted out of this movie was for Ron and Veronica to not stay split up and thanks to that, I was more than pleased.
Audience loved the film too, the kid was a horrible actor and that was brilliant, the call-backs to the last movie weren't shoe-horned in like I had feared they would be. They definitely took care when they wrote this script and it came through.
And I wouldn't say that was a little nod to popular news, it was basically the whole plot. Thought it was really well done. I'm glad we had a few different villains in the film but nothing over-the-top like the feud between Ron and Veronica because, really, how can you top that?
The bit with the shark was just the kind of stupid I wanted out of this film.
And, finally, last, but not least:
Liam Neeson made me choke on my popcorn when he showed up. I purposely didn't look to see who the cameos were going to be and I couldn't have been happier because of it. I laughed so hard, biggest response from me of the whole film.
The one and only thing about the film that completely threw me off was how much bigger the budget obviously was. The production values of this film looked absolutely nothing like the last one. They didn't look like they were filmed in the same universe at all, you could just tell that everything about this film was more expensive and that threw me off a bit throughout.
Basically: Anchorman is one of my favorite movies ever and I was very nervous about this sequel, but they did the original film justice and I am completely satisfied with what we got here today.
Also, Kanye is the worst actor...of all time.
Oh and
HE'S A WERE-HYENA!
EDIT:
Oh my God, it's a real phrase!
Werehyena - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I liked it a lot more than I expected to. Too much effort was put into making it the exact same movie as the first one and the characterizations were disastrous in spots (Brick is unintelligent, not from another dimension), but I thought the script was great and the spirit that made the original special was left intact.
"It was very surreal to have Kanye -- who's such a big fan of comedy -- in our movie hanging out for two days", he said. "He was playing the new tracks a lot -- over and over. Even when you're trying to film, he's playing the tracks."
The "tracks" are the ones that comprise "Yeezus," which was released in June, right around the same time West filmed his cameo for "Anchorman 2." Naturally, the cast and crew were too intimidated to ask West to stop blaring his music on the set.
"We got a scared 18-year-old intern to ask him to turn them down," Ferrell joked before revealing that West lingered around the set after his scenes were finished. "He hung out, even after we said, 'You're done'. He was like, 'no, no' and stayed in the background, hanging out and fighting with people."
I greatly prefer the first, but that doesn't negate how much I loved that sequel.
I thought Brick was fucking hilarious in the sequel.
Did love the sequel, not a patch on the first one of course, but it was great.
Although - and I hate to say this - Kanye's acting left a bit to be desired. Drake outshone him.
Brick was a prime example of the biggest problem I have with comedy in general. You have something that people find hilarious, you think, OK, let's go with that and then in the next incarnation, you over do it.
It's the same thing with making a movie for the Minions or the Penguins of Madagascar. Were they the funniest parts of their respective movies? Yeah. But that was because they were comic relief. When you take that one thing and make a full movie out of it, it almost inherently fails.
/stillexcitedfortheLegoBatmanmovie.