Vacation Friends 2

I genuinely enjoyed the 2021 movie "Vacation Friends", and when I had the chance to sit down and watch the 2023 sequel "Vacation Friends 2", of course I did so.

However, I have to say that writer and director Clay Tarver delivered a lukewarm sequel here. The script and storyline for "Vacation Friends 2" was generally devoid of the funny and outrageous situations that were in the first movie. And the script felt rather mundane and bland, and I was hardly brought to laughter throughout the course of the 106 minutes that the movie ran for.

The acting performances in "Vacation Friends 2" were fair, and it was nice to see John Cena, Lil Rel Howery, Meredith Hagner and Yvonne Orji return to reprise their characters in the sequel. It was really good to see Steve Buscemi in the movie, though his talent was just not utilized to any great accomplishment in "Vacation Friends 2", which was a shame. And it was certainly also nice to see Carlos Santos on the cast list.

So I found "Vacation Friends 2" to be somewhat of a disappointing viewing experience. And it is hardly a movie that I will be picking up a second time, simply because it was lacking the comedy appeal of the 2021 movie.

My rating of "Vacation Friends 2" lands on a very bland five out of ten stars.

I really enjoyed the first Vacation Friends movie. There were a lot of laughs and the premise was a good one. The sequel is the complete opposite and is just so boring. The laughs do not land in this one and the script is all over the place. I think this film could have benefited with more time in developement instead of just rushing it out to audiences. I probably really only laughed 2-3x throughout the whole movie. That's a problem especially since this movie is supposed to be a comedy. Vacation Friends 2 reminded me of that cheap straight to dvd film. Vacation Friends gets a low 3 stars out of 10. Skip this one and just watch the original.

Vacation Friends was such a great movie. I laughed until I cried it was so funny. Every character served a purpose and the jokes kept coming non stop and you couldn't help but laugh and get invested in the 4 lead characters.

None of that happens here. Vacation Friends 2 manages to make all 4 lead characters you previously liked very unlikable. Then they add Steve Buscemi who manages to be the worst character in the movie.

There were a few laughs in the film, most of which were in the trailer. They built so long to the ashes joke but since the punchline was in the trailer the whole sequence fell flat for me.

Normally I'd call this type of sequel a cash cow but since it's a direct to Hulu film I can't even call it that. I'm not sure why this was made but it definitely should have stayed unmade.

If you want to laugh with these characters re watch the original and if you want to feel let down and disappointed that's the only way I'd recommend this sequel. I gave it 5-10 cause of my love for the characters from the first movie and the movie itself was average and could have been worse.

The original was a pleasant surprise to me, as I found myself laughing out loud multiple times. It had some clever writing and scenarios that really made one laugh.

This one...where to start. I almost turned it off in the first 20 minutes. The whole beginning of the movie is little more than "let's scream the F word as loud as possible over and over" and "let's say private things out loud." If you find that funny, you may like it more than I did, but I found it incredibly lazy and just not humorous.

Luckily, it -does- get slightly better after that. There are some mildly funny scenes in it, but the writing just isn't there this time. Don't go in expecting the original, or you'll be let down pretty hard.

The first Vacation Friends was a pretty mediocre comedy, but there were a few decent laughs. This sequel really doesn't bring much new to the table and the cast, sans Cena, is just not very funny. Cena is by far the highlight as he is the only one who really displays any real charisma, but he cannot do much to offset this predictable, boring story.

It's standard father-in-law and "win over the tough exec" fare. Everything is quite lazy with a lack of really any creative spark to speak for. Hulu's original movies from 20th Century films are hit or miss to say the least, and this is without a doubt a miss.