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It’s the usual “rule” that a sequel is required to be spectacularly inferior to its original. But Murder Mystery 2 seemed to take that unspoken edict way too much into consideration during the “writing” of the script. Then again, was it really “written”? For there are far too many moments throughout the “narrative” when one tends to wonder if the script was “generated” by ChatGPT…but that might actually be insulting to ChatGPT. However, no, the film is attributed to Vanderbilt family progeny James Vanderbilt, who once again recently made a name for himself separate from New York wealth by co-writing the scripts for Scream (2022) and Scream VI. Both being far cries from the timbre of Murder Mystery (which he also wrote), and even further still from Murder Mystery 2, which manages to prove that most sequels exist solely to rest on the laurels of their original films.
As such, there is little need to “try.” Everyone here is clearly involved for the paycheck. Hence, a total lack of cohesion and plausibility to anything about this narrative, which begins in Nick (Adam Sandler) and Audrey Spitz’s (Jennifer Anistone) apartment after an overly heavy-handed recap about what happened in the first installment, in addition to telling us what the duo is up to now: sinking all of their savings into a fledgling detective business still coasting off the reputation of their one big case from 2019. Resultantly, they get stuck with less “glamorous” jobs that require using Audrey as bait to lure potentially philandering husbands into being photographed with her. This, of course, glossing over the fact that cheating is no longer the scandal that it once was (even to vanilla straights) and that someone like Audrey isn’t exactly the average man’s “first choice” for an affair. A fact made clear by the husband in question, “Silverfox” (Tony Goldwyn), walking into his living room to find the Spitzes telling “Mrs. Silverfox” (Annie Mumolo) that he has been “stepping out,” only for Silverfox to rebuff this claim by announcing that he’s been going out alone to plan a surprise anniversary party and that Audrey was the one hitting on him. The former excuse makes no sense whatsoever (why go to a bar by yourself to plan a surprise party?), but it’s just the tip of the iceberg apropos of nonsensical goings-on, with the assumption perhaps being that “movies like these” aren’t about making sense, they’re about “having fun.” But a movie is a movie regardless of genre, and should still adhere to certain, let us say, “tenets.”
Murder Mystery 2 feels little obligation to do any such thing, starting with Vikram “The Maharajah” Govindan (Adeel Akhtar) calling up Nick while riding a jet ski (because rich people are just so craaaaazzzzzyyy like that) to invite him to his wedding. This invitation, naturally, is timed to coincide with their squabbles about work, including Nick’s argument with Audrey regarding their marketing approach (Nick nominates the “disruptive marketing” style of having floss business cards [“First Floss, Then Spitz”], while Audrey thinks it’s ridiculous). What it all boils down to for Nick is: “Do you know any couples who also work together that actually get along?” Audrey replies (with one of the few comedy gold lines of the movie), “Billie Eilish and Finneas.” A riff on the duo’s incestuous dynamic, Nick has to remind, “They’re brother and sister.” Luckily for both, the argument is interrupted by this call. The one that ultimately leads to being a showcase for Hawaii, as Vik’s “private island” is actually Lanikuhonua Lagoon in Oahu (something Mike White should have thought about for season one of The White Lotus). Either way, it’s where his wedding to Claudette (Mélanie Laurent, who is acting in a role and movie that’s way beneath her) takes place.
This location, however, becomes overwrought, especially since the movie’s marketing is contingent upon the alleged bulk of it occurring in Paris (thus the maddening tagline: “Deux or Die”). But no, it takes us almost thirty-six minutes to leave the island, well above the standard “end of act one” practice. And, being that Murder Mystery 2 clocks in at approximately one hour and thirty minutes (which still feels too long), it was theoretically all set up to follow a very conventional three-act structure that manages to get biffed in manifold ways by the end. Manifest in a never-ending denouement that keeps piling on non sequitur “conclusions” for the sake of it. Seemingly under the pretense of being “comical.” But just because one piles on a slew of random occurrences doesn’t make the outcome automatically funny, so much as a poor writing choice. Or, to quote Connor Miller (Mark Strong, also out of place in this movie), “There really is no end to your bad decision-making, is there?”
Incidentally, Jennifer Aniston recently remarked of her golden ticket to being an icon, Friends, “There’s a whole generation of people, kids, who are now going back to episodes of Friends and find them offensive.” To be real, there were many people who didn’t find Friends funny when it was actually on the air either, but anyway… The point is that perhaps with this mentality in mind, Aniston is glomming onto projects that are the “lowest common denominator” of comedy for a reason. And yes, like Sandler, she’s long been known to do that (see: Horrible Bosses, Wanderlust, We’re the Millers, Mother’s Day, et al.), but, speaking to her own comment, it’s as though these lowest common denominator comedies have gotten even lower as a result of what she mentioned about the risk of offending people. Nonetheless, there was plenty of room left to ream the French as the “unexpected” villain of the story remarked of his plan to blow up the Eiffel Tower: “There’s only one thing I hate more than witnesses, and that’s the French.”
The French, to be sure, are among the few “sects,” for Americans in particular, that remain “fair game” for evisceration on the “comedy” front. This also extends to fellow Europeans the Italians, who are generally mocked at every turn for their supposed manner and supposed accent (which Americans still portray as having a superfluous “a” inserted in between every word, as in: “It’s-a me, Mario”). With this in mind, Aniston lamented that it’s “really hard for comedians, because the beauty of comedy is that we make fun of ourselves, make fun of life.” But no, most of the making fun of in the U.S. that went on in the past was never self-directed. It was never about the sham of American life or the uncouthness of Americans, so much as a bid to help solidify the othering of those who were marginalized already (on Friends, that was done amply to the LGBTQIA+ community). This is the real reason white comedians are “on edge” about comedy “changing”—i.e., becoming less bigoted. This despite Aniston saying that presenting bigotry in comedy is ultimately a way to “joke about a bigot and have a laugh.” In one sense, yes. In another, such thinking underestimates how fucking literal people are, and that they might use such “comedy” to justify their own legitimate bigotry. So now we’re saddled with “straightforward” (read: stupid) comedy such as Murder Mystery 2, which somehow manages to be so bad that it insults its predecessor.
But lack of laughs or decent Parisian representation (that’s kind of Netflix’s thing now, what with Emily in Paris as one of its “tent-pole” shows) won’t stop this gravy train from being a success as Aniston insists, “Everybody needs funny! The world needs humor! [though that’s not what Murder Mystery 2 is]. We can’t take ourselves too seriously. Especially in the United States. Everyone is far too divided.” Alas, the division in this scenario will stem from those with a brain trying to watch a laughless (and sexless, for that matter) “romp” wherein “style” outweighs all trace of substance and those whose brains have been murdered already as this movie seeks to be an amalgam of everything from Legally Blonde (with the perm “revelation” being likenable to the henna one in Murder Mystery 2) to Shotgun Wedding to Glass Onion. Doing its best, as it were, to tick everyone’s box, thereby ticking no one’s.
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Genna Rivieccio
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