The Hangover: Part II

My roommate Cormac won two tickets from some local radio station to an advanced screening of The Hangover: Part Two. The bad news for him was that he had really been trying to win the “Pay Your Bills” contest and wasn’t a fan of the first movie. So he gave me one of the tickets and sold the other on Craigslist. That was how me and some college frat boy who had cut the sleeves off his own flannel shirt and talked through his teeth ended up sitting next to each other and awkwardly trying to find conversation topics. He had some one-syllable name that I don’t remember, but it was definitely something you could chant at a kegger. And since it’s my job to be “that guy” who comes to every movie I see now with a notepad, I did just that. And some ninety minutes later it was over and I didn’t remember any of it. 

Everyone around me was laughing hysterically. Like, piss your pants and quote it on Facebook kind of funny. One-syllable and no sleeves next to me started choking on his Junior Mints, it was apparently so freaking hilarious. Everything just went through me, like water through a pasta strainer. Ricky and I made pasta once. Neither of us are very good cooks, but pasta’s easy—that’s what they say at least. We managed to set the apartment’s curtains on fire. I don’t know how you set things of fire by boiling water, but Ricky and I managed somehow. That was the first day we met. 

I’m sure The Hangover: Part II is funny. I’m sure it was like the first one, just with the rude and crude and WTF amps bumped up to the next level. When it gets its wide release, I’m sure it’ll just shoot to the top of the box office and sell a crapload of tickets. That’s what happens. You make a sequel to a good movie and everyone just turns up without you having to do much at all. 

What are people expecting when they see a sequel? The same jokes, the same stuff, just redone and set against a different backdrop, I suppose. There’s nostalgia in seeing a sequel. You love the first and the second one reminds you of why you love it. If it sucked, you’ll remember all the good things in the first one? If it rocks (and judging by the audience reaction at this thing, The Hangover: Part Two is here) you’ll just hope that the third one is just as good. Law of diminishing return. Every time you go to the things that you like, they get less and less appealing. Eventually the same jokes get old, the same things shown again and again, the same restaurants you go to, and the same conversations run over again and again.

I wish I could write a real review for this damn movie. I honestly just don’t remember anything about it. My mind was miles away, back in my apartment and thinking about the night before.

I had come in and Ricky was sitting at the couch, looking at the TV where Shakespeare in Love was playing. She always said she hated that movie because she didn’t get how Gwyneth Paltrow could have a perm while everyone else was dealing with The Black Plague and hating the Jews. I made some joke about that and she didn’t laugh. She looked up at me and her lip folded under her teeth. She does that when she has something to say, but doesn’t want to say it.

And then those faithful words, which I expect to be carved over the entrance of Hell if I ever even make it there: “Can we stop?”

I guess when someone breaks up with you; it’s never really a surprise. It’s like when your friends are planning a surprise birthday party for you and the very air of your kickbacks are thicker. And then when you come back to your apartment one stoned-ass night, they all turn on the lights and jump out. You’re surprised by a sudden horde of strangers and balloons impeding on your personal space, but when you get it, you know you always knew it. I wish people brought cake when they broke up with you. When you’d get home, they’d wait in the dark and then jump out with a Breaking Up With You! cake. And then you’d at least have cake instead of just an empty apartment and a bed that suddenly seems too big. 

I didn’t feel like laughing at all in the movie, not because of the movie but because I couldn’t. Funny felt like reading the back of a computer manual. Laughing was like a foreign language. The Hangover might as well have been in Swedish. 

When it was done, no-sleeves and one-syllable punched me in the arm and said: “Fucking awesome, eh?” Guess I’ll have to take his word for it.

Final Consensus: fucking awesome, eh/5


Samuel Wolf is a freelance writer for Pop Connect. Pop Connect assembles various blogs centered on pop culture from our writers and then compiles an actively updated website. We are based in San Diego, CA. We are currently no longer accepting job application. Check out our website for updates.