Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

Now, I feel this review should really come with a blasphemy warning; the following may not be pretty. It's never easy when a review disagrees with the prevailing public opinion, much less when it's regarding such an anticipated release with an enormous cult following, but such is the situation we find ourselves in...

So, Anchorman 2 - a film almost a decade in the pipeline, and following on from arguably the most quoted film in history. And indeed, where would society have ended up had we been denied the pleasure of uttering such classics as "60 percent of the time, it works every time" and "I love lamp" every sixteen seconds for the last nine years? It seems odd then that the result of nine years of planning, writing and (what was undoubtedly at least a few months of) ad-libbing seems to have resulted in something that feels like it has lost almost all of the magic of the first, seemingly trying to 'better' the original by just copying all the things that made it so loved and missing the mark with every single one of them. Put simply, 'The Legend Continues' almost feels like a poorly executed rip-off of the first film, rather than a sequel that is worthy of the Anchorman name.

Guys... If memory serves, Jack Sparrow escaped from here by roping a couple of sea turtles together... Just in case that's useful for you?

Putting the gripes to one side for a moment, there are forgiveable elements to the story. Indeed, there is some delight in the rather satirical swipe taken at 24 hour rolling news channels which does make it slightly worthy of note, but the annoyingly loose and unstructured storyline jumps around rather too much to allow focus on anything like that, instead favouring a particularly unique brand of lazy comedy (including shark wrestling, jokes about being blind [albeit not meant maliciously] and yet more references to salon quality hair), all strung together under the pretence of a single narrative. Even the most loved (and let's face it, quotable) of all the characters (Steve Carell's Brick Tamland) seems to operate as nothing more than a caricature of himself from the first movie, which on it's own is oddly analogous to the film as a whole. Essentially taking the form of a series of gags ready for clipping onto Saturday evening talk shows and Tumblr blogs, Anchorman 2 is just something that can't quite live up to its über-quotable, gag-dominated, cult favourite of a predecessor, though perhaps it should never have tried to.

Vital Statistics
Director	Adam McKay
Cast	Will Ferrell, Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner, Christina Applegate
Length	119 mins
Post Credits Scene	Yes (albeit small), but genuinely not worth sticking around for.
TFC Mash-Up	Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy, but with the comic laziness of an Adam Sandler film (take your pick - in this instance, I'm going for Happy Gilmore), and the meandering over-silliness and carbon copy nature of The Hangover 2
Star Rating