MOVIE REVIEW - 22 Jump Street

Here comes the second installment of this comedy series, the 21 Jump Street comedy franchise, 22 Jump Street and it brought in big bucks last week. To the tune of 60 million.

Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum are back as our aging, bungling, undercover cops that infiltrate schools and try to sniff out the problems.  This time since they are older now, they are sent into a college campus, again as students to crack a drug ring that is dealing a new synthetic drug.   That is basically the entire plot. As you might imagine this isn't real deep, and the target audience isn't going to really care anyway. They just want to laugh, and they will. I did.

This is similar to the first one, 21 Jump Street, with it's brand of exceptionally edgy humor, that in most cases isn't grandma friendly.  It is raunchy at times, and crude at others and that's OK.  It never really decides to completely go off the deep end, and that's a great decision.  What this does very well is parody the original TV show, the actors actual age, the first movie, college life, and millenials attitudes and values in general.  And it does it very, very well.   This again is loaded with fun cameo's and some funny pop-culture referenced humor and what you have is a pretty funny, young adult comedy.

Channing Tatum was hilarious in the first movie as this stoner cop who doesn't really have a clue, and he is very funny here. He is physically funny, and delivers a real fun performance as this dude cop with issues. It is funny to see him do this kind f comedy, especially after some of this earlier roles in Magic Mike and some Nicholas Sparks sullen love story films.  He is hilarious.

Hill, is who he is.  Although his comedic performances are a bit the same and limited, he is funny here, when again asked to give he same performance. I am starting to like him more and more away from "buddy comedies" as I loved him in Moneyball, and Wolf Of Wall Street. Both earned him Oscar nominations, and for Moneyball, he could have won.


The supporting cast is fun with Ice Cube as the boss, and there are a few funny twists and turns that keep you watching.  This is certainly not a perfect movie, and it is a niche audience but for mid-summer comedies, this is pretty fun.  Again, an acquired taste and certainly not for everyone.

22 Jump Street.   We need a laugh right now, and we've got one.  This franchise though could wear out it's welcome.