Look, I don't why this doesn't deserve more than a six from me. It outsanta's first on laughs, the first couple of minutes had me worried, from the start of that wonderful tracking shot along the paved two way drive in downtown shopping L.A. But then, it becomes so much funnier and punchier, laughs a constant. Thornton, a great actor, seriously, wonderfully resumes his role, where he's more pathetic, and repellent, hitting rock bottom, but still doing what he does and loves best, boozing and womanizing, some more beauties, some I said, not as hot as the ones he did, in the original, and one wonders what happen to Lauren Graham's character, Sue, the barmaid, from the first. He's revisited by an arch enemy, well two, our loud, angry cursing dwarf (Tony Cox) and stepping on board this timer (Kathy Bates) who plays Thornton's loser of a mother who had Willie at 13. Thornton is pulled back into action, this time stooping lower, by putting on the Santa Claus suit again, and creating a diversion, where his partners, rob charity money for homeless kids. The kid has grown up, and like Thornton, is exactly the same, asking dumb questions, talking crap, and still believing about the jolly bearded man in the red suit. The continuing humorous dialogue never slacks at all, where I was laughing much more in this one. One scene where Thornton, snaps at good for nothing Mum, interrupted while eating pizza, familiarizes us with a scene from the first one, where he was interrupted while on his lunch break. The line is almost a clone from the line in the original. The two twists in the end were good, where the final scene, which I made for something else at first, was tasteless and unfunny as this kind of same gag involving genitalia, has been done before. What I really loved about this one, which doesn't have to apologize for nothing (another quality I loved) keeping the happy spirit of Christmas alive, is that the characters haven't changed one bit, especially Thornton's and our new player, (Bates-fantastic) is a real nasty piece of work, where we can see, where Thornton got his beautiful bedside manner from. He has got a bit more of a heart in this one, where he has gone a little soft, where you savor these few moments. His decision of goodwill near the end, teaches us a valuable lesson about greed. But why do I feel this doesn't deserve more than a six? I put it down to it's wearing moments, where you feel, it's better to quit while ahead as with other sequels. It could be cause it's done with the same form, and took, lower below the belt laughs, to make it work. It got to a point where it felt tired, and the wearing was showing. It's as though the movie was relying on gross profanity, or too many moments of familiarity, like structure of story, "The walls closing in angle" or scenes, like "the sitting on Santa's lap" which was more meatier here, and the greedy people that could jeopardize, Thornton and company's little job. Too, the plots of conflict, and situations, which I thought were well structured. We again, sharing Thornton's familiar vices and habits, which are never changing. This is where the wearing happens, through the familiarity. Also, the substitute of a beauty, by another one, angelic and hotter, being that of Kendricks, so refreshingly cute, spouting those same words like Graham, who gets she gets butt fu..ed by Thornton. All of this highly poses a the question? "Should there be a Bad Santa 3?" Of course, not. Why ruin a bad thing? And this Santa, is a good one to finish an end note on, ball sack or not. See if you can spot who Mark Starr is here. cause he fooled me, until I read his cast role.
Review of Bad Santa 2
