Time machines in movies have come in all shapes and sizes. You have had a box, a phone booth, a hot tub, and who could forget a DeLorean. Each one of those brought it’s own twist to traveling in time, but if you asked me traveling in a DeLorean at 88MPH or jumping through time in a hot tub are the way to go. Now that we have chosen our preferred vehicle for time travel, it doesn’t have to reflect if we actually liked the movie that they were featured in. Back in 2010 “Hot Tub Time Machine” had a good idea, if not silly. Three friends and a nephew go back in time to change one faithful night, which will change all their lives forever.
Fast-forward to 2015 and two of the friends are back, as well as the nephew, and once again they travel in time to fix something, but this time in the future. Lou (Rob Corddry) has done well with his new future he got from the last movie. He owns Lougle, and has more money than he can spend. Meanwhile Nick (Craig Robinson) has had a pretty successful music career, taking songs and releasing them before the person who was suppose to write them, but changing them just a little. While Lou and Nick have had success, Jacob (Clark Duke) doesn’t really do anything, other than act as Lou’s butler during his parties. It Is during one of these parties that takes them out of their comfort zone, as Lou is shot in a place no man wants to be shot, and Nick and Jacob use the hot tub to save Lou and to find his killer, all in a funny kind of way of course. When they arrive in the future, his son, Adam Yates Jr. (Adam Scott), replaces their missing friend and together they look for the person responsible for Lou being shot.
Thinking back to something I once heard, I really think we said all we needed to say with the first “Hot Tub Time Machine”, but someone else didn’t. Having director Steve Pink and writer Josh Heald both back is a step in the right direction, but unfortunately they must have taken a wrong turn at Albuquerque. Gone is the fun of the first film, and it is instead replaced with gross humor that misses its target most of the time. While the characters are the same as the original, maybe it’s the lack of John Cusack that throws off the chemistry. While the film does have some laughs, half of them you have already seen thanks to the trailer, most of the jokes miss, including a Smart car that has it in for someone. This is a film that didn’t really need to make it to a theater, instead it would have been better served going to V.O.D, because the film has that straight to video feel. I wanted to enjoy this movie, but it’s never a good sign when a comedy has you frowning more than laughing, something this movie had me doing often. Like most sequels that are simply made to cash in on the original this one falls like a belly flop in a pool, or hot tub.
Brian Taylor
