Wayne's World 2

It would be very hard to make a sequel that was as good as the first Wayne's World, but it's even more unlikely that a sequel could even be watchable. Wayne's World 2 is not that bad of a movie, but it isn't as good as the first. There are still a lot of funny moments... and it's got The Walken! That's always cool! This is even before people loved him after that Fatboy Slim video, and all of a sudden everyone that is college age started loving him! They were way ahead of the curve on this one, and that's just plain wonderful.
What is also a delight is Ralph Brown reprising his role from Withnail and I's Danny (more or less) as Del Preston. I laugh my ass off every time he tells his Ozzy Osbourne with the brown M&Ms story, and he's got an excellent story about Woodstock. Haha!
It's obvious that Wayne's World 2 tries to recapture the great ingredients of the first one with all the non-sequitorial montages, and constantly makes references to events of the original. The problem is that this second time around, the jokes don't work as effectively, and the story itself is a little too off-the-wall for my tastes. On the other hand, I won't say this is a total waste of effort. There are still some great moments, such as Wayne and friends doing the spying on Cassandra, eventually running into a gay bar; or the scene in which Wayne meets Cassandra's dad for the first time, and they fight each other, 1970's kung fu movie style; the pigmentless eyeballed man scene; or the great cameo at the gas station when asking for directions! There are also some classic one-liners, and brief scenes that refer to other pop culture icons which work wonderfully (especially a couple blatant The Graduate moments). The main problem with this movie is the retread of Wayne's jealousy, the weak storyline, and an overall lack of direction. You can tell they didn't have as firm of an idea on what to do with Wayne and Garth this time around, and instead of not making a sequel, they went ahead with the ideas they thought would be funny for several SNL skits and put it into the movie instead. But hey, if you know this isn't going to be so great going into it, there's a chance that its' faults can be more easily accepted. I don't like it as much as the first, but I still like it enough to watch it every couple years after I stick in Wayne's World. It is acceptable enough to accompany the original, and that's saying more than a lot of other unnecessary sequels.

GRADE: C+

Reviewed 10/11/05