Kick Ass 2 brings back our favorites—Kick Ass and Hit Girl. The time is a year or so after their last adventure, where we find Dave and Mindy still working together, or more appropriately training together. Mindy is sneaking around behind the back of her adopted father, Big Daddy’s (her real father) former police partner and best friend, Marcus Williams, while Dave has been cooling his heels in the real world and staying low. In the meantime, others have dawned masks and capes and weapons and taken to the streets of NY to protect its citizens, some going so far as to commit to community work. That’s the setup, and director Jeff Wadlow sets it up with ease.
It’s what happens after that that sets Kick Ass 2 apart from other sequels.
And what happens is, we get as close to a real world view of how the characters would progress as we’ll ever get, including the circumstances around them that drive them to their eventual points.
What I’m saying is, if people without super powers really decided to put on masks and confront crime straight up, Kick Ass 2 takes you down a road that is pretty close to how that would play out.
What’s nice about Kick Ass 2 is how it gives you what you want to see, which is action, but also follows a believably natural path of progression for the characters involved in the action, real-world time. It’s nice to watch, trust me. If there’s a fault on this particular point, it’s that too many times it’s pointed out that “This isn’t a comic book” or something to that effect, throughout the movie. I don’t know how many times it’s said or implied, but it’s just a titch too much, if you ask me.
Dave and Mindy’s relationship moves forward in a way you’d expect, and the introduction of additional characters is well paced, too. And Christopher Mintz-Plasse’s character, the Mo-Fo’er, works pretty good as well, although I personally didn’t get as big a kick out of his lines as I thought I would. He’s an integral part of the story, and his growth throughout the movie is pretty believable, but don’t expect a whole lot of laughs from him. It is what it is.
One thing the movie does to ground its premise in “reality” is people die. I won’t say who, but people die, and when they die you pretty much feel the same way as when Big Daddy died in the first one. But the deaths are integral to the progression of the development of specific characters, so it makes sense.
Another “reality” the movie deals with is the young Kick Ass and Hit Girl dealing with their parents, which is obviously, from the parents perspective—stop doing this, stop putting yourself in danger. The topic is handled quite nicely and realistically, and it works.
Now let’s talk about the elephant in the room—Jim Carrey’s part in all of this.
It’s no secret that Carrey opted out of promoting Kick Ass 2, after a change of heart regarding the violence of the movie. And make no mistake…it’s violent. Is it “Reservoir Dogs” violent? No. Is it more violent than the original? Probably.
The truth is Carrey knocks his character, Colonel Stars and Stripes, out of the park. He nails it and truly is that good in the role. Unfortunately, his screen time isn’t all that much. It’s significant, it’s important, but don’t expect to see a whole lot of Jim Carrey, which is sad, as he plays completely out of character in this one. He’s great, but his greatness doesn’t get a whole lot of screen time.
Kick Ass 2 delivers as close to a natural progression of character story arcs as would probably happen in the “real” world. It’s not the best CBM this year, but it won’t apologize to Iron Man 3 or Man of Steel. It won’t take in as much as those two, not even close, but I suspect it’ll make enough that we’ll get to see “Kick Ass 3.”
And I can’t wait!
Kick Ass 2 gets 4 out of 5 from me.
I’m Citizen…