Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

Dustin: 4 of 5 stars Nick: 3 of 5 stars Average: 3.5 of 5 stars (Live canary)

Dustin: Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues is the long-awaited sequel to 2004’s Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy. This time around, Burgundy and his plucky news team have landed themselves a slot on GNN, the world’s first 24-hour news channel, and are instantly launched to stardom.

Nick, how would you say this sequel compares to the first?

Nick: When I saw Anchorman in theaters it marked my first and last time of falling out of my seat from laughing too hard. Then I didn't see the film again for five years because everyone quoted it enough to make me never want to watch it again. In the world of Anime there is a term known as “fan service.” This film is wholly fan service. It seems almost every set-up from the original is rehashed here and sometimes that worked and sometimes it fell flat--large fight among news teams, Brian Fantana’s random extensive collection of womanizing items, and, of course, some good ol’ jazz flute (pronounced with a soft J).

Dustin: There was some fan service here, the epic battle being the most noticeable. But I felt like this stuff didn't really come in until the third act. The first two parts of the movie were still original enough. And being a fan of the first film, I enjoyed the callbacks to it, and didn't think it was overdone.

Nick: The callbacks didn't bother me until the fight scene because it felt so forced and was so out of place for what Burgundy was trying to achieve at that moment. Maybe if the fight was 30 minutes earlier in the film when Harry Lime is the actual antagonist. Also, the joke about Lime being forced to change his name to Lame went on way too long with little actually coming from the situation.

Dustin: I liked how long that joke got played out. It was mildly amusing at first, got old quickly, then after awhile, it became funny again, especially as Ron Burgundy refused to budge on letting him change his name back to Lime.

I agree as a viewer I had kind of moved on from Harry Lame by the time he showed up for the battle, and I recognized that battle as being included as a somehow even more overblown version of the original. It was one of several sequences from the movie that could have been cut without missing much. The other being the dinner with his black boss/girlfriend’s family. While funny, but it didn't advance the story in the slightest, it felt like an interlude that broke up the scene between Burgundy and his girlfriend in the taxi.

Nick: Most of this movie were scenes that didn't add up to anything, but that’s how you know it’s made purely for the fans of the original. Although I feel this wasn't that good of a movie and I probably won’t watch it again, I found it extremely enjoyable. The scene where he assembles the news team is as good if not better than the sequence in the original. Champ is a fast food restaurant owner whose chicken might not actually be chicken.

Dustin: I really loved the “assembling the team” sequence. They take their time reintroducing each member of the news team, making each introduction special. You feel like you are inviting old friends into your home again.

I thought this movie was every bit as good as the first, even though it went too far at times. I definitely laughed a lot this time, and enjoyed it more upon first viewing.

I actually didn't much care for the original when I first saw it. I thought it was strange and only mildly amusing. Then, a few days later, something strange happened. I found I kept quoting the movie and couldn't get the characters out of my head. Since then, I've seen it more times than I care to admit on cable, and really love it.

Nick: The original was the beginning of the new irreverent comedy regime. Most people didn't get it, although it eventually became one of the highest selling DVDs of all time. The new film couldn't feel original and that hurt it, but at the same time I’m not sure if it’s any worse. The one thing that was detracting was that the scenes had no particular order. Most scenes after assembling the team just seemed to be forced into a certain time slot within the film. Especially the “Black Family” dinner scene you mentioned earlier. Also, I wish Harris Ford was in this movie more! He would have been a good antagonist.

Dustin: I agree Harrison Ford was a cameo at best. He shows up again later in the film, but I won’t say when to avoid spoilers, but even then he doesn't get much to do.

I still thought this one was original enough. One sequence that could have been cut from this two-hour comedy without missing a beat was when Ron Burgundy goes blind and has to adjust to a new way of life, and even nurses a captured shark back to health. It was mostly pointless, but it was also my favorite part of the movie. I've been singing “The Ballad of Doby” ever since.

Nick: That was also my favorite part of the film and one I thought should have contained a jazz flute solo. Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate) was a major part of the original film while being mostly unimportant in the follow up. Applegate did such a wonderful job in the original it was a disappointment for me she lost screentime.

Dustin: I thought she got enough screen time here, but she didn't drive the plot as much as she did in the original.

One character I thought got too much screentime here was Brick. Steve Carell was a little too over-the-top this time around, screaming and yelling. He got obnoxious at times, wooing Kristen Wiig for the second time this year (see Despicable Me 2).

Nick: COMPLETELY AGREED. Brick Tamland is a secondary character at best, standing in the back and saying or doing something unusual, and that works, but giving his character a love interest really hurt the pace of the film.

Dustin: I liked Brick because we had our own Brick in Kansas City: Don Harman from Fox 4 WDAF-TV, who unfortunately committed suicide.

The first film was like an affectionate send-up of goofy local news teams. This one was more of a criticism of sensational 24-hour news and commercial interests controlling content. I thought it may have been more relevant in that sense than the first one.

Nick: The film could have been something more if it explored the negatives of Ron reporting unimportant news and the owner wanting to control the news to his own means, but the film never gets to anywhere. It always starts a new sub-plot that never gets summed up.

Dustin: I was expecting that to become the plot, given the gravity of the situation. But it gets resolved in a very easy manner and quickly brushed aside.

Did you hear a lot of people walking out of the theater at the end saying, “That was stupid?”

Nick: Nope. The audience gave the film an overwhelmingly positive response.

Dustin: I heard about a half dozen people saying, “That was stupid,” “That sure got stupid in a hurry,” “Why did you drag me to that?”

Anchorman 2, like its predecessor, is an aggressively original comedy, and I’d recommend it to anyone looking for a laugh who appreciates Will Ferrell’s brand of humor.