Kick-Ass 2 (2013)

I was a big fan of Matthew Vaughn’s film Kick-Ass, even going so far as to believe (even if I didn’t admit it in my own review) that it improved on the Millar/Romita, Jr. comic book in many ways.  Jeff Wadlow’s Kick-Ass 2, however, misses the bar set by both its filmic and comic predecessors, never failing outright but ending up as a disappointing break from real life.

After kickstarting the real-world superhero trend, Dave “Kick-Ass” Lizewski (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) joins a team of superheroes – Justice Forever – while trying to convince his fellow hero Hit-Girl (Chloe Moretz) to suit up once more to help protect their city.  Hit-Girl is no more, though; instead, Mindy Macready is trying to make a normal life for herself as a high school freshman.  Meanwhile, Chris D’Amico (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), the supervillain formerly known as Red Mist, rebrands himself in a quest to avenge his father and kill Kick-Ass.

Sometime before arriving in theaters, Kick-Ass 2 dropped its subtitle “Balls to the Wall,” and after viewing the film itself it isn’t hard to see why.  That subtitle promises a relentless go-for-broke mentality which strives to top the already-exuberant first film, but what you actually get with Kick-Ass 2 is a tennis match of tonal inconsistencies, volleying between grim-n-gritty and Frat Pack humor, between dark comedy and unironic maudlin melodrama.  Any one of these might have made for a decent film, but the movie’s confusion about its own tone leads to a film that distances more than diverts its audience.  Matthew Vaughn managed to pull off the tonal shifts in Kick-Ass, but it seems Wadlow isn’t as deft a filmmaker.

A quick word about the source material:  Kick-Ass 2, by Mark Millar and John Romita, Jr., is stomach-churning, revoltingly violent, and that’s entirely the point.  Millar’s work on Kick-Ass 2 is uncompromising in a way that makes most readers uncomfortable (his unsettling comments equating rape with decapitation notwithstanding), but again it’s not purposeless.  By softening many of the more brutal beats from the comic book, the film ends up feeling like it’s continually undercutting itself.  Case in point:  Chris D’Amico, reduced from a genuinely evil monster to a lame attempt at comic relief whose villainous pursuits are impossible to take seriously because of his nasal whines and myriad impotencies. It’s a shame; Mintz-Plasse pulls off a few great moments of real darkness, but it’s like the editors spliced in a whole other feature alongside the one where McLovin plays the villain.

Moretz still steals the show as the foul-mouthed juvenile vigilante Hit-Girl, her purple wig and one-liners bespeaking her inbred passion for the superhero game, but there’s something just a little bit off about her performance.  Maybe it’s that she’s noticeably aged from the pint-sized terror of the first film, maybe it’s the film’s clumsy attempt to shoehorn her into a Mean Girls subplot (which works better in the comic book without resorting to icky hormones and projectile vomiting), or maybe it’s just that her heart doesn’t seem as into the project as it did; ditto for Johnson-Taylor, who’s almost the very definition of phoning it in, even when his character is supposed to be devastated.

Indeed, the only actor in the film who doesn’t seem bored or confused is Jim Carrey, in a surprisingly fun turn as Colonel Stars and Stripes, Justice Forever’s ostensible chairman.  I didn’t recognize Carrey in the early trailers, and that level of immersion in the character persists in his small role here.  You’ll want more of the Colonel from the film, in part because he’s the only consistent character in the film and in part because he lives up to the film’s attempt at a motto:  “Try to have fun; otherwise, what’s the point?” 

But the biggest problem with the film isn’t the violence that led Carrey to disavow the film in public (though some of the CGI effects need disowning).  In the final analysis, Kick-Ass 2 just doesn’t work because it doesn’t allow itself to go for broke.  Instead, it holds back and undercuts itself at every turn until all that’s left standing is an unengaging experience that just doesn’t kick as much ass as it needs to.  Never thought I’d say this, but this film really needs Nicolas Cage (a shining light in the first, conspicuously absent here).

Kick-Ass 2 is rated R for “strong violence, pervasive language, crude and sexual content, and brief nudity.”  This film is as violent as the first one, blood sprays and amputations abounding.  There are plenty of F-, C-, and other bombs dropped by the characters (including one in his own name), two prostitutes are seen topless for a few seconds, and other characters talk about sexual acts in vulgar and unflinching detail.  Please don’t do what the people sitting a few rows behind me did: leave your three-year-old at home.