Review: ‘Kick-Ass 2’

If I was some sort of stupid film critic superhero, then ambivalence would be my kryptonite, making it as difficult as possible for me to even put together enough words to actually constitute a “review” of some sort. And “Kick-Ass 2” has filled me with this ambivalence, as it doesn’t really seem to commit to anything, bounces back and forth between satire and comic book hero worship, admittedly strives to be good but really is just okay at best, and really it all comes down to an overall story that doesn’t add up to much of anything in the end and a bunch of empty action scenes with nothing behind them.

There just ain’t nothing to sink my teeth into with this movie. A lot of critics are going into fits over the movie’s violence, which is indeed over the top and in some cases done in bad taste, but really there isn’t anything in here that’s worse than what’s on primetime television. Doesn’t anyone wince at digital blood? Does that crap fool anyone? I didn’t think so. At least in “Kick-Ass 2” when someone gets stabbed or shot, there IS the blood (no matter how fake it looks), as much of this movie is about the consequences and repurcussions of the violence, which is better than a lot of PG-13 action movies that regularly feature the obvious deaths of hundreds if not thousands if not MILLIONS of people, usually in the most sanitized and bloodless manner possible. Now THAT’S offensive.

But back to this movie, in which there is a lot of violence and the movie is about violence, both in comic book form and movie form, and while they try to equate it to real world violence (“what would happen if real people put on masks and tried to stop criminals?”), they also try the ole have their cake and eat it too approach, what with the movie ending in an orgy of violence and characters meeting “deserved” bloody deaths. The problem with this revenge-fueled violence is the lack of clear story for Kick-Ass himself a.k.a. Dave (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), who made a promise to his dad to stop being a vigilante, only to break that promise to get back in the streets as Kick-Ass, only to turn around promise his dad again that he would stop, to only have to turn around and break his promise again. There’s a morale lesson in there about being his own person and living his own life or something like that, but it’s a muddled mess as this message got lost somewhere along the way in terms of this character.

Meanwhile, Hit Girl a.k.a. Mindy (Chloe Grace Moretz) promised her dad that she was continue defending the city, but then also promised she would obey her new guardian Detective Marcus Williams (Morris Chestnut) so when HE makes Mindy promise to stop being a superhero and try to act like a normal high school girl, she actually says yes and gives it a shot. And it all goes all Stephen King’s “Carrie” on her, which was ironic given the fact that the trailer for the “Carrie” remake played in front of this movie, featuring Chloe Grace Moretz as well, so then Mindy learns that…there are still evil people in the world? And then she punishes the bitchy evil “cool” girls by making them projectile vomit and poo in front of everyone…and there’s a morale lesson in there somewhere…maybe…

Okay, but then she decides that being true to her word to her dead father isn’t exactly the right thing to do, and she becomes Hit Girl again, and then what? Her catharsis seems to come from accepting that she will be a social outcast for life and that she can indeed solve much of the world’s problems with violence, which includes freely using guns by the way. Nothing like an angry teenager with a gun, amiright America?

So that’s the problem it seems, as “Kick-Ass 2” doesn’t even know what it’s selling. Are they trashing the comic book (and by extension the film) industry’s rampant problem with violence and misogyny, or they just embracing these problems with the thin veneer of criticism? The movie’s supervillain (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) insists on giving his henchmen names based on their ethnicity, and when this stereotyping gets called out, the character merely yells back that they are archetypes, and that’s it, discussion over, and details that are never brought up again or used in any way. They were just happy enough to throw a line in there, and then they felt comfortable enough to continue using those stereotypes. Whatever floats your boats, guys.

The first “Kick-Ass” felt inspired and fun and interesting, and this one feels flat and kind of boring. Nothing in it is really that great (except for Jim Carrey, who is fantastic in a small role), but it doesn’t get that bad either. It’s just there and boring, striving for brilliant by way of being offensive, but in the end just being kind of offensive. Oh well.