Spoiler Review: "Happy Gilmore 2"

When the news of a Happy Gilmore movie first hit the web, fans were right to be sceptical. After long-awaited yet failed sequels like Dumb & Dumber Too, there was a big question mark as to whether or not this would be a movie that was worth the 30 year wait.

Unfortunately, it was far from worthy. this follow-up to Adam Sandler's much-loved classic falls pretty flat and doesn't capture the magic that the original did.

The movie picks up by filling us in on Happy's career since first winning the gold jacket. He married Julie Bowen's Virginia, they had a whole squad of kids and then things turned sour for poor Happy. From that point, he vowed never to pick up a golf club again. That was until he needed money to get his daughter into a dance school in Paris, and that's where the bulk of the movie comes in.

I honestly thought that maybe the one saving grace of this movie would be Adam Sandler's return to the role of lovable yet anger-filled Happy Gilmore. Unfortunately, that much time has passed that it just feels like Adam Sandler being himself. As with most of his Happy Madison movies nowadays, he doesn't quite capture the magic that he gave us in the likes of Billy Madison, The Wedding Singer and Big Daddy.

What we get here is a tired performance with a few angry outbursts that don't land as well as they used to. It could be argued that "this is just Happy 30 years on", but we're not letting it go that easy.

Funnily enough, the real saving grace of the movie is Christopher McDonald's Shooter McGavin, back and as hilarious as ever. The updated version of McGavin stacks up pretty well and offers up some of the funniest moments in the movie with him now not having to keep his composure, and being left to run riot here and there.

We've then got Benny Safdie stepping in as the movie's villain - a rich brat who wants to revolutionise golf for a whole new generation. You've got to respect Safdie as a filmmaker, but it definitely wasn't a good move to step into a villainous role in this kind of comedy. It's a standard villain in a less-than-standard comedy movie.

We do of course have Gilmore's sons in the movies too. Not played by actors of notability (at the time of me writing this at least), but they do actually bring in some hilarious moments as they all go into rage mode together.

Then there's the cameos. Oh, the cameos. In A LOT of instances, you have to just take them as they are. Celebrities jumping in for a bit of fun. But boy do you cringe from time to time. There's a reason those golfers barely step in front of a film camera. The only cameos that really felt up to scratch were Eminem's heckler and Travis Kelce's waiter.

One celebrity who stepped in for a proper role and delivered everything well? None other than rapper Bad Bunny, who takes on the part of Happy's new caddy. We're not saying he steals his scenes, but he definitely entertains enough for us to have a bit of a giggle here and there.

All in all, the plot was exactly as we predicted. Happy needs money. Gets back into golf. Gets pulled into an ultimate showdown of take home everything or lose it all. Yawn yawn yawn. The most extravagant bit is the villains new take on Golf. Just way too out there. even a Happy Gilmore movie didn't need to go this crazy.

You've then got some of the obvious winks to the original movie. That "eats pieces of sh*t for breakfast" line from Sandler may have been finished off with a wink to camera. Its so unfortunate when those moments don't land well. We then got terrible new characters like "Chubbs' Son". "Larson's Son". Well, why? It isn't necessary. At all. Just a cheap gap filler.

Does the film have some good points though? Well yeah, actually. That twist with Virginia at the beginning? Didn't see it coming at all. It also leads into the only nice wink to the original with the "after the funeral" moment.

There's also the moment of Shooter actually becoming an ally to Gilmore. Not something I'd have predicted, and probably not something I'd have liked with foresight, but it happening without prior warning actually came as quite an appealing development for the plot.

Something else I didn't expect to be all that good? The de-aging. This obviously only makes up pretty much some of the opening 10 minutes, but for a moment I genuinely believed we were watching archive footage. But nope, some solid de-aging technology. Netflix spending money on this stuff better than Disney!

To conclude, it's a safe bet that my Happy Gilmore marathon will not consist of the original and then the sequel. I'd much rather watch the original...and then the original again. You can try and take the movie for what it is - a slapstick comedy with an over-the-top premise - but that's more or less what the O.G was and it still had it's foot in grounded territory which made it so simple and likeable.

As a big Adam Sandler fan - one only loyal to everything pre-Zohan - it's a disappointed 4.2/10 from me.

Happy Gilmore 2 is now streaming on Netflix.