The Happytime Murders
Lots of teenage boys jerk off into socks. Being teenage boys, those splooge-filled socks all too often get tossed behind dressers or underneath beds to be forgotten forever. If all those cum-covered foot bags grew up into Sesame Street style puppets that lived alongside humans in Los Angeles, they'd be the characters in The Happytime Murders.
There's an octopus that uses most of its arms for a bukkake scene with a cow. A rabbit in a trench coat buys a butt plug from a porno shop. The private dick protagonist, Phil Philips (Bill "9MM" Barretta), jizzes silly string all over his office. The femme fatale who hired Phil to find out who's blackmailing her flashes her felt furburger, complete with purple yarn bush, just like Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct.
This hard-R Muppets-meets-Mickey Spillane thinks its cutting edge, but its edge is about as sharp as pudding, and it's as original as a tribal tattoo on the arm of a gym rat. Team America: World Police nailed the whole puppets fucking thing 14 years ago. The Broadway hit Avenue Q used the same Sesame Street-like characters and had them cursing and drinking and sharing the world with humans. Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Cool World subbed the puppets out for cartoons on-screen with live-action actors. And you know what all those other movies and shows have in common? They were way the fuck better than The Happytime Murders.
The hard-nosed, hard-living cop forced to work with Phil to solve a string of puppet murders - and who just happens to be his former partner from when he was on the force - is played by Melissa "Always A Bridesmaid" McCarthy. I'll be the first to say that McCarthy manages a couple of laugh-out-loud moments. The problem is that she only ever manages a couple of those brilliant moments in every fucking movie she's in. Hey Hollywood, stop trying to make Melissa McCarthy happen! How many more wildly mediocre movies does she have to be in before you let that shit fucking go?
The Happytime Murders is brought to you by the letter C for China - yup, this has STX's and H. Brother's rice noodles all over it - and the number 3 for the three Middle Fingers it barely earns from ol' Cinemavenger.
August 24, 2018