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What’s this then?** 22 Jump Street.
Hang on, didn’t we have this one already? No. That was 21 Jump Street. This is the startlingly-similar 22 Jump Street, featuring your favourite comedy duo – Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum.
Oh, yeah those guys. How’s this one different? It’s not massively. Apart from instead of high school, Jenko and Schmidt, the Metropolitan City Police Department’s two most useless cops, are headed to college.
What for? To catch people selling drugs. I told you it was similar.
Oh, I see. Yep, there’s this new drug called WHYPHY that all the college kids are taking that’s a mix of adderall and ecstasy, which lets you FOCUS REALLY HARD for four hours so you can do all your schoolwork before having a wicked time getting off your nut for the next four. As well as having the same name as a popular method or internet connection, WHYPHY also stand for Work Hard? Yes. Play Hard? Yes! In other words, don’t take anything about this film too seriously.
OK. What happens? Well, things are a bit different for the guys now they’re in college. While Channing Tatum’s Jenko found the new breed of Gen-Y popular kid difficult to get on board with in high school, college is all about bros and the loveable idiot fits right in. Jonah Hill’s Schmidt doesn’t slip into campus life quite as easily and pretty soon develops crippling separation anxiety from Jenko. There's also some half-hearted attempts to solve the crime.
And is it funny? For the most part, yes. It’s very aware of the fact that it's a shameless sequel to a movie that probably wasn’t supposed to do as well as it did. As a result, the jokes are mainly centered around keeping everything ‘EXACTLY THE SAME AS LAST TIME’. It’s the cinematic reality of the old adage, ‘If it ain’t broke don’t fix it,’ and is also very good at picking on exactly what's funny about college life today. The library is rendered useless ('I thought they just put all the books on computers') and roommates are still like the weirdest thing ever, especially the ones that watch you have sex before making fun of your orgasm noise.
And Channing Tatum’s still got it? Yes, don’t worry, weirdo. You’ll get your fix. There is much light made of the fact that the two post-30-year-old actors couldn’t pass for college students if their life depended on it, but Channing can still rock a vest like nobody’s business. Even if it does say 'Sun's out, guns out' on it.
What are people saying? 'Those masters of having their genre-parody cake and eating it too, directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, have followed up their sly, self-referential franchise reboot 21 Jump Street with an inevitable sequel that is, at least in part, a sly, self-referencing commentary on the inevitability of sequels.' – Scott Foundas, Variety
And what are we saying? Oh, go on. Stop being a killjoy and just go. It’s hardly going to change your life, but it’ll keep you in giggles for the better part of two hours. As well as make you thank your lucky stars that you went to university in the UK and didn’t have to deal with any of the fraternity/Spring Break nonsense that our American friends have to go through. If we're perfectly honest, it's not as good as the first one, and there are a few questionable moments (dodgy Mexican accents, a pretty dodgy punch-up with a girl), but overall it's basically harmless, feel-good and will serve as a good shameless objectification layover until Channing Tatum returns for Magic Mike 2.
22 Jumpstreet is out now.
Follow Jess on Twitter @jess_commons
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.