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movie review - The Hangover, Part 2

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

This is a sequel to the original Hangover, which was set in Las Vegas. Whoever is making these things knows what they're doing because they topped the faux danger and thrills of Las Vegas with the actual danger and exotic possibilities of Bangkok. They purposefully make simple plans to avoid the kind of blow-out they experienced in Vegas in the first movie. But of course they once again manage to come to in the morning in an unfamiliar place and once again having lost one of their members - and once again they don't know what happened. Of course Alan, the emotionally and mentally unsound member of their party, takes the initial blame as he'd drugged them in the first one. But it's not that.

I didn't enjoy this sequel as much as the first, in part because how closely it followed the first but for the most part because the characters don't seem to live in their own spaces. It feels a LOT more like actors waiting to say their lines. Another problem is that doing all this so close to the same way is that you really only expect so much to change, and the creators seem to have felt the characters were already established and that they could simply up the madness and outrage in exchange. In that respect, Bangkok is a perfect follow-on to Las Vegas - is escalation the right word? So much so, that at one point they give up; "Bangkok has him," a family member concludes.

Not recommended.

A regret is that the severed finger was from a surgeon and pianist. Too much, The Hangover Part 2, too much.