I was planning to entertain myself by seeing how many “this feels familiar” jokes I could cram into this review, but I can’t even do that. The original Happy Death Day is a horror version of Groundhog Day in which Tree, our idiotically named hero, must repeatedly relive the same day and be continually killed by a masked killer until she discovers the killer’s identity and becomes a less horrible person in the process. The sequel brings back the time-loop plot, but it is a mighty big stretch to call this a horror movie. Sure, the original is a PG-13 horror comedy, but this one is basically just a PG-13 college hijinks movie with a cameo from a slasher. If the original was Halloween crossed with Groundhog Day, then this is Real Genius crossed with Groundhog Day.
Picking up the day after the events of the first film, Tree discovers that the time-loop was caused by a student science experiment at the university. The school’s Dean is incredibly unimpressed by a student experiment that creates fucking time-loops and shuts it down, causing a reaction that sends Tree back into the time-loop of the previous day. However, she has also now been sent into a parallel dimension, which means that things are slightly different now. The biggest differences are that Tree’s mom is alive in this dimension and her new boyfriend is dating someone else. So, Tree must make the age-old decision: Is it better to have your dead mother back or be reunited with your boyfriend that you’ve been dating for 12 fucking hours since you drunkenly hooked up with him the previous night? Naturally, you would go with the latter and Tree needs to figure out how to get back to her original dimension.
You might notice that I didn’t mention the killer and that’s because the movie barely mentions the killer. I’m not exaggerating that the killer basically has an extended cameo in this movie and seems to have really only been included for marketing purposes. The resolution of the killer’s identity is so irrelevant to the plot that it’s revealed as an afterthought and seems out of place in the film. If you are going into this expecting a horror film, then you are going to be mighty disappointed. I honestly can’t even remember if the slasher actually slashes anybody.
Without a horror film to get in the way, we are instead left with Tree trying to work with the geeky physics students to try to fix the experiment. The majority of the film feels like it’s trying to be a John Hughes film or the aforementioned Real Genius, but it lacks the wit and characters needed to make it work. It instead ends up feeling like a very long episode of The Big Bang Theory, complete with the hot blonde that just doesn’t understand all of this science stuff that the nerds are doing but she still bonds with them anyway. You know, kind of like every fucking episode of Big Bang Theory.
The highlight of this movie, as with the original, is Jessica Rothe’s performance as Tree. I don’t like these movies, but Rothe is the one element that keeps me from hating them. As with the original, she displays great comedic timing that makes me want to see her in an actual full-on comedy. The montage of her killing herself in various ways is the best part of the film and is actually quite funny. I also applaud the director’s boldly artistic decision to have her wear a bra and panties for no reason when she kills herself by jumping out of a plane. Unlike the first movie, she also has some surprisingly serious dramatic scenes in this as she weighs the pros and cons of leaving her mother behind. It’s again a performance that outweighs the material and I really hope to see her in something that I actually like.
Happy Death Day 2U won’t satisfy anyone looking for a horror film. It also falls flat compared to the similar College-set comedies that it seems to be aspiring to emulate. However, if you like The Big Bang Theory and aren’t satisfied by the 5,000 episodes aired on an endless loop on TBS, then you might like this. And I just checked and Big Bang Theory is on TBS as I’m writing this. It’s funny because Sheldon misses defunct search engines. Hilarious.
Image By: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Death_Day_2U#/media/File:Happy_Death_Day_2U.png
