Quickie Review:
After the massive success of Ted, director Seth MacFarlane returns to make another comedy feature film, in which he is also the star. His character, Albert, lives in the West where everything and everyone is deadly. He loses his love Louise (Amanda Seyfried) to Foy (Neil Patrick Harris). With the help of gun-slinging Anna (Charlize Theron) he must duel Foy in a gunfight to win his love back. A Million Ways to Die in the West, is a satirical comedy western that unfortunately does not deliver consistent quality of jokes. You will chuckle a few times sure, but as a whole this is not MacFarlane's best work. Quite frankly this a poor movie that has been advertised in the trailers with all the best jokes.
Full Review:
I enjoy MacFarlane's work in Family Guy and I especially loved Ted. So going in I was quite excited to see A Million Ways to Die in the West. However, by the second half I realized I was actually bored. It pains to me to say this because I really like Seth MacFarlane's sense of humor, but this was just not a good movie.
This is the first time we see MacFarlane in a live action lead role. We know he is good with voice work for animated characters but as a live action actor he's not at the same level of quality. He actually feels out of place, it's more like he is in some skit show. In fact, the whole movie feels like a series of skits, each scene is just set up for a gag. It gets so lost in making all these gags work that there is no coherent flow to the story. This makes an already 2 hour long movie feel longer because you just don't know where it's going, and more importantly the jokes aren't even that funny.
This brings me to the biggest let down of this movie, the jokes. Yes of course there are few chuckles here and there, but even the worst comedies has those. At no point was I bursting with laughter. Later on in the movie, it starts to rely on the dick, fart and poop jokes. Sure, once in a while I can enjoy those jokes, but if the whole scene is depending on that to get some laughter, then I'm switching my brain off because clearly the writers have too. You know they ran out of ideas when they resort to the laxative gag. Dear Hollywood, stop it with the laxative joke, it was funny when I was kid.
Apart from the scenes from the trailer, there is one cameo and a bar fight that I quite enjoyed watching. I think anyone going in with big expectations based on Ted will be sorely disappointed. There are definitely worse comedies out there than this. Still, considering the team and cast involved, A Million Ways to Die in the West should have been so much better.
After the massive success of Ted, director Seth MacFarlane returns to make another comedy feature film, in which he is also the star. His character, Albert, lives in the West where everything and everyone is deadly. He loses his love Louise (Amanda Seyfried) to Foy (Neil Patrick Harris). With the help of gun-slinging Anna (Charlize Theron) he must duel Foy in a gunfight to win his love back. A Million Ways to Die in the West, is a satirical comedy western that unfortunately does not deliver consistent quality of jokes. You will chuckle a few times sure, but as a whole this is not MacFarlane's best work. Quite frankly this a poor movie that has been advertised in the trailers with all the best jokes.
Full Review:
I enjoy MacFarlane's work in Family Guy and I especially loved Ted. So going in I was quite excited to see A Million Ways to Die in the West. However, by the second half I realized I was actually bored. It pains to me to say this because I really like Seth MacFarlane's sense of humor, but this was just not a good movie.
This is the first time we see MacFarlane in a live action lead role. We know he is good with voice work for animated characters but as a live action actor he's not at the same level of quality. He actually feels out of place, it's more like he is in some skit show. In fact, the whole movie feels like a series of skits, each scene is just set up for a gag. It gets so lost in making all these gags work that there is no coherent flow to the story. This makes an already 2 hour long movie feel longer because you just don't know where it's going, and more importantly the jokes aren't even that funny.
This brings me to the biggest let down of this movie, the jokes. Yes of course there are few chuckles here and there, but even the worst comedies has those. At no point was I bursting with laughter. Later on in the movie, it starts to rely on the dick, fart and poop jokes. Sure, once in a while I can enjoy those jokes, but if the whole scene is depending on that to get some laughter, then I'm switching my brain off because clearly the writers have too. You know they ran out of ideas when they resort to the laxative gag. Dear Hollywood, stop it with the laxative joke, it was funny when I was kid.
Apart from the scenes from the trailer, there is one cameo and a bar fight that I quite enjoyed watching. I think anyone going in with big expectations based on Ted will be sorely disappointed. There are definitely worse comedies out there than this. Still, considering the team and cast involved, A Million Ways to Die in the West should have been so much better.