Viewed in
2014
Formats
Movie theater.
Premise
The Muppets are caught up in a European caper-switcheroo, where Kermit is thrown into a Russian gulag and a criminal lookalike leads the Muppets.
Loved
Ty Burrell and Sam the Eagle.
Liked
Tina Fey's hot accent, infinite cameos.
Disliked
Lack of heart.
Hated
Horribly obvious green-screens at the end.
Thoughts
A solid sequel to the Jason Segal revival. However, their song lyric admitting that the followup usually isn't better was a lame self-fulfilling prophecy.
The best, and funniest, parts went to the dynamic detective duo of Sam the Eagle and Ty Burrell (doing his best Inspector Clouseau impression). Their comedy chemistry was so good, I almost wanted a spinoff. While most of the songs weren't as memorable or inspired as the 2011 entry, their "Interrogation Song" was brilliant.
Another knee-slapper of a song was "I'll Get You What You Want", sung by the bad frog, Constantine, as he seduced Miss Piggy. The other newcomers were welcome additions. Ricky Gervais was solid as Constantine's right hand man. Meanwhile, in Siberia, there were lots of fun goofy Gulag moments with Tina Fey, Ray Liotta (surprisingly adorably goofy) and Danny Trejo (but where's his "wacka wacka" scene from the trailer?). Is it me, or was Fey (already an attractive actress) super-hot in her gulag guard uniform and heavy accent?
In addition to these familiar faces, the movie had tons of cameos. I've seen plenty of throwaway lines, but I'd never seen throwaway cameos before.
So aside from the less memorable songs, another missing aspect of the underwhelming sequel was the lack of Jason Segal and Amy Adams. Not because of their star power, but because they (and Walter) brought the heart to the franchise. Without them, the story was meh. It was just a silly string of sequences that required a hard suspension of disbelief that only Animal knew Kermit was a "bad frog!"
Lastly, the visual effects in "Together Again" finale? Eesh.
Muppets Most Wanted got good comedy mileage thanks to Sam and Eagle and Ty Burrell, Tina Fey and other familiar faces. However, the vacuous story will make it not as appealing of a re-watch.
