Director(s): Phil Lord, Christopher Miller
Cast: Channing Tatum, Jonah Hill, Ice Cube
Release Date: Own it on Blu-Ray Combo Pack & DVD November 18th
A Review By: Kevin Lovell
Film Rating: 8/10
Disc Rating: 10/10
Synopsis:
After making their way through high school (twice), big changes are in store for officers Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Jenko (Channing Tatum) when they go deep undercover at a local college. But when Jenko meets a kindred spirit on the football team, and Schmidt infiltrates the bohemian art major scene, they begin to question their partnership. Now they don’t have to just crack the case – they have to figure out if they can have a mature relationship. If these two overgrown adolescents can grow from freshmen into real men, college might be the best thing that ever happened to them.
Another dangerous new drug wave has once again hit and must be stopped; yep, you guessed it, at a school. Now it’s time for the best thirty-something undercover teens on the force to go deep under cover, jump street style! But this time around, this most unlikely of duos is moving up in the educational world and heading to college. What ensues is enough hilarious and action fueled fun to deliver a non-stop laugh fest that holds up in almost every way with its surprisingly impressive predecessor; a film I didn’t have incredibly high hopes for going in, but which managed to thoroughly surprise me when it ended up being one of the best comedies of recent years. While I might not go so far as to say that the sequel is equal or better in comparison to the original, one thing is for certain, the sequel definitely does not disappoint.
Once again directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the duo that also directed the first film, along with The Lego Movie and more, they once again do an excellent job handling this one. Channing Tatum, Jonah Hill and Ice Cube also return to reprise their roles (along with some small cameo style appearances by other characters from the first) and all three of them fall easily back into their respective roles and once again deliver on all ends, Ice Cube if anything was far more hilarious this time around and delivered some of the funniest moments of the film. A number of familiar faces also join the cast this time around, some in bigger roles like the always wonderful Peter Stormare, and some in mere cameo roles that are nonetheless quite hilarious, including Patton Oswalt as a history professor and H. Jon Benjamin (the voice of ‘Archer’ and ‘Bob’ from ‘Bob’s Burgers’) as the MC football coach.
’22 Jump Street’ is one of the rare examples of a sequel to a surprisingly fantastic film that actually manages to hold up in most respects with its predecessor and delivers on almost every angle. Fans of the first should have a great time with this one and even if you don’t find it superior to ’21 Jump Street’ I’d be very surprised if most didn’t find it to be a pretty competent and fantastic sequel at the very least. It delivers non-stop laughs, some hilariously perfect chemistry between Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum once again and some incredibly entertaining action sequences to boot. I would highly recommend ’22 Jump Street’ to anyone who enjoyed the first, and to those who don’t mind more raunchy comedies and haven’t seen either, I would definitely suggest giving them both a shot because you are likely to be very pleasantly surprised.
VIDEO:
The Blu-Ray release of ’22 Jump Street’ features a full 1080p High Definition presentation utilizing the film’s original 2.40:1 Cinemascope Aspect Ratio. The video presentation looks pretty outstanding as a whole; all of the colors down to the background elements look sharp and impressively detailed and clear. The numerous fast moving sequences never falter and always hold up and look smooth. The entire release looks pretty fantastic; both fans of the film along with first time viewers should be pretty satisfied with this gorgeous high definition video presentation.
AUDIO:
The Blu-Ray release features a lossless 5.1 channel DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack. The lossless soundtrack sounds phenomenal and really adds an additional level of fun to the overall experience of this great time of a film. It’s surprisingly active, taking full advantage of all five available channels and utilizing them to their fullest to accentuate the fight scenes with bullets whizzing by, along with music and crowd noise in the party or other sequences, while never detracting from the audibility of the dialogue in any way. This DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack gets top marks along, right up there with the video presentation and should provide a pretty great experience for everyone.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
The Blu-Ray release of ’22 Jump Street’ is absolutely loaded with bonus content, jump street style! Make sure to pick up your copy on Blu-Ray if possible, because a number of the extras are Blu-Ray exclusives. The Blu-Ray release includes 22 Deleted/Extended Scenes for your viewing pleasure, totaling nearly 40 minutes in length altogether (17 of the Deleted/Extended Scenes are Blu-Ray exclusives); a commentary track with Director’s Phil Lord & Chris Miller, along with Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum. Also included are nearly an hour of behind the scenes featurette’s; 6 in all including: ‘The Perfect Couple of Directors’; ‘Everything is Better in College’; ‘Janning And Chonah’; ‘New Recruits’; ‘The Perfect Line’ and ‘Don’t Cut Yet.’ If all of that wasn’t enough for you in the way of bonus goodies, a Joke-A-Palooza, 5 Line-O-Rama’s, ‘Zook & McQuaid Scout Reel’; ‘Jenko Split’ and ‘The Dramatic Interpretation of ’22 Jump Street’ are included as well.
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