Well, it’s no secret that the powers that be have completely scraped the bottom of the barrel when it comes to original ideas. Now, they are banking on nostalgia with a seemingly endless batch of unnecessary sequels and reboots, giving everything from Blade Runner to Will & Grace an obligatory revival. It was only a matter of time before 2011’s sleeper success Goon was afforded a second birth. With Jay Baruchel slinking into the director’s seat, Goon: Last of the Enforcers dusts off the Canada-specific gags from its predecessor in a move that will be met with an overwhelmingly apathetic reaction, even from fans of the original.
Once again, our hero is Doug ‘the Thug’ Glatt (Seann William Scott) whose lot in life is beating the bejeezus out of his opponents in order to keep hockey games lively. However, this time, he is gravitating toward a more mature lifestyle because his pregnant wife (Alison Pill) doesn’t take kindly to her husband coming home bruised and bloodied every night. To make matters worse, Glatt is getting edged out by a hot-headed up-and-comer (Wyatt Russell) who is fighting his way toward the spotlight.
The rare exceptional sequel actually builds on the universe crafted by its predecessor, while most of them simply repeat the same tired formula that worked the first time around. Last of the Enforcers certainly falls into the latter category. While it drives home the same blood-spattered fight sequences and adolescent male humor, the script never makes the case for the movie’s own existence. The recipe produced pleasant enough results in 2011, so Jay Baruchel tries to replicate it exactly. Unfortunately, you can only stretch bathroom gags and slow motion tooth knockouts so far.
The one new angle the film half-heartedly throws in is an attempted emotional punch. In the midst of a vulgar testosterone overload, the script weaves in a through line that finds Doug slipping into the shoes of a family man around the birth of his child. Briefly showing the protagonist as a despondent insurance salesman doesn’t add anything to the story. In fact, it’s a fairly distracting shift from the tone set by all the blood and dirty jokes that make up all of the other scenes.
From start to finish, Last of the Enforcers is bogged down with sports movie tropes, from training montages to a hokey redemption story. Perhaps it is aiming to ape the clichés, but it never does much to make that clear. Baruchel isn’t a sharp enough director to effectively parody the genre. Where Goon found the sweet spot between imitation and mockery, its sequel either doesn’t know what goal it’s shooting for or doesn’t know how to convey its aspirations to its audience.
As far as lackluster sequels go, you could do a lot worse than Goon: Last of the Enforcers. That being said, you could do far better. Critics of the original aren’t going to be wooed by a second go on the ice, no matter how much it capitalizes on the recent success of T.J. Miller. Even fans of this universe will walk out of the theater feeling lukewarm about revisiting it. The movie makes the most of what it has, which, as it turns out, isn’t an awful lot.
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