Once I Was Engaged Review

Six years ago, back in 2015, a little LDS-themed movie called “Once I Was a Beehive” was released and made quite the storm here in Utah. Cheesy title. Cheesy premise. But a surprisingly great film that had excellent word of mouth. It stayed in theaters locally for 15 weeks and made about $730,000 at the box office. Not bad for a little Utah film. Fast forward to today and the movie now has a sequel, “Once I Was Engaged.”

It’s been a second or two since I’ve seen “Once I Was a Beehive.” I remember being uninterested initially. Then I remember giving it a go and being shocked at how much I enjoyed it. Then I remembered spending the next few months doing my best to convince others to give it a shot.

“Yes, I know it sounds dumb. A low-budget girls camp movie. But I promise that it’s really good.”

That’s how most conversations went. Usually if I was successfully, the person would come out and thank me for convincing them to watch it because they, too, thought it was a really great movie. Never once did I think we would ever get a sequel to the movie. But, well, here we are. This time it wasn’t hard to convince myself to go see it. Same cast. Same crew. Same director. OK, this is at least worth a shot.

The result?

Well… I… ummm… sorry. This one just did not work for me.

“Once I Was Engaged” is a movie that follows Bree Carrington as she goes off to BYU Hawaii for school. She meets a boy named Thys Chesterfield at the beginning of the semester. At the end of the semester when Bree thinks they are going to break up so that she can go on a mission and he can pursue his old girlfriend who is about to get off her mission, Thys surprises her by proposing instead. She says yes, even though she is not 100 percent in favor of this. But she eventually decides that getting married is what she wants to do, despite that being against her mother’s wishes, and then they begin the process of planning the wedding.

Essentially this movie is more of a spin-off to “Once I Was a Beehive,” set a few years after that movie. Whereas “Once I Was a Beehive” was a teen drama, “Once I Was Engaged” is a rom-com. Honestly this didn’t necessarily need to be connected to “Once I Was a Beehive.” It’s a much different movie with a different focus. Even though the entire cast returns, most of them are more or less afterthoughts. They’re either relegated to supporting roles or glorified cameos, showing up so that the movie could have a stronger connection to the first one rather than having a purpose in the plot to be there. This includes Lane Speer, the actual main character of the first movie, the non-member girl who gets roped into going to girls camp.

This is not necessarily a terrible angle to take. It’s much easier to get people to see your movie when it’s connected to a successful franchise as opposed to simply starting a new franchise. And if the goal is to make a fun and silly LDS rom-com, why not take one of the girls from your previous in order to accomplish this? The final goal is accomplished with what you wanted to do. You just had a built in audience of people who watched and loved the first movie. But as I thought about the movie in retrospect, this connection to the first movie did end up feeling more like a marketing gimmick than something that needed to happen.

Ultimately, though, I think my main analysis as to why I didn’t connect with “Once I Was Engaged” like I did with “Once I Was a Beehive” came with me doing a more deep analysis of why “Once I Was a Beehive” worked. Yes, it was a silly girls movie that poked fun at LDS culture, much like “The Singles Ward” or “The R.M.” from the early 2000s, but there was also a strong emotional core that made it rise above the self-referential comedy. You didn’t have to have gone to girls camp as a young woman in the Church to enjoy the movie because the story is really about learning how to overcome the loss of a family member and adjust to new changes in life. Lane is a non-member girl who gets roped into going to girls camp because her father passed away and her mother remarries a member of the church, thus she is thrown into a strange, new life and has a lot to overcome. You laugh at all the funny jokes in the movie, but you also cry and are moved by this emotional plot.

I don’t know anything about the process of how “Once I Was Engaged” was made or why certain narrative decisions came to be. And I don’t want to say the filmmakers didn’t understand why their first movie was so popular, but I can express my personal opinion the reasons why I connected with the first movie wound up not being the heavy focus of this second movie. Not only are we following Bree and not Lane, but there’s not a very strong emotional core to the movie that I was able to grasp onto.

Before I dive too much further, I do want to point out that focusing on marriage is a direction that makes sense. The girls are no longer teens and having them deal with college and marriage is another major milestone in a girl’s life after struggling with the challenges of being a teenager. And given the fact that today’s younger generation does have a more progressive and perhaps less traditional take on marriage and dating than the older generations of the Church, for better or for worse, there were potential avenues to go down if the filmmakers had the ultimate goal of telling another important and relevant story that provides strong themes to hold onto for young people in the Church. But that didn’t seem to be the case. The focus seemed to be much more on the comedy element, poking fun at the traditions and clichés of an LDS wedding. The only drama in the film involved if she was actually going to marry this guy or not rather than some deeper theme that they could’ve focused on.

Even then, if I try to take a step away from all of this and put on my rom-com judging hat rather than being disappointed that the focused on Bree and not Lane, or being disappointed that there wasn’t a strong, emotional theme for me to connect to, I’m not so sure this really succeeds as a rom-com. Structurally speaking, the balance was off. Because they were also much more interested in making fun of the intricacies of LDS wedding planning than giving the rom-com part of the film much time to breathe.

If you dissect the movie, there is a traditional rom-com arc. But Act 1 and Act 3 are extremely short. We start with Bree in her wedding dress, the day before she gets married, then quickly flash back to her saying this is the guy she met and fell in love with. There is the brief drama that they are going to break up, but he shocks her by proposing instead. There is tension with her mother and confusion in her own mind as she is deciding on if she wants to get married or go on a mission, but again, this happens fairly quickly in the movie. She commits to getting married and they set a date for two months in the future.

Act 3 I will not speak of in detail, but it is also even more abbreviated than Act 1. There is the main conflict in every rom-com of whether or not the couple is actually going to get married. Something always comes up and divides them. This drama happens much later than it should’ve and there is a lot of things that happens in a very short amount of time.

So if Act 1 and Act 3 are both very short, what is Act 2? Wedding planning. There is a literal, virtual checklist that the movie shows us and we go through that literal bullet point list of everything involved in their wedding planning. This is where we decide to poke fun at every single element of planning an LDS wedding. Call it a series of short stories inside the larger story of the rom-com. There is zero drama and very little suspense, unless you really care about who Bree is going to select for her bridesmaids, where the reception is going to be held, what to do at the Bachelorette Party, what wedding dress she wants to pick out, and how to manage the financial parts of the wedding, given that Bree’s dad is in between jobs and Thys’s parents are super rich and prosperous. I laughed at some of these individual things, but in context of the story as a whole, this elongated Act 2 went a long way in dragging the movie down.

I did realize in the final part of the movie that I have a closer than expected connection to the director of the movie than I thought. Maclain Nelson, director of the both movies and lead actor in “The Saratov Approach,” is the son of a high councilor in my single’s ward a few years back. Said high councilor and his wife show up at the very end as the parents of Thys’s ex-girlfriend, and I was like, “Oh hey, I know those two!”

Speaking of Thys’s ex-girlfriend, she’s played by Tiffany Alvord, a YouTuber and singer I’ve been following for the last decade. There’s also a cameo from a certain Utah Senator and Stacey Harkey, formerly of Studio C and currently of J.K. Studios. I’m not sure how they managed to rope all of them into being in this movie, but that led to a lot of “Oh hey!” moments. In which case, that means that there is a small percent chance that this ends up being viewed by people who were involved in the making of this film. If that does happen…

Sorry.

But as the director of “Avocado Toast,” a movie I watched and reviewed a few weeks ago, would confirm to you, I don’t think it does anyone any good if I sugarcoat my opinion of a movie just because there may be a personal connection. I don’t have to be rude about it, but I can give what I see as constructive criticism so that people can do better next time, whatever their filmmaking project may be.

For the record, all of the acting in the movie is fantastic. That’s not the problem. And all the technical aspects of the filmmaking are also done well. This a well-shot, well-made film in regards to the editing, cinematography, lighting, camera work, and all of that fun stuff, especially considering this is still an indie movie without the major budget of a traditional Hollywood studio film. But it’s the idea of the film that ultimately failed.

If there is a third “Once I Was” movie coming, I would hope the filmmakers would go back and realize what made the first one so good. And now that I have all may bases covered, most of you, if not all of you, will be simply people curious if you should watch it or not. To that I say go for it. If you liked the first movie and you’re curious about this sequel, give it a shot. You might like it more than me. Just know that it does not have my personal stamp of approval.

Grade: 6/10

Double Movie Review: Space Jam (1996) + Space Jam: A New Legacy (2021)

Hating on the 1996 film “Space Jam,” with Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny, has been quite the popular trend on the internet in the last five years or so. And it’s one of those annoying things where every new person who brings it up acts as if they’re the first person to say they don’t like it, as if they have this hot, new take. Well, it’s time to combat that negativity a bit because “Space Jam” is an excellent film that still holds up in 2021.

But then we’re going to flip a switch and go from combating the negativity to feeding it. Not by turning on “Space Jam” itself. But by unleashing on the absolute dumpster fire that is “Space Jam: A New Legacy,” an early candidate for worst movie of 2021.

But first, “Space Jam.”

I think the most common thing I’ve heard is that “Space Jam” is a movie built solely on childhood nostalgia and that it gets worse when you watch it as an adult. In other words, it doesn’t hold up. I understand that principle. Childhood nostalgia is a very common thing that in many cases has boosted popular movies that I personally think are overrated. Combine that with holiday nostalgia and there are so many terrible movies that are praised as masterpieces.

First off, I don’t think it’s totally fair to completely write off the importance of nostalgia. As kids we all have standards that aren’t as strict when it comes to which movies we enjoy. And I think it’s totally valid to have certain attachments to films that meant a lot to us, even if we grow up and learn more about what actually makes good movies. We can go back and differentiate between the movies that actually were good vs. the ones that were only good because we were seven years old and weren’t as overly critical. But I still think it’s totally fine to say we like a movie that meant a lot to us as a child, even if we acknowledge later that it isn’t perfect.

That said, in the midst of this giant wave of people on the internet claiming “Space Jam” doesn’t hold up, I’ve watched it several times. A few times with the specific question in my mind of “Does this REALLY hold up as a good movie or do I just like it because it was perfect for me as a kid?” And my answer every time comes out as, YES. It DOES hold up as a good movie. Even in 2021. I watched it and the sequel back-to-back on HBO Max on Friday afternoon. And I loved every minute of my experience watching. I almost watched it again just to get the bad taste of its sequel out of my mouth.

I obviously can’t speak for everyone on the internet or every 90s child like myself who grew up loving “Space Jam,” but for me it was the perfect storm of everything that I loved as a kid. Like most people, I grew up watching cartoons on Saturday mornings. And although Looney Tunes dates back way before I was a kid, their cultural impact has been so great across many generations that they also meant a lot to me when I was young. One of my other passions was basketball. I played Super Nintendo games like NBA Jam and NBA Showdown all the time, so I knew all the teams well. And I watched my Utah Jazz at every moment I could. I loved getting the paper delivered every day so that I could check the scores and look at the stats of the previous night’s games.

I don’t know when exactly it was that I watched “Space Jam” for the first time. It would’ve come out when I was seven years old, right at the peak of the Utah Jazz’s greatness. Our team faced Michael Jordan in the finals two years in a row in the late 90s, shortly after the release of “Space Jam.” I don’t remember seeing “Space Jam” in theaters, but I do know that I watched it and loved it as a kid because it combined those two passions of mine. Cartoons and 90s basketball. I knew all the players and teams that were featured in the movie. So that was fun for me. And I loved all of the Looney Tunes. Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and squad playing basketball with Michael Jordan? You can’t get a more perfect combination of two things for young Adam. Michael Jordan himself may have been my mortal enemy, but he was still part of the era of basketball that I love so much.

But that’s me as a kid. My opinion of it as an adult? Well, for one it has one of the greatest soundtracks for any sports movie. From the intro to Michael Jordan playing basketball as a kid to the Looney Tunes taking the court, every song elevates the sports sequences in the movie. The title track “Space Jam” by Quad City DJ’s is one of the most motivational songs ever when it comes to getting yourself pumped up for something. And I don’t even like rap, but that song is perfection. Add that to the likes of “Fly Like an Eagle,” “I Believe I Can Fly” and “Basketball Jones” are also perfect. In addition to the soundtrack, I think it’s a clever idea to Bugs and crew recruit Michael Jordan to help them beat the Monstars after said little aliens became very large and scary after the Looney Tunes challenged them to a game of basketball.

And as a 90s basketball fan, there’s a lot of references from Charles Barkley, Patrick Ewing, Mugsy Bogues, Larry Johnson, and Shawn Bradley that make me laugh. Things that non-basketball fans watching “Space Jam” might not understand. And I don’t know when I first caught it, but Shawn Bradley at one point in the movie says that maybe he should go back and serve another mission for his Church. As a BYU fan, that also makes me laugh. So I like the element of the movie that Michael Jordan is motivated to help his fellow NBA friends get their powers back, while the Looney Tunes are motivated by not wanting to become slaves to these aliens. Solid motivation from both sides, followed by some entertainingly silly basketball scenes that fit perfectly into the zany catalogue of the Looney Tunes.

I think the most clever part of “Space Jam” is that it provides an alternate narrative as to why Michael Jordan un-retired and came back to the NBA after he retired to play baseball. The Looney Tunes sparked the desire in him to play basketball again. In fact, to this day I will, in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way, blame the Looney Tunes for why my Jazz never won a title. If they hadn’t convinced Michael Jordan to play basketball again, maybe he would’ve stayed retired and then the Jazz would’ve played Alonzo Mourning’s Heat in 1996-97 and Reggie Miller’s Pacers in 1997-98. Two tough teams, but we were better than both of them.

So yeah, that perfect crossover of two things I love, being a great tribute to both, makes “Space Jam” a special movie for me. One I have seen and watched many times.

But now it’s time to analyze this sequel.

If I’m being perfectly transparent, I’ve never been opposed to the idea of a “Space Jam” sequel. It’s something that they’ve tried to do ever since the first movie got released. But they could never get Michael Jordan back to do another one. And the cards never fell in place with any other idea they tried. So it’s a sequel that sat on the shelf for two decades. Until LeBron James came into the picture and was obviously interested in participating.

I will say, if there’s any athlete to come in and take the place of Michael Jordan in a “Space Jam” sequel, LeBron makes the most sense. Jordan was the best player of his era and LeBron is the best player of his. I mean, don’t get me started on the Jordan vs. LeBron debate. It’s a stupid one. But nevertheless, you can’t do a “Space Jam” sequel today with anyone else. Not only is LeBron the best player today, but he also has a passion for film. He’s been in several movies already, as himself and as a voice actor. I imagine that will continue after he’s retired. I think that’s part of the reason why he’s now playing for the Lakers. Not just for basketball reasons, but it makes it easy for the Hollywood of it all.

But how do you construct a plot around a LeBron in “Space Jam” sequel that makes sense and is just as clever as the first movie? Given that this movie has been rumored for a long time, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about this. I don’t know if I have the perfect answer, but just like Michael Jordan being convinced to come back to the NBA because of the Looney Tunes, you could do something along the lines of the Looney Tunes convincing LeBron to go back and play in Cleveland after he ditched that franchise for the Heat for four years. Or set it in between his first and second year for the Lakers, the first being a disaster and the second winning him a title. There’s options here to make the plot clever.

But of the many things this sequel does wrong, that plot is one of them. There is no creativity in the movie in regards to it being a meta event for LeBron’s actual basketball career. Instead it revolves around LeBron’s fictional son being more into video games than basketball and LeBron being the world’s worst dad in wanting his son to do what LeBron wants him to do rather than being happy about what his son wants to do. Not only did this feel like an extremely safe route to go, but it was highly predictable in how it was going to play out and LeBron did not do a great job of selling himself as this grumpy Dad. I’m not going to claim that LeBron is a bad actor that should stick to sports because I have seen him do well in other things. But he was really bad. In fact, the kid who plays his son, who is not LeBron’s real son or even remotely based on LeBron’s son Bronny, is much better than LeBron in this movie.

On top of that clunky narrative, the actual villain of this movie is played by Don Cheadle. He plays a computer A.I. thing like an advanced Siri that lives in the computer world. His name is Al G. Rhythm. And I wish I made that up. And this Al G. Rhythm gets offended and starts a vendetta against LeBron because, after Warner Bros. invited LeBron into their studio to suggest that LeBron be a part of every Warner Bros. franchise, an idea that Al G. Rhythm came up with, LeBron says that’s the worst idea ever and leaves. So this Al G. Rhythm kidnaps LeBron’s son, then tells LeBron that if he wants his son back, he’s going to have to go into the Warner Bros. world and challenge him to a game of basketball.

And that’s our plot. Not this meta-creation that does a perfect job of combining Looney Tunes and basketball, mixed in with Jordan’s life. A forced father/son narrative based on nothing and executed horrifically combined with the strangest, goofiest plot that even feels a bit much for something related to the Looney Tunes.

And as many have already said in other reviews around the internet, it’s Warner Bros. being a little too full of themselves. Some of called this a feature-length advertisement for HBO Max. An assessment I most certainly don’t disagree. Not only do we get this montage in the studio pitch that I described with LeBron in many of the big Warner franchises, but when LeBron is out recruiting his team, he winds up on a mission with Bugs Bunny to gather up the Looney Tunes, who are scattered throughout the Warner Bros. universe in things like the Batman world, Austin Powers, Mad Max: Fury Road, and Wonder Woman.

Why are they scattered like this?

I can’t remember. But it’s only for the sake of Warner Bros. throwing their whole kitchen sink at this movie. How many of their characters from everything they own can they cram onto the screen?

But this isn’t all. When the basketball game is finally played in the movie’s second half, most of the crowd consists of every Warner Bros. character you can think of watching this game. And throughout the game, we constantly pan over to different characters that Warner Bros. features on the screen. Or rather, shots that look like people cosplaying as these characters.

Now you might be wondering what the difference is between something like this vs. the likes of “Ready Player One” and “Ralph Breaks the Internet,” two movies that I really enjoyed that also implemented a ton of property that the respective studios owned. And the difference is that both “Ready Player One” and “Ralph Breaks the Internet” made good use of these characters and places they visited. They made them critical elements of their plot. Like in “Ready Player One,” you can choose whatever Avatar you want to represent you when you’re in the digital world and many of the characters chosen represented the personalities of the people who chose them. And there’s messages that the movie used with all of this. In “Space Jam: A New Legacy,” nothing involving any of these Warner Bros. properties had any effect on the plot of the movie itself. It was just a shameless highlight reel of Warner Bros. properties that they felt like throwing on the screen for no good reason.

Granted, LeBron’s initial plan when he knew he had to play a basketball game against Al G. Rhythm’s Goon Squad team was to recruit the likes of Superman, King Kong, and the Iron Giant to play on his team. If we had something like that, where all of these Warner Bros. characters were playing a basketball game with LeBron, that could’ve been zany and fun. But that didn’t happen. They were all just there to… watch.

So if the eventual game plan for the movie was for LeBron to play a basketball game with the Looney Tunes, why not just cut to the chase and make this a crossover with LeBron James and the Looney Tunes? You know, like the first movie did? Only include characters that end up as relevant to the plot of the movie you’re making. That part of the movie just became a bit much. I kept asking to myself, why? What is happening? What is the purpose of all of this? And there was none. It was just a big, giant mess of a thing that was too distracting from the plot at hand. A plot that, as I mentioned, was not cleverly put together in the first place. So it appeared that they put more effort into throwing everything they owned at this movie than they did simply making a sequel that does justice to the first movie. And that was frustrating.

And then after all of this nonsense and wasted movie was playing out, the basketball game itself with LeBron and the Looney Tunes wasn’t even the least bit entertaining. Granted, the actual basketball sequences in the first movie were simply silly and fun. Not anything dramatic and intense like a serious sports drama. But it was still very entertaining watching the Looney Tunes play at least a somewhat normal game of basketball with Jordan. And seeing the energy they put into the second half to beat the Monstars when they thought they were drinking “Michael’s Secret Stuff” provided a good lesson that they had it in themselves to do well the whole time. The LeBron basketball game, which is a game that had no cohesive rules, was boring. It was a cut and paste thing from the original, done to the extreme with the exaggerated gameplay that LeBron’s son in the movie invented. So there wasn’t any sort of payoff to anything that happened that felt rewarding.

I don’t know what I expected from this movie. I didn’t think it was going to be a great movie, nor did I believe that they could catch lightning in a bottle a second time. But at the least, I expected more than what I got. Even knowing that the CGI Looney Tunes were going to be us ugly as you can get after seeing the movie’s trailers. I don’t know why LeBron was animated in the Looney Tunes world when Michael Jordan wasn’t. And I don’t know why they even attempted to do live-action CGI creations of the Looney Tunes when they were in the live action world. But if that was the movie’s only problem, I could’ve lived with that. But whatever it was that I was expecting from this movie, it wound up as a whole lot worse. And I spent each frame of the movie and each continued scene being absolutely flabbergasted at this giant, mess of a film that I was experiencing.

And to me this isn’t just a throwaway bad movie that I will forget about in a week’s time. This is a movie where I have become increasingly angry at. I was going on a walk after I watched and I could just feel the anger burning and festering inside of me. This is a franchise and a property that I cared deeply about that they took and smeared into the mud, creating what I think is the absolute worst possible sequel that they could come up with. And I don’t think anyone at Warner Bros’ even really cared. And that makes me furious.

A grade for both of these movies? Well, we have a childhood favorite of mine that is still one of my favorites as an adult and a new sequel that borderline offensive. So this shouldn’t be a surprise to you:

Space Jam: 10/10

Space Jam: A New Legacy: 3/10

P.S. – Maybe you thought I was going for a 1/10. But as bad and offensive as this movie is, it’s not as bad as “The Emoji Movie,” which is a movie I gave a 1/10 to. I don’t like giving 1/10s. And I rarely go below 5/10. So yeah, it’s not a 1/10, but a 3/10 is still really bad in my book. 

Avocado Toast Review

Have you ever had found yourself in a discussion with someone from an older generation who is complaining about all the young kids of today and erroneously refers to them as Millennials? And you end up super frustrated, not just from what that person had to say, but because they lumped you as a true Millennial in with Gen Z? Us millennials don’t like that. There is a definite generational gap between Millennials and Gen Z, yet some people think of Millennial as synonymous with young people, which is a wildly false misconception. 

Or better yet, have you ever talked to a person who is making fun of Millennials, yet doesn’t realize they are one? That one is rather amusing. And is the exact premise of Tyler Farr’s new comedy “Avocado Toast.” A guy named Adam is having an argument with his friends about Millennials when he learns, much to his shock and dismay, that he is one. He suffers a bit of an identity crisis and decides to go down quite the rabbit hole in discovering and accepting his new found Millennialism, essentially upheaving his whole life and finding a new sense of freedom when he feels he can do what he wants to do instead of living a rigid, boring life.

“Avocado Toast” is a movie that I’ve been following for quite some time now. Writer and director Tyler Farr is a good friend of mine. We connected in 2013 and stayed in touch partially due to our shared love of film, him being on the filmmaking side of things and me being on the journalism side of things where I love writing about and reviewing movies. In 2015, he let me be one of the first to watch and review his movie “Winning Formula” and now here we are six years later with his next film. It’s been great watching this movie go from a simple idea to now a fully completed film. And now comes the challenge to sum all that up into one review, which is a lot more daunting of a task when I know the person who made the film is most definitely going to read everything that I write about it.

Naturally this gives me a slightly different perspective than the random Joe Schmoe who randomly stumbles on this, but it’s also been a good mental exercise in remembering that every movie that’s been made is someone’s life work. Even if I don’t like it, I should remember to always respect the effort that went into it. I’ve had a few occasions over the years to talk to a filmmaker about a film they’ve made and that results in a different experience because I get a peek into what went into the project. Yet regardless of whether or not I talked to a filmmaker or witnessed it get made, every movie has a similar story.

I could go down this rabbit hole for quite some time, but those of you who clicked this link did so to read a review, not listen to me philosophize about the process of filmmaking or how we should approach critiquing something. So we move on. And my one challenge from Tyler when he asked me if I wanted to review this movie is to be open and honest. So that is exactly what I will set out to do. But in a positive way that will be helpful for everyone.

Justin Ray in "Avocado Toast"

And if we’re being honest here… I watched an entire movie called “Avocado Toast” and did not see one single person eat any avocado toast. I demand a refund!

I also heard people in this movie talk about Millennials being people who were born between 1982-2004. I had to pause the movie on that one and go double check. While the character of Adam in the movie was shocked to learn that Millennials go all the way back to 1982, I was a bit taken aback that the range went all the way up to 2004. In doing my research, the movie isn’t necessarily wrong. 1982-2004 is an age range that some people put on Millennials, but 1981-1996 seems to be a more widely accepted range. And that’s one that makes a lot more sense to me personally. There’s definitely a massive difference between those of us born in the 80s and early 90s than those born in the late 90s and 2000s. In my book, Gen Z starts with people born in 1997. That goes back to my conversation at the beginning.

Anyways, if those were the only two complaints I had about this movie, I’m sure Tyler would be jumping for joy that he won me over because I didn’t necessarily praise his last movie as much as he probably hoped I would. But unfortunately I do have my issues with this movie. We’ll get to those in a bit, though. I want to start with positivity.

Despite me being a dork about the title, that actually is a strength. It’s a perfectly titled movie that grabs people’s attention. And it’s a clever subject matter. A movie about Millennials is a movie that will pique the interest of us Millennials. I’ve actually seen several reactions from people who do fall into the Joe Schmoe category. It’s a movie about their generation that has them interested. And there’s a lot of clever, funny references that people will get a kick out of. I particularly got a chuckle out of the Christopher Columbus reference. That’s an argument that we now have every year. You could say it’s a Millennial discussion.

I also liked the performances from our lead characters. Justin Ray is the actor who plays Adam, the movie’s main character. And my goodness is he having an absolute blast in this role. Is it fully realistic for a guy who’s been married for 10 years with a successful career and a happy family to drop everything and change his life because he learned he belonged in a different generational category than he thought? Not really, but Justin Ray owns this character and relishes in everything he’s given to do. Having a likeable lead character goes a long way in forgiving some of the other bumps along the way. Likewise, did I enjoy the fact that he started cheating on his wife by dating another girl? Not really. But goodness is Mikayla Iverson, the girl who plays his new crush, a charming and loveable character.

On the flip side, his wife Jennifer, played by Jyllian Petrie, is also a loving and charming woman. Thus while I’m not sure from a story perspective that certain things really make sense, we have ourselves caught up in a love triangle between a lead male who is quite fantastic and two lead females who are equally as fantastic. There eventually came a point where I felt that the movie needed to stop being so silly and goofy and start having consequences to the dumb things this guy was doing or else the plot was going to completely lose me. And it did. When all three of these leads were asked to stop being silly and start getting emotional, it actually got me. I felt for Adam when he realized he made a lot of mistakes and wants to start fixing things. I felt for Jennifer when she wanted her husband back. And I felt for Sydney, the new crush, when she started to learn who this guy really is.

Mikayla Iverson and Justin Ray in "Avocado Toast"

What didn’t work as well for me was everything around these three, unfortunately. While there were a lot of clever things that were happening in the movie, there was also a lot of things that I didn’t think were as clever or funny. That right there is the nature of comedy, though. Every once in a while you get a movie that makes you laugh hysterically throughout, but those are more rare. Even the funniest of comedians have jokes that don’t land and most comedies can be hit and miss. Comedy is something that’s refined over time. Comedians or comedy writers have to live and learn. Take a shot, see what works, and fix things or throw things out that didn’t work. There was just a lot more miss here than I was hoping for.

For one, I personally don’t like poop jokes in my movies. And this movie has an extended poop joke gag that plays throughout. Maybe some will laugh. I thought it was gross. But it kept going. Then kept coming back. I also didn’t like pretty much anything with the friend named Connor. Maybe a lot of Millennials will relate to having roommates or friends like that, but I just kinda found him out of place and distracting. Also, some of the other side characters were a bit too exaggerated. The world’s rudest cashier, the world’s most incompetent care salesman, and the coworker who hordes all the fruit snacks are maybe people that represent real life human beings that we’ve seen, but they were exaggerated to the point where they didn’t feel like real human beings to me. Maybe those jokes will land with some, but not for me.

We also had a hard time balancing the comedy and drama. Like I referenced earlier, there came a point where I was hoping the movie would start having consequences to the silliness. And while it did eventually and that drama worked, the drama could’ve been more impactful if it was allowed to grow a bit more. Then we had a few bait-and-switches that I don’t want to get too much into where I think we undercut the drama that was working just to get a few extra laughs in. I was actually feeling sentimental and good. But the movie didn’t quite see it through in a way that was fully satisfying.

But like I said, those complaints come with the nature of comedy and are quite subjective. Balancing comedy and drama one of the age old questions with filmmaking. I’m not sure there’s a perfect formula that pleases everyone. And I’m a bit more of a Grinch, anyways, when it comes to comedy. I like laughing, but there are so many modern comedies that just aren’t funny to me, so maybe take what I say about comedy with a grain of salt.

Nevertheless, despite being a bit rough around the edges with some of the jokes and many of the side characters, I still honestly think that the majority of the movie remains solidly intact. I loved just about everything with the main three characters and it was a solid premise that lands in a lot of ways. A noticeable improvement from Tyler’s last outing, in my opinion. If you want to give a chance, you can check it out on pretty much any PVOD platform where you rent and buy movies. Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV, Vudu, etc. I observed on Google TV that it could be rented for $4 and purchased for $9. So if you want to support Tyler or you want to check out a silly movie about Millennials, I recommend you give this one a chance!

Grade: 8/10