Space Chimps 2

In 2008, a small film was released with a $37 million budget. It was a mild success, but as expected, it wasn’t very good. 2 years later, in 2010, a sequel was released to UK theaters only. Us Americans would receive it direct to video a few months later.

This sequel might be one of the laziest animated movies that we’ve seen to date. Many backgrounds areLOW-QUALITYY JPEGS ripped straight from Google Search. Look at this screenshot…

The animation quality here is dismal, of course. The recurring dog character looks like he was taken from Nintendogs, and human character models are endlessly reused, frequently having the same facial expressions and clothes.

In fact, very few characters populate the world of this movie, leaving most of the backgrounds completely barren. How lazy do you have to be to not animate any backgrounds?

The characters here are bland and the stereotypical dumb guy, Titan, is insanely stupid, yet his character is inconsistent. He has a large vocabulary and yet he does maddeningly idiotic things just to keep the plot going. The female character has no personality whatsoever and does nothing throughout the entire movie, and the extremely creepy alien love interest is really annoying and looks terrifying. In addition, she is in a relationship with a chimp, which makes it extra uncomfortable.

The Plot

When it comes to story, the movie once again falls short. Comet, a young and aspiring Space Chimp, wants to go to space with the other famous members of the crew. However, he learns that he was cut from the mission because of budget cuts. How inconvenient. Fortunately for him, the ship is somehow accessible by a phone in the shape of a banana, and he takes one last look around the ship, knowing the mission isn’t his.

As he reclines in the huge space ship chairs, he laments to himself, “I wish I could really light this candle.” Wish granted! “Lighting candle.” the ship says, as it begins to take off. Comet, of course, is horrified and tries to stop the ship. Nope! He doesn’t have the password. Honestly, I think there’s a design flaw in there somewhere. A ship that can be activated with no password but not controlled without one could be an issue.

Fortunately, he is actually on course for the planet he’s always dreamed of visiting: Malgor! There waiting for him is his “best friend” Kilowatt, a strange alien with a massive forehead that lights up randomly. Him and her have this weird romance, that like so much of the movie, is really uncomfortable. After romping through the “paradise” (barren wasteland because of lazy animation) that is Malgor for half that part of the movie.

However, all is not as it seems! Zartog, the main villain, has spent the entire movie up to this point being peed on while acting as a lawn decoration (don’t ask)! He breaks free and steals a weapon that de-particalises things. (The item looks suspiciously like a Wii remote, and it’s no coincidence that there was a Wii space chimps game). He begins killing people senselessly with it, and they die with the same lack of seriousness and semblance of reason that you would expect from the movie.

This is followed by an extremely awkward scene in which the Indian scientist dances to a Garageband Beat without lyrics. This lasts for 2 excruciating minutes of cringe comedy that equates “bad dancing” to “hilarity.” Zartog is (almost) defeated by Ham lll when Ham suddenly becomes magic and “it’s magic”ifies the remote into his hand. This is never in the movie before this scene, so it comes off as a terrible dues ex machina.

Unfortunately, Ham randomly teleports the remote back into Zartog’s hand and is unable to retrieve it, for some idiotic reason. Eventually, they defeat Zartog and save the dead people by “rewiring the remote” (which, by the way, involved using one of “Einstein’s theories” and turning the circuit board backwards). Why they didn’t do this before, I don’t know, and it’s yet another miraculous event that saves the day despite it never happening before.

Conclusion

The jokes here are extremely lame to the point that they’re actually kind of funny again. Like when Ham says the only thing he knows how to download on the computer is “Chimps Gone Wild.” I… think I know what it’s hinting at, but… really? That’s a little strange for a kids movie, don’t you think?

Space Chimps 2 is a movie we can only describe as dismal. But certain parts are almost so bad, they’re funny. If you get the chance, watch this awful, awful movie and laugh your head off with some friends.