Happy Gilmore 2 Review: The Comedy Sequel Takes A Big Swing But Completely Whiffs It

"Happy Gilmore" is one of those enduring comedies that has stood the test of time. While it may not have been a massive blockbuster hit at the box office, it found quite an audience on home video, especially as Adam Sandler's star continued to rise with the likes of his best comedies like "The Wedding Singer" and "Big Daddy." It's a simple, grounded sports comedy that was the perfect outlet for Sandler's unique comedic sensibilities, letting him be both charming and hilariously angry while shaking up the classic institution of golf. Following in the footsteps of movies like "Caddyshack" and "National Lampoon's Animal House," it was the perfect successor in the slobs vs snobs comedic formula that frequently worked so well. 

When it comes to "Happy Gilmore 2," Netflix's latest comedic collaboration with "SNL" sensation Adam Sandler, you'd be better off taking a cue from Happy's golf rival Shooter McGavin (Christopher McDonald) and simply eating a piece of s**t for breakfast.

Directed by "Workaholics" executive producer and co-creator Kyle Newacheck, who previously directed Sandler in Netflix's decent "Murder Mystery," "Happy Gilmore 2" is an absolute slog of a comedy that takes everything that made the original movie great and regurgitates it all into something resembling a "Dodgeball" sequel crashed into professional golf outing. Gone is the quaint, grounded feel of the original "Happy Gilmore," and instead, we get a technicolored parade of shoehorned callbacks sprinkled throughout an asinine story that is so far removed from Dennis Dugan's original comedy, you'll wonder if it takes place in one of the parallel worlds of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. 

What's particularly frustrating is that it all starts with one major misstep that will make your jaw drop, and the movie never recovers from it. But beware, because we're about to dig into a major spoiler that's the inciting incident for the entire movie. 

There's no way to get around this, so we're just going to come out and say it. As we predicted, Virginia Venit (Julie Bowen) is killed off in the film's opening sequence. After the stage is set, revealing the ideal life Happy and Virginia had after the end of "Happy Gilmore," which includes having four rambunctious sons and one quiet daughter, Venit is suddenly killed off. While this decision to fridge Virginia in order to give Happy a story arc in the sequel is frustrating on its own, it's the manner in which she's dispatched that completely brings down the movie. 

During a golf tournament, Happy hits a long drive that inadvertently kills Virginia. 

While you might be thinking that this is tonally in line with the original movie, where Happy's father was killed by a rogue hockey puck in the film's opening credits sequence, this variation on the darkly comedic death just doesn't hit the same way. Making Happy the man behind the killer shot makes this moment so much darker, and it's such a shocking turn of events that every time you see Virginia, whether it's in Happy's fantasy "happy place" or in a sudden vision on the golf course, you're reminded of just how terrible that tragedy is. 

The movie never gets back on its feet after this, but at the same time, there's not much else to enjoy when you dig into the meat of the story, which has largely been hidden from the film's marketing.

The driving force of "Happy Gilmore 2" that gets Adam Sandler's now-depressed golfer back onto the links is the Maxi League, a new golf organization that threatens to upend the traditional roots of the game in favor of something more exciting. Imagine they turned professional golf into a giant mini-golf competition, complete with ridiculously unrealistic obstacles like fire and snow and zero semblance of fair play, and you've got some idea of what the Maxi League is trying to achieve.

Benny Safdie ("Uncut Gems" filmmaker and co-star of "Oppenheimer") takes a big supporting role as Frank Manatee, a major douchenozzle who tries to recruit Happy Gilmore into the Maxi League in order to get him some good publicity. But Happy is too depressed and too busy drinking out of an endless array of sneaky flasks shaped like cucumbers, pepper grinders, and remote controls. 

Adding to his sadness is the fact that, after losing all of the money he won playing golf while Virginia was still alive (she was also in charge of the finances), he now lives in a crappy house with his daughter Vienna (played by Sandler's real daughter and "You Are So Not Invited to My Bar Mitzvah" star Sunny Sandler). Plus, he just found out that in order to send Vienna on the right track to follow through on her aspirations of being a professional ballet dancer, it's going to cost him $70,000 a year for her to attend a Paris ballet school for which she's already secured a coveted spot. 

That's why Happy chooses to pick up his clubs and get back into golf. Of course, the professional golfer's tour run by Doug Thompson (Dennis Dugan, reprising his role from the first film) is taking some heat for this new league, and at Happy's suggestion, he challenges the Maxi League's best golfers to a tournament against their best traditional golfers to determine the future of golf as a sport. I'm not sure how this tournament would stop anyone from playing traditional golf ever again, but that's the least of this movie's logistical problems.

It's important to remember that this movie is supposed to be a comedy, but it's just a shame that everyone involved seemed to forget why the original movie was so successful and hilarious. "Happy Gilmore" shook up golf in a way that felt genuine and wasn't completely nonsensical. Happy was a bull in a china shop, and the china shop owner was an arrogant golfer who you loved to see fail. 

"Happy Gilmore 2" delivers a despicable enough new rival in Frank Manatee and the Maxi League (which also includes Haley Joel Osment as a smug opponent on the course), but the problem is the Maxi League's approach to golf feels like it belongs in the absurd world of "Dodgeball" or "Blades of Glory." It takes all of the fun rivalry out of the practical sports side of the comedy. It doesn't help that Shooter McGavin and Happy Gilmore are only at odds for a single scene of the sequel. That's right, the two rivals duke it out in a graveyard but quickly make nice and work together to stop the Maxi League from becoming a success, and it sucks what little wind there might have been in the movie's sails. 

However, if you like professional golf, there are countless (read: way too many) cameos from real pro golfers. Do you like your punchlines stilted and delivered by athletes with almost no discernible acting talent? Then you'll love "Happy Gilmore 2." Sure, there are a couple good bits here and there, but this movie would have been so much better with an ensemble of day players or rising comedians in place of the endless array of real golfers. Even one of the characters from the first "Happy Gilmore" who returns in the sequel is played by a professional golfer rather than the actor who originated the role.

Speaking of which, it's rather frustrating that almost every single side character from the first movie comes back in some contrived fashion, including legacy characters in place of the departed Carl Weathers (Chubbs), Richard Kiel (Mr. Larson with the nail in his head), and Joe Flaherty (the "jackass" guy). Admittedly, the latter is somewhat amusing, as Eminem plays Flaherty's character's son (seen above).

But perhaps the biggest problem that "Happy Gilmore 2" has — again, aside from the fact that Happy Gilmore kills his wife with a golf ball — is that it can't escape the shadow of the original. Not only does the sequel go out of its way to turn every single memorable laugh from the first movie into a clumsy callback, but just in case you forgot about what they're referencing in the original movie, they play a quick flashback clip. Even if it's the innocuous line from Ben Stiller's nursing home attendant Hal, where he says, "Check out the nametag," you're getting a split second flashback moment to the original scene that inspired it. It's as if the filmmakers think you're too dumb to remember the joke that inspired the reference, or they think the joke is so good that you'll want to see the scene where it came from. Either way, they're wrong, and it turns the movie into a humorless, sputtering callback machine.

When there are jokes that aren't callbacks, they're either so dumb or make such little sense that you're wondering how they ever made it onto the page. For example, there's a running gag that Frank Manatee has incredibly bad breath. When he accesses a restricted part of the Maxi League headquarters for another stupid plot point, he uses his breath to unlock the door, and the technological mechanism acknowledges it by saying, "Fart Recognized." Why would Manatee allow that to be part of his headquarters? These are the kind of gags we're forced to endure. 

All of these sloppy ingredients combine to form a comedy sequel that completely misses the green (golf!). What's worse is that it doesn't even have any real heart. What little emotional core that remains is tainted by the movie's opening mistake, and the connection between Happy and his kids isn't anywhere near touching enough to fill that void. While there might be a stray chuckle here and there thanks to a genuinely clever line or a surprising cameo, those moments are few and far between.

"Happy GIlmore 2" is a poor excuse for nostalgic comedy, and you'd have more fun getting a colonoscopy with a rake. The sequel is available on Netflix now.

/Film Rating: 2 out of 10