So in case you were living under a rock this weekend or better yet, you were consuming a lot of great HBO, you might have realized the MTV Movie Awards took place (“The Hunger Games” won a bunch of shit, just like the “Twilight” movies before it). That means every studio and their mother released some kind of new clip or TV Spot and we have a few more stragglers today.
What do you do if your first writer/directorial effort is a smash hit? Well, if you’re comedian and “Family Guy” creator Seth MacFarlane, you use the success of “Ted” and parlay it into the cachet of doing a western. And a western comedy, no less. I can just see the execs at Universal trying to agonizingly squeeze amused looks in their faces during the pitch. A western comedy? It sounds like a recipe for box-office poison, but with what is hopefully a modest budget and “Ted 2” along the way, maybe if MacFarlane’s “A Million Ways To Die In The West” tanks, it won’t really affect the bottom line much. The movie stars MacFarlane, Charlize Theron, Liam Neeson, Amanda Seyfried, Sarah Silverman, Giovanni Ribisi and Neil Patrick Harris and hits theaters May 30th. They mighta loved him as a foul-mouthed Teddy bear, but I really have doubts about how he’ll fare as a lead here (presumably someone said, “Hey, he hosted the Oscars, he’s not an unknown, right?”).
Looking far more appealing in the comedy summer field is “22 Jump Street,” the sequel to the surprisingly excellent “21 Jump Street.” Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum had chemistry to spare, Tatum discovered his comedic chops and directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller proved they knew how to reinvent a brand for their own comedic purposes. After all, “21 Jump Street” the movie was nothing like the TV series, but who cares, they used the premise to their advantage and leveraged nostalgic brand cachet to create a comedic hit. ‘Jump Street’ hops into theaters on June 13th and if it’s as funny as the original, we can’t wait. TV spots for both movies below, including lots of new images from “A Million Ways To Die In The West.”
