Up until now, on a scale of 1-10, I have not been very excited for the the Anchorman sequel. Because the first movie was sooooo hilarious, sooooo awesome, sooooo I know I throw this term around pretty loosely but in this case it's accurate: life-altering....I kinda didn't want them to ever make a sequel. Especially not nine years after the first one. There's nowhere to go but down. (Although it could be worse; they could be taking the other personality-shaping comedy of my life and making a sequel 20 YEARS LATER. Oh wait.)
When we were in college, a lot of my friends liked to get sauced before going to a movie-- or if there wasn't enough time beforehand, they liked to smuggle booze into the theater, relax in their seat, and tie one on, giggling and rolling their empty bottles under the seats the whole time. I was never a fan of this sort of chicanery. Don't get me wrong, I love to watch movies while drinking, but only in the comfort of somebody's home, during a pre-gaming or post-gaming session, and only movies that we've already seen approximately 20 times, so we can crack jokes and rip on it the whole time and not feel bad. I've always said that if you never went home to your college apartment with your roommates after a long night of drinking, thrown in the Old School DVD, and awoken the next morning on the couch, with your beer 98% full, your phone in your hand (flip-screen still open to a never-sent text message), and the DVD menu screen BLARING....then in my opinion, you never truly went to college in the first place.
So, I don't like to be drunk the first time I see a movie. Embarking on a cinematic adventure for the first time is excitement enough without chemical stimulants. Also, I hate not being able to figure out if I truly like a movie, or if it was a result of booze. For example, the first time I watched The Other Guys, Gangel and I were pretty banged up, and we laughed our asses off. I barely remembered it, so I bought the DVD, re-watched it with Paul.....but then we started pre-gaming during the movie, so I still have no idea if my laughter was genuine or not. Totally annoying. (I do remember that this scene is hilarious, though. Anything that lets me and my friends yell "CHRISTINITH!!!" at my wife is OK by me. Who wants some Arnie Palmies? Classic.)
Having said all that, I was planning on getting a lil' drunk before going to see Anchorman 2 in the theater in a couple months. There's really no downside. If the movie is only mildly funny, the booze will make us enjoy it more. If the movie is truly funny, we'll be rolling in our seats, and walking out of the theater high-fiving and hoping the third movie was already in production. If the movie sucks like I expect it to, the booze would soften the blow. Everyone goes home happy. Bing bang boom.
But now that I've seen this latest preview, I'm cautiously optimistic. I laughed quite a bit; maybe this movie won't be so bad. Maybe it will end up being a worthy sequel.
Still probably gonna get housed in the theater though.
