Clerks II

Reviewed by: George 'El Guapo' Roush - 07.21.06

****DISCLAIMER**** These reviews are for entertainment purposes only. Please make sure your reading copy of this review has been spayed or neutered. I'm not responsible for copycat offspring reviews.

For those of you who question the existence of a higher being, we have now been given concrete proof that He is up there. The human populace is blessed with another Kevin Smith movie. If this is your first Kevin Smith experience, I shall give you a brief rundown of his previous works:

• Clerks (1994): The black and white film that launched Kevin Smith's career following the misadventures of a convenience store clerk and a video clerk, with appearances by losers Jay and Silent Bob.

• Mallrats (1995): A story following the misadventures of two best friends in a local mall, with appearances by losers Jay and Silent Bob.

• Chasing Amy (1997): A story following the misadventures of two comic book artists, with appearances by losers Jay and Silent Bob.

• Dogma (1999): A story following the misadventures of two rebellious angels, with appearances by losers Jay and Silent Bob.

• Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001): A story following the misadventures of two loser friends, Jay and Silent Bob, with appearances by losers Jay and Silent Bob.

• Jersey Girl (2004): A story following the adventures of a single Dad and his daughter. No appearances by losers Jay and Silent Bob.

• Clerks II (2006): Sequel continuing the misadventures of a convenience store clerk and a video clerk, who both now work in a fast food joint, with appearances by losers Jay and Silent Bob.

There's no need to watch them all. Just pick one and you'll have seen his entire library of ideas.

Our ‘Dead Horse Not Beaten Enough' review this week is Clerks II starring the same two no name fuck faces that were in the first Clerks and some other actors who may have appeared in Kevin Smith's previous movies. If you really need a complete credits listing in the first paragraph of my review, go to IMDB and read their shit. 

Clerks II takes place ten years after the first Clerks. Since the Quick Stop burned to the ground, our two heroes now work at the fast food joint Mooby's. Funnies and hoo-haa's ensue as the usual cast of Kevin Smith quirky characters swear and try to do something meaningful with their petty lives. If you had read the early review of Clerks II posted on Somethingawful.com, that reviewer talks about a ton of sound effects and jokes that were not in the version I saw this past week. So either that kid was on crack and made it all up, or Kevin Smith read it and realized how stupid his movie was sounding and re-cut it. But that's not to say this film still doesn't have its share of major problems. The biggest one being the cast:

• Brian O' Halloran as Dante: Hiding behind his pedophile goatee and bazooka sized nose, Dante is supposed to move to Florida with his fiancé leaving his best friend Randal behind. Not only is this man the worst actor next to James Remar, but his character is still the whiny little bitch from the first film. If Brian had any sympathy for the human race he would go into the woods, cover himself with honey, find a bear cave, chop his own head off and let nature take care of the rest.

• Jeff Anderson as Randal: The other half of the no talent pool, Jeff Anderson's Randal is doing his best to try and convince his best friend to stay. If by his best I mean looking concerned with his now giant bloated face, and hiring a donkey sex act as a going away present for Dante then you get a D for effort. Randal's other job is to argue about Lord of The Rings vs. Star Wars which no one gives a shit about. Randal does have the best scene in the film at the end when he and Dante are discussing their friendship while in a jail cell. This scene is immediately rendered retarded by making sure Jay and Silent Bob are present.

• Rosario Dawson as Becky: Rosario Dawson is the actress you hire when Eva Mendes is unavailable and you don't feel like putting up with Michelle Rodriguez's crazy ass bullshit. As the manager of Mooby's, Becky harbors secret feelings for Dante. You know…because he's so sexy and talented.

• Jennifer Schwalbach Smith as Emma: Concrete evidence that Skeletor had a lover, Kevin Smith's ‘hang her on the door during Halloween' wife plays Dante's fiancé. I'm not sure if she's a good actress or not because I was too distracted by her 60 lb. frame and pasty skin. She also has hideously crooked facial features as if Bell's Palsy was trying to puncture through all the plastic surgery she's had done to her Monchichi monkey face.

• Jason Mewes as Jay: Living proof that some pregnancies shouldn't be brought to full term and that some loads should have been swallowed, Jason Mewes once again plays Jay, the stoner loser who hangs outside of the fast food joint with his buddy Silent Bob. I'm sure all the dorks and nerds who post on ViewAskew message boards will cream their pants at being able to see Jay on screen one more time. Me? I hope when the terrorists attack again they fly an airplane right into Jason Mewes' fucking face.

• Kevin Smith as Silent Bob: The biggest hack of Hollywood is back with his sequel to Clerks. He also plays the character Silent Bob. Like Jay, he serves no purpose for being in the movie. He always has that look on his face where he's either thinking “I'm in pictures, and I'm better then you.” or “My wife needs to eat a cheeseburger before corn fields start to hire her for scarecrow seasonal work.”

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the first Clerks when it hit the theaters. As I watched each subsequent Kevin Smith movie, I began to feel ripped off because he was doing the same lame jokes and the same story structure. Clerks 2 is no different. Kevin Smith doesn't try to break any new ground with characters that have been simmering in DVD land for the past ten years. Randal and Dante are annoying and while they touch upon their friendship, I still pitied them at the end of the movie. Was I supposed to be happy for them? I don't know, because Kevin Smith can't seem to write dialogue unless it's about Star Wars or whatever other pop culture reference he thinks is original and cool.

The funniest scene involves Wanda Sykes and her husband. I'm sure most of their dialogue was improvised because they were the only two saying things that didn't seem tightly scripted. There are a couple of other funny scenes but for the most part, this is material you've seen before. Even when Clerks II tries to be edgy by having a donkey sex act, it only shows Kevin Smith not being able to ever mature as a writer, actor and director. Clerks II is a sequel that gives you more of the same and wasn't necessary. On his website, Smith talks about how if he just wanted money he could have made $5 million by directing the Green Hornet. But instead he made Clerks II for $5 million total. Wow. Jesus Christ has nothing on the sacrifices you've made. In reality, no one gives a shit about Green Hornet and it wouldn't have made any money. Not too mention the studio dropped Smith and the project when Jersey Girl tanked. Whenever he makes half truth statements like that I just want to punch him. Actually I'd rather punch Jason Mewes, because I want to see if his head will explode like in Mortal Kombat.

Fans of his movies will probably like Clerks 2. It was kind of cool going back and re-visiting the characters ten years later, yet it ends up being disappointing because it's the same movie as the first except this is in color, and for some reason he put a dance sequence in the middle of the picture. There are no extra scenes if you stay through the credits, only a running text commercial pimping his products at his comic book store. But that's no surprise since he's been pimping the same jokes and characters for years.

Got a problem, pal? E-mail me: george@latinoreview.com