Seth McFarlane's Ted (2012)

Ape X

Mr E wrote: »

I thought it would be funnier. It was a classic case of throwing jokes at the wall and seeing what sticks (which is similar to what FG/AD/TCS do).

Enjoyed it, though.

Yeah, pretty much my take on it... Quite a few misses along with the hits. Some of the hits were genuinely laugh out loud funny though.

Banjaxed82

Mr E wrote: »

I thought it would be funnier. It was a classic case of throwing jokes at the wall and seeing what sticks (which is similar to what FG/AD/TCS do).

Enjoyed it, though.

+1

Better than average, but still not as funny as I'd hoped for.

Also, there's a lot of pop culture jokes (Justin Bieber, Susan Boyle, etc) that will affect how this film ages. Always a risky route to take.

Dermighty

I thought it was terrible.

Really sorry I saw it.

Delightfully Pessimistic

I really liked it. I'm a big fan of Family Guy and it was that basic style of humor. So I enjoyed it.

Proxy

Crap movie, but made me laugh a bunch of times. Enjoyable overall. Exactly what I was expecting, and exactly what they were going for.

NegativeCreep

I'd would have rathered watching a box set of family guy that seeing this. Didn't laugh out loud once during it. And I really wanted to like this film because I love Family Guy :L Ah well, Seth might try another more funny film in future. Hopefully :L

delbertgrady

Family Guy has deteriorated over the last few years, and this continues the downward slide of MacFarlane's world. I don't dispute that he is a talented guy, but he has descended into one of these people who is content to wallow in his own smug coolness. Sure, he's got celebrity pals who are willing to do self-deprecating cameos, but he's taken his eye of the ball and the joke ratio is plummeting badly.

Once you remove the central conceit of Ted being a bear, it's no different to any other generic romcom we've seen about some loser whose girlfriend is frustrated at him and his unemployed, stoner friend. Now, of course, that is the very crux of the film - that Ted is a teddy bear - but, as Patrick Stewart remarks in the opening monologue, after a while, nobody gives a ****, so Ted's very uniqueness is quickly rendered unimportant. At which point, the novelty wears off for the audience too. He drinks, he swears, he does drugs. Yeah, but we know most of that from the trailer. What else have you got?

Ultimately, MacFarlane has clearly made a film for himself and hasn't really considered how a broader audience will respond to a lot of the pop culture references. I'd be the first to admit that there are probably a whole ton of jokes in Family Guy that have gone over my head because the sports star/celebrity/sitcom/TV show in question never had the same impact here as in the States, but that's to be expected.
What you don't do is invest a significant portion of a feature film into

a lovefest for one of your alltime favourites, namely, Flash Gordon and Sam J. Jones. Now, speaking as a huge fan of that film, I LOVED anything in Ted that was in any way connected to it (not least the use of Football Fight and The Hero on the soundtrack and - most especially -
the Flash leap at the end), but I considered myself very fortunate that he
chose that film to incessantly pay homage to. I'd have been screwed if he
picked a different eighties movie that I wasn't familiar with, or worse, a
film I hated.

MacFarlane shouldn't assume that the audience are going to to appreciate that schtick to the same extent.

Likewise, topnotch though the

Airplane! pastiche was, in terms of recreating the original scene, Airplane! was taking the **** out of Saturday Night Fever, so all they're really doing is a retread of a parody from thirty years ago.

The joke's been done already. Having Wahlberg and Kunis recreate it isn't funny in itself.

Other references are equally demanding of an awareness of their source material:

I thought that Ted doing the schoolteacher from The Wall was gold, but it seemed to fall on deaf ears in the screening I was at.

CMpunked

delbertgrady wrote: »

Other references are equally demanding of an awareness of their source material:

I thought that Ted doing the schoolteacher from The Wall was gold, but it seemed to fall on deaf ears in the screening I was at.

Was that the "

you cant have pudding without the meat!

" line?

godtabh

Banjaxed82 wrote: »

+1

Better than average, but still not as funny as I'd hoped for.

Also, there's a lot of pop culture jokes (Justin Bieber, Susan Boyle, etc) that will affect how this film ages. Always a risky route to take.

There is also references to Sinead O'Connor. Wouldnt have throught she would be that well known out side Ireland.

I think it will age ok.

Didnt fully live up to expectations but I enjoyed it alot. Leave your brain at the door kind of thing. Suits me

Mellor

delbertgrady wrote: »

Ultimately, MacFarlane has clearly made a film for himself and hasn't really considered how a broader audience will respond to a lot of the pop culture references. I'd be the first to admit that there are probably a whole ton of jokes in Family Guy that have gone over my head because the sports star/celebrity/sitcom/TV show in question never had the same impact here as in the States, but that's to be expected.
What you don't do is invest a significant portion of a feature film into

a lovefest for one of your alltime favourites, namely, Flash Gordon and Sam J. Jones. Now, speaking as a huge fan of that film, I LOVED anything in Ted that was in any way connected to it (not least the use of Football Fight and The Hero on the soundtrack and - most especially -
the Flash leap at the end), but I considered myself very fortunate that he
chose that film to incessantly pay homage to. I'd have been screwed if he
picked a different eighties movie that I wasn't familiar with, or worse, a
film I hated.

MacFarlane shouldn't assume that the audience are going to to appreciate that schtick to the same extent.

You don't have to be a massive fan of the previous movie to understand the jist of the flash Gordon parts. As long as your are aware of it your fine, even still, its not too difficult to figure out.

Likewise, topnotch though the

Airplane! pastiche was, in terms of recreating the original scene, Airplane! was taking the **** out of Saturday Night Fever, so all they're really doing is a retread of a parody from thirty years ago.

The joke's been done already. Having Wahlberg and Kunis recreate it isn't funny in itself.

I assumed they were doing saturday night fever not Airplane.

Other references are equally demanding of an awareness of their source material:

I thought that Ted doing the schoolteacher from The Wall was gold, but it seemed to fall on deaf ears in the screening I was at.

I think that was a hilarious outburst whether you were aware of the source or not.
Basically I think you are putting too much though into understandign where the jokes came from, instead of considering them at face value.

CMpunked wrote: »

Was that the "

you cant have pudding without the meat!

" line?

yup

Cokeistan

Thought it would be much better than it actually was. There were several laugh out loud moments but, personally, I felt the film was basically a romance. Disappointed...

utyh2ikcq9z76b

Overall it wasn't great, about four good laughs from it, suppose if your 15 you would find it hilarious as bad langauge and drugs might have some shock value for ya, which is why I can't understand using flash gorden etc in it, as the kids who are gona find this really funny, won't have a clue about this old stuff

Mocha Joe

I didn't like this film at all. There wasn't as many jokes as an average Family Guy episode and most of them were misses. Mark Wahlberg was pretty good in it though.

WatchWolf

Mellor wrote: »

You don't have to be a massive fan of the previous movie to understand the jist of the flash Gordon parts. As long as your are aware of it your fine, even still, its not too difficult to figure out.


I assumed they were doing saturday night fever not Airplane.

Look familiar?

niallon

Biggest problem with the film is that McFarlane was making his first live feature and wanted to shoe some directing chops so there's some more serious moments than most expected and yes, it is a romance movie with a comic relief bear. I'd hazard a guess McFarlane wasn't mad about the marketing because I can see him doing a sequel that is Ted-centric and is the movie people thought this would be.

In all I loved it and found it funny when I should have but appreciated the writing for the more serious moments too. It actually warrants a re watch so as not to be sitting around waiting for a joke to happen

Lyaiera

I thought this was excellent. It's one of the few films I've been to recently that didn't have me thinking about what they should have done differently, slowed up bits or cut bids, or even added bits. I was sort of expecting a crude-fest, in fact I was hoping it would be crude because I hate Family Guy and American Dad's stupidity based-ness, but I'm far happier with what I got. If you do go in expecting frat-house humour you'll probably be disappointed. It's essentially a romantic comdey. However, where the ****e that was 90's romantic comedies went for shmaltzy romance and Hugh Grant flapping about this went for the comedy side of things.

I liked pretty much all the characters in it. Apart from Joel McHale playing the guy everyone hates (he is eminantly douchebag in his cultivated persona) I thought everyone in the film were people I would like to talk to. They were all pleasant and nice people if weird. Overall it was a really pleasant, non-challenging film with a good deal of funniness, and people being charming and sweet.

As for the earlier argument about

the Airplane scene[/spoiler. I thought that was hilarious, and really showed you Wahlbergs personality and way of thinking. Where the standard (Hugh Grant) romantic comedy "joke" would be to have a guy thinking back and picturing himself

dancing amazingly a la Saturday Night Fever, instead you have the funny, charming stoner thinking back to one of the greatest films doing an amazing parody in its own right.

That's actually a really smart joke.

Scanlas The 2nd

I thought this was really good, I was expecting it to be awful having seen the trailers. Only reason I reluctantly went to see it was a friend asked me to go and had no other plans.

Mickeroo

I found it a bit hit and miss. When it was funny it was very funny but mostly I found the film quite bland and even a little boring in places.

Tayleur

Personally I found this to be quite awful. I barely laughed at all. I wasnt expecting much but I got much less than I expected.
Pity because I always liked the early Family Guy stuff

Galvasean

Saw it today and quite enjoyed it. There were some seriously good 'laugh out loud' moments.

candy-gal1

Finally saw this last night, for my birthday , been looking forward to it for weeks! Brilliant movie, some awesome laugh out loud lines and actually quite geniunely teary at times , i thought it would be good but it definitly exceeded that

krudler

joke spoiler:

poor Brandon Routh, what'd he do to McFarlane?

Nervous Wreck

I laughed at a couple of bits of this. For the most part though, I sat there thinking "I'm never gonna watch this again and I really wish I'd gone to see Batman again..."

Uriel.

Seen it tonight.

Look, you should know going to a film like this that you're not about to be seeing one of the Oscar nominees. So you need to adjust your expectations accordingly.

I have to say though, I enjoyed. 2 hours of entertainment, not needing to think much and it got some laugh out loud moments for me.

Mila Kunis, as usual, looks stunning in this, which is always a nice bonus.

Faith+1

I really enjoyed the movie, I found it trailed off a little at the end but I didn't expect a masterpiece. This movie will live with me forever though as I'll never view parsnips in the same way again!:eek:

I really enjoyed it. Must've laughed out loud a good 20 times. Both of the exchanges with the boss were class.

HazDanz

I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. Definitely watch it again. Some jokes throughout the film are tried and tested favorites but nothing wrong with that as long as they are execute well, which they are in Ted.

I was surprised by the level of pop culture references in the film and it had me giggling away plenty of times.

Is it just me that the story in a very weird way reminded me of the story of the snowman?

YouTookMyName

Saw it last night, was alright worth a watch, it's missing something to make it better.

When you hear the sound of thunder, / Don't you get too scared. / Just grab your thunder buddy / And say these magic words: / "**** you, thunder! / You can suck my dick! / You can't get me thunder / 'Cause you're just God's farts!"
[blow raspberries]

The last line messes the whole thing up, it should be something different, to make it sound better.

Which is like the rest of the film. Missing something.

Just watched this and really found it hard going at times, I was pretty much ready to give up mid way through and were it not for the phone call about the party with Sam Jones I would have. The Flash Gordon stuff was brilliant though I imagine that those who don't love the film may find it a lot tougher of a film to sit through. At 106 minutes it's far too long and much like McFarlane's shows the idea of comedy seems to be throw as much at the viewer as we can and hope that one out of every 15 raises a smile.

Giovanni Ribisi was rather good,

his dancing scene was great and the punching the fat kid was the biggest laugh for me, that and the waking up retarded moment.

Rest of the film was quite a chore to get through and I really cannot understand how the film has been so well received.

Basq

Watched it last night was all set to enjoy it after the good things I'd heard but as a big fan of early Family Guy (Seasons 1 - 3) and not so much recently, I found it very hit and miss.

The funniest bits were in the trailer and because I'd seen them all before, they didn't raise much of a laugh.

As Darko said, Ribisi was great.. although under-used, although it did go with the role.

Don't know - definitely a tad disappointed!