Horrible Bosses 2 - C

Rated R, 108 minutes
Wes's Grade: C

Charlie Day, Jason Sudeikis, Jason Bateman

Slack, dumb "Horrible Bosses 2" not as fun as the first one

If it were my employee, I'd have to let go of the forgettable comedy sequel "Horrible Bosses 2" for being a slacker.  Mildly enjoyable but lackluster, it's what you expect: overly crude, contrived and only sporadically fun; it's not as near as original as the darkly fun 2011 film and unlike that film, this outing grows tiresome after awhile. After Nick (Jason Bateman), Dale (Charlie Day), and Kurt (Jason Sudeikis) decide to launch their own business, savvy entrepeneurs Burt Hanson (Christoph Waltz) and his son Rex (Chris Pine), appear to take them down. With no other viable option in sight, the trio decide to kidnap Rex in order to put up a ransom to take back their business. The lazy and predictable "Horrible Bosses 2," directed by "That's My Boy's" Sean Anders and co-written by Anders and John Morris, "Horrible Bosses 2" has its charming leads but a plot so silly and contrived, it's hard to buy in this time. It's also not as fun, given that some of the best parts of the first movie are given little to do this time out: Kevin Spacey only cameos and Jennifer Aniston and Jamie Foxx are criminally underused, and I wanted to see more of them, especially Foxx, who steals all his scenes here as their lowlife partner, MF (I will only use his initials here). "Star Trek's" Pine, along with Oscar-winner Waltz, who is blandly miscast here, don't have the comedic chops and are much more milquetoast than the trio of bosses from the first film, though they're very game physically. Day and Sudeikis, both smart comedians, are so annoyingly dumb in this one that it doesn't really make sense (I happen to enjoy both of them, though Day can be shrill at times), while Bateman seems confused and Waltz a little befuddled. The opening sequence was best, then it goes downhill after that, from there the film has only a handful of genuinely funny moments, one of them a funny sex scene with Aniston and Bateman shown on security cameras. You tend to know the mark of an unfunny film when the funniest part is the outtakes over the end credits, which is the case with "Horrible Bosses 2."  Skip this one and rent the original instead.