Filmology Rating: 2 out of 4

Life seems to be going well for the Radners (Seth Rogen) and pregnant wife Kelly (Rose Byrne), this is until Kappa Nu moves in next door. They begin to party just as much and just as loud as the previous fraternity. With these parties threaten the sale of their home, they then turn to their ex-neighbor and once enemy Teddy Sanders (Zac Efron) for help. However, these girls will not go down without a fight.

The sequel to the very successful Neighbors is here! This has been a movie that I have been looking to for some time now but all throughout the excitement, I have always wondered why? Why did they feel the need to make a sequel to a movie that seemed to be a stand-alone movie? So throughout this entire time, I have been nervous because I just didn’t want them to distort the good vibe and feeling the first one left. Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising doesn’t live up to the original but it still delivers quite a few laughs.

There are a lot of good parts and qualities of the film but also a lot of flaws and things that should have been a lot better. I would first like to start off with the dynamic between Zac Efron and Seth Rogen and how awesome it was to see it again. These two guys have this chemistry that is really enjoyable to watch. Zac I feel was also the star of the show this time. He had quite a few hilarious lines and to me was the driving force and theme behind the movie. While the movies main target is the battle between the parenthood and the sisterhood, we also have Teddy who is still struggling to find himself after college. This is a very common theme that young people in college/fresh out of college and even into mature adults can struggle with struggle with. Seth Rogen and Rose Bryne once again are back and I was really happy to see that their chemistry together was still there. These comedic trios will deliver a good amount of laughs but sadly just not as much as the original movie.

I have a few very obvious faults with this sequel and that is really poor editing and the pacing of the movie feels really rushed at times. It just seems like it’s one thing after the other and with the really choppy editing and poor directing, it just seemed lazy and off to me. The feel just felt off for a large portion of the movie and it just didn’t seem to grab that same feel that the original had. Paired with the poor editing and pacing was the writing and dialogue. For some of the characters, the writing just seemed to be off the mark from what the characters should have been given. Even running with the same jokes multiple time throughout the movie when it should have been dropped already just felt lazy to me. I could help to shake the feeling everything felt rushed together and pushed to the market without fully being a well-rounded film through and through.

Overall I did enjoy Neighbors 2 but not as much as the original. It will have you bursting out laughing sometimes but it will also have you left confused and disappointed at other points.

Rating: Rent It 

-Nick