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What do you get when you get trio of comedy superstars together and throw an alien invasion into a raunchy guy movie? A hodgepodge of unexecuted ideas with lots of vulgarity and gross humor for cheap laughs—that’s what best describes The Watch.

The plot revolves around control freak Costco manager Evan (Ben Stiller) assembling a ragtag bunch of civilians into a neighborhood watch after the peculiar murder of his Mexican security guard on duty. Party-hard dad Bob (Vince Vaughn), police reject Franklin (Jonah Hill) and peculiar new neighbor Jamarcus (Richard Ayoade) heed the call, looking to have a good time with the guys away from the daily get-go. But when the extraterrestrial start to tread on their turf, the men gear up to take back their Ohio haven.

With the major changes made to the plot and title due to the shooting of Trayvon Martin by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman earlier this year, the final product just isn’t successful. The genres just don’t mesh well, especially with incorporating certain aspects of the watchmen’s personal lives (ex., being a good father to a wild child or dealing with inadequacy in the bedroom).

Acting-wise, the laughs are far few and in-between. The very sexually-charged jokes were awkward. This R-rated movie earns it for the amount of profanity just for giggles at times, so if you have “sensitive ears” then that may be a problem. While Stiller and Vaughn were hysterical in their last outing, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, the same energy wasn’t fully utilized. They both do well respectively in their own elements, with Vaughn being the loud obnoxious one and Stiller trying to keep his cool. Hill comes off of his 21 Jump Street-hype and keeps up the pace nicely among the comedy veterans humor-wise. Ayoade brings his own British charm to his character, adding a quirky factor to the peculiar neighbor.

For me, this movie isn’t bad, but not worth a watch in the theater. I still laughed and whatnot, just not for the right reasons for the most part.

Until next time,
Rachel