22 Jump Street “Lowbrow As It Gets”

(“Lowbrow As It Gets”)

“Hotshots” looks at a movie!

22 JUMP STREET is the sequel to the 2012 21 JUMP STREET, which in turn was a spoofy adaptation of the 1980 TV series, all of which just keeps on proving that Hollywood has run out of ideas.

Once again, Jonah Hill stars as Schmidt and Channing Tatum stars as Jenko, Schmidt’s partner as they go undercover yet again to bust up a drug ring.

“Wait a minute!” you say? “Didn’t they do that in the first movie?” you say?

Well, yes, but in the first movie they pretended to be high-school students, whereas in this movie they pretend to be college students, which makes the running joke of their looking too old to be students a little less jokey this time, especially the more often we hear it.

Also, their offices in an old Korean church at 21 Jump Street have changed, because the Koreans bought the church back, and so they were moved across the street into an old Vietnamese church at 22 Jump Street, which also leads to a mildly entertaining sequence at the end of the movie for the possibility of more sequels than you can shake a nightstick at.

The explanation that the partners receive is that they got lucky on 21 Jump street, and so the budget was increased and now they’re to do the same as last time and everyone will be happy, which leads Jenko to believe they have Cate Blanchett to do what they want.

They will have the same identity and the same assignment, except that they will be in college instead of high school.

So, Jenko, the more dim-witted of the two, says, “I’m the first person in my family to pretend to go to college.”

Well, in an attempt to blend in with their fellow college students, Jenko becomes friends with a fraternity leader and football star, and Schmidt becomes friends with an art-major coed.

Jenko’s buddy, Zook, says that they are like Batman and Robin, except that they are both Batman.

And Schmidt becomes so “friendly” with Maya, the art major, that it causes problems during parents weekend when Maya’s parents meet Schmidt.

The humor is so lowbrow that when Jenko suggests maybe they should start “investigating” other people, you might miss that he’s implying “seeing.”

22 JUMP STREET is as lowbrow as it gets.

I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”