COMING 2 AMERICA

The 33-year-old sequel to the 1988 hit brings most of the original cast back: Eddie Murphy and Arsenio Hall once again play multiple characters, Shari Headley as Lisa, John Amos as Cleo, and James Earl Jones as King Jaffe Joffer amongst others. However, like most sequels that are made today decades after the original, this one is both unwanted and unneeded. The title is somewhat bizarre as about 90% of the film takes place in Africa as opposed to America. Yes, I'm fully aware it's a sequel but COMING 2 AMERICA was the best they could do? The film follows Akeem, who learns from a local witch doctor that he has an illegitimate son in America and must bring him back to Zamunda to be his heir, since Akeem and Lisa have 3 girls and no male heirs of their own. The first film is a classic and one of my favorite Eddie Murphy movies of all-time. It was original and funny, whereas the sequel attempts to recycle the same jokes and the new ones are far and few in-between that fall flat upon delivery. They also ruined whatever positive image fans had of the character of Lisa as she was a strong and outspoken character in the original. Here, she's wasted and thrown behind the scenes with the exception of one outburst. Finally, there's quite a bit of product placement that is just too cringeworthy during every scene. Once again, another needless sequel that nobody asked for that tarnishes the memory of its predecessor. 5/10