Movie Review: Jay and Silent Bob Reboot

On the off chance Kevin Smith or anyone from his organisation happens to read this review, I want to applaud Kevin for personally taking this movie on the road to theatres. I think that's amazing and more directors should release their films that way but...

For the love of God, can you please find a way to release your films so that people in countries you won't be touring in can get to see them sooner... and I don't mean that BS where one streaming service gets the film exclusively for 3-5 months before the DVD/Blu-ray release and wider distribution to other streaming services.

Jay and Silent Bob Reboot Roadshow kicked off mid October of 2019. At the time of writing this it became available on DVD just a week or so ago. I bought a copy as soon as it became available here in Australia. So, about eight months after it released I can finally see it. I can also finally listen to the Smodcast Commentary track Kevin recorded, which has sat on my playlist for at least two months at this point (or since whenever the movie first debuted on streaming I think).

Streaming services may have replaced the video store but just like video stores they lie by saying you'll be able to access all your favorite movies whenever you want. Well at least for as long as we exist and we still have a licensing deal with the company that makes your favorite movies... and don't forget we randomly remove titles for 'reasons'. I'm not subscribing to a service for one movie.

Personally I like owning physical copies of my favorite movies regardless of the format, just so long as I can store it somewhere where no one can say it's no longer available to me anymore. At the same time I'm not paying DVD/Blu-ray prices for digital copies of movies that don't have any postage or packaging costs (and I don't buy that server space is that expensive when Youtube gives away so much of it for free to shit, four hour live streams)...

Anyway, I guess that's a bit of side track rant. All I'm saying is having to wait so long to see a movie is a real buzz kill because any podcast that was likely to share my enthusiasm for the movie, or at least provide some independent commentary, moved on ages ago (looking at you Weekly Planet - who said you might feature Kevin Smith movies in the lead up to this movie but never did because of the wait just to be able to even see it in Australia).

So, back to the review. Jay and Silent Bob Reboot is basically the same story as Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back where Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith) travel across the country to try and prevent Hollywood from making a reboot of their movie, Bluntman and Chronic. Basically a reboot about rebooting old movies.

Is it any good? It's a Kevin Smith movie. How good it is, is relative to how much of fan you are of Kevin Smith. Although I'm sure Kevin does his best to make his films as good as can be what he's really trying to do is make sure you have a good time. If this is your first Kevin Smith movie it may be a little all over the place but you should still have fun.

That's really what I think Jay and Silent Bob Reboot sets out to be... a good time with Kevin and his friends. If you're a Kevin Smith fan, you'll feel included with the nods and winks directly to camera on some of the inside jokes.

Kevin has admitted to editing this movie down to a tight 105 minutes which makes me question if the road trip section of the movie was longer at one point? Although I haven't seen it in a while I'd swear Jay and Silent Bob Strikes back had much more road trip featured as part of the journey.

In Jay and Silent Bob Reboot the road trip section doesn't feel like they did much more than travel across town, and seems over so fast you wonder why Kevin just didn't have them hop on a plane, as the characters intended to do on the outset?

As such the storyline of Jay having a daughter, Milly (Harley Quinn Smith), travelling with him but he can't tell her, seems a little bit rushed, and doesn't quite earn any emotional weight once things unfold. There's very few moments, if any I recall, where Milly starts to suspect Jay may be someone of more significance to her.

Beyond that I did indeed have a good time watching the movie. My favorite scene was in Brodie's (Jason Lee) Comic shop where Brodie expositions the hell out of some important plot points. You know it's all exposition but Jason Lee's delivery sells it so well.

I also got a real kick out of Ben Affleck's scene, returning as Holden McNeil. It doesn't serve a whole lot of purpose in this film but, as I think Kevin Smith has said, it kind of serves as a mini sequel to his earlier film, Chasing Amy. Not that I needed that, it was just great to see Ben having some fun and being reunited with Kevin (crossing my fingers those two will sit down for a long podcast about Ben's career, and especially his turn as Batman - though I'd be happy with just swapping memories from Kevin's early films too).

Another highlight was definitely Chris Hemsworth's cameo. That guy really needs to do more dialogue driven comedy... maybe Kevin can write a buddy movie for him and Jason Lee?

Special mention for Melissa Benoist as Chronic. Even in a ridiculous looking Superhero suit she totally sells how bad ass she can be. Whether you like her Supergirl show or not, it's impressive how she can go from sweet, girl next door, to laser vision, I'll f**k you up if you mess with me, in seconds and be totally convincing.

The biggest laugh for me came right at the very end post credit scene. Such a simple idea but the ramifications of it make it one of the best Easter egg jokes ever in a Kevin Smith movie.

Overall, if you're a Kevin Smith fan, this movie will certainly entertain and is kind of a book end to Kevin's earlier movies. It's not a perfect movie by any stretch but the highlights are memorable and the cameos add to the fun.

To top it off, you get a fun moment between the late Stan Lee and Kevin Smith during the credits. Stan was set to make a cameo in this film, which would have been very fitting given one of his very first cameos was in a Kevin Smith film (Mall Rats). Unfortunately it was not to be but this moment is maybe even better than the cameo would have been.

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