One-note joke comedy; a disappointment.

Rating: 7/10 (8 July 2012)

TED (2012) **1/2 Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, Seth MacFarlane, Joel McHale, Giovanni Ribisi, Patrick Warburton, Matt Walsh, Jessica Barth, Bill Smitrovich (Narrator: Patrick Stewart); (CAMEOS : Norah Jones, Sam J. Jones, Tom Skerritt. One-note joke comedy from FAMILY GUY twisted genius Seth MacFarlane (in his big-screen filmmaking debut and co-scripted with Alec Sulkin and Wellsey Wild) : a young boy's wish for his teddy bear to be his best friend inexplicably makes the toy come to life and flash forward to the present with the cuddly, fuzzy plaything as a foul-mouthed, whore-mongering, bong smoking lout sharing digs with his human bud Wahlberg in serious Peter Pan denial while his girlfriend Kunis gives him an ultimatum - her or Ted. That's it. Everything else feels like pop-culture riffings and pacing left over from MacFarlane's aforementioned animated blockbuster that doesn't translate too well to the big screen. Scatterings of gut-busting laughs and a game-on turn by its handsome leads are too few to mention and the non-stop FLASH GORDON references fall with a deadening thud. A disappointment.