For all the insane hype...I really thought I'd like it...

Rating: 5/10 (12 December 2012)

I'm not a huge fan of comedies, I'm even less of a fan of dirty raunchy comedies and not because I'm offended easily, you couldn't offend me if you tried...they just aren't funny. As an adult I am not amused by fart jokes and yelling body parts to get a laugh. However, that being said...I really looked forward to Ted. I know it would be raunchy and dirty but I thought Seth MacFarlane might bring a certain level of intelligence to the silly comedy genre like he does with Family Guy. I was sorely disappointed. Ted spends more than half of it's run time being outrageous stupid Adam Sandler-esque humour that resorts to the most juvenile of sex jokes and drugs. Half way through I thought I would be scoring this a 2 if it was lucky. However, surprisingly so the film does turn itself around slightly in the latter half. I really thought Ted would have a good story to go with the raunchy comedy but the good story doesn't really start until more than three quarters of the way through the movie. I also give the film kudos for the insane amount of 80's media nods from music to film to Television because that is a lot of fun for anyone who loved the 80's.
The cast is almost surprisingly good considering how bad most of the script is. Mark Wahlberg continues to prove his diversity as pot smoking, life struggling, and often lazy John. He has an undeniable chemistry on screen and the banter with Ted is really amusing sometimes. Mila Kunis plays her role well although it's a simple enough role. Her and Wahlberg have good chemistry and her character is a little basic but she does well. Seth Macfarlane is our Ted. Obviously the guy is a multi-talented comedian and can do MANY voices. I am a little confused why he chose Ted's voice to be one and the same with Peter Griffin though they do make fun of that at one point which was amusing. Still you can't doubt Macfarlane's comedic talent as Ted's voice. He nails it. The supporting cast includes Joel McHale (why does he always play a sleaze-bag in comedies?) and a skeezy and perfectly villainous Giovanni Ribisi. The cast all work well together and probably pull the awful script out of being completely lost.
I suppose I wanted Ted to be nasty and dirty but also have some heart. And in the end it tries to do that but its way too late. It relies far too heavily on really juvenile jokes that don't really work. It jumps from shocking jokes about racism to sex and I did laugh, I even hazard to say I laughed a lot but it meant nothing because the film leaves you feeling very empty. This film got really hyped up by so many people and I heard nothing but how amazing and hilarious it was so I'm sure my expectations were probably high going into it but the film remains a sub par effort in the dirty comedy genre. 5/10