Long Live Ricky Stanicky

To Ricky Stanicky, the best friend we never got to see in theaters.

Relegated to the streaming wasteland, Ricky Stanicky is the type of the comedy we used to get in theaters in abundance in those glorious years past.

In another universe, amid the gigantic releases of Dune 2, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, we would have been treated to a theatrical change of pace in something like Ricky Stanicky. A brisk comedy that mostly sticks the landing, features charismatic leads and some good gags - it would have been the perfect chaser to the bombastic shot of the big-budget season.

Instead, Ricky Stanicky - a comedy from the mostly dependable Peter Farrelly, mind you - has been shuffled off to Amazon Prime, halfheartedly promoted and no doubt a blip that will soon be forgotten (though you can bet I’ll be looking for the physical release to prove to my kids one day that this was real).

It’s all too bad. John Cena has true, undeniable comedy chops, and he gets so much to do in Ricky Stanicky, more or less carrying the movie’s comedy weight under his massive shoulders. Seeing him in the Britney Spears schoolgirl outfit is funny, but Cena doesn’t have to always rely on his size and physicality; he’s a gifted comedian in every other facet as well. It just helps that you can also make this giant, muscular man dress in silly outfits.

It’s also just as much to the movie’s benefit that Cena is game for anything. Need to make him pee his pants? Perfect. He has no boundaries, something that has begun to add a layer of stink to Dwayne Johnson’s recent work. Whereas The Rock is constantly aware of the image he’s trying to cultivate, Cena is out to make movies where he could push himself and the audience’s perception of him as a performer (much like Dave Bautista has done in other ways, if we’re sticking with the WWE line here).

And in being paired with Zac Efron, a great comedic performer himself, the two are able to play off each other to solid effect. Nothing about Ricky Stanicky is groundbreaking; this follows the once-common comedy formula and is just as enjoyable as what the Farrelly brothers used to pump out back in the day. Your tolerance for that filmography will likely guide and inform your own enjoyment of Ricky Stanicky.

But for the Farrelly heads out there, this will do the trick.