Johnny English Strikes Again review - finally restores the saga to almost its original heights [National Student archive]

~~~THIS ARTICLE was originally written for THE NATIONAL STUDENT it has been archived on my personal blog anticipating the TERMINATION of that VENERABLE ESTABLISHMENT~~~

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Verdict: Rowan Atkinson is hilarious in Johnny Engilsh Strikes Again, if you can look past the film itself.

Johnny English has retired into obscurity as a teacher, when a cyber attack reveals the identity of every secret agent serving the UK, forcing the government to (reluctantly) call on English again. It’s a pretty basic premise which requires one while watching the film to imagine the first idea on a writer’s whiteboard under the question “how do we justify a sequel in canon?”

[Image probably copyrighted, author too lazy to check.] 

But it does the job, and then we’re away.

The first thing that deserves mentioning is the excellent slapstick. Rowan Atkinson’s comedic instincts continue to amaze, and his performance in this film is wonderfully, gloriously silly. It’s not quite as thoroughly funny as the original film, and yet it’s still enjoyable in itself, and there are moments which are more laugh-out-loud funny than the original, so it evens out. I won’t spoil my favourite gag, because it’s brilliant, but watch out for the green and red pills. The joke you’ll see coming from a mile away – Johnny English is always great at planting hints of future hilarity – but the pay-off is even better than you could imagine.

There’s also a nice range of humour for parents as well as kids. Surprisingly, however, there’s also an almost covert anti-PC, anti-Health-and-Safety/bureaucracy agenda, which felt more than a bit out of place, uncomfortably so as they detract from otherwise light-hearted fun – to the extent that Atkinson’s recent dubious free-speech-warrior interventions make more sense. The film also has a “back-in-my-day” sense of world-weariness about it, yearning for a more analogue world (also incidentally a more male world), the apogean manifestation of which is our hero in a suit of armour vanquishing a touchscreen mobile phone with a sword. The now almost two-decade-old franchise blends nostalgia and luddism in other interesting ways: for example, the school Johnny English teaches at being straight out of the Famous Five. Also striking (no pun intended) is the overuse of senseless actual violence instead of slapstick – perhaps a fine line, but it’s noticeable how often the butt of the joke is English inflicting injury others, much more so than in the original. The humour is less often self-depricative and more often mocking, which is as much an observation as a criticism.

What the film gets mostly right in comedy it gets mostly wrong in terms of, shall we say, good storytelling. The dialogue is absolutely awful and the delivery of the Downing street scenes is awful too. It’s honestly heartbreaking to see Emma Thomspon phone it in, but in a way it's a joke between her and the audience to have such a highly-respected actor play a bit-part in a comedy sequel. The film is therefore a sort of potted affair in which moments of decent hilarity are interrupted by dubious attempts to hash a plot together. It fails in this regard in a way in which the original didn’t: Johnny English (2003) was a much more comprehensive and integrated affair in its silly way. As a result, Johnny English Returns (2011) lacks momentum and the pacing is a bit off.

Though Johnny English Strikes Again will be enjoyable enough for fans of the original which came out 15 years ago, the real target is probably those young enough to have missed the original and therefore the ill-advised second sequel. It’s difficult not to view Johnny English Strikes Again as a thoroughly fun comedy romp.

The series continues to combine an excellent pastiche of Bond and Mission Impossible with wonderful silliness, and while not all of the slapstick lands perfectly, and the topical dialogue is exceptionally phoned-in, when Rowan Atkinson’s famed comedic performance shines, it really shines.

Johnny English Strikes Again is in UK cinemas on October 5th.