'My Spy: The Eternal City' Review
“My Spy: The Eternal City” is the sequel to the 2020 action comedy “My Spy”, which was originally supposed to go to theaters and then Amazon acquired it for a Prime Video release early on in the COVID pandemic. I kinda like that film. Not amazing, but unique and entertaining enough, with Dave Bautista in his best movie role to date.
That’s the case once again with “The Eternal City”. Bautista is the (only real) reason to watch this “My Spy” follow-up. He’s comfortable, charismatic and confident in the role of J.J., guardian to Sophie (reprised by Chloe Coleman). J.J., who was working in the field as a C.I.A. agent, is now behind the scenes. Sophie’s now a teen and is more into teen things (hanging out with friends; has a crush on a boy) than doing exercise training with J.J. (what she loved in the first film).
Sophie’s school choir has been selected to go to Italy and perform for the Pope. I don’t know how the school could afford to send 75 to 80 kids to Italy, but that’s the story we get! J.J. serves as one of the chaperones. And when they all arrive, some bad stuff quickly goes down, including a kidnapping. We have returning cast members Kristen Schaal and Ken Jeong (not great work from them) and new castmates Anna Faris and Craig Robinson (so-so work from them).
I wanted to laugh and enjoy myself a lot more while watching “My Spy: The Eternal City”. This is a rougher — and tougher in tone — installment. Not as clever or genuinely exciting as the original. A lot of the humor falls flat, and returning director Pete Segal (who also did the hilarious, underrated “Get Smart” and “Grudge Match”) lets the action scenes, especially in the second half, go on way too long.
A bit of the humor works. There’s some heart and honesty in the dialogue and interactions, especially between Bautista and Coleman. But overall, “The Eternal City” absolutely suffers from sequelitis.
