The Kissing booth 2 movie Review
“Psst! Hey!” “Are you gonna review The Kissing booth 2?”
"hey, did you know that the kissing booth 2 movie is out, are you going to review it?!" “hey are you gonna review the kissing booth 2?!” *the horde screams* *the horde screams, but quieter* “hey are you gonna review the kissing booth 2?! *sigh* “hey are you gonna review the kissing booth 2?! no! no! nooooaaaaaaaarrrrrggggghhhhhhh! i can’t believe it’s been over a year and a half since i reviewed the original kissing booth.
You should go watch my article on that trainwreck, it’s pretty good if I don’t say so myself. But here’s a quick recap for the uninitiated. (God, how I envy you ). The Kissing Booth is a Netflix original teen romcom based on a story written on Wattpad by a 15-year-old. Which should… tell you everything you need to know…. The story follows Elle (not Ellie, as I wrongly assumed in the previous article, you can stop reminding me now) and her unfortunate relationship with generic Chad, Noah, as she struggles with her feelings for him and her promise to his brother and her best friend Lee that she wouldn’t date him because that would break one of the stupid friendship rules that he arbitrarily imposed on her.
It’s essentially two men trying to manipulate and control a woman, who ends up going along with it for the most part, so as well as being clichéd and boring, the film has a lot of, to put it mildly, *questionable* ideas about romance.
“Just get in the car, Elle.” “GET IN THE CAR ELLE!”. Despite that glaring issue - and the film just being melodramatic and ridiculous in general - it was one of the most viewed movies on Netflix in 2018. This popularity would lead main actress Joey King to argue that the Kissing Booth movies are “critic-proof”. *Barely contained rage*. And because that’s how the business works, this level of success will inevitably result in a sequel. Thus we have The Kissing Booth 2. My most requested article *ever* by an enormous margin. “Hey you gonna review the Kissing Booth 2?” “Hey you gonna review the Kissing Booth 2? Hey you gonna review the Kissing Booth 2?" "Hey you gonna review the Kissing Bo-".
I’m going to be hearing that in my sleep! I’m going to be carrying it around in my head until the day I die! This is going to be the new channel meme, isn’t it? I can just feel it. But I gotta give the people what they want, so let’s take a look-. TWO HOURS AND TEN MINUTES?! ARE YOU SH*TTING ME?! *Groan*. You know what, if I have to sit through all this garbage for you guys, you can sit through an ad for me. Enjoy. Your ears will thank you for picking up a pair of Everyday e25 Wireless Earbuds from Raycon. I use these on a daily basis due to their great sound quality with added bass, high levels of noise isolation, easy and quick connectivity via bluetooth, 6 hours of playtime, and their sleek, discrete design that fits comfortably within your ears, And they stay in better than any wired earbuds I’ve ever used.
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And not only do they start at around half the price of other premium wireless earbuds on the market, but you can pick up a pair of these bad boys with an extra 15% off by going to buyraycon.com/cynicalreviews. That’s buyraycon.com/cynicalreviews for 15% off your order. Check the article description and pinned comment for a link. Okay, now we’re even. So, shocker: The Kissing Booth 2 is bad. Who would have expected otherwise from the unholy quadfecta of sh*tty movies? There’s absolutely no justification for the film to be two hours and ten minutes long. It felt like more happened in the first film, and that was half an hour shorter. I guess they thought: “Hey, the first film was successful…” “So let’s just do… *more* of it!”.
The only thing that surprised me about this movie was how much it didn’t surprise me. It’s incredibly slow, predictable, cliche-ridden, most of the comedy is poorly executed, and it feels like an amalgamation of all the bad aspects of every teen movie I’ve reviewed all smashed together into a vile concoction of angst and boredom. The story ends up not going anywhere and finishing at pretty much the same point as it started, with the characters barely growing or learning anything.
There’s a great deal of repetition and
Redundancy when it comes to the dialogue, and it takes characters far longer to say things than they actually should.
The runtime is further padded out with a bunch of pointless scenes and subplots, by far the most egregious being the gay romance arc. Which is only one level behind the lesbian kiss in The Rise of Skywalker in terms of how forced-in, pointless, and insulting it is. All the other side characters are as paper-thin as you’d expect, but this also extends to the main characters, who are still barely developed. But worse, most of them are terrible people, especially Elle.
It’s perfectly fine to have an unsympathetic protagonist, as long as they’re presented as such. But Elle is meant to be the sympathetic “plain Jane” everygirl that we’re supposed to root for and the film completely fails to establish her as such. Words cannot express how much I loath this character. She’s somehow managed to become even more insufferable than she was in the first movie and her awful behaviour and staggering levels of hypocrisy are either barely addressed or indeed rewarded in the end. Also, I think it’s pretty funny how Apple has a policy of not allowing movie villains to use their products. And yet they're all she's ever using. The other characters are only slightly better, and all their pathetic drama stems from their being sh*tty people, or being too stupid to communicate properly. Why is this even called The Kissing Booth 2? It should have been called “Rich Idiot Kids 2: “Richer Idioter….
Uh… Kidser.”. The only character who deserves any sympathy is Lee’s long-suffering girlfriend Rachel. Who we still discover nothing about despite her having more screentime in the sequel. She’s still nothing more than “Lee’s girlfriend” and acts like a complete dumbass with no self-respect. The most sympathetic character acts like a complete dumbass with no self-respect. That’s The Kissing Booth 2 in a nutshell. Probably the only positive thing I have to say *is* that the acting is fairly on-point. In that the cast do successfully portray these characters as I think they were meant to be portrayed.
But that doesn’t change the fact that those characters are less appealing than soggy toast. It has other problems in terms of filmmaking, like some really bad editing at times. And the music choices being quite bizzare and not making much sense in many of the scenes. But pretty much all the issues I have with the film derive from its awful script. Monkeys with typewriters could have put together something better. And I’ve barely scratched the surface of how bad the writing is. It was difficult for me to structure my thoughts about this movie because there’s just so much to process. It’s like scraping away layers of a turd, only to come across yet more layer of even-smellier turd.
Really the only way to unpack how bad it is is to just f*cking show you by going through it. O-okay. Alright. Alright! Let's do it! Let's just- let's just f*cking do it! I-I don’t have to watch it right away, right! I can relax and enjoy some wholesome content first. "Hi people, and I'm back cooking.
Again.".
Aww, she seems like a sweet lady.
And she's making my favourite meal-.
OH MY GOD NO! No Kay, what are you doing?! That is not how you make spag bol! NO! NO! Noooooooo Spaghetti bolognese is my favourite meal. And I think I'd rather watch it get completely butchered than sit through The Kissing Booth 2. Again. *sigh* Okay! Just think of the ad revenue… “Considering where we left off, I’m guessing you might have a few questions.”. Nope. None at all. I’m good. So the sequel begins with Elle letting us know what happened since she got together with Noah in the first movie and when he headed off to Harvard, which he got into because he read a book once.
Yeah… that’s the world we’re in. It’s a bunch of pointless stuff, like her starting a podcast about article games with Lee even though the only game we saw her play in the first film was a Dance Dance Revolution knockoff, then it only gets brought up again once in a flippant comment. This is just one of many instances of the film making a mockery of Chekhov’s gun. Elle’s also applied to Berkeley, which is where her mom and Lee and Noah’s mom met, and where she and Lee have always planned on going. Remember those stupid friendship rules and how a large part of the first movie was how b*llshit and smothering they are? Well, all that’s forgotten because they’re now important again! Elle is obligated to go to Berkeley because of these idiotic rules. But it’s okay because Berkeley has a hill to roll down and a meme page that uses formats that haven’t been popular since 2011. Oh, on that note, the movie repeatedly tries to be “cool” and “down with the kids” but… fails miserably. And it seems completely divorced from reality, like it’s taking place in a fantasy land.
Which would explain lots of little things that on their own wouldn’t be worthy of note but make a lot more sense when put in the context of a teenager’s daydream. Such as why the uniform policy at the school seems incomprehensible. Why the senior year has a Field Day when that’s not a thing that happens in high schools. And why Noah has a fireplace in his dormroom at Harvard, 'cos that’s clearly what Harvard’s like! But anyway, the main focus on the story is on Elle and Noah’s long distance relationship and the toll it takes on the both of them as they struggle to make it work. I’m in a long distance relationship myself. Transcontinental in fact. So I definitely sympathise with how difficult this can be. It’s hard work, but when you’re with the right person, it’s all worth it.
GF: “Aww, thanks honey!” "You're welcome ". Unfortunately, neither of these people is “the right person”. They’re both terrible in their own ways, and they’ve never had any chemistry beyond hot guy and… girl. So, of course, they have a lot of issues. She says she wants to be “mature” and give Noah his space, but interprets this to mean calling him then immediately hanging up, and then ignoring all of his calls and messages. Real mature It gets to the point where right after she ignores another message, he phones the school pretending to be her dad so that he can talk to her! Like Jesus Christ, just call her home phone, maybe?! And in case you’d forgotten within the last few minutes they take every opportunity to remind you that he is - in fact - at Harvard.
Hehehe…. He makes it very clear that he doesn’t want that much space, and she has nothing to worry about.
Everyone at the school, especially the OMG Girls, are still so obsessed with their relationship.
Why? Why do they give a sh*t?
Is there really such a drought of gossip at this school?! but you see, everything in this world has to revolve around this girl despite her having done nothing to deserve it.
Overly-British Girl makes a re-appearance and I just want to take a second to acknowledge the only redeeming quality of the first movie. This glorious line: “I’m British, you wanker!” (We have T-shirts now. Go check ‘em out.). Elle and Lee propose they do a Kissing Booth again, which is swiftly and unanimously approved. Before they know who the kissers are… “Because without Flynn as a headliner to draw in business, the booth may not do so well this year.” “Ah- that's a good point!". What, are they still saying that he the only attractive guy at the school? But let’s be honest, we all know that the ladies are going to be the main selling point.
Not that kissing booths ever happen outside of a Wattpad fantasy because they’re so awkward and gross. And I can’t think of a movie about a Kissing Booth being more inappropriately timed They haven’t got anyone lined up for the booth, but the horny idiots on the committee are satisfied with Elle’s B.S. answer. During a article call, Noah suggests she apply to colleges in Boston so she can be closer to him. But her teacher reminds her that she’s neither smart nor talented enough to get into Harvard, and that her personal essay is trash. After all, you can’t just write an essay and get into one of the most prestigious universities in the world! Right ? But Lee wants her to go to Berkeley, and because he’s still a controlling dickhead, he’ll get pissy if she even thinks about applying to other colleges. So she doesn’t tell him that she’s applying to Harvard. The next day, some random goth girl shows Elle a article that someone creepily took of the new hot guy in school, Marco.
She of course being a dumbass turns on the intercom so everyone hears her gushing about how much she wants to wear his ballsack as a facemask. Not only is this joke one we’ve seen many times before, but the setup makes no sense. Who is this girl, and why is she showing Elle a article of this guy? And why does Elle tell this total stranger every thought spurting out of her vagina? And if you reverse the genders of this situation, it would be really f*cking weird. But here it’s funny, because men. AND she has a boyfriend, so this is so wildly inappropriate. But we get to see some epic totally rad stuntwork from Lee! *groan*. They do the whole “he’s behind me, isn’t he?” joke. And then Marco - who’s basically a hispanic Noah Centineo who looks way too old to be at this school - teases her about it.
So naturally she doesn’t apologise and gets defensive. Her deflecting blame is gonna be a running theme. With his deep, buttery smooth voice and obligatory musical talents, Marco acts as the Jacob to Noah’s Edward, in the battle of two tall attractive men over an uninteresting gremlin. In fact, he plays pretty much the same role that Noah did in the first film, minus the abuse. But since everyone in school is drooling over him, they want him to do the Kissing Booth. He refuses, not giving a reason, just like Noah in the first film. “It’s for charity!” "Don’t you believe in charity?” “I’m standing here talking to you!”. You know what? I kinda like this guy.
So Elle challenges him to a dance off, which of course she wins, albeit barely. So he reluctantly agrees to do it. Noah buys Elle a ticket to come visit him, then his friends interrupt their article call.
And she sees one singular DREADED FEMALE!
And immediately starts worrying and stalking her on social media.
Feeling threatened by someone who actually has
Good looks and a personality, she decides that she needs to dig her claws into noah by getting into harvard.
But this being Harvard, it’s stupidly expensive and her dad can’t afford it. So she decides to enter a Dance Dance Revolution-knockoff competition with the hope of using the prize money to pay for Harvard. Which is such a *stupid* plan! Because even *if* she wins, that money won’t even cover one year’s worth of tuition and living expenses at Harvard.
And she’ll have to split that money with her dance partner. Or she would, if she were a good person. And I think the IRS might have something to say about those earnings. Welcome to the real world, kiddo! But she ropes Lee into joining the dance competition with her. And this exacerbates the conflict in the major subplot of the movie: how Elle is a massive third wheel in Lee and Rachel’s relationship, and how the two friends act like selfish, oblivious assholes towards Rachel. Elle even forces her to sit in the back seat of Lee’s car, like oh my god that does not bode well! And the same night Elle won the dance contest against Marco, Lee stood Rachel up for their date. So she gives him an ultimatum to tell Elle that she needs to back off. Not gonna lie though, their relationship is made much weirder by her looking like she’s old enough to be his mum….
Soon after, Elle flies to Boston to see Noah. See, that could have been intentionally funny, but they completely wasted the opportunity! She meets his friends in a restaurant, before our love rival Chloe walks in. She’s British for some reason. I suppose because this makes her seem more sophisticated and therefore more of a threat. And she looks like she just came from a catwalk. Why does everyone in this movie look so old?! And what the f*ck is that?! Elle goes for an interview with a Harvard admissions counsellor who tells her that she needs to be her *real* self and not just tell them what she thinks they want to hear. But she wouldn’t give her this advice because she wouldn’t give a sh*t and would just reject her without a second thought. Elle finds an earring under Noah’s bed, then invades his privacy by snooping on his conveniently unlocked phone.
His text conversation with Chloe is mildly suspicious, but nothing that couldn’t be cleared up with about a minute’s worth of communication. But of course she overreacts, refuses to talk to him and storms out. And she flies back home all sad. “I’m definitely not used to seeing you around all those college girls.”. You mean that ONE AND ONLY college girl you saw in the entirety of Boston?! She says she trusts him that nothing has happened between him and Chloe, but she’s not convinced. Here’s the thing though: I can’t blame her entirely. Because both Noah and Chloe act weirdly inappropriate towards each other considering they’re meant to be just friends. “You look beautiful.” "Thank you!" “Oh hello, handsome! I’m outside.
Buzz me up.” “I think you’re great for me.” “Tell me something I don’t know.”. Chloe later says she’s not the least bit interested in him, but this is not how someone who’s NOT romantically interested in someone acts. This is the movie clumsily trying to trick us into thinking that there’s something going on, when in fact there isn’t. This is not how you do a bait and switch. Back at school, Lee hijacks the intercom to confess his love to Rachel and beg for her to take him back. “So would you please text me a smiley face emoji for yes, and a poop emoji for no, please?”. For that line alone, he should die a virgin.
Also, why are you airing your relationship
Problems in front of hundreds of people, man? like what the f*ck….
BUT SHE TAKES HIM BACK! WHAT ARE YOU DOING GIRL?! Lee promises Rachel that he’ll tell Elle to give them space, but of course he doesn’t. Instead, he takes a convoluted, pussy way out. During dance practice, he dramatically sprains his ankle. It later turns out he was faking, and his acting is very unconvincing, but Elle is dumb enough to believe it. Marco’s a good dancer, but they’re reluctant to work together, so Lee tricks them, because deceit is cool. It’s never established exactly *why* Marco wants to do this. I guess he’s just horny for normie. She calls Noah - who is of course working out - and finally tells him about the earring she found.
He insists that he has no idea how it got there. She’s suspicious of him because of his past, which is unfair because while he was a player in the first movie, it’s never established that he’s been unfaithful to anyone. And it’s stunningly hypocritical of her not to trust him when the things she does with Marco are equally if not more suspicious. They end up spending a lot of time together preparing for the contest. Eventually going on what’s basically a date where they get closer and give each other bedroom eyes. The best thing about this scene, is how she talks about her suspicions about Noah and Chloe while at the same time enjoying a quasi-romantic moment with Don Juan here! All without a shred of irony or self-awareness! He basically says: “I’d never do that to you, m’lady!”. Then he pulls his guitar out of his ass and starts playing for her to get those panties *extra moist*. Elle discovers that Lee was faking his injury, and even though he did so in order to have an excuse to spend less time with Elle and more with Rachel, he doesn’t tell *her* that.
And being as fickle as a yo-yo, he continues to prioritise Elle over Rachel. Because he’s a dick. They go to the beach, and then this gay character who has no prior relationship with Elle (except for being her partner in a race that one time) confesses his feelings for their classmate, but he’s nervous about what his macho friends will think. “You really shouldn’t care what the guys think." “And you definitely shouldn’t let it stop you from being with someone that you like.” "Believe me, I know all about that, and it sucks.”. Oh, f*ck off! You did not just compare your experiences to those of a closeted gay man! Are you *trying* to make me hate you?! But we’re not supposed to hate her. That’s why this subplot exists! It has no impact on anything else that happens and could easily have been cut out without any consequences. These aren’t characters. They’re props.
And I can’t think of a more insulting use of a gay romance than to prop up a boring main protagonist and trick the audience into thinking that she’s a good person, when actually she’s a massive piece of sh*t! And her “you shouldn’t care what guys think!” message is so rich coming from someone who makes all of her life decisions based around what guys think.
Because this is a teen movie, of course there’s a massive Halloween party. Elle and Lee decided to go as the Ghostbusters, and because they’re both selfish twots they didn’t tell Rachel they’d changed their costume idea. Rachel finally blows up at Elle, because Lee didn’t tell her something that she really doesn’t need to be told. Because really, you don’t need much awareness to realise when you’re cockblocking this hard. Or clam-jamming in this case. Elle also takes the opportunity to share a slow dance with Marco. Argh, this dance is reminding me how slow this movie is! How do we still have an hour left, oh my god! Cue another montage to ill-fitting music as she drifts further away from Lee and Noah, and closer to Marco.
She realises that the earring was - in fact - Chloe’s.
And then she and Marco have another
Slow-motion romantic dance.
Now that I did not need to see….
They go to the Dance Dance competition - which is absolutely a real thing that happens in 2020. They do their thing, and of course sparks fly (just like in the last movie) and she decides to break the sexual tension. This is witnessed by Noah in the audience, and Lee watching at home. “Watch this, Lis. You can actually pinpoint the second when his heart breaks in half.” “Aaaaaaaaand now!”.
They win the competition, because of course they f*cking do. So she can’t catch up to Noah. And she leaves Marco hanging as well. But she decides to go to Thanksgiving dinner at the Flynn’s residence anyway. BEFORE TALKING TO NOAH! This girl must be addicted to cringe. “I know that you're upset, but-" "Seriously, Elle!" “Seriously, can you just talk to me, like I don’t know what’s going on!”. She told you to your face what the issue was! How can you say that with a straight face?! How are you such a moronic bint?! Lee confronts her, but not about her cheating on his brother on live TV in front of thousands of people. Oh, no! He’s angry because he discovered that she’s applying to Harvard.
Wow, wh- what an asshole…. And then because we gotta fit just a little bit more cringe in, Noah walks in with Chloe. Cue an awkward family dinner. Although from what I’ve been told, is how most Thanksgiving Dinners go, to be fair. “Why are you acting like I’m the one that did something wrong?” “Noah! You- You don’t want to go there right now!”. Why not? Are we not going to talk about this? Lee admits that he never told Elle to give him space, and Rachel finally has enough of his being a terrible boyfriend and breaks up with him. Good for her. She deserves so much better.
But the snarky conversation continues. Elle pulls out the earring as a GOTCHA! to Noah, still deflecting away from her own terrible behaviour. Then she storms out. And she’s meant to be the good person here?! She patches things up with Rachel. And Chloe tells Noah that she crashed in his bed once when he was out of town, and the earring must have fallen off then. WHY WOULD SHE NOT TELL HIM THAT EARLIER?! Like at the Thanksgiving Dinner? That would have been very helpful to your friend, you know! Molly Ringwald - who’s returned for the sequel and honestly looks worse the wear for it - tells Elle that she needs to listen. I mean, yeah. Duh….
But this enables her to very quickly and conveniently patch things up with Noah. Then at the Homecoming game, Lee gets voted Homecoming King, because of course he does. Noah and Marco have a battle of the jawlines. Noah almost punches him, but in the most significant character development we’ve seen in the franchise so far, he’s gone from being a violent douche to an almost-violent douche. Not gonna lie, I was really disappointed Just give me *something* fun… anything! Please…! And then, one hour and 45 minutes in, when the movie should already be f*cking over! The kissing booth finally makes its appearance.
They trick Lee and Rachel into kissing,
And i really hope i don’t have to tell you how messed up that is.
BUT THEY GET BACK TOGETHER AGAIN! WHY GIRL, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! YOU WERE DOING SO WELL! ERMAHGURD, EYM UN THE KURSUNG BURTH! This is also where the gay couple get together, with Elle getting the credit. I really can’t say it emphatically enough.
F*ck this movie! Marco shows up to talk to Elle, and she confesses that she has feelings for him. Now, I was actually hoping the movie would do the interesting thing, and - dare I say it - subvert my expectations, having Elle and Noah both realise they’re not right for each other and end up with new people with whom they have far better chemistry. But no, that would be too realistic and nuanced for these writers, so she runs off to be with Noah. Leaving Marco to be essentially f*cked, chucked, and cucked. She runs to the airport, where Chloe tells her that nothing is going on between her and Noah. And she suddenly now takes her word for it, because even what is character development?! Wait a minute… “That was some great timing, mate. At least they didn’t have a ‘rushing-through-the-airport’ scene.”. OH YOU MOTHERFU-.
Noah has gone after her, and they meet at the gazebo where they first got together. Minus the pervy groundskeeper, unfortunately. They take too many words to say that they’ve both been idiots, but it doesn’t matter anyway because we all know where this is f*cking going. The worst part though, is that she never once apologises for cheating on him in such a humiliating way. But then, why would we expect any different at this point? She completely rewrites her college admission essay, but it only gets her wait-listed to Berkeley and Harvard, while Lee got into the former. Okay, I can see this happening. She doesn’t actually get everything handed to her. This could actually go in an interesting direction.
After all, you can’t just write a mediocre essay and get accepted into Harva-. Lol joking! She actually got into both Berkeley and Harvard! ARE YOU F*CKING KIDDING ME?! YOU HAD A CHANCE, JUST A CHANCE, TO DO SOMETHING INTERESTING. AND YOU F*CKING BLEW IT! WHY DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING IN ALL THESE F*CKING MOVIES?! And in this essay, she says that she wants to *be* the qualities of the other characters, whom an admissions officer isn’t going to know or give a sh*t about! And she’s STILL defining herself based on other people, so she’s not really learned anything! And the essential conflict we’re left with at the end of the movie is in essence exactly the same as that in the first movie: between her feelings for Noah and her sense of obligation towards Lee.
So we’ve just come full circle and ended up going nowhere! And all this - of course - is meant to set up the sequel which has already been filmed in secret, and has been slated for a release next year. Dredd doesn't get a sequel and yet this piece of sh*t gets TWO?! WHY?! WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME, NETFLIX?! Did I f*ck your mother in a past life? Did I run over your dog and piss on its corpse?! Because of course *I’m* going to have to review this f*cking garbage, because that’s now my purpose in life! Thanks for the ad revenue I guess, you window-licking arseholes!… *groan*.
I think I’m going mad. What do you think, Cthulhu? *Garbled Cthulhu noises*. Yeah, yeah I think you’re right.
I should let the darkness consume me… “Honey! Let’s go, it’s time for your flattening.” “Yes, dear.”. Thanks for watching folks. If you enjoyed the article, give it a like and a share, and all that good stuff. If you want to support the channel, I’ve got brand new merch out to coincide with this article which you can pick up at bonfire.com/store/cynicalreviews. This design will only be available for a few weeks though, so get cracking. Alternatively, you can join these many fine individuals in pledging your support over on my Patreon page. Your contributions go a long way in helping these article get made, and becoming a Patron earns you early access to articles and a mention in the credits. I stream semi-regularly over on Twitch, so follow me on there if you’re interested in hanging out. Follow me on my social media and join my public Discord server to stay up to date, and I’ll see you in the next one...