(Full review available here.)

I didn’t like Zombieland. Except for you-know-who’s cameo, I thought it was derivative and unfunny, an uninspired recycling of other, better zombie movies. Plus a lot of it didn’t even make any fucking sense! Who’s that British guy doing the Hitchhiker’s Guide-style narrative intrusions? Who’s keeping score of the “kill of the week” in this post-apocalyptic wasteland? Nobody, that’s who! I call bullshit!

I have heard from others who feel similarly about Zombieland, yet it felt like everyone else liked it, which is why I periodically burst into righteous hate-flames like above when the topic comes up. Well, our side just got some pretty strong supporting evidence: the sucky failure that is 30 Minutes or Less.

Different writers, same deal: uninspired, unwitty, and un-capable of making me want to watch it ever again. Jesse Eisenberg and Aziz Ansari are funny together, yeah. But although director Ruben Fleischer showed a bit of style with Zombieland, 30 Minutes or Less is about as bland as it gets in visuals, framing, and pacing. It’s like if Judd Apatow made a movie except it wasn’t funny and it felt much longer than it was and all right, you can stop making jokes about Funny People already.

In my book, Fleischer is now 0-2. That’s a baseball metaphor meaning he blows. Well, not really. Any baseball player who goes 1-2 or better every day is the greatest baseball player of all time. But if he doesn’t improve soon, or attach himself to better writers next time, we could be looking at the M. Night Shyamalan of comedy directors–a successful debut leading to a long and crummy career.

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