10 Surprisingly Great Movies From Summer 2016

9. Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising

Star Trek Beyond Pete S Dragon Lights Out
Universal Pictures

What We Expected: A near-pointless sequel made solely to line the pockets of those involved, lazily rehashing the original premise to highly diminished returns just as happened with the wildly unnecessary Hangover sequels.

What We Got: More 22 Jump Street than The Hangover Part II, Sorority Rising exhibits enough self-awareness to one-up the original's premise by introducing a rowdy band of sorority girls (led by Chloë Grace Moretz) and laying a welcome feminist twist on top of the frat house comedy formula.

There are some absolutely killer gags here (especially one about Jews and ovens), it moves the original's characters on in an interesting and entertaining way, introduces a new host of hell-raisers, and at least matches if not betters the first film. What more could you want from a comedy sequel that sounded so transparently lazy from the outset?

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Contributor

Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.