Spinal Tap II: The End Continues

Spinal Tap II: The End Continues (2025)

66% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 134 reviews) 

Runtime: 84 minutes

Directed by: Rob Reiner

Starring: The gang from the first film, plus many others, including mostly pointless cameos

From: Bleecker Street

I’d rather discuss other things rather than this movie. Now I’ll mention that I made it back home to Florida fine-albeit, a long flight delay meant that stepping foot at home didn’t occur until after 3AM! It was still better than my flight back last December; I suffered the worst case of food poisoning in my life and it wasn’t a pretty sight-no, I didn’t have the grilled halibut. I’ll mention some details concerning the trip to Kansas at the end of the review, for anyone that cares. Now, it’s the time to mention that while Spinal Tap the band hasn’t been seen by me elsewhere aside from the 1984 original movie, that original movie is great-a droll mockumentary so authentic to the irrationality of a successful rock band, several acts before and after 1984 thought the movie was about them. A sequel would have been created much sooner, if not for rights issues that took three full decades (!) to resolve.

That’s why I’m especially disappointed that the film mostly missed the mark for me. The idea of a band reuniting for one last concert is a fine one, & rock and roll bands have had feuding members for the better part of the last 70 years. As stated often by me, comedy is the most subjective of genres-while II contained some chuckles, the majority of the humor just did not entertain me. Some of the potential even felt squandered. What sank the movie for me was the music producer character who based on his name was a spoof of Simon Cowell. This film’s Simon was a dumb and not funny caricature of a music producer; I loathed that character.

Furthermore, the references to such modern-day aspects as cryptocurrency and K-Pop felt like senior citizens addressing those topics—that means “not cool.” This is a modern movie trope I haven’t mentioned yet, but only due to my avoidance of such films: a conflict, whether it’s built up throughout or suddenly begins, is resolved quickly and felt superfluous. Sadly, that occurred here. AND, the onslaught of cameos from famous musicians mostly felt pointless.

To reiterate, some chuckles were present and the catchy tunes (whether old or new) were nice. As a whole, though, The End Continues sadly does not go to 11-apologies for the low-hanging fruit of a joke that might may be look like a hack. In fact, I’d rather smell the glove than ever watch this again, while the OG effort will forever be rewatchable.

As for the annual sojourn to Kansas, as always it was nice to see my sister & her family, even if all three of my nephews are a handful. The ability to drive a car out there this time meant that a few interesting locations were visited along the way, not just in Kansas. Getting to see a cleaning robot (w/ cute face) at a Quik Trip gas station was neat, and stumbling across a Golden Chick restaurant was unexpected-it is a small chain based in Texas which has an outpost in Wichita. Visiting a Jack in a Box and Whataburger was rare… even if the former is opening an outpost in Orlando and the latter might return to Central Florida.

However, a Holy Grail place was visited in Dallas: In-N-Out! Somehow, one had never been visited before in my almost 45 years on this planet. After the hope for years that one would be had: the fries were good (as long as they aren’t cold) and the pink lemonade was good… but the burger was quite tasty. That does help demonstrate why the chain is so beloved, even if I still do get why some find the onslaught of praise through the decades at least a bit overwrought. All the fun and travel the past 3 weeks aside, I’m happy for a return to normalcy for at least the rest of 2025.