The original was a pleasant surprise to me, as I found myself laughing out loud multiple times. It had some clever writing and scenarios that really made one laugh.

This one...where to start. I almost turned it off in the first 20 minutes. The whole beginning of the movie is little more than "let's scream the F word as loud as possible over and over" and "let's say private things out loud." If you find that funny, you may like it more than I did, but I found it incredibly lazy and just not humorous.

Luckily, it -does- get slightly better after that. There are some mildly funny scenes in it, but the writing just isn't there this time. Don't go in expecting the original, or you'll be let down pretty hard.

I don't get the negative reviews for this sequel. I agree that the first movie was better and funnier but this sequel is certainly not bad. My wife and I enjoyed this new adventure of the two completely different couples. This time in The Caribbean although filmed completely in Hawaii. Lil Rel Howery as Marcus, Yvonne Orji as Emily, John Cena as Ron and Meredith Hagner as Kyla, all did a good job again. This time they added Steve Buscemi as the father to the cast and watching him is always good. Like said before the sequel is slightly lesser good than the first movie but that's almost always the case if you think about it. Good easy entertainment.

I genuinely enjoyed the 2021 movie "Vacation Friends", and when I had the chance to sit down and watch the 2023 sequel "Vacation Friends 2", of course I did so.

However, I have to say that writer and director Clay Tarver delivered a lukewarm sequel here. The script and storyline for "Vacation Friends 2" was generally devoid of the funny and outrageous situations that were in the first movie. And the script felt rather mundane and bland, and I was hardly brought to laughter throughout the course of the 106 minutes that the movie ran for.

The acting performances in "Vacation Friends 2" were fair, and it was nice to see John Cena, Lil Rel Howery, Meredith Hagner and Yvonne Orji return to reprise their characters in the sequel. It was really good to see Steve Buscemi in the movie, though his talent was just not utilized to any great accomplishment in "Vacation Friends 2", which was a shame. And it was certainly also nice to see Carlos Santos on the cast list.

So I found "Vacation Friends 2" to be somewhat of a disappointing viewing experience. And it is hardly a movie that I will be picking up a second time, simply because it was lacking the comedy appeal of the 2021 movie.

My rating of "Vacation Friends 2" lands on a very bland five out of ten stars.