Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on January 2013

Seven-year-old Johnny’s wish that his big teddy bear would come to life and be his best friend comes true. Twenty-seven years later, John (Mark Wahlberg) and the amusingly foul-mouthed Ted are content slacker roommates, but long-suffering girlfriend (a criminally underused Mila Kunis) finally says Ted goes or she does. There are some great laughs in this one-joke movie, mostly in the first 30 minutes. The rest of the film tapers off into odd subplots and obvious padding (there’s even a chase scene) to stretch to feature length what would have worked better as a 22-minute television show. Seth MacFarlane, whose brand of incongruity-based humor will be familiar to fans of TV’s Family Guy, serves as producer, director and writer—and he even voices Ted. But it’s completely unoriginal. Take away the talking teddy, and this is pretty standard gross-out material, no matter how you stuff it. Bottom line: For a juvenile interspecies bromantic comedy about a racist, misogynist, homophobic, pot-smoking, beer-swilling, anatomically incomplete and frequently flatulent teddy bear, heavy on warmed-over pop-culture references, it’s not bad. You will best enjoy this if you are an active member of a fraternity. NOT for kids.