There are movies that you know are gonna be fantastic. Then there are movies that you hope will be fantastic, but you have a sneaking suspicion Hollywood could really screw the pooch on this movie with little to no effort. I was definitely in the latter camp with Ted, but fortunately it’s a good-time film that will make Seth MacFarlane fans very happy and leave everyone else in the theater with a ton of off-color laughs. Does it kinda feel like a two hour live version of tv’s Family Guy? Well, yeah. But we’re talking about the story of a living, toking (no, I didn’t mean talking, though he does that too) teddy bear here, so that’s not a bad thing.
Picture this: a beautiful Christmas Day in Boston. Snow on the ground, kids bundled up tight against the cold, Patrick Stewart’s soothing Shakespearean voice narrating the festivities. And a little boy wishing on a Christmas star that his beloved teddy bear could be his living, breathing best friend forever. Ahh, Currier & Ives, right? Uh, back it up a sec. This is, after all, Seth MacFarlane’s Boston, so you know something’s coming. Sure enough, before you can say “isn’t that sweet?”, there’s a flurry of crude, made all the funnier by Stewart’s deadpan delivery. The crude, unapologetic humor only snowballs — taking a winter motif and running with it y’all — from there. As the years go by, little John Bennett and his pal Ted go from sweet playtime buddies to beer-n-bong bros. Cut to present day, and John’s girlfriend of 4 years wants John to grow up and not spend so much time (getting stoned) with Ted. Let’s see how far that gets her.
