Ed Helms has struck comedy gold. He’s done it on the small screen (The Office) and the big (Hangover), and while his name recognition is fairly high, he has yet to cement any sort of leading man status. This has left him to pick up slack in some pretty dreary films (we’re looking mostly at you, We’re The Millers). But now he’s getting a crack at leading his own ensemble in Vacation, a re-boot of the National Lampoon classic.

From the looks of the first trailer, Vacation promises a pretty straight forward plot to make room for the hijinks that are sure to come: Rusty Griswold (Helms) is all grown up and looking to recreate some of the good ol’ family bonding time that his father, Clark (once again reprised by Chevy Chase) managed to create on their long-past road trip to the infamous Walley World.

Vacation is the directorial debut of John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein (the writing duo behind Horrible Bosses and The Incredible Burt Wonderstone), which is reason enough to instill some hesitation. But hopefully the stacked supporting cast behind Helms and Chase will make up for it: Christina Applegate, Leslie Mann, Chris Hemsworth, Charlie Day, Nick Kroll, Keegan-Michael Key and many others are promised to pop up.

So, while we’ve never heard anyone out in the streets calling for more Griswold films, it’s a property with some potentially pre-established fans. And if the first red band trailer is any indication, it doesn’t look to change up the formula too much. We do like Helms, so we’d love to see this surprise us. Vacation hits the road on July 31st.

Vacation Red Band Trailer

It’s a given that children’s movies will fall into certain plot paths. Characters and story devices are often obvious; themes and lessons are overly sentimental. Given the right mix of well-placed maturity throughout, this doesn’t have to mean a children’s movie feels “dumb.” Pixar has been doing it right for years. Dreamworks has started catching on with How to Train Your Dragon. Twentieth Century Fox has mostly stuck to animal films, and Reel FX Animation has hardly produced anything, but the two companies are certainly branching out with their latest, The Book of Life. Full of some vibrant and excellent animation, fraught with detail, the film gives some much overdue appreciation and attention to Latino culture. But the film is limited in its innovation, leaning heavily on its imagery while being weighed down by stock children’s cartoon characters with Mexican accents (though not even consistently).

Produced by Guillermo del Toro and directed by feature first-timer Jorge Gutierrez, The Book of Life tells the story of La Muerte (Kate del Castillo) and Xibalba (Ron Perlman), the rulers of the Land of the Remembered and the Land of the Forgotten respectively, who make a wager regarding three children: empathetic and quick-witted Maria (Zoe Saldana), musically inclined Manolo (Diego Luna), and the heroic and orphaned Joaquin (Channing Tatum). Separated at a young age when Maria is sent off to boarding school in Spain, Manolo grows into a sentimental musician forced into the family business of bullfighting, while Joaquin — aided by a magical pin the sneaky Xibalba gave him ensuring he can’t be hurt — becomes a prized soldier like his general father before him. Maria returns all grown up and the wager for which of the men will win Maria begins. But Xibalba doesn’t play fair, and when Maria begins to fall for the crooning Manolo (women are so predictable) he sends his venomous snake to do away with Manolo. This sends Manolo on an adventure among the dead, determined to reunite with Maria.

In a somewhat telling parallel, the film’s story is told by a museum tour guide to a group of unruly white kids. This isn’t the only way Mexican director Gutierrez panders, working in many recognizable Mexican elements (churros, moustaches, mariachi) almost as if to soften the heavier subject of the Mexican view of death to white audiences. It wouldn’t be so bad except that the script meanders and fails in its likability to make up for such things.

The love triangle is generic, with very little motivation behind the men’s competition other than their view of Maria as a muse (Manolo) or a prize (Joaquin). And while she asserts herself, Maria’s feminist stance is barebones and rather moot in the face of almost no character development. Instead generic themes erupt as if trying to fill some sort of quota — teamwork wins, love prevails, good conquers evil, death is not the end, friendship is greater than or equal to love, etc. They’re all there, but none of them really stick. And when about 8 new characters are introduced in the second half of the film, there is just too much going on for there to be real connectedness to anyone.

The puppet style of the characters, with their hinged limbs, is an interesting animation choice, but doesn’t necessarily tie in to Día de Muertos directly. Overall the abundance of detail can be somewhat feverish and points to a director whose background lies primarily within animation. The sunset coloring is at first striking, and then numbing. It is undeniably skillful, but some restraint may have made it that much more impressive.

The Book of Life is overstimulating, holding all its energy in its colors and the constant action of its characters, but when broken down, while everyone is doing so much, there are almost no moments of originality or chances for emotional affinity. I can’t decide if Gutierrez and co-writer Douglas Langdale underestimate children’s ability to notice when clichés are being thrown at them, or if there was some sort of self-doubt that accounts for their over saturation of trite techniques in the film. Given so much to look at and experience, the film ends up offering very little, even when it seems obvious real talent lies behind the effort.

It’s been nearly a decade since Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy introduced Will Ferrell and director Adam McKay’s (then a newcomer) absurdist brand of humor to the masses, a brand of humor that earned the film the biggest cult following for a comedy since perhaps Caddyshack and lived on in McKay’s subsequent (mildly less successful) films Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, Step Brothers, and The Other Guys (all starring Ferrell). In Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, McKay and his now-way-more-famous cast return with a bigger, broader, less memorable chapter in Burgundy’s story. The laughs still hit hard (I was bowled over quite frequently) and the wonderful cast is as sharp and witty as ever, but multiple, needlessly inflated, disposable plotlines drag the film down, and the novelty of McKay’s unfettered randomness has all but worn off in the last ten years.

It’s 1980, and happily married newscasters Ron Burgundy (Ferrell) and Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate, as beautiful and quick as ever) arrive at an impasse when Veronica beats Ron out for a coveted position at the news station and their boss (Harrison Ford) rips Ron’s job away (in Ford’s signature callous growl). Brimming with jealous rage, Ron leaves his wife and son (one of the worst child actors I’ve seen this year) and tracks down his old news crew to start a new career path at GNN, a news network in New York, where they help to pioneer a revolutionary concept called “24-hour news” (yuck yuck).

Returning are Steve Carrell as weatherman Brick Tamland, an extreme representation of McKay’s affinity for random dialog; Paul Rudd as reporter Brian Fantana, the embodiment of faux, cologne-collector machismo; and David Koechner as sportscaster Champ Kind, an ambiguously rape-y pervert with a hilariously uncomfortable affection for Ron (long, dick-to-dick hugs). Ron and his brigade are met with fierce hostility in New York, dished out by rival hot-shot anchor Jack Lime (James Marsden, surprisingly very funny) and their alpha-female station manager (Meagan Good). With everything stacked against him (including a miserable 2am time slot), Ron stands stubbornly determined to out-career Veronica, and finds his path to success in the form of the trashy, nothing-news we’re now oh-so familiar with in 2013 (in a stroke of “brilliance”, Ron reports on a car chase and sticks with the pursuit until the perp is caught, earning him sky-high ratings).

The satire is half-baked, laid on thick, and isn’t handled with nearly the deftness of the small, zingy, hyperbolic moments Anchorman is adored for. Narratively, the movie is a mess, with a tangle of plots and sub-plots that are so conventional and uninteresting that they bog down the film’s free-flowing, improv-is-king spirit. Veronica finds a new man (Greg Kinnear); Ron’s career focus has made him an absentee father; Brick’s found a love interest (Kristen Wiig, who merely mimics Carrell’s character, disappointingly); Ron’s success gets to his head and shuns his friends; etc. It all feels too conventional and schematic, and McKay spends an inordinate amount of time fleshing these story lines out, when all we really want to see are the gags. The crowded narrative feels restrictive, barring the talent from letting loose as much as they want to.

The good news is (yes, I said it!), the funnies are as tangential, out-of-left-field, and irreverent as the first film’s, if not more. You won’t find many über-repeatable one-liners here, but there are some scenes that absolutely kill. In perhaps the most interesting narrative thread in the film (really), Ron and his family befriend a shark named Doby and sing a 2-minute-long tribute musical number in his honor that had me rumbling so hard my throat was on fire (no one else in the theater found it as found it as funny, but hey…different strokes). McKay’s sense of timing is excellent; in one scene, Ron and his team begin laughing uproariously at a throwaway joke, and then McKay awkwardly cuts–right in the middle of their guffawing–to them standing in utter silence. Again, it’s an unquotable moment, but it’s funny as hell.

McKay takes the most bizarre, out-there scene from the first film–the incredible news anchor gang fight–and recycles it here (with the expected parade of super-celeb cameos). What’s fascinating is, now that we’re so familiarized with McKay’s comedic style, the scene feels safe, redundant, unsurprising, and dull, though it still has baseline entertainment value. I wouldn’t say Anchorman 2 is an unnecessary sequel–it’s still a lot of fun to watch these guys flex their comedic muscles–but it simply doesn’t measure up to the legendary (yes…I said it!) stature of its predecessor. Unfortunately, if this sequel is an indication of a downward trend in quality for the franchise, the forecast for Ron Burgundy’s future (okay, now I’m just being stupid) looks pretty cloudy (sorry).