solidgameboy12-1 I think over a thousand years from now, the people of that time will look back at the history of spoof films, we will find an overabundance of parody films from January 1, 2000 to December 31, 2009, and perhaps most of humanity will look at that decade as the poorest excuses for Parody films.However, in the event that the internet still exists in the future, I hope some people find this review to help them sift through the mountains of waste in the Spoof film genre, and one of those rare few movies would be "The Comebacks".The Comebacks stars David Koechner (Perhaps most remembered from Anchorman) as Coach Lambeau Fields, a man whose history of poor coaching have earned him the title of "Worst Coach", causing some of the major blunders in sports history (I'm glad Bill Buckner wasn't spared from a joke). After years of failure, an old coach buddy, Freddie Wiseman (Played by none other than Carl Weathers) tells him of a sports team in desperate need of a coach.Well, it wouldn't be a movie without this plot point being fulfilled, now would it? Coach Fields takes up the team for hopefully his first real chance at coaching a winning team. Everything after this becomes parody fodder shortly thereafter.With Parody films, it is hard to judge the movie, considering how much of the parodies and jokes you end up giving away in the review. This movie suffers from that, so I'll do the best I can from here.The movie plays on a lot of tried and true clichés from sports movies, some in situation (An oddly disturbing yet hilarious scene from a character Aceel Tare, whose name gets mispronounced as ACL Tear, provides the "Best player getting injured" Cliché), or in reference (A football team is called "Friday Night Lights") and for the most part, it becomes hit and miss.However, the problem with most parody films is simply this: Some gags are drawn out to death. One gag in the movie is that a team is called "The Trojans", and they reference Condoms (Product Placement at its finest) and Coach Fields then makes a remark obviously making sex talk about the team. The joke was the team and its name, no need to make intercourse jokes after, it becomes 15 seconds too long and boring, then its called a bad joke.There is also a lot of filler in this movie, none to make the story work, just to make it nearly an hour and a half so you felt like you watched a movie and not an episode of MadTV starring the actors who couldn't cut it.However, despite all its negatives, it does have its funny parts, the problem is that they aren't fast enough or strong enough to work. This movie would have worked at an hour, just by cutting out all the filler, all the overstretched jokes and probably a minute and a half of the musical number (Oh, I didn't mention the cast sings "Don't Stop Believin" by Journey because it's a staple of sport films, or that the writers ran out of ideas).Is it funnier than most parody movies? Yes. Is it the greatest parody movie? Not by a long shot. Watch it on TV. It doesn't hurt like "Meet The Spartans" or "Epic Movie" (Which both rank a "1" and "3" from me, respectively) but there could have been a lot worse about it.5/10

Lilith Hexus Do all spoof films require pure stupidity and a lack of ANY sort of intelligence whatsoever to the humour? Is there even just a single genuinely FUNNY parody film anymore? All I see are zero-quality films that look like a couple stoned high school students got bored one day with a video camera. These movies are not funny, they're not clever, they're not entertaining, they're just useless in every conceivable way.The Comebacks was a movie that tried to hide its hideous level of trash by not calling itself "Sports Movie". It's the same thing, though. There are a few different writers for these films, the Wayans did some, Freidberg and Seltzer did some others, and I'm sure there's another pair. I can't even tell the difference in direction or humour to be honest, it all seems like the same people wrote and directed them. I can't tell if the Comebacks was done by the people who did Scary Movie or the guys who did Epic Movie, or someone else, it's just the same jokes from all the others.If you have ANY shred of taste or value for humour, don't see this movie. If you have self-worth, don't bother seeing it. If you have ANY respect for film making, don't even consider watching it. Don't see it in any broke down, derelict theatre that may still carry it, don't rent it, don't order it on Netflix or Pay-Per-View, don't Redbox it, and don't even watch it for free on OD. Avoid it like the plague.The only conceivable reasons I can see to watch this film are as follows.A. Masochism. If you like torturing yourself, there's very few better ways. B. Seeing a prime example of why to avoid ANYTHING that says "Fox Atomic". C. You're being paid considerably high amounts of cash.I really would not watch the entire thing if someone offered me $100 to do it. It's just mindless, mental collapsing torment.You might as well watch Zohan.

Tommy Nelson With so many horrible spoof movies, this is sadly a breath of fresh air to the genre. Compared to classics like Airplane or the Naked Gun, this is awful, but compared to recent spoof movies like Meet the Spartans and Disaster Movie, this is very clever and original. Don't get me wrong, though, this was not a good movie in any way. I laughed a few times, and there are a few inspired gags, but any pop culture reference falls flat on it's face, as does most jokes in the movie.Lambeau Fields (David Koechner) was a bad coach in the past, but now he's brought back to teach college football, and this time he'll do a good job. His wife (Melora Hardin) is feeling distant from him and his daughter is dating a football big shot to spite her father. Spoofs of various recent movies come into play, as do a lot of sight gags and nonstop stupidity.The best parts of the movie are the gags not relying on reference to recent movies. Spoofs of Radio, Rocky, Dodgeball, Friday Night Lights, Invincible and many other sports movies are not funny in the least. It's mainly the smaller gags that get a few laughs, like a bizarre crotch scratching scene, or a chewing tobacco spitting joke. These little throwaway giggles cannot carry the movie, and by the end, it's hard to watch. The last 20 minutes are grueling to sit through.The characters are surprisingly developed for a sports spoof movie, however, I'm sure the characters were built on clichés from the genre. Nonetheless, they're not too bad. David Koechner can pull lead actor in a movie off. Too bad they gave him so much crummy material to work with. Matthew Lawerence has fine comedic timing in a not always so comedic role as a ballet dancing football player with a cross dressing father. Carl Weathers rounds off the cast, once again playing in a sub-par sports movie (Not the Rocky movies...Happy Gilmore!) Overall, this is a goofy comedy. At times, it's funny, but more often than not, it's just very annoying and predictable.My rating: * 1/2 out of ****. 90 mins. PG-13 for language, sexual humor and drug humor.

moviewizguy A comedy that spoofs the inspirational sports movies, The Comebacks tells the story of an out-of-luck coach, Lambeau Fields, who takes a rag-tag bunch of college misfits and drives them towards the football championships. In the process, this life-long loser discovers that he is a winner after all by redeeming himself, saving his relationship with his family and friends, and finding that there is indeed, no "I" in "team"!I decided to watch the unrated version for this film. It was thirty minutes longer and I though it may be better than the theatrical release, hearing that people hated this movie. After all, thirty minutes of extra footage can add a whole lot to a movie. Well, I certainly was wrong. It was as bad as the recent "Meet the Spartans" but it was thirty minutes more of torture!Seriously, who makes a close to two hour spoof movie?! A spoof movie is short because if it goes any longer, it would be overkill! Honestly, I love stupid comedies. Heck, I liked "Date Movie," "White Chicks," "Epic Movie," and "Little Man"! I guess when it comes to spoof movies, it is either a hit or miss and this one definitely missed.On the lighter side, from the many jokes in this film, I will say about six or seven made me laugh, even some that made me laugh out loud. But that's not saying much. Following those jokes were more scenes of torture and unfunniness.I can't see how people would say this is not a terrible spoof film. In fact, there is as much product placement in here like Meet the Spartans, there are as many dance sequences, and unfunny jokes. I will say another thing I like about this movie is the songs. They are some very good songs in here. Overall, watch it if you like spoof films. Skip it if you like funny films.