Meet the What?????

I heard something sort of interesting today on the radio … go figure! Apparently, the movie “Meet the Spartans” was the number 1 grossing movie of the weekend in the U.S. How is this remotely possible? I’m pretty sure everybody knew that this movie was done by the guys who did “Epic Movie” and “Date Movie,” possibly two of the worst spoof movies since “Dracula, Dead and Loving It.”

There was a time in the early 1990’s when movie producers got lazy, and would green-light any spoof movie that featured Leslie Nielson (thanks to his success in the Naked Gun trilogy). Most of these spoofs were downright awful, and quite a few of them ended up going straight to video … which was probably for the best.

Movie companies decided to phase these movies out for a while – that is until Scary Movie came out. The first one was rather funny, if not totally disgusting. The second one, also produced by the Wayans brothers, was just disgusting and not funny (in fact, there really wasn’t a story line at all). The Zucker Brothers, legends with regards to spoof movies (more on them later), took over Scary Movie 3 and 4 – neither was a “classic,” but both were funny in their own right.

There was another movie in the early 2000’s called “Not Another Teen Movie,” which, in my opinion, is an absolutely fantastic spoof. An actually story? Check! Great movie spoofs woven into the movie without just being thrown in there? Check! No slow parts? Check! This movie spoofed over 25 teen flicks from the 80’s on – quite a feat in itself. However, unlike Date Movie and Epic Movie, the spoofs were totally relevant and actually added to the movie.

The Epic and Date Movie chain of movies seems to just throw a bunch of spoofs together without relying even a little bit on a plot. Plus, the spoofs are SO obvious, that they actually detract from the humor. I just can’t believe people are still going out to view this dreck.

How come nobody has taken the actual torch from the Zuckers and Mel Brooks and created incredible spoofs like Airplane, Top Secret, Naked Gun, Blazing Saddles, and Space Balls? Has the movie industry really gotten this lazy? I beg some bright young director to attempt to make a great quality spoof again … PLEASE!