Daddy’s Home is the kind of movie that gets made when people with money completely run out of ideas. Acknowledging the natural rivalry between fathers and step-fathers, Daddy’s Home chose the professional wrestling route, where no adult behavior can found despite two men desperately in need of being one. After all, there are children of divorced parents around. Why nurture them when you can buy them?
I know. I know. It’s a comedy. Ok, so tell me — how is it funny that ex-husband Dusty (Marky Mark) reacts soooooo negatively to the thought his wife Sara (Linda Cardellini) remarrying, he races “home” in an attempt to destroy the relationship? Consequently, how is it funny that milquetoast step-father Brad (Will Ferrell) is so threatened by Harley-ridin’ Dusty’s manliness that he acts like a complete jackass for the entire time Dusty is present? There’s just no gold in these mines. In digging for the big score, we are treated to subplots of Dusty spending $18k on basketball tickets to win the love of his step-children and going to a fertility clinic on the prompt of the ex- to win the love of his wife. Good God, man, why did she marry you? Why she marry either of you?
There are no boundaries in Daddy’s Home … and none encouraged. Dusty not only invites himself back to home doesn’t live in, he brings a guest (Hannibal Buress – great name) … a guest specifically intended to humiliate Brad as Brad was bullied into firing that particular man from a drywall repair job earlier that day … a drywall in need of 
repair because Brad was taunted into displaying skills he does not have … because Dusty made fatherhood a competition the minute he heard Sara had remarried … and Brad is the world’s biggest tool. Sigh. So.much.wrong.
So what’s the message here? “Make sure your first husband is a dud?” “Antagonize a potentially bitter relationship?” “The ex- is encouraged to pit himself against his replacement at all times?” This could quite easily have been a bottom 10 film. What keeps it from the bottom 10? Three things:
- The leads are all very likeable. Inside this bad script are three genuinely good-natured people. If it gets angry and ugly; if there’s screaming and punching among Ferrell, Wahlberg and Cardellini, this is a bottom 10 film.
- Unlike Adam Sandler, Will Ferrell is good for at least one laugh-out-loud outrageous moment per film, and the halftime court shot scene fills this quota.
- There’s a hilarious in-joke from Trainwreck in the very last scene in the film. I hate to have Trainwreck fans have to go so far, but if you’ve seen Trainwreck and you’re determined to give this one a chance, do stay to the bitter end.
Thomas Haden Church has a nice role as Brad’s bad-advice giving boss. Huh. Are there Thomas Haden Church fans? People that gotta come see when he has a film out? Hope this does it for both of you, because it sure didn’t for me.
Dusty and Brad share a connection
In battling for their children’s affection
Evolutionary speaking
In bad need of tweaking
Death by plot or natural selection?
Rated PG-13, 96 Minutes
D: Sean Anders
W: Brian Burns, Sean Anders & John Morris
Genre: Idiot rivalries
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Sadists
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Step-dads
