Jackass Forever

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At the risk of sounding like a purist, Jackass Forever is one comeback too many. I’m aware that expecting purity from this franchise is akin to drawing blood from the proverbial stone, but even when taken on its own terms, it’s safe to say that there is no Jackass without Bam Margera and Ryan Dunn – just like there wouldn’t be any Jackass sans Johnny Knoxville or Steve-O. To its credit, JF doesn’t try to replace the irreplaceable, but it does attempt to fix what’s not broken by injecting ‘new blood’ into the cast (come to think of it, it's definitely broken, and it doesn't get fixed either). Thus, we get a new fat guy, even though the old fat guy is still around (and still round). Why? You already have a fat dude; you don’t need two fat dudes. Similarly, with the likes of Dave England, known for his ability – if one can call it that – to defecate on cue, what need is there for a Dave England-lookalike named Poopies? All of this makes as much sense as having another little person on set other than Wee Man – and again, I know that ‘sense’ doesn’t enter the equation here, but just because the performers are dumb enough to do what they do to themselves, it doesn’t mean that the fan base, among whose numbers I count myself, is too dumb to have its intelligence insulted. There is no point in introducing newcomers this late in the game, especially considering that, as JF makes abundantly clear, watching random strangers suffering grievous bodily harm isn’t all that funny; ironically, it’s much funnier when it happens to people you have come to know and actually like over the years – and even then the novelty has doubtless finally worn off (and it certainly had a damn good run); there is a lot more deja vu in the proceedings than there is nostalgia. All things considered, I was considerably more entertained by Knoxville’s match with Sami Zayn at Wrestlemania 38 than by Jackass Forever.