Ted (2012) Review by Zach Maynard

I didn't think that I was going to see Ted until about 2 hours before the showtime. My friends invited me to go see it with them at the newly constructed Regal Cinemas 12 theater at the Waugh Chapel center in Crofton. During the first four days before officially opening (September 10th-13th), the theater was showing films from early 2012 and mid to late 2011, and the tickets were only $2 a piece with the profits going to a different charity each day (on the day I went, 9/11, the proceeds were going to boy scouts of America). 

What I'm basically trying to say is that I went into this film nearly completely clean, which rarely happens with me. I had heard mixed reviews of the film when it released in June, but I wasn't very interested in seeing it in the first place. So I was both surprised and disappointed with Ted when I walked out of it.

Ted is helmed by Family Guy creator Seth Macfarlane; not only did he make his directorial debut with this film, he voiced the title character, Ted, a teddy bear brought to life by his lifetime friend and owner's Christmas wish. I can appreciate how the film handles this out-there storyline in a realistic way. It presents the idea that a talking teddy bear would go through the fame and fortune but eventually end up as a faded celebrity after awhile, and I quite enjoyed this.

The film is quite funny and made me laugh (and it takes a lot from a comedy to make me laugh). It deftly balances gross-out gags and smartly written humor while simultaneously handling character development and characterization. Yet I found the story to be quite forgetable. It serves only to lay a foundation for the humor. The film also feels very much like a Family Guy episode; this is understable considering that Seth Macfarlane is the creator of Family Guy, but the layout doesn't work for a film. Pointless cutaways to things that have nothing to do with the story might be funny, but they're complete throwaways when you really think about it. That being said, if you like Family Guy, then you might just enjoy this film. I, however, found it to be just a slightly entertaining comedy with a poorly told story that seemed sloppily put togehter.

For these reasons, I give Ted a 5.5/10.