Family Guy and American Dad! creator Seth MacFarlane throws himself into his first feature film with Ted, a film exploring the relationship between a 35-year-old man (Mark Wahlberg), his anthropomorphic childhood teddy bear, and his increasingly frustrated girlfriend (Mila Kunis).
With MacFarlane writing, directing, producing, and providing both the voice and motion capture acting for his eponymous stuffed bear, his influence is smeared across the screen like a helicopter parent smears sunscreen on their redheaded child. The result is the same: it’s sad to look at, and you feel a little embarrassed on the film’s behalf.
Take for example Ted’s Boston setting, which is completely irrelevant to the story except to allow MacFarlane to selfishly revel in pride of his native New England. The result is spending two hours watching Mark Wahlberg spout a horrible exaggeration to his natural Bostonian accent that makes you wonder if he might have something stuck up his nose.
To add further insult, the humour just isn’t supplied with anywhere near the frequency or the potency of an episode of Family Guy, resulting in a disappointingly pedestrian affair.
Ted is a vehicle for Seth MacFarlane, as both comedic celebrity and egotist, and nothing more. For ardent fans of his work only.
Two stars.
