Ted

Director: Seth McFarlane
Writer: Seth McFarlane
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, Seth McFarlane

An impromptu trip to the cinema last week saw me watching, and being extremely entertained by, this summer's biggest comedy, Ted.

The first feature film from Family Guy creator, Seth McFarlane, was thankfully not as close to his brash and in-your-face TV show as expected. A few moments were slightly tedious such as a five minute fight between Wahlberg and his talking teddy bear, reminiscent of that ridiculous chicken fight in the show (my brothers continue to find that hilarious) , as well as the party with Sam “Flash Gordon" Jones. As a British teenager, this character meant nothing to me and seemed to please the film-makers more than an international audience.

Many gags were great though: jokes about pop culture (“...whether you're Frankie Muniz, Miley Cyrus, Justin Bieber or a talking teddy bear, eventually nobody gives a shit"), amusing lines from the narrator (Patrick Stewart) a few shock laughs about 9/11 showed McFarlane was the writer but this film was more silly than offensive.

Mark Wahlberg was an impressive comedic lead, a highlight being the reeling off of white-trash American girl names (“Wait; was it any of those names with a “Lynn" after it?"). As a reasonably frequent viewer of Family Guy, I found the voice of Peter Griffin to be a little too present in Ted's speech. Though they made a joke about it, I would have preferred it if McFarlane had created a new voice for this character.

Though not a flawless comedy, I hadn't laughed that much in the cinema since The Hangover or Bridesmaids and compared to the trailers for other upcoming American comedies including “The Watch" and “That's My Boy", this definitely seems the best of the bunch.

7/10