ive years after he neuralyzed Agent K (Jones), MIB Agent J (Smith) is on the beat in New York with the latest in a series of partners, Agent T (Patrick Warburton). After wrestling a giant subway-dwelling alien worm named Jeff, J takes T out for pie at a local diner. "Do you ever feel like you're alone in the universe?" J asks T. Then he neuralyzes him.
Meanwhile, a mysterious starship has landed in Central Park. A tiny plant stalk emerges and shoots tendrils out to probe the grass, touching on a Victoria's Secret catalog. Absorbing the information, the mass of tendrils morphs into the image of a black-clad model, Serleena (Boyle). She's immediately grabbed by a would-be mugger, who licks her face before dragging her behind the bushes. "You taste good," he sneers. Then he screams as Serleena consumes him. "So do you," she says.
Back at headquarters, MIB boss Zed (Rip Torn) tells J that he's got to stop neuralyzing his partners, or they're going to run out of agents. He assigns Frank the Pug as his temporary partner until another agent can be assigned.
Serleena tracks down an alien whose two heads are named Scrad and Charlie (Johnny Knoxville). "I got your message," she says. "Where's the light?"
Nearby, Laura Vasquez (Dawson) has just received the employee-of-the-week plaque from her boss at a pizza parlor. Vasquez goes into the back room just as Serleena and her sidekick enter. Vasquez watches in horror as Serleena grabs the pizza-parlor owner, interrogates him, then zaps him into oblivion.
Agent J and Frank arrive on the scene to investigate the pizza owner's murder. Vasquez explains it all to J, who hesitates to neuralyze her as required.
Back at MIB headquarters, Serleena has arrived, seeking the Light of Zartha. It seems that 25 years earlier, the Zarthans came to Earth, seeking to hide the Light from Serleena and the Kylothians. The MIBs supposedly refused, telling the Zarthans that they could not be drawn into an interstellar conflict. But Serleena has learned that the MIBs back then may have lied, and she's back for vengeance.
After Serleena attacks MIB headquarters, the place is locked down. Agent J realizes that the only man with the answer to the Light of Zartha mystery—and hence the fate of the Earth—is Agent K, who has forgotten everything he knew and is now a postal worker in Massachusetts.
Invasion of the humor snatchers
When the first Men in Black opened in 1997, it landed in movie theaters like a UFO that had flown in under the radar, a dazzling delight that came out of nowhere. A sequel seemed a sure thing in the wake of its huge box-office success, but financial dogfights delayed production until now. Five years later, the universe of movies has morphed. Sadly, the Men in Black world has not kept up.
Reuniting most of the original cast with newcomers Boyle and Knoxville, Men in Black II tries to recapture the original film's mixture of SF thrills and out-of-this-world humor. But Sonnenfeld, working from Galaxy Quest writer Gordon's story, has made the mistake of thinking that he can do this by simply revisiting the same characters, scenes and jokes that made the first movie original. The result is a movie that feels flat, perfunctory and as mechanical as a Kylothian star cruiser.
Oh sure, there's a lot of new stuff: new villain, new aliens, new vehicles, yadda yadda. But the movie plays like a greatest-hits compilation of MIB shtick. Like Frank the Pug? Here's Frank the Pug singing. Like the Worm Guys? Here's the Worm Guys in their swinging bachelor pad. Like it when Jeebs gets his head blown off? Let's blow it off again and again. Like the souped-up black Ford LTD? How about a souped-up black Mercedes that flies!
The movie also misses the point about what made Smith and Jones so charmingly mismatched in the first movie. In that film, Smith was our surrogate, the innocent whose eyes were opened to the reality of the world, guided by the world-weary agent who'd seen it all and more. MIB II tries to flip that around, with Smith the cynical vet and Jones the newly awakened innocent, and that plays out all wrong and undermines each actor's particular gifts. Smith, the streetwise smart aleck, is instead irritable and lonely; Jones, the master of deadpan, just seems old and sleepy. Dawson is appealing but underused, and she's no Linda Fiorentino, whose smoky spunkiness is sorely missed.
