I have a lot of misplaced affection for Beavis and Butt-Head. Dumb as a box of rocks satire of some of the people I grew up with (Butt-Head’s laugh is very familiar to me). So I was super-chuffed when I saw their new movie pop up on Paramount+ (“huh huh… he said mount.”).

Beavis and Butt-Head Do The Universe takes our heroes into space in 1998 aboard the space shuttle, sure they’ll finally score with the lady captain of the mission. After a series of clearly witty and erudite adventures, they fall into a black hole (“he said hole”) and find themselves back on Earth in 2022. Pursued by confused federal agents, the duo try to find their way back to the astronaut…. to score.

I’d be lying if I said this movie didn’t make me laugh more than anything else I’ve seen this year. I’d also be lying if I said it was consistently funny enough to rate a higher score. Unfortunately, I think it runs a solid twenty minutes too long and the boner jokes start to slip and the conceit of them time travelling is never fully realized.

I mean, the movie makes some very funny jokes about Siri and smart phones in general and the risk of teaching idiots about white privilege… but they just didn’t take their gags far enough. I mean, why not have these guys sit in front of modern MTV and figure out slowly there are no more music videos. Or, hey, find their way to YouTube or the internet in general. Imagine their heads exploding when they find pornhub.

But, hey, what they did include was pretty dang funny… assuming the same jokes repeated to the point it becomes funny again works for you. I mean, the movie is one long boner joke… but that’s what Beavis and Butt-Head are all about. That either tickles your inner 12 year old or it doesn’t.

Good flick though, in general. Wish it had been a little tighter written with better take-downs of life in the 2020s… but it still worked pretty well.

Score: 84