Well this was far from what I expected. I didn't expect to be crying from laughter, but I did expect a more mature comedy. This was more of a teen comedy, but the leads were the adults instead of the teens. The movie takes place on Senior Prank Day, so immature comedy is a given. But the penis jokes were endless, and I never could get into Jillian Bell's character's obsession with having sex with high schoolers when they turn 18. And Tracy Morgan was, well, Tracy Morgan. That can mean different things to different people, good or bad depending on the person. Don't get me wrong, the audience laughed, more so towards the second half of the film. But I was not very amused, though I did laugh every now and then. A younger audience would likely have a lot of laughs, but with older viewers it'll depend on the viewer. It's a comedy, but there are different levels to humor. Unfortunately, the writers seemed to have let the high school setting take over the humor. Teen comedies are great for what they are, but given the lead actors and characters in the film, I think there was some type of mix up between the expected market and delivered comedy.
Ice Cube's character, Strickland, was extreme and one-dimensional throughout practically the entire film. He was over the top mean and aggressive. And that sets the tone for the film, one-dimensional. His character was completely unreasonable for no apparent reason, though they attempted to slide in some sort of reasoning about the "participation ribbon" generation running amuck. Honestly, he was so angry and menacing I really expected his reasoning to be that he didn't actually want to be a teacher.
Campbell (Charlie Day) had a one-dimensional personality, but at least he had a backstory. In fact, we know way more about him than any other character. He even runs into his family while out shopping, and performs in a talent show with his daughter (and none of the other main characters are in these scenes)! The most background story we received about Strickland were imagined rumors that enforced his Chuck Norris style behavior. If you've seen Ice Cube's character in his TV version of "Are We There Yet?" where he plays the wife's military brother, think of Strickland as the teacher version of him. And the lack of background for Strickland, especially in light of the amount of time given to Campbell and his family, seemed heavily unbalanced.
If you're a teenager, or you still get a good laugh from teen flicks, this may be the film for you! If you like a little more sophistication in your comedy, or at least its delivery, this may not be for you. If it was marketed more as a teen flick, I'd give it more credit, but it simply wasn't.
7/10