Stanko's Stance

My Spy
Director: Peter Segal
Writers: Erich Hoeber, Jon Hoeber
Stars: Dave Bautista, Chloe Coleman, Parisa Fitz-Henley, Kristen Schaal
Release Date: June 26, 2020

Biggest takeaways from My Spy:

• The movie took roughly 20-30 minutes to figure out what type of movie it was and what type of vibe it wanted, but once My Spy gathers its footing, the ride is mostly enjoyable experience.
• This is a super nit-picky thing, I will admit it…but man the CIA is super dumb in this movie. A nine-year old finds a hidden camera? They let JJ (Dave Bautista) and Bobbi (Kristen Schaal) return to gather equipment after being fired? Intelligence is just dumb assuming someone is dead? I know it doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, but it irked me a little.
• The best aspects of My Spy are Chloe Coleman, who plays the young child Sophie, and Schaal. Whenever they are on screen, the vibe of the movie hits its perfect tone. Schaal really thrives at just playing her role perfectly and knowing how to make the little moments matter. A got way too much of a chuckle when she was spying on a date/dinner through a telescope and eating popcorn saying that JJ is screwed. And Coleman brings the best out of everything when she is on screen. She is like the constant variable that is always steady; she raises the ceiling of Bautista, Fitz-Henley and Schaal when sharing the scene.
• The ending sequence seems a tad bit rushed, but it did have two of the best little comedic bits from the movie. There is a direct “WTF” call out about the airplane runway on the cliff, and Bobbi directly references how the fight between JJ and Hassan (Basel Daoud) calls homage to Raiders Of The Lost Ark (1981) with a fist fight happening next to an airplane with a propeller running and gasoline flowing and a fire threatening.
• The gay partners who are neighbors in the building to Sophie and Kate (Parisa Fitz-Henley) are hilarious. Carlos (Devere Rogers) is great, but the silent Todd (Noah Dalton Danby) is batting 1.000. His grunts, looks and mannerisms that are interpreted by Carlos are fantastic.
• The over arching question I have about My Spy is that I am a little confused on who it was made for. The story is safe and really made for kids, but also it is rated PG-13? I think it is definitely safe for kids to watch, but the way it was marketed and shared made me think it was made for more mature audiences, but maybe that was just my interpretation.

STANKO RATING: C+ (2.5/5 Stars)

“My Spy” IMDB
“My Spy” Rotten Tomatoes