Journey 2: The Mysterious Island is a sequel to 2008's Journey to the Center of the Earth and, presumably, a prequel to Journey 3: The Search for More Money. I didn't even realize what Journey 2 was sequelizing until I was in the theatre and saw Josh Hutcherson's jawline. But even then I wasn't certain because, no matter how hard I looked, I couldn't see Brendan Fraser anywhere. Instead I was greeted by the rippling muscles, shaved head and perfect white teeth of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. Suddenly I knew that this is what my whole life had been leading to, and this is where I was meant to be.
Journey 2 was going to be the greatest film I had ever seen.
I'm not going to lie: my recollection of Journey 2 is going to be suspect at best. I spent an equal amount of time between my seat in the nearly empty theatre (literally the only other person in the audience was the friend who drove me there) and the men's room because I drank enough liquids to drown the Kool-Aid man's alcoholic uncle Ted Kennedy. I'm certain I must have missed a few key scenes that tied the movie together, because otherwise it would have been an unedited mess that jumps from chase sequence to travel montage to yet another chase sequence, and there's no way the producers would have conscionably let that happen.
What I can tell you is that there is one full scene dedicated to Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson popping his pectoral muscles and demanding that Hutcherson feed them berries that are growing in the forest. Hutcherson immediately recognizes the irresponsibility of feeding unidentified vegetation to a wrestler's chest and allows the Luis Guzmán who is travelling with them to satisfy the hunger of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's muscular man-titties instead. This is exactly the sort of real-life lesson that Journey 2 tries to teach children: never eat wild berries unless you are accompanied by a Luis Guzmán to handle them for you.
But it's not all about Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's outstanding physique and motor control. His nipples also play a prominent role in driving the plot forward, the key words in this sentence being "prominent" and "nipples." The Rock's rock-hard nips cannot be constrained by such quaint things as decency, digital editing and a PG rating. They choose, rather, to freely exhibit themselves through their skin-tight, sweat-drenched coverings and show us all how Johnson earned his nickname.
Luis Guzmán also has a daughter in the film named Vanessa Hudgens. She plays the role of romantic interest to our peppy young explorer, who is played by 79-year-old Michael Caine. Toward the film's climax, the two of them head off into the jungle together under the pretense of searching for the girl's father who has wandered off in search of gold. Caine and Hudgens then spend the next twelve minutes off camera, presumably in full tongue- and lip-lock.
This is about where my bladder could take no more of the two liters of Diet Pepsi that I had pumped into it over the course of the film, and it began spraying heavily diluted urine out of my penis. Luckily I made it into the men's room first. Unluckily for the man already in there, he was occupying the only urinal and my sack of pee was unsympathetic to the difference between a porcelain bowl and the back of his jeans.
So, I missed the final act of Journey 2 but I'm willing to hazard a guess as to what happens: Our team of intrepid adventurers is faced with the perils of the mysterious island, which is now sinking into the ocean for some mysterious reason (possibly due to some sort of mysterious tectonic movement, explainable only through the mysterious science of geology). When all hope seems lost, the trio plus Michael Caine and maybe Luis Guzmán if he feels like it are rescued from certain doom by the surprise reappearance of Brendan Fraser's character from the first film, who has been living in the jungle with a tribe of apes for the last three years and insists on being called "George" now.
And so ends the mysterious tale of the mysterious island. It was a fun ride that only loses points for refusing to slow down to let the audience (both of us) catch our breaths, and for not sticking with its far superior working title, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson 2: The Rock's Mysterious Areola.
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