Amazing how little these sequels make sense
Ernest Goes to Jail was made three years after 'Ernest Goes to Camp'.
Whereas in EGtC (or Camp, to shorten it), similar jokes worked, because they were well crafted, perfectly timed, perhaps novel and somewhat 'consequential', not to mention 'organic', in this movie..
..it's difficult to even explain; it's as if they took the spirit and soul out and just left the motions. It's like taking out what made EGtC great and leaving only the empty shell of the external mimicry.
Now, Jim is brilliant, as always, but even his performance feels as if he's a bit tired.
I am around 16 minutes in, and already Ernest has been 'harmlessly electro-shocked' (and magnetized) TWICE. Not only is it idiotic and dangerous to show someone getting electro-shocked by things that have actually KILLED people in real life, making this just a silly cartoon instead of a 'family movie' that everyone can enjoy, it's baffling to use the same thing twice in such a short time.
The other things that miss the mark profoundly are staggeringly high in numbers.
Just for one good example of how sequels miss the mark (see how annoying it is when something is repeated too soon?), is your typical 'Ernest longing to do bigger things'-sermon, but it just doesn't work here.
In Camp, it worked, because it was a noble cause; to help kids have something more constructive than gangs and something more active than TV and video games, to have a connection to Gaia, mother nature, forests and the old indian cultures and spirituality. There was a DEEP meaning in Ernest hitching his wagon to this particular path, it was an INNER victory through bravery, spirituality and making the world a better place by stopping the capitalism and greed-based wanton destruction of beautiful nature.
In this movie, Ernest has switched sides! This movie's Ernest would GLADLY cut down that forest and destroy the camping grounds, if he could just be a banker (or whatever - I am just paraphrasing Kramer, because at least that made sense).
Do you see what I mean? In the first movie, it was a NOBLE cause, it was a spiritual insight, it was something in himself that he found, it was almost enlightenment, it was almost reaching Zen, and at least probably Zatori.
But here, it's a simple greed-based lust to be a clerk or a banker. It SEEMS to be the same thing on the surface; to be a higher-up, a more respected member of the community, to try hard to become a 'counselor' and failing because of clumsiness and unplanned accidents.
It just doesn't work, because it's not organic. It smells, sounds and looks like a 'movie trying very hard to be an Ernest movie', instead of being a movie that just has Ernest in it, trying to tell a good story (the first movie does this perfectly).
I mean, Ernest is working for the VERY SYSTEM that Ernest survived and fought against in the first movie. Ernest is now deeply entrenched in that system, serving its most evil, greedy, capitalistic masters and overlords, and is happy to work for a BANK, one of the most evil organizations on the whole planet.
What happened to the spiritual life? What happened to the 'magic'?
Also, since when is Ernest an inventor? There was a perfect balance with the two weird cooks trying to 'invent' eggs erroneous, with their weird machine and all, and Ernest being their victim. Ernest being the victim of his own invention just doesn't make any sense.
The 'runaway vehicle' gag was also hilarious in Camp. Here, this 'cleaner' thing just isn't the same.
I would much rather watch the Ernest 'toilet plumbing scene' 20 times in a row than any of these 'magnetism' things or the 'Human washing mashine' things.
The toothbrush thing doesn't even make any sense, only the back teeth are brushed (and not well), plus, he talked about flossing, but then he doesn't do it.. what kind of sense does THAT make?
When do sequel makers learn that you have to have a SOUL of a joke, not just the empty shell or motions of a joke, for it to land and to be funny?
It's like light sabers back in the day - at first, it seems 'very cool', but then you watch some youtube video, where some amateurs have made their own 'light saber duel', and you realize that although the effect is impeccable and the fight supposedly 'intense', it's BORING, because there are no stakes. You don't know who is fighting who or why, so it's just a boring lightshow at that point.
The so-called 'prequels' REALLY hit that point home with absolute over-use of that stuff, which lead to inflation of interest for light sabers long before Disney got to ruin the franchise.
These Ernest sequels miss the mark the same way, they make the same kind of mistake, just dangling the 'Ernest tropes' in front of you and hoping that's enough to make you laugh.