Bad Monkey

Starring Vince Vaughn as Andrew Yancy, Bad Monkey follows a former Miami detective who is demoted to restaurant inspector in the Florida Keys. The plot kicks off when a tourist discovers a severed human arm, prompting Yancy to investigate in hopes of reclaiming his badge. As he delves deeper, he uncovers a web of greed and corruption that spans from Florida to the Bahamas, encountering a host of quirky characters and unexpected challenges along the way.

Bad Monkey Review

Bad Monkey is its own animal. With a story that endeavors to reach Babylonian heights of whimsical ingenuity but never quite surpasses a two-story bohemian cottage, its moderately interesting components are held together by the Gorilla Glue stickum of Vince Vaughn’s charisma.

                   

While the story is not as thrilling or comical as it might like to be, it offers up regular twists and B-12 plot shots at just the right dosage to keep the viewer engaged. That said, the writers intentionally built coincidence into the narrative algorithm as the solution to virtually every question and conflict. The result is that audiences will likely feel something of an emotional detachment from the situations while still cheering on the show’s likable characters, of which there are many.

Arguably, the only meaningful metric for a mystery series is whether each episode builds your anticipation of the next and Bad Monkey delivers more or less. Even so, the returns are somewhat diminished as it reaches its climax. While audiences may feel a bit let down by the season’s ultimate conclusion, the ride is enough fun to carry most through until the end and to have them looking forward to subsequent seasons. I liked it enough to mark it as Worth it, with the caveat that you must enjoy Vince Vaughn going full Vince Vaughn; otherwise, there is not much reason to watch.

WOKE REPORT

DEI

• The series has a lot of diversity, but it doesn’t feel forced. Taking place in the Florida Keys with its massive Latino population and The Bahamas, which is almost entirely black, the show does a fine job representing the natural ethnic mix of these locations, with one exception: Johnna Russell of the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. Played perfectly well by Anna Nicole Black, her body-positive black state investigator character stuck out like a sore thumb for both minutes of her time on screen. With doing no real research, I feel comfortable assuming that Oklahoma, which has a black population of less than 8%, boasts few female state investigators, significantly fewer black ones, and statistically zero morbidly obese black female field agents. However, Black plays such a small role that I didn’t ding the Woke-O-Meter too hard for her presence.

What Do You Expect?

• In one brief scene, a main secondary character and her sister go to a busy bar full of beautiful singles. She is car-crash beautiful and has her 10.5 physique on full display, including her can-be-seen-from-space assets, which are tantalizingly situated in a very revealing top. When a handsome man begins an unsolicited and, at first, relatively innocent conversation with her, she immediately turns into a complete b!t@h. First, she bates him with a suggestive comment that all but promises sex, and when he takes the bate and asks if she’d like to go to his place, she lies to him so that he’ll wait for her, ultimately embarrassing him when she leaves. The tone of the scene is that she is completely right and that he is a total douche. Don’t get me wrong, I do not advocate hookup culture at all. It’s both gross and immoral. Therefore, my problem isn’t that she didn’t sleep with him, it’s the representation of modern women and the treatment of men. He was wrong for wanting to sleep with a stranger but she was just as wrong for advertising her wares and being rude to him just because she didn’t feel like being politely hit on.

The Birdcage

• Thanks in no small part to the success of The Birdcage, even your little blue-haired midwestern grandmother knows that Key West is a bastion of homosexuality (about 30% of the population). So, while it’s not crazy that Vince Vaughn’s lawyer and police partner are in a gay relationship, it is completely narratively irrelevant, and they are the only homosexuals that we ever see, even in the background. Neither plays massive roles, and Vaughn’s partner presents as straight and traditionally masculine. So, while it exists and only exists to check a box, at least it’s not thrown in your face too badly.

It’s Not Racist if You’re Black

• Several of the black women in The Bahamas are racist against white people. One, a boutique owner, charges them extra and calls it “white lady tax.” The show’s perspective is that this is understandable and perfectly acceptable.
• In another scene, a white character compliments a black character’s skin as “beautiful,” and the black character looks at her with disdain. Later, she derisively laments that white people are always complimenting her skin. The show’s perspective is that her irritation is justified. I might not have grown up a poor black man, but I’ve heard my mother and many white women compliment women of all colors on their skin, from my wife’s “porcelain” completion to that of Naomi Campbell. Secondly, the actress Jodie Turner-Smith is known for having a particularly beautiful skin shade.

Divo In Da’ House

• Several “strong” women are rude to men who are interested in them. Instead of finding their behavior offputting, the men seem to behave as though it is justified.
• One of the main antagonists in name only’s (MAINO) primary character traits is that he’s regularly led around by the nose by his partner in crime/wife.
  Spoiler

  However, he realizes the error of his ways by the end, even if it is too late.
• Not every white man is portrayed as a loser or goof, but only white men are portrayed that way. However, there are villains of color aplenty, and Vaughn’s character, while unconventional, is heroic to an actual fault.

Let’s Get Drunk and Screw

• Vaughn and his lady friend never define their sexual relationship at her behest. This forced casualness is treated as good and healthy behavior.
  • Spoiler

    At the very end, after a nice goodbye screw, she leaves to go “find herself,” another favorite Leftism.

Did Pope Francis Write This?

• Bad Monkey overtly promotes few socio-political or theological messages except towards its conclusion when it spends a significant chunk of one episode preaching religious perennialism, the belief that all religions are equal and fundamentally the same, including the completely incompatible voodoo and Christianity.

Quittin’ Makes Me Feel Good

• Spoiler

  The ultimate lesson that Vaughn’s character learns by the season’s end is that sometimes it’s better to give up than sacrifice yourself for what is good and right, even if that means letting murdering criminals go free.