The Big Picture

Dave and John Chernin’s raunchy high school comedy belongs in detention.

Incoming
pales in comparison to the teen comedies it’s trying to replicate.
It’s just not very funny.

Incoming isn’t the next Superbad — it’s just super bad. Dave and John Chernin follow in the footsteps of everything from Can’t Hardly Wait to American Pie, but they’re miles behind. Booksmart, Blockers, and Good Boys have shown how R-rated teen comedies (or younger) can thrive in a modern climate — Incoming kills that momentum. It’s the lowest-hanging fruit of house party mischief, resulting in literal toilet humor and misguided attempts to skewer the 2000s sex comedy era. One or two jokes might cause a titter, but the other ninety-eight percent of this unfunny deflation has nothing to offer but hormonal awkwardness without the gut-busting payoff.

What Is ‘Incoming’ About?

Mason Thames stars as Benj Nielsen, a dorkish, theater-loving freshman who wants to kick high school off right. Benj’s friends aren’t much cooler, but they’re optimistic nonetheless. Connor (Raphael Alejandro) is an anxious gremlin nicknamed “Fetus,” and Eddie (Ramon Reed) is a meek pushover. They’re all more Jim than Stiffler, but an opportunity presents itself. The final pillar of their group, aspiring social media star Danah ‘Koosh’ Koushani (Bardia Seiri), claims his brother is throwing an upper-classman party, and he can sneak them onto the VIP list. Can this be the start of a badass new era for Benji’s boys, or will their night turn into a complete shitshow?

Let’s start with “shitshow,” because my phrasing is intentional. An entire subplot of Incoming involving internet celebrity Loren Gray concerns excrement — and that’s mostly all. It’s about a blackout drunk girl, late-night Taco Bell, and poop (for multiple scenes). It’s also depressingly unfunny, yet two significant characters are tethered to Gray’s soiled Katrina Aurienna for most of their screen time. That’s not to say high school comedies of yore have been paragons of intellectual stimulation, but what the Chernins put forward challenges braindead direct-to-video sequels like Road Trip: Beer Pong.

In short bursts, there are times when Incoming displays some semblance of reflective commentary. Danah’s creepy-as-hell control room, where he can spy on his brother’s party via surveillance cameras, acknowledges how movies like American Pie — which doubled down on Porky’s pervy invasions of privacy — positioned unacceptable behaviors as humorous. Benj and Danah agree, out loud, that it’s reprehensible … and then Danah goes right back to spying on girls he wants to have sex with (to prove he’s worthy of his insane older brother’s legacy). Whenever Incoming is about to make an interesting point, said point tumbles off a cliff, and the film embraces precisely what the Chernins just tried to roast. Where a satirical movie like Dude Bro Party Massacre III learns from the past and becomes a loving parody of the slasher subgenre’s mistakes, Incoming does the opposite and regresses to the mechanical beta version of high school sex comedies without any introspection.

‘Incoming’ Is a Netflix Comedy That Wastes Bobby Cannavale
Image via Netflix

The Chernins’ screenplay is spectacularly uninspired, like how Danah and Kayvon Koushani (Kayvan Shai) are a recreation of the Bilzerian brothers from Big Mouth. The writing and directing duo drenches Bobby Cannavale’s Mr. Studebaker in cringe, ruining his funny-on-paper schtick as he teaches the children lessons while getting inappropriately hammered with minors. Coming-of-age elements beam the charisma of candy Valentine’s Day hearts, and high school stereotypes are cookie-cutter molds that have rusted over from neglect. Not to mention Benji’s driving motivation the whole movie, asking out his sophomore crush Bailey (Isabella Ferreira), ends in the most don’t-make-me-watch-this fashion right before the credits slam into an abrupt finish. It’s all a Mad Libs of stupidity like “cattle prod to balls” or “sex with your mom jokes,” no funnier than the genius who draws dicks on people’s foreheads when they’re asleep (which happens, duh).

It’s disappointing because the cast is brimming with talent. Names like Kaitlin Olson, Gattlin Griffith, and Scott MacArthur are wasted on a single defining trait. None of the young headlining boys break the shackles of their caricatures, stunting formative storytelling. For an “epic” night of debauchery, Incoming plays scenarios safe and tempers its reductive ambitions. That extends to the lengths performances can push, which isn’t very far. Maybe the doodie gag exhausted all the studio’s goodwill? It’s lighthearted in the wrong, inconsequential way, which leads to its thematic juvenility hitting like a down pillow.

An Andy Warhol quote says, “Art is what you can get away with,” which applies here. Incoming reuses the same morally uncouth methods of teen comedies that we now look back on with raised eyebrows — without any humor to soften the blow. The Chernins replicate raunch and ridiculousness, but there’s no comedic justification behind most of what’s depicted. It’s not edgy, funny, or provocative enough to overcome lousy taste, lacking key ingredients that made movies like American Pie so successful. Incoming is a massive disappointment that’d get picked last in gym class, barely funnier than the class clown who never left your hometown.

Incoming is now available to stream on Netflix in the U.S.

WATCH ON NETFLIX