We're entering the final stretch of 2018's summer movie season, and among the release on the way ready to close things out is The Happytime Murders. In development for over a decade, this puppet-inclusive comedy finally rolled cameras last year, and for years we've known that this movie wouldn't be appropriate for Sesame Street's primary demographic. However, nothing could have prepared us for the first Happytime Murders trailer that dropped in May, which was hilarious and cringeworthy all at once. Well, if you thought that the next trailer was going to tone things down, you'd be wrong, as you'll see below. And just to be perfectly clear, this is definitely NSFW.
The first Happytime Murders trailer ended with puppet lead Phil Phillips shooting silly string everywhere after getting, shall we say, too excited. In this latest trailer, after the scene is set, it proceeds to show us a puppet cow getting off on being milked by a squid creature. So yeah, The Happytimes Murder doubling down on the dirtiness as it goes through the audience reactions to the last trailer. Other highlights from this red-band trailer include a seductively-dressed female puppet recreating Sharon Stone's Basic Instinct leg cross and that puppet who propositioned Melissa McCarthy in the last trailer being unclear about what her "gun" means. Beyond the raunchy imagery, this new Happytime Murders trailer shows that the last trailer caught a lot of people's interest. With less than two weeks to go until the movie drops, STX undoubtedly is hoping that the above preview does the same.
Set in a world where puppets live alongside humans, albeit with the former considered inferior to the latter, The Happytime Murders follows Melissa McCarthy's Detective Connie Edwards re-teaming with her ex-partner Phil Phillips to track down the serial killer that murdered Phil's brother and is now targeting the cast of the 1980s TV show The Happytime Gang. The Happytime Murders' human players include Elizabeth Banks as Jenny, a burlesque dancer who used to be on The Happytime Gang; Joel McHale as Agent Campbell, an FBI agent; Maya Rudolph's Bubbles, Phil's secretary; and Leslie David Baker as Lieutenant Banning, Connie's superior, while the puppeteers include Bill Barretta as Phil; Dorien Davies as Sandra, who asks Phil to solve a case for her and Drew Massey as both Goofer, a former Happytime Gang cast member who's now a prostitute.
The Happytime Murders opens in theaters on August 24, so stay tuned to CinemaBlend for continuing coverage and our eventual thoughts on the movie. If you're interested in learning what other movies are coming out later this year, look through our 2018 release schedule.
